Speaking strictly they [the credobaptistic confessions of the 17th century] were apologies, taking the form of confessions, or creeds, as the most convenient way of informing adversaries of the matter of their faith. […]
They sought to reflect the existing harmony of sentiment, and the scriptural orthodoxy of the communities whose pastors signed them[…].
—Edward Bean Underhill
Confessions of Faith, and other Public Documents, illustrative of the History of the Baptist Churches of England in the 17th Century, London, 1854, page vi
From the list of questions, individual topics can be accessed using the triangular symbols ▼.
The triangles ▲ at the beginning of those texts navigate back to the list of questions.
In the Comprehensive Version presented here, the aim is not to adhere to just one of the historical editions, but instead to integrate textual variants from all three historical text versions. It is not comprehensive in the sense of including or documenting every variant from each of the three historical original London text versions of 1644, 1646 and 1651/1652.
Although it is based on the text of the second edition from 1644, it does, however, aim to include variants from the earlier and the later version of the text in passages where they do most fully express biblical truths. This document originated in a 21st century reformed and credobaptist church: The Reformierte Freikirche (Reformed Free Church) in Germany, which holds a German translation of this text as the main expression of their faith under the authority of Scripture. The church did not want to formulate their own confession, but rather desired to use a tried and tested “pattern of sound words”. When the first congregation was founded in 2016, only the text of the 1644 edition was known to the founders, and a translation of that was used. From the beginning, the original text was amended by an article on the Lord’s Supper, which was a selection from the Second London Confession of Faith from 1677. This should not imply total agreement with every every position of the 2LCF’s, but simply full accord with the excerpt used.
Later, when photomechanical facsimiles of all four historical London editions of the confession could be studied, it was decided that some phrasings from other editions than the 1644 were more suitable in content or language for the church’s textual use. Thus this document came into being – not under the desire to write a new confession, but rather with the intention of choosing passages from several variants of this “pattern of sound words” that most fully express biblical teaching as the church understood it, to better serve the glory of God and the benefit of the elect.
While the Reformierte Freikirche does use a German translation of this confession, the English version of the text is made available in the hope that it may prove useful to other Christians.
The confession has been carefully and respectfully edited, and mostly within the bounds of only choosing between text variations given by the diverse historical editions. Compiling this edition has led in some areas to improvements in clarity with regard to closeness to biblical expressions and, especially in the case of treating the Lord’s Supper in its own article, in the inclusion of more precious and important truths for Christ’s church at all times.
For a full documentation of the differences to previous versions of the text, please refer to the downloads section.
▲ What are the differences between the First and Second London Confessions?
The First London Confession (1LCF) was drawn up independently by the issuing congregations in 1644 taking into account and analysing previous confessional writings, but without there being a specific template to which the structure and content would have been consistently oriented. The Second London Confession of Faith (2LCF), also known as the Baptist Confession of Faith of 1689 was published in 1677 and recommended by a synod in 1689. It follows the structure and content of the Westminster Confession of 1646. (The actual textual basis was presumably an adaptation of this confession from Congregationalist circles, the so-called Savoy Declaration of 1658.) The text was adapted to the convictions of the issuing congregations regarding the question of baptism and in matters of church constitution, and other, minor editorial changes were made.
The essential differences are therefore not in the fundamental questions of biblical faith, not in the Reformed understanding of God's sovereignty, including in salvation, nor in the understanding of baptism as an ordinance of Christ to be given to believers and not to infants who are not yet capable of confessing the faith, but they stem predominantly from the particular elements adopted from the Westminster Confession. This is not the place to undertake such a comparison in detail, to categorise it historically and to evaluate it theologically (this would be a good topic for a master's thesis, or perhaps even a doctoral thesis, depending on the research question), but a few brief references will be made.
In chapter 7, the 2LCF represents a covenant theological understanding that points to one continuous covenant of God. In contrast, there are certainly views of biblical theology that distinguish more strongly between the Old Covenant and the New Covenant. The 1LCF does not take a firm position on this question, but instead emphasises the role of Christ in the New Covenant from Article 10 onwards.
