Chapter 1: The Twofold Defection of the Jewish Church

The duration of the church before and after the Reformation — the state of the Reformed churches — the twofold defection of the Jewish church — the first, partial — its nature — the denial of the first foundation of Mosaic theology — the superstitious worship arising therefrom — this worship twofold, with respect to the object of worship and the means.

I. This Mosaic worship, although it was not destined to be eternal, was nonetheless more permanent and stable than the condition of those drawing near to God through it. For just as we find that all others, from the laying of the world's foundations, have fallen away in the course of time from the original divine institution and from the principles of theology with which they had been instructed, so we shall see this new nation of theologians entangled in the fellowship of the same wickedness. Now the theology of the Jewish church that made use of this worship had a twofold defection: a partial one, to be repaired by the renewal of God's grace; and a final one, which the ultimate punishment in the complete destruction of the nation was destined to overtake. Moreover, since that church had once been divided into two parts — the one that embraced the ten tribes, and the other that had obtained the seat of the solemn worship of God as prescribed by God Himself — the former rushed into both kinds of defection more swiftly, and thus into perpetual ruin.

II. The apostasy of the Jewish church took its beginning from some degree of defection from the divine truth as exhibited in those three theological foundations which we have set forth above. And there followed, as usually happens, a corruption of morals. For wherever men bind themselves by the wickedness of contemning divine truth, they immediately show themselves prone to all other crimes as well. For it is necessary that the morals of men collapse when every standard and foundation of true obedience lies cast aside and despised.

III. Under the name of partial apostasy I reckon all errors, superstitions, idolatries, and other wickednesses of which the Jewish people were guilty from the first institution at various times up to the Babylonian captivity. From the Sinaitic institution to that captivity, that church had completed one thousand and seven years; and after being restored by the people returning from exile, it was destroyed by slaughter within six hundred years. It is generally the case that, just as no ecclesiastical reformation has perfectly expressed the original pattern, so no church will ever be found to have equaled the duration of its original constitution in a reformed state. I fear that the Reformed churches in Europe may serve as an example of this. We all acknowledge and lament that they never attained the perfection of the apostolic churches; for, hindered by very many earthly concerns, they have scarcely been able to extricate themselves successfully from those entanglements.

[Running page header: 318 — Corruption of Mosaic Theology, Book 5.] to extricate themselves. There are therefore many things that fill me with fear, lest they should continue adorned with that holiness and purity which they graciously attained for as great a span of time as those first churches endured — which we know nevertheless fell away. The causes and reasons for this fear we shall perhaps explain elsewhere. What we have said stands firm: entangled in the affairs and political conditions of nations and peoples, they were never able to drive far enough from themselves the morals, corruptions, and filth of the age. Hence in certain places not long ago illumined by divine truth, such confusion has now been reached that scarcely any semblance of an evangelical church remains; and to those whom it fell, by God's gracious ordering, to pass their life under the discipline of the cross, the degenerate sons and grandsons of noble and heroic parents have long been nearly ruinous — men who, greedily gaping after the honors and riches of the age, by the most shameful defection from the profession of divine truth, have compelled very many to perish with them forever. I fear I speak all too truly:

"Our fathers' age, worse than our grandfathers', has borne us, more wicked still, and soon to give forth offspring yet more vicious." — Hor. Od. iii. 6, 46.

IV. But to return from the digression. This partial defection had regard to those three foundations of Mosaic theology mentioned above. The first taught the complete fullness and perfection of the Holy Scriptures. This they sometimes either consigned to oblivion or counted as nothing. From that wickedness flowed all that infamous superstitious and arbitrary worship, so often most severely rebuked by the Holy Spirit on that account. For they deemed it right and lawful for themselves to devise whatever they most vainly supposed would serve to promote the worship of God — as though the glory of God were to be fashioned according to their own will and pleasure. The same madness still rages through the Christian world. Now to uproot this most pernicious error, God employed the extraordinary ministry of the prophets. And in order that the unmoved authority of that foundation of His worship, which they wickedly undermined, might stand firm — although there was no lack, as it may perhaps seem to us, of weightier charges He could bring against the idolatrous people — yet He presses them especially with this aggravation of impiety: that they observed in religious worship things "which He had not commanded, nor had they come up into His heart" (Jeremiah 7:31, 19:4, 5).

V. Now the apostates defected from this theological foundation in two ways: first, with respect to the object of worship, and then with respect to the means. For, to speak of the first point, they adopted for their worship foreign gods besides the true God — together with Him, without Him, after Him. Now every worship of idols or foreign gods has joined to it either a tacit or an express denial of the true God. For however much idolaters may cloak His name, He does not wish to be counted among the number of gods. Since, moreover, the chief part of the initial defection of these theologians consisted in the wickedness of this foreign worship, it may not seem foreign to our purpose if I briefly enumerate the idols themselves which that people, subject to superstitions to a remarkable degree, worshipped in place of the living God — after I have first said a few things that must necessarily be premised.