Ten Articles (1536) The
Church of England's break with Rome inaugurated a period of doctrinal confusion and controversy as both conservative and reforming clergy attempted to shape the church's direction, the former as "
Catholicism without the
Pope" and the latter as
Protestant. In an attempt "to establish Christian quietness and unity", the Ten Articles were adopted by clerical
Convocation in July 1536 as the English Church's first post-papal doctrinal statement. The Ten Articles were crafted as a rushed interim compromise between conservatives and reformers. Historians have variously described it as a victory for
Lutheranism and a success for Catholic resistance. Its provisions have also been described as "confusing". The first five articles dealt with doctrines that were "commanded expressly by God, and are necessary to our
salvation", while the last five articles dealt with "laudable ceremonies used in the Church". This division reflects how the Articles originated from two different discussions earlier in the year. The first five articles were based on the Wittenberg Articles negotiated between English ambassadors
Edward Foxe,
Nicholas Heath and
Robert Barnes and German Lutheran theologians, including
Martin Luther and
Philip Melanchthon. This doctrinal statement was itself based on the
Augsburg Confession of 1530. The five principal doctrines were the
Bible and
ecumenical creeds,
baptism,
penance, the
Eucharist and
justification. The core doctrine in the Ten Articles was
justification by faith. Justification – which was defined as
remission of
sin and accepting into God's favour – was through "the only mercy and
grace of the
Father, promised freely unto us for his Son’s sake
Jesus Christ, and the merits of his
blood and
passion".
Good works would follow, not precede, justification. However, the Lutheran influence was diluted with qualifications. Justification was attained "by
contrition and
faith joined with
charity". In other words, good works were "necessarily required to the attaining of everlasting life". To the disappointment of conservatives, only three of the traditional seven
sacraments were even mentioned (baptism, the Eucharist and penance). The Articles affirm the
real presence of Christ in the Eucharist, stating that "under the form and figure of bread and wine ... is verily, substantially and really contained the very self-same body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ". This definition was acceptable to those who held to
transubstantiation or
sacramental union, but it clearly condemned
sacramentarianism. More controversially for the reformers, the Articles maintained penance as a sacrament and the
priest's authority to grant divine
absolution in
confession. Articles six to ten focused on secondary issues. Significantly,
purgatory, which had been a central concern of medieval religion, was placed in the non-essential articles. On the question of its existence, the Ten Articles were ambiguous. They stated, "the place where [departed souls] be, the name thereof, and kind of pains there" was "uncertain by scripture".
Prayer for the dead and
masses for the dead were permitted as arguably relieving the pain of departed souls in purgatory. The Articles also defended the use of a number of Catholic rituals and practices opposed by Protestants, such as kissing the cross on
Good Friday, while mildly criticising popular abuses and excesses. The use of
religious images was permitted but people were to be taught not to kneel before them or make
offerings to them. Prayer to
Mary, mother of Jesus, and all the other
saints was permitted as long as
superstition was avoided. In summary, the Ten Articles asserted: • The Bible and the three
ecumenical creeds are the basis and summary of true Christian faith. • Baptism imparts
remission of sins and
regeneration and is necessary for salvation, even in the case of infants. It condemns the opinions of
Anabaptists and
Pelagians as
heresy. • The sacrament of
penance, with confession and absolution, is necessary to salvation. • That the body and blood of Christ are
really present in the Eucharist. • Justification is by faith, but good works are necessary. • Images can be used as representations of virtue and good example and also to remind people of their sins but are not objects of worship. • Saints are to be honoured as examples of life and as furthering the prayers of the faithful. •
Praying to saints is permitted, and holy days should be observed. • The observance of various rites and ceremonies, such as clerical
vestments, sprinkling of
holy water, bearing of candles on
Candlemas, giving of ashes on
Ash Wednesday, is good and laudable. However, none of these has power to forgive sin. • It is a good and charitable deed to pray for the dead. However, the doctrine of purgatory is biblically uncertain. Abuses related to purgatory, such as the claim that papal
indulgences or masses for the dead offered at certain localities (such as the
scala coeli mass) can deliver immediately from purgatory, are to be rejected.
''Bishops' Book'' (1537) headed the committee that authored the ''Bishop's Book''. The failure of the Ten Articles to settle doctrinal controversy led
Thomas Cromwell, the King's
vicegerent in spirituals, to convene a national
synod of bishops and high-ranking clergy for further theological discussion in February 1537. This synod produced a book called
The Institution of the Christian Man (popularly called ''The Bishops' Book
), the word institution
being synonymous with instruction
. The Bishops' Book'' preserved the semi-Lutheranism of the Ten Articles, and the articles on justification, purgatory, and the sacraments of baptism, the Eucharist and penance were incorporated unchanged into the new book. When the synod met, conservatives were still angry that four of the traditional seven sacraments (
confirmation, marriage,
holy orders and
extreme unction) had been excluded from the Ten Articles.
