Catholicity and The Covenant of Works: James Ussher and The Reformed Tradition (Oxford Studies in Historical Theology) 1st Edition Harrison Perkins

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Catholicity and the Covenant of Works
OX F O R D S T U D I E S I N H I S T O R IC A L T H E O L O G Y
Series Editor
Richard A. Muller, Calvin Theological Seminary
Founding Editor
David C. Steinmetz †
Editorial Board
Robert C. Gregg, Stanford University
George M. Marsden, University of Notre Dame
Wayne A. Meeks, Yale University
Gerhard Sauter, Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn
Susan E. Schreiner, University of Chicago
John Van Engen, University of Notre Dame
Robert L. Wilken, University of Virginia
AUGUSTINE, THE TRINITY, AND THE ANTOINE DE CHANDIEU

CHURCH The Silver Horn of Geneva’s Reformed
A Reading of the Anti-Donatist Sermons Triumvirate
Adam Ployd Theodore G. Van Raalte
AUGUSTINE’S EARLY THEOLOGY OF ORTHODOX RADICALS
IMAGE Baptist Identity in the English Revolution
A Study in the Development of Pro-Nicene Matthew C. Bingham
Theology
DIVINE PERFECTION AND HUMAN
Gerald Boersma
POTENTIALITY
PATRON SAINT AND PROPHET The Trinitarian Anthropology of Hilary of Poitiers
Jan Hus in the Bohemian and German Jarred A. Mercer
Reformations
THE GERMAN AWAKENING
Phillip N. Haberkern Protestant Renewal after the Enlightenment,
JOHN OWEN AND ENGLISH PURITANISM 1815–1848
Experiences of Defeat Andrew Kloes
Crawford Gribben THE REGENSBURG ARTICLE 5 ON
MORALITY AFTER CALVIN JUSTIFICATION
Theodore Beza’s Christian Censor and Inconsistent Patchwork or Substance of True
Reformed Ethics Doctrine?
Kirk M. Summers Anthony N. S. Lane
THE PAPACY AND THE ORTHODOX AUGUSTINE ON THE WILL
A History of Reception and Rejection A Theological Account
Edward Siecienski Han-luen Kantzer Komline
DEBATING PERSEVERANCE THE SYNOD OF PISTORIA AND
The Augustinian Heritage in Post-Reformation VATICAN II
England Jansenism and the Struggle for Catholic Reform
Jay T. Collier Shaun Blanchard
THE REFORMATION OF PROPHECY CATHOLICITY AND THE COVENANT
Early Modern Interpretations of the Prophet & OF WORKS
Old Testament Prophecy James Ussher and the Reformed Tradition
G. Sujin Pak Harrison Perkins
Catholicity and
the Covenant of Works
James Ussher and the Reformed Tradition
HA R R I S O N P E R K I N S
1
3
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Perkins, Harrison, author.
Title: Catholicity and the covenant of works : James Ussher
and the Reformed tradition /Harrison Perkins.
Description: New York, NY, United States of America : Oxford University Press, 2020. |
Series: Oxford studies in historical theology |
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2020003954 (print) | LCCN 2020003955 (ebook) |
ISBN 9780197514184 (hardback) | ISBN 9780197514191 (updf)|
ISBN 9780197514207 (epub) | ISBN 9780197514214 (online)
Subjects: LCSH: Ussher, James, 1581–1656. |
Church of Ireland—Doctrines—History—17th century. |
Covenant theology—History of doctrines—17th century. |
Reformed Church—Doctrines—History—17th century. |
Predestination—History of doctrines—17th century. |
Jesus Christ—History of doctrines—17th century. |
Salvation—History of doctrines—17th century.
Classification: LCC BX5595.U8 P46 2020 (print) |
LCC BX5595.U8 (ebook) | DDC 283.092—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020003954
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020003955
1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2
Printed by Integrated Books International, United States of America
For Sarah,
in deepest thanks to be in covenant with you
Contents
Acknowledgments ix
List of Abbreviations xiii
Introduction 1
1. James Ussher, Covenant Theology, and Theological Contexts 4
2. The Content of the Covenant of Works 41
3. Developing and Debating the Covenant of Works 85
4. The Covenant of Works and Predestination 126
5. The Covenant of Works and Christology 166
6. The Covenant of Works and the Doctrines of Salvation 209
Conclusion 254
Bibliography 267
Index 289
Acknowledgments
I am grateful even for the chance to have written on James Ussher, and
those who have made it possible have my deepest gratitude. The most mate-
rial thanks must go to Crawford Gribben, my former supervisor at Queen’s
University Belfast, for his tireless reading, editing, and commenting on many
drafts of this work. I am inestimably grateful for his long hours of work on
my project and the way he has shaped my thinking about everything we do as
scholars, and also for his (if he will permit) friendship over these last several
years. It was a real privilege to study under his tutelage. Ian W. S. Campbell
also read and commented on all but one of these chapters, and his guidance
in the field of intellectual history and insight into proper historical method
have been a rudder into a more precise way of sorting difficult issues. Martyn
Cowan of Union Theological College in Belfast also read and commented on
most of this work, and his advice on the broader social dynamics at work in
theological discussion was indispensable. I am especially grateful to Todd
M. Rester for his hours of tutoring me in Latin and reading over my transla-
tion work. Todd was a welcome American friend in Belfast and has quickly
become one of my favorite people. It would be very difficult to overstate my
appreciation for Todd as a friend and as a scholar. Richard Snoddy has been
a true gentleman and essential friend as he welcomed me into Ussher studies
and gave inestimably helpful guidance, especially in the early phases of my re-
search. John Fesko has also been a faithful conversation partner and encour-
ager, and I am grateful for his support as well as his knowledge of covenant
theology. Thanks also to Bryan Estelle for his feedback on Chapter 3. I assur-
edly must thank Stephen Hampton and Michael McClenahan, who examined
my PhD thesis, for their helpful input about the Reformed and Conformist
traditions. I also must thank the anonymous examiners at Oxford University
Press for suggestions that improved the work overall. Thanks to Michael
Lynch for looking over my brief discussion of John Davenant and providing
me with a copy of his dissertation. Of course, I am responsible for any lin-
gering mistakes and inaccuracies throughout this study. I certainly need to
thank as well Matt Bingham for his inexhaustible insight about moving over-
seas and his friendship in Belfast and London, Karie Schultz for her good
x Acknowledgments
humor and friendship in our Latin seminars, Floris Verhaart for his help with
some difficult Latin reconstructions, and David Whitla for conversations
about paleography and puritanism. I even more must thank R. Scott Clark,
who supervised a directed study paper on James Ussher’s covenant theology
that was the beginning of this work, for showing me the value of covenant
theology, sparking my interest its history, setting me on the trail that led to
this book, and foremost for showing me how to be a Reformed churchman
with a passion to read the Bible with our forebears.
There have been many invaluable libraries along the way. Thanks must go
preeminently to the McClay Library of Queen’s University Belfast for their
ongoing help in obtaining resources. I am grateful to the Folger Shakespeare
Library in Washington, D.C., for funding my travel and stay to undertake
research in early modern paleography at their facility. Thanks must specifi-
cally go to Heather Wolfe for her excellent training on seventeenth-century
handwriting, and for making sure that I was able to view certain manuscripts
that were in less than ideal condition for consultation. I am also grateful
to the librarians in the manuscripts departments at Cambridge University
Library and the Bodleian Library of Oxford University. They have continu-
ally provided excellent help to a visiting student, and I am thankful for their
help in locating, investigating, and using the many manuscripts connected
to Ussher. Thanks must go to Amanda Saville of Queen’s College, Oxford,
and Anna Sander of Baliol College, Oxford, for their assistance in accessing
important sources. The archivists in the manuscripts room at Trinity
College, Dublin, have put up with me sitting for entire days in their reading
room, and I am grateful for their patience, and certainly for their help in
accessing many of Ussher’s papers. Thanks to the British Library for making
so many rich resources easily accessible. Special thanks to Ben Farwell, who
sent me a copy of his thesis on Ussher, which would have been impossible to
obtain through library systems. Thanks also to Calvin Theological Journal
for their permission to use material from my previously published article in
chapter 3.
There seems to be countless people that deserve my personal gratitude.
To David W. Hall and the session and congregation of Midway Presbyterian
Church, I am infinitely thankful for granting me the ACTS doctoral schol-
arship each year of my studies. Your support has been invaluable. Dr. Hall
has always been enthusiastic about my work and its potential, and I only
hope it does not disappoint. To the people of Trinity Fellowship Church in
Chula Vista, California, none of this work would be possible without your
Acknowledgments xi
continued financial and personal support. Chris and Kayla Pinto supported
us faithfully, and even made the trek from the United States to make sure
my wife and I had American company for our first Christmas in the United
Kingdom. Trey and Alaina Jasso have given regular financial support, and
Trey has always been quick to answer text messages and provide help at every
turn. Stanley McFarland has been of continual encouragement, and he and
Adeline have been tremendous friends to my wife and me. Their help to let
Sarah visit family will have our lasting gratitude. Michael, Helen, Victoria,
Andy, and Catherine Clarke have been immensely generous to us. We could
not have made it without your support and your welcoming us into so many
moments of your family life. Graham Connor was gracious enough to let
me work alongside him for the years I spent in Northern Ireland, and I am
thankful for his professional wisdom and personal support. Matt and Erin
Francisco were faithful supporters of us every month, and Matt’s confi-
dence in my usefulness is a permanent cause of motivation. I am certainly
grateful to Harry and Cindy Reeder for their early support in coming to the
United Kingdom, and for Dr. Reeder’s ongoing mentorship and correspond-
ence. Judith Riddell deserves massive thanks for welcoming us to the United
Kingdom and offering us a place to stay for the first stretch of our lives there.
She is a wonderful friend and a generously hospitable host. Colin Campbell,
of course, needs mention for always giving me the best deals he could on
books, the lifeblood of a scholar. Thanks to Moore Casement for hiring me as
a lecturer at Cornhill Belfast and keeping me as lecturer when it is less con-
venient to do so. Allison Dossett always made sure that our update letters
were displayed at New Life Presbyterian Church, La Mesa, and I am thankful
not only for her faithfulness in that but also for the endless friendship she,
Jim, and Jennifer have given us over the years. Ronnie and Anna Curfman
have been committed friends, and their generous support has been an im-
mense help. There are numerous people who gave us one-time financial gifts
to help us as we prepared to move internationally. There is not space to list
you all, but I am grateful for your support. I owe a heavy debt of gratitude to
Scott McDermand, who, for whatever reason, keeps thinking my thoughts
are worth something. Thanks as well to Olan Stubbs, who offers a constant
stream of personal support and advice. You have no idea how far it goes to
have you in my corner. Thanks must also go to Andy Pearson, the best boss
I have, but more so a friend and ally, who has been immensely supportive
even in our short time as colleagues by permitting me to use time for ac-
ademic studies. In that regard, I need to thank London City Presbyterian
xii Acknowledgments
Church for now having me as their assistant minister, and for encouraging
me in the pursuit of rigorous study.
I have been indeterminately blessed with my in-laws, Patrick and Shirley
Wade. Their support has been more than of great value, and I’m immensely
thankful for them. Nana and Peepaw Wade are always more than giving and
supportive, as is Nanny Moore. My father, Robert Perkins, sent boxes of
American food to cure homesickness. My mom, Denise Perkins, proofread
every chapter, remained interested, and helped in every way that she possibly
could along the way. There is obviously no way I would have completed this
work without her contributions.
I owe the deepest and most substantial thanks to my wife, Sarah. She has
been the champion of my work since the first moment of our life together,
and in moments of delusion continues to think I am a “big deal.” She has
put countless hours into making sure this work happened. She is my fore-
most source of earthly happiness, and words cannot do justice to the grati-
tude I have for her and the thanks I wish I could offer her. There is no better
companion in this world for me than she is, and I am more than thankful to
be in covenant with her.
Harrison Perkins
London, 2019
Abbreviations
AH Archivium Hibernicum
AJT Asia Journal of Theology
Albion Albion: A Quarterly Journal Concerned with British Studies
AMW Anselm of Canterbury, The Major Works, edited by Brian Davies
and G. R. Evans (Oxford: OUP, 1998).
ANF Ante-Nicene Fathers, 10 volumes, edited by Philip Schaff (Buffalo,
NY: The Christian Literature Publishing Co., 1885)
AFR Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte
English Articles Articles agreed upon by the archbishops and bishops of both
provinces, and the whole cleargie: in the convocation holden at
London, in the yeere 1562 (London, 1628)
ATR Anglican Theological Review
BL British Library
Bodl. Bodleian Library
CH Church History
CO Ioannus Calvini Opera Quae Supersunt Omnia, Corpus
Reformatorum, volumes 29–87, edited by Guilielmus Baum,
Eduardus Cunitz, and Eduardus Reuss (Braunschweig: C.
A. Schwetschke and Sons, 1864)
CQR Church Quarterly Review
CTJ Calvin Theological Journal
CTQ Concordia Theological Quarterly
CUL Cambridge University Library
CUP Cambridge University Press
DLGTT Richard A. Muller, Dictionary of Latin and Greek Theological
Terms Drawn Principally from Protestant Scholastic Theology, 2nd
ed. (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2017)
EEBO Early English Books Online
EQ Evangelical Quarterly
HI History Ireland
HJ The Historical Journal
HLQ Huntington Library Quarterly
HTR Harvard Theological Review
IHS Irish Historical Studies
Irish Articles Articles of Religion Agreed upon by the Archbishops and Bishops,
and the Rest of the Clergie of Ireland (Dublin, 1615)
xiv Abbreviations
ITQ Irish Theological Quarterly

