Theologia Cambrensis , livre ebook

Theologia Cambrensis
Theologia Cambrensis
Protestant Religion and Theology in Wales, Volume 1: 1588-1760
From Reformation to Revival
D. DENSIL MORGAN
© D. Densil Morgan, 2018
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ISBN: 978-1-78683-237-5 (hardback)
978-1-78683-238-2 (paperback)
e-ISBN: 978-1-78683-240-5
The right of D. Densil Morgan to be identified as author of this work has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 79 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
The University of Wales Press acknowledges the financial support of the University of Wales Trinity Saint David.
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Cover design: Olwen Fowler
Er cof am Blodwen Mair Rees (1928–2011) Edgar Rees (1931–2014)
Contents
Preface
Abbreviations
Introduction: The Bible in Welsh
Chapter 1 1588–1642
Chapter 2 1642–1660
Chapter 3 1660–1689
Chapter 4 1689–1760 (i)
Chapter 5 1689–1760 (ii)
Bibliography
Preface
Theologia Cambrensis is a two-volume survey of Protestant theology and religion in Wales from 1588, the year of the publication of the Bible in Welsh, to the dawn of the twentieth century. The present volume, 1588–1760: From Reformation to Revival, covers the period between the reign of Elizabeth I to the Civil Wars, the impact of Puritan theology and the development of Welsh Anglicanism, the emergence of the Dissenting tradition and, despite mutual tensions, the way in which Churchmen and Dissenters made common cause where possible on the basis of a shared Protestant faith. The narrative proceeds to analyse the way in which High Church teaching and its accompanying sacramentalism impacted popular piety, delineates the growing influence of continental Pietism through the work of the Society for the Promotion of Christian Knowledge (the SPCK), and portrays the immense significance of Griffith Jones, rector of Llanddowror. This included not only his well-known educational exertions through the circulating schools, but the dissemination of an explicitly Reformed theology through the immense popularity of his catechisms and expository publications. The eighteenth century witnessed doctrinal rifts between High Calvinists and Arminians within Protestant Dissent, though an evangelistically vibrant moderate Calvinism came to enshrine a norm which would contribute richly to the post-1735 Evangelical Revival. The volume concludes with an assessment of the initial phase of the Revival, the emergence of the Methodist movement, and evaluates both the continuity and the change which had occurred in the century and three-quarters since the publication of William Morgan’s Bible in 1588.
This is the first assessment to concentrate explicitly on theology since 1900, when the Calvinistic Methodist scholar William Evans published his An Outline of the History of Welsh Theology . Although social historians have never been oblivious to theological concerns, while historians of religion have been obliged to take doctrinal matters seriously, it is surprising that a full-scale history of Protestant theology per se has not been attempted for well over a century. Some, though by no mean all, of the texts analysed in the following narrative have been studied by scholars of Welsh literature, but their interest has been more in style, rhetoric and linguistic expression than in their theological content. Readers will readily perceive the enormity of my debt to generations of social, religious and literary scholars who have written in both Welsh and English, but the focus of the work is on theology or the way in which Welsh Protestants understood, contemplated and conveyed the truths of the Christian revelation to their contemporaries.
In his superb Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine (1878), the great nineteenth-century Catholic theologian John Henry Newman claimed, notoriously, that ‘[t]o be deep in history is to cease to be a Protestant’. Apart from such radical innovators as William Erbury and Morgan Llwyd who were convinced that the end of history was at hand, this view would not have endeared itself to the bulk of those whose work will be evaluated in the following chapters. They all believed that the God who had caused Holy Scripture to be translated into Welsh and sent forth the gospel message of justification by faith alone, was uniquely active in the story of the people that they had been called to serve. For them, to be Protestant was to be steeped in the historical process. As well as providing an appraisal of the way in which their convictions and formulations developed in Wales between the Reformation and the Evangelical Revival, I hope that the exposition of these numerous, and for the most part little-known texts, will serve as a contribution to a contemporary ressourcement theology, inspiring fresh reflection on the riches of the past along with their creative application to the challenges of the present. As well as being an exercise in historical theology, it aims at providing a modest contribution to practical theology as well.