John Stokesley argued for all seven, while
Thomas Cranmer only acknowledged baptism and the Eucharist. The others divided along party lines. The conservatives were at a disadvantage because they found it necessary to appeal to
sacred tradition, which violated Cromwell's instructions that all arguments refer to scripture. In the end, the missing sacraments were restored but placed in a separate section to emphasize "a difference in dignity and necessity." Only baptism, the Eucharist and penance were "instituted of Christ, to be as certain instruments or remedies necessary for our salvation". Confirmation was declared to have been introduced by the
early Church in imitation of what they had read about the
practice of the Apostles. The ''Bishops' Book'' also included expositions on the creed, the
Ten Commandments, the
Lord's Prayer and
Hail Mary. These were greatly influenced by
William Marshall's primer (an English-language
book of hours) of 1535, which itself was influenced by Luther's writings. Following Marshall, ''The Bishops' Book'' rejected the traditional Catholic numbering of the Ten Commandments, in which the
prohibition on making and worshiping graven images was part of the first commandment, "
Thou shalt have no other gods before me". In agreement with the
Eastern Orthodox and
Huldrych Zwingli's church at Zurich, the authors of the ''Bishops' Book'' adopted the Jewish tradition of separating these commandments. While allowing images of Christ and the saints, the exposition on the second commandment taught against representations of
God the Father and criticised those who "be more ready with their substance to deck dead images gorgeously and gloriously, than with the same to help poor Christian people, the quick and lively
images of God". Such teachings encouraged
iconoclasm, which would become a feature of the English Reformation. The list of the 46 divines as they appear in the ''Bishop's Book
included all of the bishops, eight archdeacons and 17 other Doctors of Divinity, some of whom were later involved with translating the Bible and compiling the Book of Common Prayer'':
Thomas Cranmer –
Edward Lee –
John Stokesley –
Cuthbert Tunstall –
Stephen Gardiner –
Robert Aldrich –
John Voysey –
John Longland –
John Clerk –
Rowland Lee –
Thomas Goodrich –
Nicholas Shaxton –
John Bird –
Edward Foxe –
Hugh Latimer –
John Hilsey –
Richard Sampson –
William Repps –
William Barlowe –
Robert Partew –
Robert Holgate –
Richard Wolman –
William Knight –
John Bell –
Edmond Bonner –
William Skip –
Nicholas Heath –
Cuthbert Marshal –
Richard Curren –
William Cliffe –
William Downes –
Robert Oking –
Ralph Bradford –
Richard Smyth –
Simon Matthew –
John Pryn –
William Buckmaster –
William May –
Nicholas Wotton –
Richard Cox –
John Edmunds –
Thomas Robertson –
John Baker –
Thomas Barett –
John Hase –
John Tyson In August 1537, it was presented to the King who ordered that parts should be read from the pulpit every Sunday and feast day. Nevertheless, the King was not entirely satisfied and took it upon himself to make a revised ''Bishops' Book'', which, among other proposed changes, weakened the original's emphasis on justification by faith. This revised version was never published. Because the ''Bishops' Book'' was never authorised by the Crown or Convocation, the Ten Articles remained the official doctrinal standard of the Church of England.
Six Articles (1539) Fearful of diplomatic isolation and a Catholic alliance, Henry VIII continued his outreach to the Lutheran
Schmalkaldic League. In May 1538, three Lutheran theologians from Germany – Franz Burchard, vice-chancellor of Saxony; Georg von Boineburg, doctor of law; and
Friedrich Myconius,
superintendent of the church in
Gotha – arrived in London and held conferences with English bishops and clergy at the archbishop's
Lambeth Palace through September. The Germans presented, as a basis of agreement, a number of articles based on the Lutheran Confession of Augsburg. Bishops
Tunstall,
Stokesley and others were not won over by these Protestant arguments and did everything they could to avoid agreement. They were willing to separate from Rome, but their plan was to unite with the
Greek Church and not with the Protestants on the continent. The bishops also refused to eliminate what the Germans considered abuses (e.g. private masses for the dead, compulsory
clerical celibacy, and withholding
communion wine from the
laity) allowed by the English Church. Stokesley considered these customs to be essential because the Greek Church practised them. As the King was unwilling to break with these practices, the Germans had all left England by 1 October. Meanwhile, England was in religious turmoil. Impatient Protestants took it upon themselves to further reform – some priests said mass in English rather than Latin and married without authorisation (Archbishop Cranmer was himself secretly married). Protestants themselves were divided between establishment reformers who held Lutheran beliefs upholding the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist and radicals who held
Anabaptist and
Sacramentarian views denying real presence. In May 1539, a new Parliament met, and
Lord Chancellor Audley told the
House of Lords that the King desired religious uniformity. A committee of four conservative and four reformist bishops was appointed to examine and determine doctrine. On 16 May, the
Duke of Norfolk noted that the committee had not agreed on anything and proposed that the Lords examine six controversial doctrinal questions that became the basis of the Six Articles: • whether the Eucharist could be the true body of Christ without transubstantiation, • whether it needed to be given to the laity
under both kinds, • whether
vows of
chastity needed to be observed as part of divine law, • whether clerical celibacy should be compulsory, • whether
private (votive) masses were required (legitimate) by divine law, • whether auricular
confession (that is, confession to a priest) was necessary as part of divine law. Over the next month, these questions were argued in Parliament and Convocation with the active participation of the King. The final product was an affirmation of traditional teachings on all but the sixth question. Communion in one kind, compulsory clerical celibacy, vows of chastity and votive masses were a legitimate form. Protestants achieved a minor victory on auricular confession, which was declared "expedient and necessary to be retained" but not required by divine law. In addition, although the real presence was affirmed in traditional terminology, the word
transubstantiation itself did not appear in the final version. The Act of Six Articles became law in June 1539, which, unlike the Ten Articles, gave the Six Articles statutory authority. Harsh penalties were attached to violations of the Articles. Denial of transubstantiation was punished by burning without an opportunity to
recant. Denial of any of the other articles was punished by hanging or life imprisonment. Married priests had until 12 July to put away their wives, which was likely a concession granted to give Archbishop Cranmer time to move his wife and children outside of England. After the act's passage, bishops Latimer and Shaxton, outspoken opponents of the measure, were forced to resign their dioceses. The Act of Six Articles was repealed by the
Treason Act 1547 (
1 Edw. 6. c. 12) during the reign of Henry's son,
Edward VI.