JBQ Jewish Biblical Quarterly
JBS Journal of British Studies
JEH The Journal of Ecclesiastical History
JETS Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society
JTI Journal of Theological Interpretation
JTS The Journal of Theological Studies
LQHR The London Quarterly and Holborn Review
LW William Laud, The Works of the Most Reverend Father in God,
William Laud, D.D., 7 volumes, edited by W. Scott and J. Bliss
(Oxford: John Henry Parker, 1847–1860)
MAJT Mid-America Journal of Theology
MPT Medieval Philosophy and Theology
MPWA The Minutes and Papers of the Westminster Assembly 1643–1652,
5 volumes, edited by Chad Van Dixhoorn (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2012)
MUP Manchester University Press
NPNF Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, edited by Philip Schaff
(Grand Rapids, MI: Christian Classics Ethereal Library)
ODNB Oxford Dictionary of National Biography
OUP Oxford University Press
P&P Past & Present
PRJ Puritan Reformed Journal
PRDL Post-Reformation Digital Library
PRRD Richard A. Muller, Post-Reformation Reformed Dogmatics: The
Rise and Development of Reformed Orthodoxy, ca. 1520
to ca. 1725, 2nd ed., 4 volumes (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker
Academic, 2003)
RHB Reformation Heritage Books
RRR Reformation and Renaissance Review
RTR Reformed Theological Review
SAJ The Saint Anselm Journal
SBET Scottish Bulletin of Evangelical Theology
SC The Seventeenth Century
SCG Thomas Aquinas, The Summa Contra Gentiles, translated by the
English Dominican Fathers, 4 volumes (London: Burns Oates &
Washbourne Ltd., 1924)
SCJ Sixteenth Century Journal
SH Studia Hibernica
SJT Scottish Journal of Theology
Abbreviations xv
ST Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, translated by the Fathers