As a consequence of this topic, the question of the Christian's position in relation to the Mosaic Law arises. In chapter 19, the 2LCF sees a tripartite division of the law into ceremonial law, judicial law and moral law, whereby the moral law remains the valid norm for the church and the world. Although such a classification into three parts is widespread, it is by no means without exception or without criticism, as the Bible itself does not make such a categorisation anywhere, but on the contrary assumes the law as one single entity.
In the 1LCF, the role of the law does not feature much; it is mentioned, for example, in Article 25 (the terror of the law not being a necessary prerequisite for coming to faith). The emphasis of the 1LCF is completely different: The Christian does not repudiate the law, but is under the law of Christ, see article 29 section 3..
A specific consequence of the position on the law is also the understanding of the Sabbath.
Christians have quite different attitudes in theory and practice. In chapter 22, paragraphs 7 and 8 of the 2LCF , the Sabbath continues to exist in principle, but was moved from Saturday to Sunday at Christ's resurrection, and instructions are given on how it is to be observed as a day of rest and worship. (Biblically and exegetically, the question of such a transfer of the Sabbath does not exactly stand on firm ground). The 1LCF does not deal with the question of the Sabbath, and thus also leaves freedom of conscience on this point: whoever, for whatever reason, comes to the conclusion that the Sabbath should be observed in the manner described, even under the gospel of Christ, may do so; but this is not imposed on the community of those who hold this confession.
Another point has already been mentioned in the introduction to this website: Is it good, true and wise (with all the necessary distance of an evangelical-reformed, baptist Christian to the Roman Catholic Church) to confess the statement ‘The Pope is the Antichrist’ as it is done in chapter 26 paragraph 4 of the 2LCF – quite apart from the question of which Pope is meant? Innocent XI, who held the office from 1676 to 1689? The current one when the reader of this text looks at the screen? Or perhaps the institution of the papacy in general? The latter would perhaps be a conclusively justifiable view, but the text of the 2LCF itself does not support it.
The 2LCF represents a specific position in the area of covenant theology. The 1LCF does not define such a position and is also acceptable to Christians who are more inclined towards New Covenant theology. To summarise, it can be said that both confessions agree as one would expect on the core issues of faith, but that the 2LCF contains some further stipulations that are not shared in their specificity by all reformed, baptist-minded Christians.
As a result, a large number of those congregations that adopt the 2LCF express through footnotes or reservation clauses that in individual, specific points it is not considered authoritative — an approach that is understandable in terms of content, but problematic in formal terms: a confession that does not apply in all parts?
On the other hand, we are not aware of any case in which a congregation has adopted the 1LCF with similar restrictions. Although there are different text variants (as a rule, either the version of the first edition, the second edition or the Comprehensive Version reproduced here is adopted), these can obviously each be upheld without restriction. In the 1LCF context, however, it is common and sensible to add good, biblically based position papers on specific topics of our time; examples of this would be the question of the work of the Holy Spirit and the continued existence of certain spiritual gifts or the complex of questions concerning the understanding of sexuality.
▲ Who has currently adopted the 1LCF Comprehensive Edition?
The Comprehensive Edition and its German translation were published on Reformation Day 2022. Here are those who hold one of these two versions of confession so far and have contacted the operators of this website. The list will be added to as needed.
The text of the Comprehensive Version in the English original and in the German translation is under copyright. Nevertheless, anyone interested may distribute the confession digitally or in any quantity as a printout of the unchanged text, as it is made available in the downloads section, free of charge. For other uses, especially commercial or professional printing, please contact us for a licence. We will most likely be happy to agree to such use.
To ensure the usage according to the terms descibed above, we use the Creative Commons license Attribution - NonCommercial - NoDerivatives 4.0, to allow for freedom of distribution while securing textual integrity: The First London Confession of Faith, Comprehensive Version 2022 by Reformierte Freikirche in Deutschland is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0
▲ What is that logo at the top of the page? May I use it?
