Articles & Papers
Two Visions of Authority
Two genealogies of power in church and state, branching from one root, and the constitutional crisis where they collided.
Download the full PDF One-page summary (PDF)The Common Root
The Reformation · 1517–1560. Scripture over papal authority. The godly magistrate charged with religion. One question left open, which both lines below claim to answer: who wields the sword — and under what law?
- John Calvin (1509–64), Institutes (1559) — two kingdoms, spiritual and civil, distinct; magistrates ordained by God for the people’s good; lesser magistrates may resist a tyrant.
- John Knox (c.1514–72) — carries the two kingdoms into Scotland; Christ alone is Head of the Church; appeals to God and the covenants against idolatrous rulers.
- First Book of Discipline (1560) — the Kirk of Scotland ordered; obedience owed to lawful magistrates — lawful being the operative word.
- Andrew Melville (1545–1622) — “two kings and two kingdoms in Scotland”; the kirk independent of civil authority.
- George Buchanan (1506–82), De Jure Regni (1579) — the king’s authority derives from the people; the king under law; a tyrant may be resisted.
- Scottish Covenanting Movement (1638–43) — covenants bind Church and nation to God’s law; a covenant-breaking king forfeits obedience.
- Samuel Rutherford (c.1600–61), Lex, Rex (1644) — the law is king, the king is not the law; power held in trust from the people, under God; lawful resistance and deposition justified.
- The Henrician Royal Supremacy, Act of Supremacy (1534) — the Crown becomes Supreme Head of the Church of England; God reforms through the king.
- Richard Hooker (1554–1600), Of the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity (1594–97) — church and commonwealth one society, one head; the line’s moderate wing, grounding law in consent.
- James VI & I (1566–1625), The True Law of Free Monarchies (1598) — kings are God’s lieutenants; monarchy precedes law; no power on earth may judge the king.
- William Barclay (1546–1608), De Regno (1600) — written against Buchanan; obedience due in nearly all cases; God alone may judge kings.
- Laudian & Episcopal Alliance (1630s) — “no bishop, no king” made policy; the 1637 Prayer Book the spark that lights the fuse.
- John Maxwell (c.1590–1647), Sacro-Sancta Regum Majestas (1644) — the king’s authority is sacred and inviolable; resistance is sacrilege.
- Sir Robert Filmer (1588–1653), Patriarcha (written c.1628–42, pub. 1680) — Adam was a king; political power is paternal property; absolute, unaccountable monarchical power.
The British Constitutional Crisis · 1637–1651 — where the two genealogies converge and collide.
The Lines Cross Before They Collide
The two genealogies don’t run in parallel silence. Each produces a direct reply to the other, twice, before the crisis itself.
James VI, raised on Buchanan, writes The True Law against his own teacher’s doctrine.
Barclay’s De Regno is written expressly against Buchanan — and coins “monarchomach” as the charge.
1644 · The Duel in Print. Rutherford’s Lex, Rex is written in direct answer to Maxwell’s Sacro-Sancta. The genealogies now argue face to face.
Charles I
Charles I (1600–49, r. 1625) claimed the full inheritance of the right-hand line — personal rule, dissolved parliaments, enforced conformity. The left-hand line tried him as a man under law.
Limited government. Covenant. Accountability. Lawful resistance to tyranny.
Absolute power. Unconditional obedience. Accountable to God alone. Rebellion is sin.
The Reformed reading: authority delegated by God through the people — conditional, covenantal, under law. The Supremacist reading: authority devolved by God onto the Crown — absolute, personal, above law. Both start at the Reformation. Neither is a corruption of it.
The Crisis, Year by Year
Prayer Book Riots
Riots in Edinburgh — the Laudian program meets the covenanting inheritance.
The National Covenant
Buchanan and the Books of Discipline made a national oath.
The Bishops’ Wars
Covenant against Crown, in arms.
The Wars of the Three Kingdoms
The constitutional crisis becomes open war across England, Scotland, and Ireland.
The Duel in Print
Lex, Rex against Sacro-Sancta Regum Majestas.
Trial and Execution of Charles I
Resistance theory acted out; divine right answered at the scaffold.
Who holds authority? For whom? Under what law? Every later argument about legitimate power in the English-speaking world is a rerun of this one, usually without either side realizing it’s a rerun.
From the Reformation to the Revolution — one root, two genealogies, one collision that shaped the modern world.
Both lines claim the Reformation. Which one actually inherits more of Calvin — the resistance tradition that names him, or the supremacy tradition that keeps his doctrine of the godly magistrate?
SOURCES · John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion (1559) · John Knox, Appellation & Writings (1558) · George Buchanan, De Jure Regni apud Scotos (1579) · Samuel Rutherford, Lex, Rex (1644) · Richard Hooker, Of the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity (1594–97) · James VI & I, The True Law of Free Monarchies (1598) · William Barclay, De Regno et Regali Potestate (1600) · John Maxwell, Sacro-Sancta Regum Majestas (1644) · Sir Robert Filmer, Patriarcha (1680)