of the English Dominican Province, 5 volumes (Notre Dame,
IN: Christian Classics, 1948)
TCD Trinity College, Dublin
TS Theological Studies
TJ Trinity Journal
TynBul Tyndale Bulletin
UW James Ussher, The Whole Works of the Most Rev. James Ussher
D.D., Lord Archbishop of Armagh, and Primate of All Ireland,
17 volumes, edited by Charles R. Elrington and J. H. Todd
(Dublin: Hodges, Smith, and Co., 1829–1864)
V&R Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht
WCF The humble advice of the Assembly of Divines, now by authority
of Parliament sitting at Westminster, concerning a confession
of faith, presented by them lately to both houses of Parliament
(London: Printed for the Company of Stationers, [1646])
WTJ Westminster Theological Journal
WWP William Perkins, The Workes of That Famous and Worthy
Minister of Christ in the Universitie of Cambridge, Mr. William
Perkins, 3 volumes (London: John Legatt, 1626)
Introduction
This book is about how James Ussher, a highly prominent Irish archbishop
of the seventeenth century who stood in the Reformed tradition, integrated
a doctrine called the covenant of works throughout his theological system.
This doctrine taught that God made a covenant with Adam, the first person,
and in this covenant offered him eternal blessings if he rendered perfect obe-
dience during a period of probation. The deeper specifics of Ussher’s im-
portance and the theological content of the covenant of works are explained
in the first chapter and spelled out at length throughout this work, and so
this introduction is meant simply to give a basic sketch of what follows. The
crucial point demonstrated throughout is that Ussher used the covenant of
works to inform many of the most important features of his theology. The
covenant of works is most associated with the Reformed tradition, but when
the interconnectedness of the various doctrines is explained, it becomes ob-
vious that Ussher constructed his understanding of this covenant from very
traditional teachings that he appropriated from the ancient and medieval
church. Ussher’s unity with the Christian past shows how even theological
developments in the Reformed tradition were not truly novel, which is why
this study emphasizes the catholic aspects of Ussher’s doctrine of the cov-
enant. It should be obvious that in this respect “catholic” refers not to the
Roman church but to the universality of certain ideas in the Christian tra-
dition; this point does not entail much connection between Ussher’s the-
ology and Roman Catholicism, but it does underscore the link between the
Reformed doctrine of the covenant of works and several generally accepted
premises of the broader Christian past. This link creates an opportunity to
explore some of the underpinning intellectual foundations of this doctrine,
and this exploration reveals that many Reformed theologians built their in-
dividual formulations of the covenant of works within different and eclectic
philosophical apparatuses. The present study has sought to advance our un-
derstanding of the underlying issues involved in early modern constructions
of the covenant of works in more detail than any previous study has done.
Further, Ussher is an interesting case study in regard to covenant theology
Catholicity and the Covenant of Works. Harrison Perkins, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780197514184.001.0001
2 Catholicity and the Covenant of Works
because, although covenant theology is mostly associated with puritanism,

Ussher was a conformist, meaning he adapted to the practices of the estab-
lished church. The arguments that follow advance the notion that there were
thoroughly Reformed clergy who do not fit some descriptions of the rad-
ical puritans. These points help to add nuance to our understanding of early
modern religion and the complexities of doctrinal debate in the seventeenth
century.
This book emphatically prioritizes the use of manuscript sources. The
advent of EEBO, PRDL, and other online databases that provide instant
and easy access to early modern print sources has overwhelmed the schol-
arly world with an embarrassment of resources, but it has also made those
print sources no longer a rare commodity. Due to the ready availability of
original editions through these databases, this work cites early modern
printings unless there is a modern scholarly edition. In these instances, the
books were printed in London unless otherwise noted. Nevertheless, the cut-
ting edge of historical research has become engagement with archival and
manuscript material because those are the sources that are most difficult to
access and require the most skill to decipher and analyze. For this reason,
Ussher’s extant manuscripts feature prominently as some of the most impor-
tant sources for understanding his theology and ministry. Previous Ussher
scholars, including Alan Ford and Richard Snoddy, have used some of these
manuscripts, but some have not appeared in earlier bibliographies of Ussher
research. Moreover, the Latin manuscripts have been fronted as incredibly
crucial windows into Ussher’s teaching because far too many studies of early
modern theology in England opt for a focus on English-language sources.
These Latin manuscripts have never been translated before, and oftentimes
they have needed to be reconstructed from abbreviated shorthand or from
letters lost in the gutter of bound papers. Because these manuscripts are not
available outside the libraries where they are housed, the characters I have
supplied are indicated in square brackets, but I have not made extended
justification for my critical decisions there. Most of them follow standard
abbreviations. A published edition of some of these manuscripts, which I am
nearly finished preparing, will follow this work and provide a rationale for
all of these reconstructive decisions. All translations of Latin and Greek texts
are my own, so I have provided the original and often reconstructed Latin
in the footnotes. (The only exceptions are Thomas Aquinas’s works and one
work by Robert Rollock, which have modern critical translations that I have
cited. Instances where I differ from these chosen translations are noted.) It
Introduction 3
is the assumption of this book that deep engagement with these manuscript
sources will advance historical scholarship into a richer understanding of the
minutiae of early modern religion, even those ideas that were disseminated
at times outside of the public mainstream of publication and distribution,
and specifically will shed the best light on the catholicity of the covenant of
works and James Ussher in the Reformed tradition.
1
James Ussher, Covenant Theology,
and Theological Contexts
Introduction
James Ussher (1581–1656), theologian, controversialist, and archbishop

of Armagh, made one of the most important contributions to the devel-
opment of the doctrine of the covenant of works within the history of
Reformed Protestant theology. Many Reformed theologians before Ussher
had emphasized the genealogical connection between Adam and the rest of
humanity, making their view of his headship more philosophically realist
and grounded in biology.1 Ussher, however, developed a more legally driven
view that highlighted a more forensic account of anthropology and soteri-
ology that was grounded in God’s covenant. This book explores how Ussher
constructed the covenant motif as the linchpin of his theological system.
Ussher used this covenant between God and Adam in the Garden of Eden as
a paradigm to understand God’s law, anthropology, human destiny, predes-
tination, Christology, and salvation. He never wrote a treatise on covenant
theology, which may explain why the secondary literature has substantially
overlooked him on this issue, but he did support his theological formulations
by tying them to the idea of covenant. He also preached regularly on the
covenant idea and weaved it throughout his catechisms to structure several
theological loci.
The purpose of this work is to explore Ussher’s articulation of the covenant
of works in reference to its broader significance for early modern religion.
Although some studies have scratched the surface of the historical develop-
ment of this covenant by looking at its growing popularity in the seventeenth
century, no research has traced how it actually resulted from the convergence
1 Aaron C. Denlinger, Omnes in Adam ex pacto Dei: Ambrogio Catarino’s Doctrine of Covenantal
Solidarity and Its Influence on Post-

