Thomas Blake's Book on Covenant Theology, Vindiciæ Foederis

[Sam Jer]

I think the title says most of what needs to be said about the content:

VINDICIAE FOEDERIS; OR, A TREATISE OF THE Covenant of God ENTERED WITH MAN-KINDE, In the several Kindes and Degrees of it, IN WHICH The agreement and respective differences of the Covenant of Works and the Covenant of Grace, of the Old and New Covenant are discust.

The Conditions of the Covenant of Grace on mans part, are assigned and asserted.

The just latitude and extent clearly held forth, and fully vindicated.

Several Corollaries containing many heads of Divinity, now controverted, and practical points singularly useful, inferred.

In particular the necessity of a constant settled Ministry (to bring men into Covenant, and to bring them up to the termes of it,) and of Schooles, and Nurseries of Learning, and an orderly call in tendency to it.

Infant Baptisme in that latitude, as now in use in reformed Churches maintained.

Newly corrected and much enlarged, & in many places cleared by its Author.

Thomas Blake, late Minister of the Gospel, at Tamworth in the Counties of Stafford and Warwick.

I have read this book off the website of the University of Michigan (here is a link). This book, as the title suggests, goes through the doctrines around Covenant Theology, with a particular focus on those issues Blake saw as important or too frequently attacked or forgotten. He is very technical, which makes him difficult to follow at times, and he goes down a lot of rabbit-holes to disprove his adversaries; however, he brings much needed clarity on an issue that is too often muddied; he explains the old covenant's relation to the new; he explains the conditions of the covenant of grace, and how it does not introduce works righteousness, he explains what degree of obedience is enough for one to have repented, he explains the many passages where the Christian is described as walking in sincerity. At the end of the book, he discusses infant baptism at leangth, defending it in detail and addressing all kinds of objections. He clears so many things up, I cannot help but recommend it.

One recommendation if you read it: most of the chapters are short, and many build on eachother. He often has a seperate chapter for objections to the previous one. I recommend reading several chapters at once, that way you get through it faster, and if you are like me, keep better better concentration on what you are reading.

 

[Charles Johnson]

I really think Thomas Blake is one of the best to have written on covenant theology. Roberts, Witsius, and Rutherford are more well-known, but he just might beat them all in terms of precision.

 

[alexanderjames]

I can see it's also available here- https://www.puritanpublications.com/product/the-covenant-of-god-thomas-blake-1597-1657/
https://puritanboard.com/threads/the-covenant-of-god-by-rev-thomas-blake.53241/

 

[PhilalethesIrenaeus]

Blake writes:

“The Covenant of grace is between God and man, between God, and those of fallen mankinde, that he pleases to take into covenant, God and man are the two parties in the covenant; It is not made between God and Christ. This is so plain, that a man might think there needed no words about it, but that there are some that will have man to be no party in it, and that it is entred onely with Christ on behalf of those that God hath chosen in Christ to himself.”

Was he writing prior to the Westminster Assembly?

WLC Q. 31. With whom was the covenant of grace made?
A. The covenant of grace was made with Christ as the second Adam, and in him with all the elect as his seed.

 

[Charles Johnson]

Blake writes:

“The Covenant of grace is between God and man, between God, and those of fallen mankinde, that he pleases to take into covenant, God and man are the two parties in the covenant; It is not made between God and Christ. This is so plain, that a man might think there needed no words about it, but that there are some that will have man to be no party in it, and that it is entred onely with Christ on behalf of those that God hath chosen in Christ to himself.”

Was he writing prior to the Westminster Assembly?

WLC Q. 31. With whom was the covenant of grace made?
A. The covenant of grace was made with Christ as the second Adam, and in him with all the elect as his seed.

Blake wrote after the assembly. He is responding to certain Independents and Antinomians that taught that the covenant of grace has two parties, God and Christ, and therefore, there is no condition whatsoever placed on man.

As one can see in the Larger Catechism, men are included as parties, which is the main point that Blake is getting at. Although the exact language of the Larger Catechism smells somewhat of a compromise between those who would have the two parties be God and Christ, and those who would have them be God and man.

It would have been nice if they had hammered this out a little more, because this ended up being a point of difference or controversy between the secession church and the mainline CoS in the 18th century.

 

[PhilalethesIrenaeus]

Blake wrote after the assembly. He is responding to certain Independents and Antinomians that taught that the covenant of grace has two parties, God and Christ, and therefore, there is no condition whatsoever placed on man.

