Cherry Picking Quotes Instead of Showing Direct Evidence
Zachary Cole apparently presented his paper, “Providential Preservation of Scripture and Textual Criticism in the Sermons of Westminster Divines” (68.3 (2025): 405–23), in a late 2025 edition of JETS at a recent meeting of the Evangelical Theological Society. I don’t want to misrepresent him. His intent seems to reconstruct the meaning of “kept pure in all ages” in WCF 1.8 as receptive of modern textual criticism, so not approving of one specific reading in the Greek Text of the New Testament, but multiple readings.
The men Cole quotes make use of marginal readings of the King James translators and some of the variations between editions of the Textus Receptus. He concludes from this a doctrinal point about the preservation of scripture that contradicts what the men of the Westminster Assembly believed about preservation of scripture. I give him credit for digging up or, maybe better, cherry picking, these quotes from selected sermons from men in the Assembly, as if he pulls a contradictory truth out of the time capsule, at the same ignoring their direct statements about the doctrine, never mentioning those.
Perfect Preservation and Textual Variants
Cole’s observations and reflections don’t bother me about the position of the men of the Westminster Assembly, who wrote a statement about preservation also stated in the London Baptist Confession of 1689. Their position wasn’t that they didn’t or couldn’t know the exact text of scripture. It did acknowledge variants, like everyone today of the ecclesiastical text or confessional bibliology position also do. They maintain a doctrine of absolute perfect preservation, including in the description the reality and existence of textual variants between Textus Receptus editions. They’ve never denied those.
Confession of textual variants doesn’t lessen the belief in the perfect preservation of scripture or exactly how God did it, which was not by modern textual criticism. They explained it all, something denied today by many men hoping to upend the historical and biblical position with modern naturalism. Their position, rather than something parallel or akin to modern textual criticism, is well stated by Assembly man, Richard Capel, member of Gloucestershire, among others, who said, “what mistake [“scrapes by Transcribers”] is in one print, is corrected in another.” How though? They also explain that.
Cole chooses to look at and then represent 16th and 17th century believers and churches through a lens of 19th and 20th century modernism, thus revising what they did into a more contemporary equivalent. Someone can’t get that out of their actual writings. Instead of looking through a modern and postmodern grid, people should see them through the premodern, transcendental view of goodness, truth, and beauty that they saw the world. Scripture was sufficient for their doctrine, receiving it from the pure mother’s (sincere) milk of God’s Words.
Text Critical Problems?
On the fourth and fifth page of his article, Cole writes concerning what he describes as the WCF Assembly members emphases on textual variation:
[P]reachers who raised text-critical problems in this manner evidently did not expect that occasional references to textual variation would startle, confuse, or rattle their flocks.
Cole calls these variations, “text-critical problems.” He calls the existence of some difference in Textus Receptus (TR) editions as text-critical problems, instead of giving it the characterization that Capel made, ‘a mistake in one print is corrected in another.’ The Assembly members of Westminster didn’t see these “scrapes by Transcribers” as the restoration of a lost text through comparing various ‘textual traditions’ and using naturalistic principles of science to make the best human assessment. Their many, many direct statements say what they think and believe.
Actual View of the Westminster Assembly in Direct Statements
In the official commentary on Matthew 5:18 in the annotations by the Westminster Assembly (in other words, the conclusions of the whole group), the committee of Divines wrote:
By jot and tittle is meant the least requirements of the Law, and the least letter or part of a letter in the writing thereof. This shows that the Scripture is so preserved by God, that nothing of the substance, nor the very words and letters, shall be lost until the world’s end.
This is verbal plenary preservation parallel with the same characteristics of inspiration. God preserved all of the words, the substance, and then the very words and letters or the least letter or part of a letter.
The Assembly men occasionally mentioned textual variations between the TR editions, which were all preserved and available and also mentioned by the KJV translators in marginal notes. He says that this would not “startle, confuse, or rattle their flocks.” Just because we can read a relatively few examples from that time of talking about these variations, so knowing about them, does not prove that their flocks weren’t ‘startled, confused, or rattled,’ as Cole puts it. It would be better to hear what the Assembly members said and wrote about the effect of embracing something less than perfect preservation of the text of scripture.