Reformation Reformed Theologians (Göttingen: V&R,
2010), 38–39.
Catholicity and the Covenant of Works. Harrison Perkins, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780197514184.001.0001
Ussher, Covenant Theology, Contexts 5
of important doctrinal themes latent in the Christian tradition.2 This study

looks at how Ussher tied several traditional theological premises together by
using the covenant of works motif.
The first theme relates to metaphysics. In the medieval period, intellec-
tualism and voluntarism were competing outlooks, with intellectualism
prioritizing the mind and voluntarism prioritizing the will or choice.3 The
intellectualist emphasis on the mind argued that reason was more funda-
mental than choice; in other words, the mind determines the will.4 God’s
nature or character, therefore, governed the way that he chose to shape the
created order.5 In this intellectualist view, God built an unchangeable nat-
ural law that reflected his character into creation.6 That law was unchange-
able because God’s nature was immutable.7 The voluntarist emphasis on the
will, on the other hand, was more arbitrary, in that voluntarists thought that
God made the world according to principles he chose rather than principles
he knew according to his own nature.8 God’s decisions, which were utterly
free, determined how the world would work, and the law was not neces-
sarily unchangeable, since God’s will determined its contents.9 Early modern
Reformed theologians were eclectic in their appropriation of philosophical
categories, and neither intellectualism nor voluntarism committed them to
specific other views. As this study shows, different theologians taught very
similar doctrines of the covenant of works, although some built their view on
intellectualist principles and others on voluntarist principles. The point is not
that either paradigm was better, nor that one was more Reformed, nor even
2 Andrew A. Woolsey, Unity and Continuity in Covenantal Thought: A Study in the Reformed
Tradition to the Westminster Assembly (Grand Rapids, MI: RHB, 2012), 399–539; Joel R. Beeke and
Mark Jones, A Puritan Theology: Doctrine for Life (Grand Rapids, MI: RHB, 2012), 217–36; R. Scott
Clark, “Christ and Covenant: Federal Theology in Orthodoxy,” in Herman J. Selderhuis (ed.), A
Companion to Reformed Orthodoxy (Leiden: Brill, 2013), 425–26.
3 Jeffrey Hause, “Thomas Aquinas and the Voluntarists,” MPT 6 (1997): 168.
4 Irena Backus, “Calvin’s Concept of Natural and Roman Law,” CTJ 38 (2003): 10–15.
5 ST, 1a2ae.91.1.
6 David Dickson, Truths Victory over Error (Edinburgh, 1684), 137–39; Robert von Friedburg,
“The Rise of Natural Law in the Early Modern Period,” in Ulrich L. Lehner, Richard A. Muller, and
A. G. Roeber (eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Early Modern Theology, 1600–1800 (New York: OUP,
2016), 629; Stephen J. Casselli, Divine Rule Maintained: Anthony Burgess, Covenant Theology, and the
Place of the Law in Reformed Scholasticism (Grand Rapids, MI: RHB, 2016), 61–62.
7 William Ames, Substance of Christian Religion (1659), 41; Backus, “Calvin’s Concept of Natural
and Roman Law,” 11–12.

8 Francis Oakley, “Medieval Theories of Natural Law: William of Ockham and the Significance of
the Voluntarist Tradition,” Natural Law Forum (1960): 65–83.

9 WWP 1:32 (this book typically cites original editions or the last edition prepared by the author,
unless a critical text exists, but Ussher owned this 1626 edition of Perkins’ collected works); TCD MS
6, fol. 125r. Ussher certainly interacted with this version of Perkins’ writings, so it is used throughout.
that theologians were entirely consistent with one viewpoint, but simply that
both outlooks were present in the period and contributed to Reformed doc-
trinal formulation. That said, however, this work argues that Ussher normally
favored the intellectualist position and that its presuppositions were woven
throughout his doctrinal views. This study uses Thomas Aquinas (1225–
1274) as the exemplar of the intellectualist paradigm and argues throughout
that Ussher leaned in a decidedly Thomist direction. Ussher’s intellectualism
connected to the covenant of works in that the terms or conditions of that
covenant linked to the natural law, which is the second theme Ussher wove
into the covenant of works. God made humanity in his image, and his char-
acter was reflected in the law of nature that he hardwired into them.10 Ussher
taught that the covenant of works rose from this natural law, as God added
the promise of eternal life as the reward for fulfilling the law.11 Ussher’s third
theme tied into this doctrine was that God appointed Adam as the repre-
sentative head of this covenant, which meant that Adam’s success or failure
determined the eternal outcome for the rest of humanity. These three themes
of philosophical intellectualism, the law’s foundational role in shaping the re-
lationship between God and Adam, and Adam’s representative role as a head
of humanity run throughout this work.
These ideas were not novel in the early modern period but were embedded in
the broader Christian tradition, which shows that the covenant of works itself
was not novel but was an integration, repackaging, and redeploying of several
catholic ideas for the purposes of furthering a thoroughly Reformed theology.
There was, therefore, at least in the roots of the idea, an underlying catholicity
to Ussher’s construction of the covenant of works, which is a major point that is
highlighted throughout this study and is one of its fundamental claims.
Another purpose of this work is to analyze the boundaries of the Reformed
tradition in early modern Ireland and England.12 Ussher was a conformist,
meaning that he accepted many of the practices and structures of the estab-
lished church, but, as Stephen Hampton has shown, it has often been incor-
rectly assumed that Reformed theology in the seventeenth century conflicted
with conformity.13 This view needs to be abandoned in light of someone like
10 Stephen Hampton, “Sin, Grace, and Free Choice in Post-Reformation Reformed Theology,” in
Oxford Handbook of Early Modern Theology, 237–40; Casselli, Divine Rule Maintained, 51–53.
11 Casselli, Divine Rule Maintained, 61–77.
12 PRRD 1:28–30.
13 Stephen Hampton, Anti-Arminians: The Anglican Reformed Tradition from Charles II to George I
(Oxford: OUP, 2008), 3–10.

Ussher.14 Alan Ford wrote, “He was a divine right, firmly royalist bishop,
yet, at the same time, he was also a strong Calvinist and friend of puritans,
parliamentarians and Presbyterians.”15 Ussher had connections across the
ecclesiastical landscape and, moreover, held sway in a variety of camps. As
will be shown, he played a major role in codifying the doctrine of the cov-
enant of works, which became a hallmark Reformed doctrine, and his role
solidifies the notion of rigorous Reformed divinity within the established
church.16 His influence was far-reaching among the Reformed, but he still
maintained his conformity to the established church. More space must be
made for the category of Reformed conformists because the reductionist cat-
egories of Anglicans and puritans are no longer adequate to explain the broad
spectrum of divinity and churchmanship in seventeenth-century Ireland
and England.17 W. B. Patterson argued that William Perkins was essentially
a conformist in the late Tudor period, and Hampton has revealed the preva-
lence of Reformed conformity after the Restoration.18 Ussher exemplifies the
presence of Reformed conformity in the early Stuart period, and his experi-
ence suggests that this camp may well have remained the most stable theo-
logical position throughout the quickly shifting political landscape.
On this note, conformity is likely best understood predominantly in terms
of the established church’s canon law, a topic that has gone overlooked in
the disputes about defining puritanism and which explains several features
of Ussher’s career that have long been debated.19 Canon law was a disputed
issue in the English church ever since its split from the Roman See, but Ussher
ministered during a time when the 1604 canons were in force.20 Using canon
law as a measure of conformity explains why Ussher preached in his episcopal
habit, enforced wearing the surplice, and maintained worship according to
14 Peter Lake, “‘Puritans’ and ‘Anglicans’ in the Post-Reformation Church,” in Anthony Milton
(ed.), The Oxford History of Anglicanism, Volume I: Reformation and Identity, c. 1520– 1662
(New York: OUP, 2017), 352–79; Stephen Hampton, “The Manuscript Sermons of Archbishop John
Williams,” JEH 62, no. 4 (2011): 707–25.
15 Alan Ford, “One Church, Two Histories: The Jacobean and the Caroline Traditions in the
Church of Ireland, 1600–2000,” in Mark Empey, Alan Ford, and Miriam Moffitt (eds.), The Church of
Ireland and Its Past: History, Interpretation and Identity (Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2017), 297.
16 Stephen Hampton, “Confessional Identity,” in Oxford History of Anglicanism, 210–27.
17 Kenneth Fincham and Stephen Taylor, “Episcopalian Identity, 1640–1662,” in Oxford History of
Anglicanism, 457–81; Stephen Hampton, “Richard Holdsworth and the Antinomian Controversy,”
JTS 62, no. 1 (April 2011): 218–50; Hampton, “Confessional Identity,” 210–27.
18 W. B. Patterson, William Perkins and the Making of Protestant England (New York: OUP, 2014),
40–63; Hampton, Anti-Arminians, 1–38.