Did they teach any differently than the Seceder divines? It’s my understanding that the Seceders saw everything in relation to us as contained in the promissory part of the covenant of grace, and the only condition is Christ’s fulfilling all righteousness.

 

[Charles Johnson]

Did they teach any differently than the Seceder divines? It’s my understanding that the Seceders saw everything in relation to us as contained in the promissory part of the covenant of grace, and the only condition is Christ’s fulfilling all righteousness.

They had a lot in common with the Seceders. Thus why the Seceders were so controversial in their day — to a lot of men it seemed like they were reviving the same views Rutherford, Blake, and others had fought against a couple generations earlier.

 

[MW]

Did they teach any differently than the Seceder divines? It’s my understanding that the Seceders saw everything in relation to us as contained in the promissory part of the covenant of grace, and the only condition is Christ’s fulfilling all righteousness.

As I understand it, that is also what the more conservative divines of the 17th century taught. They used the language of condition, but they did not mean it was the "proper" condition because they taught that Christ merited the fulfilment of the condition for the elect. It is only a condition in its outward aspect of administration as it is preached to men.

 

[Sam Jer]

As I understand it, that is also what the more conservative divines of the 17th century taught. They used the language of condition, but they did not mean it was the "proper" condition because they taught that Christ merited the fulfilment of the condition for the elect. It is only a condition in its outward aspect of administration as it is preached to men.

wouldn't that then be the diffrence with Blake? Blake argues that the external administration is the covenant properly speaking.

 

[MW]

wouldn't that then be the diffrence with Blake? Blake argues that the external administration is the covenant properly speaking.

Yes; he runs counter to Culverwell on the point of faith being improperly the condition. And yes; he regards the outward, not the inward, as the covenant properly speaking. That is to press the fact that the covenant is an agreement and conditions laid on men are necessary to it. But so far as he confines himself to the outward his position comes to much the same thing with what other divines call the administration of the covenant.

 

[Sam Jer]

Yes; he runs counter to Culverwell on the point of faith being improperly the condition. And yes; he regards the outward, not the inward, as the covenant properly speaking. That is to press the fact that the covenant is an agreement and conditions laid on men are necessary to it. But so far as he confines himself to the outward his position comes to much the same thing with what other divines call the administration of the covenant.

Can you help me understand where Blake would stand among the broadly confessional Presbyterian views, where others may disagree with him, and who? This was my first time reading a full-leangth book on covenant theology, and I don't even know who Culverwell is, so it would be nice to get a better understanding of where people will disagree with him even within the Westminster-confessing camp.

 

[Charles Johnson]

Can you help me understand where Blake would stand among the broadly confessional Presbyterian views, where others may disagree with him, and who? This was my first time reading a full-leangth book on covenant theology, and I don't even know who Culverwell is, so it would be nice to get a better understanding of where people will disagree with him even within the Westminster-confessing camp.

The main difference is that some authors, like Rutherford, talk about both an external and internal aspects of the covenant.

They don't really disagree with Blake on the substance of the matter, because he's talking about what a "covenant" is in Scripture, and in the Scripture use of the term, it's almost always referring to an external covenant (the main exception being Jer. 31, which according to Blake would be "improper").

Whereas when they (Rutherford et al) talk about internal and external covenants or aspects of the covenant, they're making a theological distinction that some are in the covenant externally, according to membership in the church and participation with the sacraments, while not receiving the spiritual benefits of the covenant. Which is of course something Blake would agree with.

So in the substance of the matter, Blake and Rutherford line up quite well. They're more so two sides of the same coin than two opposing streams of thought.

 

[MW]

I suppose if there is a difference the more conventional theologians would say the inward covenant is the covenant properly speaking. That is because they either posit a covenant of redemption as the foundation for the covenant of grace or they say the covenant of grace was made with Christ in the first instance and with the elect in Him. This means it is essentially a covenant for the elect. Blake's view makes the covenant essentially an administration to elect and reprobate. As a Calvinist he must have thought that this is grounded in election in some way. But I don't recall he makes this point. And he himself had to clear his doctrine from the charge of Arminianism at one stage. His external covenant is left hanging on nothing. But it matches up with the external covenant of more conventional federalists and is a good antidote to those who over-spiritualise the covenant and make it only inward.