The logo is based on the coat of arms of the City of London shown here:
(Ssolbergj, Sodacan, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons). Although the City of London makes up only a small part of the urban area known as London as a whole, the coat of arms symbolically represents it in the public's perception; this can also be seen in the large number of souvenirs sold throughout London bearing this sign. This reference to Greater London is, strictly speaking, inaccurate, but we are only quoting the coat of arms here (not adopting it).
The First London Confession in the Comprehensive Version is published with a sign that refers to London as the place of origin and is inspired by the City of London's coat of arms. The edge of the shield has been made more visually prominent, the cross has been set off from the edge and the sword floating next to the cross in the original has been placed on of the cross itself.
Whoever in print or other media reproduces, informs about or refers to the text of the 1LCF in the Comprehensive Version unchanged, may use this logo, as shown at the top of the page, free of charge for this purpose. The colour of the design is not fixed; use in other colourings in accordance with the possibilities of the respective medium or any other existing colour specifications is permissible.
Use for other purposes, including use with other versions of the 1LCF, is not permitted. In case of doubt, please contact us before use.
▲ Are the Scripture references from the historical editions? And, by the way, there's one that doesn’t fit!
The historical editions of the Confession were published in a situation of persecution. After the printing of the second edition, two people responsible, Benjamin Cox and Samuel Richardson, were arrested and taken to task for publishing it, as can be seen in the Journal of the House of Commons.
In this situation, there were a number of discernible errors in the compilation of the biblical reference texts, which suggest great constraints of time. The editor of a modernised version of the text (Wenkel, David: The London Baptist Confession of 1646 – A Modern Version for the Church Today, Belfast und Greenville, 2017) writes in this regard, referring to his own edition (p. 21):
“In a few instances, proof-texts have been changed because it is evident there was a mistake by the authors or printer.”
The list of references for the Comprehensive Version has been completely redone. The positions of the references in the text are for the most part still the historical ones, but we reserve the right to revise the list of references again and fundamentally in a later edition. Whether in this or a later edition – it can always happen that the reference of a biblical passage to the statement made in the article is not seen the same way by readers. Let us also listen to David Wenkel on this (from the same page as above):
“It should be possible for a church to adopt this confession without adopting all of the individual decisions about various supporting bible verses.”
▲ This confession in the Comprehensive Version has 52 articles. I once read that the 1LCF had 53 articles. Which is correct?
It is widely claimed that the first edition of the 1LCF has 53 articles. Although this is the prevailing opinion, the assumption is incorrect, as a look at the facsimiles of the editions will show.
Following the 52 numbered articles of the first edition there is another passage which – like the previous one – is headed with the roman numeral LII. This is obviously a typesetting error which needs to be corrected – as there cannot be two Articles 52, the natural assumption is that the second passage is in fact meant to be a fifty-third article. Actually, the copy in the Angus Library at Oxford has been corrected by a previous owner accordingly, adding by hand the missing line to form LIII. The content of this passage, however, does not really deal with any theological statements about biblical beliefs to be confessed, but rather gives reasons and motivation for publishing a confession of faith.
With the publishing of the 1646 edition (“The second impression corrected [!] and enlarged”), however, the assumption that this was meant to be a further article can no longer be maintained. The passage in question, which in 1644 begins with the words “And thus we desire to give unto God” after the 1646 revision starts with “And thus we desire to give unto Christ”. It is clearly the revised equivalent. Rather than headed with an article number like LIII, it is titled “The Conclusion”.
Also, when a new Article 5 was included in 1646, the editors made sure to combine both former Articles 7 and 8, both dealing with Holy Scripture, under the number 8, showing an intention to – at that time – keep the number of articles at 52.
This means that the 1644 edition just has an error in the typesetting of the heading for the closing passage following Article 52, and while at first it may have seemed obvious to interpret this as a further article (LIII), the correction made by the editors themselves about fourteen months later forbids this interpretation as the 1644 edition also has 52 articles.
That the 1651 and 1652 editions have only 51 articles is undisputed; the previous Article 38 on the remuneration of pastors has been left out.