The Actual Effect of Rejecting Absolute Perfect Preservation of the Words According to Assembly Members
Richard Capel
Richard Capel again argued in his Remains (1658) that if the letters of the text were not perfectly preserved, the foundation of faith would vanish.
And that we have none in Hebrew or Greek, but what are transcribed. . . . Now transcribers are ordinary men, subject to mistake. . . . [But to say we have no supernaturally preserved text] are terrible blasts. . . . [it is] to open the door to Atheism.
Samuel Rutherford
Samuel Rutherford, Scottish Commissioner of the Assembly, in his “A Free Disputation Against Pretended Liberty of Conscience” emphasized that the “sense” of God’s Word is physically “wrapped” in the letters; therefore, the letters must be certain.
Though the Letter of the Scripture be not the Word alone, yet the Letter with the true sense and meaning of it, is the Word. So if ye destroy the Letter of the Scripture, you do destroy the Scripture. . . . for the Sense lies wrapped up in the Letters.
He continued:
If the letters be not certain, the faith of the believer is shaken, for he knows not if he rests upon the Word of God or the errors of men.
Francis Cheynell
Francis Cheynell, member for Oxford and a fierce defender of the Trinity, in his “The Divine Trinunity” (1650) argued that for scripture to be a perfect rule, it must be pure in its very delivery.
The word of God is pure and perfect, it doth fully discover Gods mind and our duty. . . . nothing can be embraced with a divine faith, but that which is delivered to us upon Divine Testimony.
He also wrote:
We must have the same words which were written by the Prophets and Apostles; for if the words be changed, the sense is in danger of being altered, and then we have not a Divine, but a human doctrine. . . . If the fountain be not pure, the streams of doctrine cannot be sweet.
John Lightfoot
John Lightfoot, the Assembly’s greatest Hebraist, wrote:
The very points and pricks of the Hebrew text [vowel points] are of divine origin. . . . to deny the perfection of the letters is to make the Word of God a nose of wax, which every man may bend to his own fancy.
In other words, without perfection of the very letters, scripture becomes something that people can bend the Word of God to his own fancy.
Thomas Gataker
Thomas Gataker, another Assembly member, wrote:
The authority of the Word depends upon the integrity of the text. If any jot or tittle be lost or changed by the negligence of men, the truth of the doctrine is endangered, for God’s truth is tied to His words.
“The authority of the Word depends upon the integrity of the text.”
Edward Leigh
Edward Leigh, another Assembly member, makes an argument in his A Body of Divinity that a corrupted jot or tittle would render the Bible a mute judge:
The Hebrew Text is the fountain. . . . and this fountain is kept pure by a singular providence. If so much as one jot or tittle were changed or lost, the Judge of controversies would be corrupted, and we should have no Authentical word to end debates. But Christ saith, not one jot shall pass; therefore, we have them all entire.
He also wrote in the same book:
If the divine providence had not kept the Scripture pure in the original languages. . . . we should have no sure foundation for our faith, nor any certain rule to judge of translations by. . . . God by His providence hath preserved them uncorrupt.
John Owen
John Owen wrote:
The providence of God hath manifested itself no less concerned in the preservation of the writings than in the giving of them out. . . . That every letter, tittle, and iota should be preserved is more necessary for the Church than that the heavens and earth should continue.
Owen says that the providence of God is not less in preservation than it was in inspiration. You don’t hear this from modern version proponents and critical text advocates — not a whisper of this.
Nicholas Proffet (Member for Marlborough)
Proffet was an obscure member who preached before the House of Commons. He argued that the authentical nature of the text required it to be physically identical to what the Apostles wrote. He wrote in England’s Impenitencie (1645):
The Word is the Scepter of Christ’s Kingdom. . . . A broken scepter is no scepter. If the words be corrupted by men, it is no longer the Scepter of God, but a reed of man’s making.
Lazarus Seaman (Member for All Hallows)
A highly regarded parliamentary Assembly member, Seaman argued in “The Son of God as the Foundation” that the Greek and Hebrew were the original deeds to the believer’s inheritance:
If the original deeds [the Greek and Hebrew texts] be lost or defaced, the inheritance is called into question. God has therefore kept the originals pure to preserve the title of the Saints.
Further Samuel Rutherford
Earlier I mentioned Samuel Rutherford, an Assembly member, who argued a covenantal argument that since the covenant of God is eternal, the instrument of that covenant (the written Word) must be preserved in its smallest parts.