''King's Book'' (1543) When Parliament re-convened in April 1540, a committee was formed to revise the ''Bishops' Book'', which Henry VIII had never liked. The committee's membership included both traditionalists and reformers, but the former held the majority. Convocation began discussing the revised text in April 1543. The ''King's Book
, or The Necessary Doctrine and Erudition for Any Christian Man'' to use its formal title, was more traditional than the 1537 version and incorporated many of the King's own revisions. It was approved by a
special meeting of the nobility on 6 May and differed from the ''Bishop's Book'' in having been issued under the King's authority. It was also statutorily enforced by the
Act for the Advancement of True Religion. Because of its royal authorisation, the ''King's Book'' officially replaced the Ten Articles as the official doctrinal statement of the Church of England. Significantly, the doctrine of justification by faith
alone was totally rejected. Cranmer tried to save the doctrine by arguing that while true faith was accompanied by good works (in other words, faith was not
alone) it was only faith that justified. However, Henry would not be persuaded, and the text was amended to read that faith justified "neither only nor alone". It also stated that each person had free will to be "a worker ... in the attaining of his own justification". The ''King's Book'' also endorsed traditional views of the mass, transubstantiation, confession, and Church ceremonies. The traditional seven sacraments were all included without any distinction in importance made between them. It was taught that the second commandment did not forbid images but only "godly honour" being given to them. Looking at images of Christ and the saints "provoked, kindled and stirred to yield thanks to Our Lord". The one area in which the ''King's Book'' moved away from traditional teaching was on prayer for the dead and purgatory. It taught that no one could know whether prayers or masses for the dead benefited an individual soul, and it was better to offer prayers for "the universal congregation of Christian people, quick and dead". People were encouraged to "abstain from the name of purgatory, and no more dispute or reason thereof". Presumably, the hostility towards purgatory derived from its connection to papal authority. The King's own behavior sent mixed signals. In 1540, he allowed offerings for the souls of deceased
Knights of the Garter to be spent on works of charity instead of masses. At the same time, however, he required the new cathedral foundations to pray for the soul of
Queen Jane. Perhaps because of the uncertainty surrounding this doctrine, bequests in wills for
chantries,
obits and masses fell by half what they had been in the 1520s.
Forty-two Articles (1553) Henry VIII was succeeded by his son,
Edward VI, in 1547. During Edward's reign, the Church of England adopted a stronger Protestant identity. The
Book of Common Prayer of 1549 authorised a reformed liturgy, and the
1552 Book of Common Prayer was even more explicitly Protestant. To make the English Church fully Protestant, Cranmer also envisioned a
reform of canon law and the creation of a concise doctrinal statement, which would become the Forty-two Articles. Work on a doctrinal statement was delayed by Cranmer's efforts to forge a doctrinal consensus among the various Protestant churches to counter the work of the Catholic
Council of Trent. When this proved impossible, Cranmer turned his attention to defining what the Church of England believed. In late 1552 the first edition of the confession was produced in the form of the Forty-Five Articles that Cranmer submitted for comment and revision, and which were approved by Parliament in June of 1553 by which time their number had been reduced to the
Forty-two Articles which were drafted by Cranmer and a small group of fellow Protestants. The title page claimed that the articles were approved by Convocation when in reality they were never discussed or adopted by the clerical body. They were also never approved by Parliament. The articles were issued by Royal Mandate on 19 June 1553. All clergy, schoolmasters and members of the universities were required to subscribe to them. The theology of the articles has been described by some as a "restrained"
Calvinism. Others point to a much stronger Lutheran influence. == Development ==