The Due Right of Presbyteries, Chapter 10 · Section 15 · Objection 16
Object. 16. Therefore was the Synagogue of the Jewes no compleat Church, because all the ordinances of God cannot bee performed in the Synagogue, and therefore were the Jewes commanded onelyonly at Jerus salem and in no other place to keepe the passeover, and to offer offerings and sacrifices, which were òrdinary worship, Deut. 12. but there is not any worship or sacred ordinance, (saith that aAmes Medul. Theolo. lib. 1. c. 38. ch. 37. lib. 1. 39. thes… 26.worthy Divine Dr. Ames) of preaching, praying, Sacraments, & c. prescribed, which is not to bee observed in every Congregation of the New Testament: Nor is there any ordinary minister appointed who is not given to some one Assembly of this kind. So also bA modest and brotherly answer to Mr. Herle, c. 2. p. 12. 13.Mr. Mather and Mr. Thomson, teachers in New England. Others say because there was a representative worship of sacrificing of all the 12. Tribes at Jerusalem, therefore all the Synagogues were dependent Churches, and Jerusalem was the supreme and bighest Church, but there is no representative worship in the New Testament, and therefore no need of Synods, as higher Churches.
Answ. Surely the aforesaid reverend Brethren of New England have these words, cIb. c. 1. pag. 8.But it seemeth to us that the power (of a Synod) is not proporly a power and exercise of government and jurisdiction, but a power of doctrine, and so a Synod is rather a …aching then a governing Church; from which I inferre; 1. That out Brethren cannot deny a power of governing to a Synod, but it is not so proper governing, as excommunication and ordination performed in their Congregations, but (say I) it is more properly governing, as to make Lawes and rules of governing, is a more noble, eminent and higher act of governing (as is evident in the King and his Parliament) then the execution of these Lawes and rules. 2. Our brethren incline to make a Synod a teaching Church; but I inferre that Synodicall teaching by giving out decrees tying many Churches, as our Brethren of dChurch-government of New-England, Answer to q. 14. pag. 43, 44.New England, and the forenamed eMr Mather & Mr. Thomson Answer to Mr. Herle, c. 4 pag. 40, 41, sig.authors teach, is an ordinance of Christ that can bee performed in no single Congregation on earth, for a doctrinall Canon of one Congregation can lay no ecclesiasticall tie upon many Churches. Ergo, by this reason our Congregations shall bee dependent, as were the Jewish Synagogues. 3. With favour of these learned men it is a begging of the question to make Jerusalem the supreme Church, and the Synagogues dependent Churches, because it was lawfull onelyonly at Jerusalem to sacrifice, for I hold that Jerusalem was a dependent Church no lesse then the smallest Synagogue in all the tribes, for in a Catholick meeting of all Judah for renewing a Covenant with God, Ierusalem was but a sister Church, with all of Iudah, Benjamin, Ephraim, Manasseh, who 2 Chron. 15. 9. 10. 11, 12. made up one great Church which did sweare that Covenant. Ordinances doe not formally make Churches visible, nor divers ordinances divers Churches; profession of the truth formally constituteth a visible Church, and Church union in ordinances and government, and this was alike in the Synagogues and in Ierusalem. It was a thing meerely typicall that at Ierusalem onelyonly, and in the Temple onelyonly should there bee offerings and sacrifices, because in Christ God-man, all our worship and service and prayers are accepted of the Father, but (I pray you) did this instampe Ierusalem with any note of Church-supremacy above the meanest Synagogue in all Israel and Iudah? I see it not, all the Synagogues and all the land were members of the nationall Church, and every one a member of his owne Synagogue, the persons processing the truth and dwelling at Ierusalem had no supremacie over the Synagogues, because they did inhabit that typicall place, but the Priests and Levites were indeed servants to all the land, in offering sacrifices, and in governing in the Synedry either the greater, or the lesse, but these professors who did constitute the visible Church at Ierusalem had no Church supremacie at all for their relation to the Temple, their cohabitation or bodily contiguitie was no Church-relation then or now; and that these of the Synagogues behooved to worship in some solemne acts onelyonly at Ierusalem, did no more give supremacie to the inhabitants of Ierusalem to bee a Church over them, then the Synagogues could claime supremacie over the inhabitants of Ierusalem, for the inhabitants of Ierusalem were tied to worship there, and in no other place, and to stand to the determinntion of the great Synodrie without appeale, because there was not a Catholick visible Church in the world but the Church of the Iewes; and this argument with as great force of reason might conclude that all the cities and incorporations of England are in government dependent and subordinate to London and the suburbs, because they are subordinate to the honorable Houses of Parliament, if wee should suppone that Westminster by a standing Law of the Kingdome were the unal…erable seat where the Parliament can fit, and in no other place, which yet could prove nothing, seeing London and the suburbs are in their government no lesse subordinate to the Parliament, then the meanest village and towne in England, and therefore I see no ground, because some representative worship was tied to Jerusalem, to give Jerusalem a Church-supremacie, 2. because one Congregation doth pray for another that is under pestilence and diseases, and praises God for the deliverance from these evills which also is a sort of representative worship (every Church and person partaking of a Christian priesthood to offer up prayers and praises one for another) it will not (as I conceive) prove that one Congregation hath Church-supremacie, and power of jurisdiction over another. Because 1. all Israel was alike circumcised; 2. all alike the called people of God, in covenant with God; 3. all had claime to the Altar, Sacrifices, Temple, Arke, &c. 4. All alike professed their subjection to God, to Priests and Prophets in these same ordinances, whether typicall, or judiciall, or morall, therefore every Synagogue alike at Ierusalem, at Dan or Bersheba, were alike Congregationall Churches, without dependance one upon another, and all depended upon the whole nationall Church, and on the Synodries supreme, subordinate, and the Synagogue-government according to their subordinations respectively; and I see no nationall Church in Israel peculiar to them, or typicall, more then there is a nationall Church in Scotland or England, though God put some distinguishing typicall notes upon their government, yet it never made either the invisible or visible Church of the Iewes to differ in nature and essence from the Christian Churches.