God hath a speciall eye upon the syllables and letters. It is a part of Christ’s kingly office to see that his Law be not falsified. Therefore, he keeps the jots and tittles as the King keeps the standard weights of his realm; they are preserved pure for the sake of the Covenant.
This belies or just straight out contradicts the idea expressed based on speculation by Cole in his journal article about startling, confusing, or rattling the flocks. Acceptance of loss of the text or teaching the same conclusions that Cole and others make about textual criticism would, according to the Westminster Assembly members, do far more than just confuse, startle, or rattle people. This is not speculation, because it is a conclusion that comes from their very words, debunking what Cole concludes based on, ironically, conjecture.
Review of Arguments about the Horrible Effects of Embracing Multiple Options on the Words of the Bible
I want to review all the arguments above. I’m not saying these are all the ones made by the Westminster Assembly members, but they made them. These are arguments essentially ignored by modern textual criticism advocates. Most of them are silent on the historical and biblical point of view, not offering anything to deal with what these men wrote. It isn’t restorationism, because the textual criticism viewpoint on preservation didn’t exist in the past. It is novel. No one believed it until something embracing naturalism as a fundamental and accepted concept for the Bible.
Without absolute perfect preservation, the Westminster Assembly members say:
- It Would Open The Door To Atheism (Capel)
- You Would Destroy Scripture (Rutherford)
- The Faith Of The Believer Is Shaken (Rutherford)
- Nothing Can Be Embraced with a Divine Faith (Cheynell)
- We Have Not a Divine But a Human Doctrine (Cheynell)
- Scripture Becomes Something To Bend To One’s Own Fancy (Lightfoot)
- Scripture Loses Its Authority (Gataker)
- Truth of Doctrine Is Endangered (Gataker)
- The Judge of Controversies Would Be Corrupted (Leigh)
- We Have No Sure Foundation Of Our Faith (Leigh)
- Diminishes The Doctrine Of The Providence Of God (Owen)
- Scripture Becomes The Reed Of Man’s Making Rather Than The Scepter of God (Proffet)
- It Calls Into Question The Believer’s Inheritance If Words Are Lost (Seaman)
- It Falsifies The King’s Covenant (Rutherford)
For these men, the loss of a single letter was not a “minor error”; it was a theological catastrophe. They argued that:
- If the Letters are lost, the Words are lost.
- If the Words are lost, the Sense (Meaning) is lost.
- If the Sense is lost, the Authority of God is lost.
- If the Authority is lost, Faith is merely human opinion.
More Westminster Assembly Quotes Presenting the Same View on the Preservation of Scripture
In addition to the thirty-five of part one in this series, here are further helpful quotes to show the depth and breadth of this consistent belief, not a cherry-picked one.
36. William Jenkyn, successor to Assembly member William Gouge
Though writing shortly after the Assembly, Jenkyn reflected the consensus of the “Gouge circle” (William Gouge was a key member):
The inspired words had been preserved and kept pure. . . . by a singular care and providence, without any loss or alteration of the original words.
37. John Ley (Member for Great Budworth)
Ley was the head of the committee that examined ministers. He wrote in the preface to the Westminster Annotations:
The Scriptures in their original languages. . . . are the very words of the Holy Ghost. God hath by a special providence preserved them from the injuries of time and the malice of Satan, so that they remain entire and uncorrupt.
38. Henry Wilkinson (Member for Waddesdon)
Wilkinson, known as “Long Harry,” was a member of the committee that drafted the Confession. He argued that the preservation of the text was a “perpetual miracle.” He said in “Three Decades of Sermons,” “The Principles of the Christian Religion,” and “Morning Exercises”:
The preservation of the Scripture is a perpetual miracle. . . . That the Hebrew and Greek should be preserved in their purity through so many successions of ages… is a singular work of God’s care. . . . it is the Church’s treasury, and if the gold be debased [corrupted], the Church is impoverished.
39. Arthur Jackson (Member for St. Faith’s)
Jackson was a rank-and-file member who spent his life writing short notes on the Bible. He argued that even the superfluous letters in Hebrew were divinely protected. In his Annotations upon the Five Pious Books, he writes:
God hath so watched over the text that not a word, no, not a letter, is so lost or changed as to lose the sense of the Spirit. . . . His Providence is the Great Librarian of the Church.
More to Come