A preface always affords an author the pleasure of listing his indebtedness to others. Professor David Bebbington of the University of Stirling convinced me that this was a project worth undertaking and one in which readers beyond Wales would be interested; this is only one of the many kindnesses that he has shown me over the years. Professor John Coffey of the University of Leicester and Dr R. Brinley Jones, president of the University of Wales Trinity Saint David, gave me the benefit of their wide erudition in their specific fields of expertise, English Puritanism and the Civil Wars in the one case and Renaissance thought in Wales in the other, while Dr Eryn Mant White of Aberystwyth University undertook the onerous task of reading the typescript in its entirety. Her comments have been invaluable, many of which have been incorporated into the finished text. I am also indebted to the very positive account supplied by the University of Wales Press’s anonymous reader. Although I have benefitted enormously by all suggestions made by these scholars, it goes without saying that the interpretation which follows, and all accompanying mistakes and weaknesses, are wholly my own.
My gratitude to the University of Wales Press for undertaking the publication of Theologia Cambrensis is considerable. Initial support by Helgard Krause, then director of the Press, was invaluable, while Llion Wigley and his colleagues, Dafydd Jones, Siân Chapman, Elin Nesta Lewis and Elin Williams, have shown unfailing skill, kindness and professionalism throughout all stages of the process. Publication would not have been possible without the generous financial support of the University of Wales Trinity Saint David, for which I am sincerely appreciative. A warm thanks to all who have supported the venture.
Unless otherwise noted, all translations from Welsh are my own. For the English sources, spelling, punctuation and capitalization have been modernized throughout, but not in the titles of early printed books.
D. Densil Morgan January 2018
Abbreviations
BQ
The Baptist Quarterly
BBCS
Bulletin of the Board of Celtic Studies
CA
Carmarthenshire Antiquary
CH
Cylchgrawn Hanes. Journal of the Historical Society of the Presbyterian Church of Wales
CCH
Cylchgrawn Cymdeithas Hanes y Methodistiaid Calfinaidd
DWB
Dictionary of Welsh Biography
JBS
Journal of British Studies
JEH
Journal of Ecclesiastical History
JHSCW
Journal of the Historical Society of the Church in Wales
JMHRS
Journal of the Merioneth Historical and Record Society
JWBS
Journal of the Welsh Bibliographical Society
JWEH
Journal of Welsh Ecclesiastical History
JWRH
Journal of Welsh Religious History
JTS
Journal of Theological Studies
NLW
National Library of Wales
NLWJ
National Library of Wales Journal
ODNB
Oxford Dictionary of National Biography
PRJ
Puritan Reformed Journal
TCAS
Transactions of the Carmarthenshire Antiquary Society and Field Club
TCHB
Trafodion Cymdeithas Hanes y Bedyddwyr
TCHS
Transactions of the Caernarfonshire Historical Society
THSC
Transactions of the Honourable Society of Cymmrodorion
TRHS
Transactions of the Royal Historical Society
WHR
Welsh History Review
Introduction: The Bible in Welsh
In a text which has been described as the ‘manifesto of the Renaissance and Welsh Protestant humanism’, 1 the scholar William Salesbury ( c .1520– c .1584) called his compatriots to do everything within their power to secure the Word of God in their own tongue:
Insist on having learning in your own language … Insist on having the Holy Scriptures in your own tongue … Make barefoot pilgrimage to his Grace the King and his Council and ask leave to have the Holy Scriptures in your own language. 2
A young man from Denbighshire’s Vale of Clwyd, he had been inspired by the twin ideals of Protestant Biblicism and humanist reform while at Oxford and subsequently at the Inns of Court. 3 Clearly Salesbury was exceptionally talented. He was said, during his academic training, to have mastered Latin, Greek and Hebrew as well as French and German. Certainly He