19 I appreciate Stephen Hampton’s comments in person that motivated me to think along
these lines.
20 Gerald Bray, “Canon Law and the Church of England,” in Oxford History of Anglicanism, 168–85.
the Book of Common Prayer but omitted certain ceremonial practices and
neglected to set the communion tables altarwise, as they had been under
papal authority, when Archbishop William Laud commanded it.21 Canon
law required certain clerical dress and use of liturgical forms, but it did not
demand—even if it defended—bowing at Jesus’ name, making the sign of the
cross, or setting the communion tables altarwise.22 Ussher not only preferred
things otherwise but also knew that historical practice varied on these is-
sues.23 Ussher’s personal practice, which differed from what he required of all
the ministers under his jurisdiction, and his flexibility on these issues during
the 1630s and 1640s likely related to the differences between the English and
Irish ecclesiastical canons on issues such as dress and prayer book subscrip-
tion, and those differences certainly complicate the issue of using canon law
to describe conformity and puritanism more accurately.24 More to the point,
however, Ussher’s emphatic use of the covenant of works and its intersecting
themes underscores his commitment to broad catholicity as well as to rig-
orous Reformed divinity, and he does not appear to have thought that these
theological commitments conflicted with his conforming ecclesiology.
Ussher’s use of the covenant of works needs to be framed within the
broader Reformed development of covenant theology. Protestants always
prioritized doctrinal clarity and precision, and covenant theology was part
of the ongoing Reformation endeavor to refine and integrate the elements
of biblical doctrine.25 God’s relationship to humanity and the coordination
of grace and works were perennial debates among the Reformed, and cov-
enant theology was one of several structures that Reformed theologians
designed to address these issues.26 Some of the earliest Reformed uses of cov-
enant were implemented to relate justification and sanctification in light of
Roman Catholic criticisms, but the idea of covenant was increasingly used to
21 Nicholas Bernard, Clavi Trabales (London, 1661), 57–61; Alan Ford, James Ussher: Theology,
History, and Politics in Early-Modern Ireland and England (New York: OUP, 2007), 56, 164–73, 205–6;
Kenneth Fincham, “The Restoration of Altars in the 1630s,” HJ 44, no. 4 (December 2001): 919–40.
22 [Church of England], Constitutions and Canons Ecclesiasticall (1604), canons IV, VI, XIIII, XVI,
XVII, XXIIII, XXV, LVIII, LXXXII.

23 E.g., The Correspondence of James Ussher, 1600–56, ed. Elizabethanne Boran, 3 vols. (Dublin: Irish
Manuscripts Commission, 2015), 1:250 (letter to John Selden dated April 16, 1622).
24 [Church of Ireland], Constitutions, and Canons Ecclesiastical (Dublin, 1635); Ford, Ussher,
178–97.
25 Willem J. van Asselt, “Christ, Predestination, and Covenant in Post- Reformation Reformed
Theology,” in Oxford Handbook of Early Modern Theology, 222–23.
26 David A. Weir, The Origins of the Federal Theology in Sixteenth-Century Reformation Thought
(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1990), 1–36; Woolsey, Unity and Continuity, 45–52; Clark, “Christ and
Covenant,” 425–26.
organize the full range of doctrine—which Ussher would have described as

the “body of divinity.”27 Later developments in covenant theology included
the identification of two foundational covenants to govern humanity’s rela-
tionship to God.28 The covenant of works bound God to Adam so that Adam
could earn eternal paradise for himself and his posterity, but the covenant
of grace was God’s single plan to provide salvation in Christ across all eras
of history.29 Ussher adopted these conventions but also furthered them by
modifying older versions of the covenant of works and codifying them into
the confessional mainstream.
Ussher led that codification as the primary composer of the Irish Articles
(1615), which was the first Protestant confession to include explicitly the cov-
enant that God made with Adam.30 Other confessions defended the unity of
Old and New Testaments by using the covenant idea, but they never identified
this prelapsarian covenant as an official church doctrine. The Articles pushed
this covenantal formulation into the Reformed confessional mainstream,
and this confession’s importance should not be underestimated. The Articles,
formally authoritative from 1615 to 1634, delineated the established church’s
commitment to Reformed Protestantism, and Ireland’s predominantly Roman
Catholic context may explain the confession’s new specificity on matters
such as the covenant of works.31 Regardless, when Parliament convened the
Westminster Assembly as a theological advisory committee in the 1640s, the
divines used the Irish Articles as a source document for their confession.32
27 Richard A. Muller, “Reformed Theology Between 1600 and 1800,” in Oxford Handbook of Early
Modern Theology, 173–76; R. Scott Clark, Casper Olevian and the Substance of the Covenant: The
Double Benefit of Christ (Grand Rapids, MI: RHB, 2008), chs. 6–7.
28 Robert Letham, “The Foedus Operum: Some Factors Accounting for Its Development,” SCJ
14, no. 4 (1983): 457–67; Michael McGiffert, “Grace and Works: The Rise of Covenant Divinity
in Elizabethan Puritanism,” HTR 75, no. 4 (1982): 463–502; Michael McGiffert, “From Moses
to Adam: The Making of the Covenant of Works,” SCJ 19, no. 2 (Summer 1988): 131–55; Michael
McGiffert, “Federal Theology,” in Francis J. Bremer and Tom Webster (eds.), Puritans and Puritanism
in Europe and America: A Comprehensive Encyclopedia (Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2006),
2:395–96; Richard A. Muller, “The Covenant of Works and the Stability of Divine Law in Seventeenth-
Century Reformed Orthodoxy,” CTJ 29 (1994): 75–101.
29 DLGTT, “foedus gratiae” and “foedus operum,” 128–29, 130–31; Muller, “Reformed Theology,”
174–76; van Asselt, “Christ, Predestination, and Covenant,” 221–25.

