A42757:893
Aaron's rod blossoming, or, The divine ordinance of church-government vindicated so as the present…Aarons rod blossoming, or, The divine ordinance of church-government vindicated so as the present…
Aaron's rod blossoming, or, The divine ordinance of church-government vindicated so as the present Erastian controversy concerning the distinction of civill and ecclesiastical government, excommunication, and suspension, is fully debated and discussed, from the holy scripture, from the Jewish and Christian antiquities, from the consent of latter writers, from the true nature and rights of magistracy, and from the groundlessness of the chief objections made against the Presbyterial government in point of a domineering arbitrary unlimited power / by George Gillespie ...Aarons rod blossoming, or, The divine ordinance of church-government vindicated so as the present Erastian controversie concerning the distinction of civill and ecclesiasticall government, excommunication, and suspension, is fully debated and discussed, from the holy scripture, from the Jewish and Christian antiquities, from the consent of latter writers, from the true nature and rights of magistracy, and from the groundlesnesse of the chief objections made against the Presbyteriall government in point of a domineering arbitrary unlimited power / by George Gillespie ...
London: printed by E.G. for Richard Whitaker, 1646
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
CHAP. VII. That 1 Cor. 5. proveth Excommunication and (by a necessary consequence even from the Erastian Interpretation) Suspension from the Sacrament of a person unexcommunicated.
Master Prynne in his first Quaere did ask whether that phrase 1 Cor. 5. To deliver such a one to Satan, be properly meant of excommunication or suspension from the Sacrament only. This, he saith, I did in my Sermon wave with a rhetorical preterition. I answer for the latter part of the Quaere, I know not the least ground, for who did ever expound it of suspension from the Sacrament only? for the former part of it, its not necessary to be debated, therefore for husbanding time and not to multiply Questions unnecessarily, I said in my Sermon, that the Question ought to be whether that Chapter (not whether that phrase) prove excommunication; and that we have a shorter way to prove excommunication from the last words of that Chapter as Doctor Moulin doth in his Vates lib. 2. cap. 11. And if I should grant that delivering such a one to Satan signifieth either of those things which Master Prynne conceiveth, that is, a bodily possession, torture, or vexation by Satan, inflicted either by the apostolical power of miracles, or by Gods immediate permission: yet that will not prove that it signifieth no more. Therefore Peter Martyr upon the place, thinks that the Apostles delivering of the man to Satan by a miraculous act, and the Churches delivering of him to Satan by Excommunication, do very well stand together. So Synop. purr. Theol. disp. 48. Thes. 40▪ and he alloweth ⟨p. 424⟩of both these expositions; and afterward in his common place of excommunication he speaketh of Gods cooperating with the Church censure, by punishing the Excommunicate person with diabolical vexations. Sure I am an excommunicate person may truly be said to be delivered to Satan, who is the God and Prince of this world and reigneth in the Children of disobedience. But Master Prynne will find himself difficulted to prove that trader Satanae