The Works of James Pilkington (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Press, 1842). From Parker Society Series. A series most highly commended for students of the Reformation in general and of the English Reformation in particular.
This book is available and freely downloadable at:
http://www.books.google.com/books?id=y6BfjCs6PDoC&printsec=frontcover&dq=the+works+of+james+pilkington&lr=&as_brr=1.
B. 1520. D. 1576. He was the Bishop of Durham, 1561-1576, home to the ancient Norman Cathedral.
James Pilkington entered Pembroke College, Cambridge in 1536, but moved to St. John’s college, Cambridge where he obtained his BA in 1539 (MA, 1542; BD, 1550). It is believed that he was ordained before 1550. According to the introductory biography, Pilkington was a zealous and learned Reformer, reading gratuitously theological lectures from the Book of Acts to public schools. He also skillfully defended Reformation theology in debates on Romanism at Cambridge in 1549.
In 1554, during the reign of Queen Mary I, he moved to the Continent, staying variously at Zurich, Geneva, Basel and Frankfurt. Our biographer notes that he lectured on Ecclesiastes, 1 & 2 Peter, and Galatians. We infer here and from other places that Pilkington was apprised of the Reformation solas and the different doctrines of Scripture, God, man, sin, Christ, justification, salvation, ecclesiology sacraments, and eschatology held in the Reformed, True and Catholic Church compared to the False Church of Rome.
When Mary I died in 1558, English exiles prepared to return to England. Pilkington was one of them; we find him at Frankfurt, Germany, home to the famous debacle and contentions between John Knox’s anti-BCP-party and Cox’s pro-1552-BCP party. The stench of that debate was odious to Frankfurtians, other Germans, Lutheran and Reformed, but also to the Swiss Reformers.
Prior to the repatriation of the exiles to England, a letter was sent from Geneva to the English Reformers counseling unity and unanimity in matters liturgical and ecclesiological. They were not to make ceremonies and other pieties matters of contention, but were to submit to lawfully ordained authorities. Pilkington wrote a response to Geneva, called the “Peaceable Letter.”
Upon return to England in 1559, Pilkington found himself associated with the luminaries of the English Reformation: Parker, Grindal, Cox, Guest, Whitehead, and May. He was appointed by Royal order to serve on a committee with these gentlemen in the revision of the 1552 BCP.
Furthermore in 1559, he was appointed Master of St. John’s College and Regius Professor of Divinity at Cambridge, replacing the ousted Romanist, Dr. Bullock. Widely favoured, he was an active preacher in Cambridge and London; he was appointed to the Royal Visitors’ Commission to collect fealty oaths to Queen Elizabeth; in order to obliterate the indignities to the remains of Reformation stalwarts Martin Bucer and Paul Fagius perpetrated by Cardinal Pole (exhumation and burning of the bones), Pilkington was appointed to preach at the memorial service at Cambridge for both Reformers.
He was eventually nominated Bishop of Durham on 2 March 1561 and was seated 10 April 1561, the first Protestant and Reformed Bishop of Durham. In the same year, October, he resigned his Mastership at St. John’s College.
(For current information on the See of Durham (home to Bishop Tom Wright), see:
http://www.dur.ac.uk/durham.diocese/diocese/index.htm and http://www.durhamcathedral.co.uk/.)
As Bishop, Pilkington found the diocese to be in disorder and found recusancy strong in the north, along with power struggles between the Earls of Westmoreland and Northumberland. He found corruption, laxity in conducting services, little preaching, and ecclesiastical pensioners with livings but without replacements, e.g. Bishop of Man. The new Dean of Durham (1563), William Whittingham, became Bishop Pilkington’s strong ally in the appointment of numerous, committed Reformers for this area with entrenched recusancy.
A northern rebellion occurred in 1569. The insurgents took control of the Durham Cathedral and celebrated the Romish High Mass. Pilkington and his family narrowly escaped. His letter to Elizabeth’s senior counselor, Sir William Cecil, outlines the difficulties for the Reformation in north-eastern England. The biographer notes that Pilkington was vigourous but modest, learned and grave, reverend and determined to establish the True Catholic faith.
He died in January, 1575, at the age 55. His body was reburied on 24 May 1576 at the head of Bishop Beaumont’s tomb in front of the high altar of the Durham Cathedral.
This book contains an Exposition of Haggai, Obadiah, and Nehemiah, “The Burning of St. Paul’s (1563), “Answers to Popish Questions,” “Sermons on Bucer and Fagius,” a “Tract on Predestination,” along with assorted letters.
He published Haggai and Obadiah to stir up the people to press forward with the Reformation. His work on Popery is unsparing and affords no liberality of sentiment to the false church. His work on a fire at St. Paul’s was designed to address aspersions cast by recusant-Romanists, to wit, that the fire was the result of Divine Judgment for theological libels, heretical sermons, transformed liturgies, and Protestant theology.
It is felt by scholars that there were other lost manuscripts that bore Bishop Pilkington’s notes.