30 Ford, Ussher, 85–103.
31 S. J. Connolly, Contested Island: Ireland 1460– 1630 (Oxford: OUP, 2007), 37; S. J. Connolly,
Divided Kingdom: Ireland 1630–1800 (Oxford: OUP, 2008), 17–22; Tadgh O’Hannrachain, Catholic
Reformation in Ireland: The Mission of Riniccini, 1645–1649 (Oxford: OUP, 2002), 3.
32 Robert Bailie, Life of William, Now Lord Arch-Bishop of Canterbury Examined (1643), 15, 21;
Thomas Bayly, Certamen Religiosum (1651), 256, 325–26; William Bridge cited Ussher in his un-
paginated preface to John Brinsley, Gospel-Marrow (1659); Cornelius Burges, Case Concerning the
Buying of Bishops Lands (1659), 27; Cornelius Burges, Reasons Shewing the Necessity of Reformation
(1660), 53; Cornelius Burges, No Sacrilege nor Sin to Alienate or Purchase Cathedral Lands (1660),
Apart from Ussher’s personal success within the church by law established,
his Irish Articles helped shape Reformed theology across and beyond the
churches of the three Stuart kingdoms by influencing the divines at the
Westminster Assembly.33
35, 59, 60; Edmund Calamy, The City Remembrancer (1657), 13; Francis Cheynell, Sions Memento
(1643), 25, 26; Francis Cheynell, Chillingworthi novissima (1644), sig. D4v, sig. E2r; Francis
Cheynell, Divinity of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (1650), 259, 296, 299, 363; James Durham,
Commentarie upon the Book of the Revelation (Edinburgh, 1658), 341, 499; James Durham, A
Practical Exposition of the X Commandements (1675), sig. D2v–D3r; James Durham, The Law
Unsealed (Glasgow, 1676), [to the reader, 7]; John Dury, An Earnest Plea for a Gospel-Communion
(1654), 79–83; John Dury, Summarie Account of Mr. Iohn Dury’s Former and Latter Negotiation
(1657), 7; John Dury, The Earnest Breathings of Foreign Protestants (1658), 45–46; Daniel Featley,
Romish Fisher Caught and Held in His Owne Net (1624), sig. K3v, sig. P3v; Daniel Featley, Roma
Ruens, Romes Ruine (1644), 33; Daniel Featley, The Dippers Dipt (1645), 12; Daniel Featley, The
League Illegal (1660), 24, 39; Thomas Gataker, Last Will and Testament of Thomas Gataker (1654),
4; George Gillespie, Dispute Against the English-Popish Ceremonies ([Leiden], 1637), 3.4.9, 3.4.13,
3.8.1 (this work is cited as part, chapter, section, e.g., 1.1.1); Thomas Goodwin, Of the Knowledge
of God the Father, and His Son Jesus Christ, in Thankfull Owen and James Barron (eds.), Works of
Thomas Goodwin (1683), 16; Henry Hammond, Letter of Resolution (1653), 463; Henry Hammond,
Vindication of the Dissertations Concerning Episcopacie (1654), 41, 60, 146–47, 150–51; Henry
Hammond, Answer to the Animadversions (1654), 9, 10–11, 16, 24; Henry Hammond, Paraphrase
of Annotations upon All the Books of the New Testament (1659), sig. A3r–A3v, 865, 875; Thomas
Hill, Best and Worst of Paul (Cambridge, 1648), 15; Joshua Hoyle, A Reioynder to Master Malones
Reply Concerning Reall Presence (Dublin, 1641), sig. C3r–C4v; Edward Leigh, Treatise of Divinity
(1646), 119; Edward Leigh, Annotations upon All the New Testament Philologicall and Theologicall
(1650), 147, 148, 186–87; Edward Leigh, Treatise of Religion & Learning (1656), sig. A3r–A4v.;
Edward Leigh, Annotations on Five Poetical Books of the Old Testament (1657), sig. A4r; Edward
Leigh, Foelix Consortium (1663), sig. A3r–A4v; John Ley, Letter (Against the Erection of an Altar)
Written in Iune 29, 1635 (1641), 12; John Ley, Defensive Doubts (1641), sig. B2v–B3r; John Ley,
Sunday a Sabbath (1641), sig. A2r–C2r; Stephen Marshall, Defense of Infant-Baptism (1646),
34; William Nicholson, Ekthesis Pisteos (1661), 38; Samuel Rutherford, Divine Right of Church-
Government and Excommunication (1645), 5–6, 52, 59; John Selden, Dominion, or Ownership of
the Sea (1652), 274; William Twisse, Riches of Gods Love unto the Vessells of Mercy (Oxford, 1653),
1.58. 1.59, 2.13, 2.89, 2.90 (this work is cited as book and page number, e.g., 1.21); John Wallis, A
Defence of the Royal Society (1678), 26; Thomas Westfield, England’s Face in Israel’s Glass (1646),
2.76, 2.77 (the pagination restarts in this book, so I have indicated that this is the second round
of numbering by citing it as 2.76); Harrison Perkins, “The Westminster Assembly’s Probable
Appropriation of James Ussher,” SBET 37, no. 1 (Spring 2019): 45–63; Alan Ford, “Irish Articles
(1615),” in Puritans and Puritanism, 430–32; Richard A. Muller, “‘Inspired by God—Pure in All
Ages’: The Doctrine of Scripture in the Westminster Confession,” in Richard A. Muller and Roland
S. Ward, Scripture and Worship: Biblical Interpretation and the Directory for Worship (Phillipsburg,
NJ: P&R, 2007), 40–41; Alexander F. Mitchell, The Westminster Assembly: Its History and Standards
(Philadelphia: Presbyterian Board of Publication, 1884), 372–85; Phillip Schaff (ed.), The Creeds of
Christendom, 6th ed. (New York: Harper, 1931; repr., Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 1998), 1:665; B. B.
Warfield, The Westminster Assembly and Its Work (Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R, 1959; repr., Edmonton,
AB: Still Waters Revival Books, 1991), 1–257; Robert Letham, The Westminster Assembly: Reading
Its Theology in Historical Context (Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R, 2009), 62–83, 224–41; J. V. Fesko, The
Theology of the Westminster Standards: Historical Context and Theological Insights (Wheaton,
IL: Crossway, 2014), 60, 125–68; John McCafferty, “Ireland and Scotland, 1534–1663,” in Oxford
History of Anglicanism, 251; Ford, Ussher, 140 n. 38.
33 Muller, “Reformed Theology,” 170.

Framing Ussher Research
Ussher’s biography, particularly in regard to his ecclesiastical and scholarly

output, sheds light on his significance for the early modern period. He was
born into a prominent Dublin family on January 4, 1581, later becoming one
of Trinity College, Dublin’s first students and most influential teachers. As
the bishop of Meath (1621–25) and archbishop of Armagh (1625–56), his in-
ternational repute as a scholarly polymath helped him become the most sig-
nificant leader of the Church of Ireland in the seventeenth century.34 Today
he is most famous for suggesting that creation occurred “the night preceding
the twenty-third day of October” in 4004 BC, but this minor claim in a mas-
sive cross-disciplinary account of world history focused on the transmission
of pure doctrine should actually highlight the large scale of Ussher’s schol-
arship, which made him an authority in theology, history, and linguistics.35
He was in fact renowned well beyond his own churchly and schol-
arly circles, and various opposing parties competed for his legacy.36 James
I esteemed Ussher, and even William Laud, the anti-Calvinist archbishop
of Canterbury, respected him.37 The high Calvinist Congregationalist John
Owen and the controversial Presbyterian Richard Baxter, who vigorously
debated each other, both attempted to link themselves to Ussher.38 The poet
and propagandist John Milton trumpeted how he challenged “the giant
whom no one else dared to tackle.”39 Although Ussher refused to attend the
Westminster Assembly, many of its divines admired him and drew upon
34 Ford, Ussher, 1– 8; Richard Snoddy, The Soteriology of James Ussher: The Act and Object of
Saving Faith (New York: OUP, 2014), 1–4; R. Buick Knox, James Ussher: Archbishop of Armagh
(Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 1967), 7–11; Sara Jean Clausen, “Calvinism in the Anglican
Hierarchy, 1603–1643: Four Episcopal Examples,” PhD diss., Vanderbilt University, 1989, 226–27;
Nicholas Bernard, Life and Death of the Most Reverend and Learned Father of Our Church, Dr. James
Usher (1656); Richard Parr, Life of the Most Reverend Father in God, James Ussher (1686), 100.
35 James Ussher, Annales veteris testamenti (1650), 1 (in noctis illius initium, quae XXIII. diem
Octobris praecessit); Bernard, Life, 17, 54, 58–59, 83–85; Parr, Life, 100.
36 Alan Ford, “‘Making Dead Men Speak’: Manipulating the Memory of James Ussher,” in Mark
Williams and Stephen Paul Forrest (eds.), Constructing the Past: Writing Irish History, 1600–1800
(Woodbridge, UK: Boydell, 2010), 49–69.
37 Ford, Ussher, 2.
38 Crawford Gribben, John Owen and English Puritanism: Experiences of Defeat (New York: OUP,
2016), 188–89; Richard Baxter, Reliquiae Baxterianae (1696), Lib. I, 206. Despite his claim of famil-
iarity with Ussher and record of a discussion on church polity, Baxter also argued that if they had half
an hour together, they could have settled the English church. R. Buick Knox, “Archbishop Ussher and
Richard Baxter,” The Ecumenical Review 12, no. 1 (1959): 60; R. Buick Knox, James Ussher, Archbishop
of Armagh (Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 1967), 141, citing F. J. Powicke, A Life of the Reverend
Richard Baxter, 1615–1691 (London: Butler & Tanner, 1927), 126–27.
39 Hugh Trevor-Roper, Catholics, Anglicans and Puritans: Seventeenth Century Essays (Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 1988), 150.

his theology.40 In 1647, Parliament appointed Ussher to preach in London’s

Lincoln’s Inn, following in a tradition of well-known preachers including
John Donne (1572–1631), and, despite Ussher’s criticism of Parliament
during the civil war, they paid him an annual pension of £400 “in respect
of his great Worth and Learning; of his Fame abroad.”41 The vote to appoint
Ussher was not unanimous, but Parliament’s comment speaks for itself.
Oliver Cromwell, England’s Lord Protector, insisted that Ussher should have
a state funeral at Westminster Abbey.42 Nicholas Bernard, Ussher’s chaplain,
even considered him to be a prophet.43 Ussher navigated the Scylla of royalist
establishment and the Charybdis of parliamentary revolution, managing to
maintain his freedom, reputation, and permission to preach until his death
in 1656.44 He held people’s respect in a way that clearly transcended mid-
seventeenth-century party lines.
Ussher’s scholarly output showed he was a master of multiple discip-
lines. He became famous as professor of theological controversies at Trinity
College, Dublin, because of his historical books, catechesis, and theological
treatises. These works reveal his emphasis on the importance of right doc-
trine for the church, which was also manifest in his lifelong commitment
to preaching. He was the preacher to several congregations, beginning in
Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin, then in St. Patrick’s Cathedral, Dublin,
and later in various English pulpits. Despite his prolific output of sermons,
he published mostly historical research, recording the history of Irish and
British churches, investigating patristic sources, and reconstructing me-
dieval theological controversy.45 These works were polemically charged to
prove the antiquity of Protestant doctrine, and even if the methodological
assumptions of his historiography differed from those of modern historians,
40 MPWA, 1:141; see note 26.

41 “House of Commons Journal Volume 5: 5 October 1647,” in Journal of the House of
Commons: Volume 5, 1646–1648 (1802), 326; “House of Commons Journal Volume 5: 20 December
1647,” in Journal of the House of Commons: Volume 5, 1646–1648 (1802), 393–94; “House of Lords
Journal Volume 9: 8 January 1648,” in Journal of the House of Lords: Volume 9, 1646 (1767–1830), 643.
42 Ford, Ussher, 271; Knox, Ussher, 76–78.
43 Ute Lotz-Heumann, “‘The Spirit of Prophecy Has Not Wholly Left the World’: The Stylisation of
Archbishop James Ussher as a Prophet,” in Helen Parish and William G. Naphy (eds.), Religion and
Superstition in Reformation Europe (Manchester: MUP, 1994), 119–32.
45 E.g., James Ussher, Gravissimae quaestionis de Christianarum ecclesiarum (1613); James Ussher,
A Discourse of the Religion Anciently Professed by the Irish and the British (1631); James Ussher,
Gotteschalci, et Praedestinatianae Controversiae (Dublin, 1631); James Ussher, Britannicarum
ecclesiarum antiquitates (Dublin, 1639); James Ussher, Annales, Bodl. MS e Mus. 46; Bodl. MS e Mus
47 (copies of Ussher’s original notes: BL MS Harleian 822).
his grasp of sources was astounding, allowing him to leverage them upon
some of the most controversial issues of his day.
Older secondary literature enlisted Ussher into debates about the date of
creation or proper ecclesiastical polity, but he must be reassessed in light of
more nuanced accounts of religious and national contextualization.46 Ford’s
magisterial biography situated Ussher in the Irish context and showed how
that context influenced his concerns.47 This approach was far more accurate
than older studies that too often framed Ussher exclusively within English
puritanism. R. Buick Knox, for example, argued that Ussher’s episcopacy
meant that he could not be a puritan and “certainly cannot be linked with
[Walter] Travers and [Thomas] Cartwright.”48 Despite this claim, Travers
taught Ussher at Trinity College, and Ussher cited Cartwright’s works as an
important source for his own works, even though Cartwright was a con-
troversial English Presbyterian.49 Knox separated Ussher from Travers and
Cartwright based entirely upon English concerns, but those concerns were
not preeminently Ussher’s. Knox’s problematic categorization of these fig-
ures relates to the perennial difficulty of defining the term “puritan,” and the
term becomes only more confused when applied across multiple ecclesias-
tical contexts.50 Amanda Capern also blended Ussher into the English reli-
gious context but, in contrast to Knox, found him to be “the quintessential
Jacobean puritan,” even though Ussher actually denied the charge of being
46 On creation: Robert Letham, “‘In the Space of Six Days’: The Days of Creation from Origen
to the Westminster Assembly,” WTJ 61 (1999): 171–72; K. A. Kitchen, On the Reliability of the Old
Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2003), 441; Mike Fluent, “James Ussher: Champion of
Piety and Scholarship,” Fundamentalist Journal 6, no. 7 (July–August 1987): 31–33; Colin Groves,
“From Ussher to Slusher, from Archbish to Gish: or, Not in a Million Years . . . ,” Archeology in
Oceania 31, no. 3 (1996): 145–51; Peter Hiscock, “The Creation of Time,” Archeology in Oceania
31, no. 3 (1996): 101–2. On ecclesiastical polity: William M. Abbott, “James Ussher and ‘Ussherian’
Episcopacy, 1640–1656: The Primate and His Reduction Manuscript,” Albion 22, no. 2 (1990): 237–
59; Henry Sloane Coffin, “An Anglican Precursor of the ‘Basic Principles,’” ATR 26, no. 1 (January
1944): 49–51; Knox, Ussher, 113–89; R. Buick Knox, “Archbishop Ussher and Richard Baxter,”
Ecumenical Review 12, no. 1 (1959): 50–63; R. Buick Knox, “A Caroline Trio: Ussher, Laud, and
Williams,” CQR 164, no. 353 (October–December 1963): 451–52; Jack Cunningham, “The Eirenicon
and the ‘Primitive Episcopacy’ of James Ussher: An Irish Panacea for Britannia’s Ailment,” RRR 8,
no. 2 (2006): 128–46; Bernard, Life; C. R. Elrington in UW 1:1–322; Baxter, Reliquiae Baxterianae,
Lib. I, 62.
48 Knox, Ussher, 140; cf. Clausen, “Calvinism in the Anglican Hierarchy,” 226–88.
49 Correspondence of James Ussher, 3:880.
50 Ian Clary, “Hot Protestants: A Taxonomy of English Puritanism,” PRJ 2, no. 1 (2010): 41–48;
Randall J. Pederson, Unity in Diversity: English Puritanism and the Puritan Reformation 1603–1689
(Leiden: Brill, 2014), 1–86; C. H. George, “Puritanism as History and Historiography,” P&P 41
(1968): 77–104.
a puritan in order to win James I’s favor.51 Ussher’s insistence on conformity