Haggai did not bear the customary dedication. Pilkington felt it was the duty of all Christians to promote kingdom-issues and that the Prophet, Haggai himself, was a sufficient noteworthy. He calls the past “a Romish slavery”, like Luther a “Babylonian Captivity,” with the current days a new liberty to build God’s house. The Word of God is always working, saving those who believe and working condemnation upon those who disbelieve. Recalling Jesus’ cleansing of the Temple, Pilkington calls the church to change the “Pope’s market place” into God’s House. He recalls the munificence of the princes and leaders in offerings for the Temple, as well as beneficentCyrus and Artaxerxes of later times. Justianus, Theodosius, and Charlemagne. “Let us abhor popery, avoid sin and cleave to God.” “If God didn’t rule us every minute, we’d forget him and ourselves.” Fidelity to God’s Word, in season and out of season, in life and doctrine called for. He calls the recent Marian persecutions as God’s whip to Gospel fidelity.
Hag.1.2—Prophet speaks only in God’s name and with faithfulness to God’s Word. Similar call to Englishmen. He recites Gal.1.6 re: the Gospel and Dt. 4, the exhortation to neither add nor subtract to God’s Word. The Jews had failed for almost 40 years in building the Temple. “Papists” pull God’s Word from people; they claim the people can’t chew meat. Kings, princes, priests, and family-heads are to regularly teach the Scriptures, not the “John Mumble-Matins” of the Church of England. God takes away His Word as a form of judgment, Amos 8, and the false clerks are an instrument of the divine scourge. Pilkington lists several OT scourges and judgments. Yet, despite manifold mercies, the people claim, “It is not time to build God’s house.” Ingrates and self-service predominates. Whether rich or poor, all called to serve God—including fathers in their homes. PV—education and literacy grew with the Reformation and the exhortation to family-devotions with prayers and Bible reading, something unknown in the Church of Darkness. Zerubbabel, the Governer and Joshua, the High Priest, are rebuked as leaders of the many, with the call to pull down idols, restore the worship, and lead by example. The rulers are to be blamed, principally, although the rank and file do not escape censure. “Lay hand quickly on no man” means qualified ministers. Pilkington observes that England has failed here and that God and Cranmer sought biblical reforms. As God took Haman in his plot and pogrom in Esther’s day, so has God delivered many “Gospellers” from the persecutions of Romanists. He notes how God has prospered Germans, but England is still beset by problems.
Hag.1.3-4. God’s house to be built before one’s own house is built. “Is this not a setting of the cart before the house” asks Pilkington. Pilkington speaks of slugs. PV—one cannot escape the conviction Pilkington lays forward. There is no excuse for not building God’s Temple. God is to be obeyed over man, e.g. Daniel praying three times a day contrary to the royal order. Princes and nobility are not excused. “The rich men would not; the poor could not.” The pulling down of monasteries and chantries was well and good, but many sought a financial profit. The “fearful, abominable” will have no place in God’s kingdom. 2 Tim.4.2 obtains for all clergy. As Gregory and Chrysostom note, offense of people is often required for the preservation of the truth. (Hah! Tell that to Anglican accommodators! Weaklings!) Pilkington continues to run through biblical texts…if this isn’t sola scriptura in exposition and application, not sure what would be.
Hag.1.5-6. Sin brings spiritual insensitivities and judgments. This section could be read from a pulpit verbatim. More scriptural examples of sloth, indifference, and self-service. “A thin diet with the fear of God is better than a feast without the fear of God.” This section is quite a challenge; personally, after simply giving up on these fat-cat Anglican bishops, indifference and despair is the natural choice; this would not fly with Pilkington of whom a contemporary noted that north-eastern, English ungodliness, itself, vexed and killed the man. As is so often true with these English Reformers, they are concatenaters of Scripture upon Scripture—they were clearly exercised in God’s Word. Aside from Bishop Herter and Dr. Van Til, I have not heard a single modern pulpit that compares with these Scripture-men. The cumulative effect of “fire for effect” is massive demoralization before the witness of God’s Word; Pilkington leaves no room for wiggle-room. Residual sin (Rom.7.14ff.) will do no man any good, ergo, “battle-stations daily.” Artists paint varied nationalities in the customary dress, millinery and haberdashery, but always paint an Englishman as “naked.” More comments on greed. Pilkington chides the failure to advance the “Reformation” by all hands—it’s every man’s duty, rich and poor.
Hag.1.7-8. Strong words must pull down “stubborn stomachs.” Where there is stiff-neckedness, hard words. Where fear, encouragement and nurture. Ergo, go get the building materials and get on with it. Pilkington chides the Pope for his taxes and fiscal behaviours. Pilkington likens the individual Christian as the temple of the Holy Spirit, to be built, not just churches. No more idols at Canterbury, Ipswich and Walsingham. More chastisements of Papal pardons, pilgrimages, etc., and Masses for sale—serving the rich which mitigates Purgatorial sufferings, while the poor without such means are excoriated longer. Churches are for schoolmasters (pastors) and scholars (parishioners), a good metaphor for anti-intellectual Americans like charismatics. Again, all hands, royalty included, are to build God’s house, including heads of homes. All offenders are to be corrected without respect to rank or place. More Scripture again.
To be continued.
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