and submissive royalism as well as on the absolute divine right of kings at the
very least stretches the bounds of puritanism, specifically of the English sort,
if not rendering it nonsense.52
Still, the issue of whether Ussher was a puritan hinges upon definitions,
since Ussher’s strong links to “puritans” such as the Cambridge controver-
sialist Thomas Cartwright simply reaffirms that the categories of puritan
and Anglican can be too sharply divided. Ussher could easily deny being
a puritan if it connoted subversive behavior, specifically behavior that
contradicted canon law, which this study uses as the primary reference point
to distinguish puritanism and conformity, especially since the staple debates
of English puritanism did not directly transpose into his own Irish context.53
Although Knox denied that Ussher could be linked to Cartwright, Ussher
explicitly leaned on Cartwright to compile A Body of Divinitie (1645), which
became a highly regarded work among puritan theologians.54 Elizabethanne
Boran has demonstrated that Ussher’s friendship network was thoroughly
puritan, which shows that Ussher cannot be properly understood if meas-
ured only by English concerns.55 Even in terms of the English context, Ussher
remained a political and ecclesiastical conservative, which does not match
the characterization of puritans as “the hotter sort of protestant,” but it does
fit conformity to canon law, since both the Irish and English canons began
with the king’s supremacy.56 Yet his soteriological emphasis on the doctrine
of justification, as seen throughout this work, certainly aligned with puritan
51 Amanda Louise Capern, “Slipperye Times and Dangerous Dayes: James Ussher and the
Calvinist Reformation of Britain 1560–1660,” PhD diss., University of New South Wales, 1991, 70;
Ford, Ussher, 105; UW 1:52.
52 Ian W. S. Campbell, “Calvinist Absolutism: Archbishop James Ussher and Royal Power,” JBS 53
(July 2014): 588–610; Ben Farwell, “James Ussher and the Divine Right of Kings: A Theory Explored,”
MA thesis, Westminster Seminary California, 2016.
53 The use of canon law as the basic factor in describing—not defining—puritans and conformists
obviously affects the debate about the end of the puritan movement. There would formally be no
puritans if canon law is not in force, since the description of puritanism hinges on dissent from
canon law. The puritan rejection of and objection to the contents of canon law obviously could have
remained after canon law was abolished, but a formal movement within the established church that
dissented from binding ecclesiastical legislation would no longer be identifiable in the same way once
that legislation was nullified.
54 Ian Green, Print and Protestantism in Early Modern England (Oxford: OUP, 2000), 666; James
Ussher, A Body of Divinitie, or, the Summe and Substance of Christian Religion (1645). The authorship
of A Body of Divinitie is addressed later.
55 Elizabethanne Boran, “An Early Friendship Network of James Ussher, Archbishop of Armagh,
1626–1656,” in Helga Robinson-Hammerstein (ed.), European Universities in the Age of Reformation

and Counter Reformation (Dublin: Four Courts Press, 1998), 116–34.
56 Lotz-Heumann, “Spirit of Prophecy,” 123–24; [Church of England], Constitutions and Canons
Ecclesiasticall, canons I–II; [Church of Ireland], Constitutions, and Canons Ecclesiastical, canon II.
theological concerns. These strong Reformed inclinations do explain why

some of his early biographers were able to present him in a moderate pu-
ritan light, but they cannot define him as puritan because other conformists
were thoroughly committed to Reformed orthodoxy.57 C. H. George’s defi-
nition of puritans as “conforming, beneficed ministers who wished to limit
the concept of adiaphora [things indifferent], to improve the quality and fre-
quency of sermons, and to influence more aggressively the ethics of the laity”
describes Ussher accurately, but it may exclude many dissenters who are typ-
ically labeled puritans.58
These observations raise again the point about understanding conformity
in reference to canon law, with conformists being those who accepted canon
law (even if they were Reformed) and puritans being those within the es-
tablished church who rejected canon law. This understanding creates a wide
range of English puritanism, since it avoids defining the concept by doc-
trinal content and instead focuses on ecclesiastical policies, which were
undoubtedly still connected to doctrine. This description—markedly not a
definition—of puritanism as directed against canon law also removes tensions
that historians have noted about Reformed conformists having puritan sym-
pathies, since doctrine is not the primary reference point for describing a
puritan. This use of canon law will not solve all the complexities involved
in the issues of conformity, even for Ussher, as he worked strenuously for
separate Irish canons that left far more freedom than the English ones on is-
sues that were typically puritan concerns, which does mark Ussher’s puritan
sympathies.59 Still, in this understanding, Patterson’s argument that William
Perkins was not a puritan but a standard English Reformed clergyman
becomes clear, since Perkins’ “puritan” doctrine was not a deviation from
church canons.60 Ussher certainly preached extensively to reform the laity
in doctrine and ethics, but this was all in accord with canon law.61 Reformed
theologians in Ireland, facing more aggressive Roman Catholic pressure,
most likely thought that the matters of actual indifference were more nu-
merous than did their peers in England. Ussher unquestionably emphasized
57 Hampton, Anti-Arminians, 77– 128; Bernard, Life; William Dillingham, Vita Laurentii
Chadertoni . . . Una cum vita Jacobi Ussherii, Archiepiscopi Armachani . . . (Canterbury, 1700), 51–100.
58 George, “Puritanism as History and Historiography,” 78; Wade Johnston, The Devil Behind the
Surplice: Matthias Flacius and John Hooper on Adiaphora (Eugene, OR: Pickwick, 2018), 87–149.
60 Patterson, William Perkins and the Making of Protestant England, 40–63; Bray, “Canon Law in
the Church of England,” 177–80. A standard “puritan” response to canon law is found in Cornelius
Burges, Reasons Showing the Necessity of Reformation (1660), 57–63.
61 E.g., TCD MS 1173.
the puritan “key concern” for “the godly spreading of the Word.”62 Contextual
factors counted, Ussher cannot be considered an English puritan, but per-
haps he could be an Irish one.63 “Purification” may indeed have been per-
ceived with different perspectives in Ireland and England, as the English
Reformed wanted to extend reform beyond the Elizabethan Settlement,
but the Irish Reformed struggled even to achieve a unified Protestantism in
their nation.64 Perhaps Irish puritanism was more inclined to acquiesce on
matters of indifference and to lean on canon law as a mechanism to further
Reformed doctrine—after all, canon law required that catechesis take place
every Sunday and at one point granted authority over recusants, as Catholics
would be in Ireland—but either way, Ussher is still best understood in terms
of rigorous Reformed conformity.65
Two major academic works on Ussher have appeared, but even they have not
yet created critical mass to establish the crucial issues for future Ussher schol-
arship. Ford’s biography situated Ussher within Irish and English ecclesiastical
politics and showed how Ussher worked for the independence and Protestant
constitution of the Church of Ireland.66 Ford’s book is an essential starting
place for Ussher scholarship, as it established the political context with which
theological assessment of Ussher must reckon. More recently, Richard Snoddy
initiated the historical-theological study of Ussher, demonstrating that there
was development in Ussher’s soteriology over the course of his career.67 Snoddy
revealed the complexity of understanding Ussher in the context of Reformed
debates and pointed to the necessity of engaging Ussher’s manuscript sources.
Ford and Snoddy’s works currently define the field of Ussher research and have
helped retire the worn-out issues of creationism and episcopacy.
There are, however, other lacunas within Ussher literature that must
be highlighted. Theologically, Jonathan Moore and Michael Lynch have
added to Snoddy’s extensive discussion of Ussher’s view of the extent of
Christ’s satisfaction.68 More significantly for establishing patterns of
62 Boran, “Early Friendship Network,” 118.

63 Ford, Ussher, 52; Ford, “One Church, Two Histories,” 295; Alan Ford, “Dependent or
Independent? The Church of Ireland and Its Colonial Context, 1536–1649,” SC 10, no. 2 (1995): 170;
Crawford Gribben, The Irish Puritans: James Ussher and the Reformation of the Church (Eugene,
OR: Wipf & Stock, 2003), 23–90.
64 Bray, “Canon Law and the Church of England,” 177–84.
65 [Church of England], Constitutions and Canons Ecclesiasticall, canons LIX, LXV–LXVI; [Church
of Ireland] Constitutions, and Canons Ecclesiastical, canons XI, XL.

66 Ford, Ussher, 119–74, 208–20.
67 Snoddy, Soteriology, 1–11.
68 Snoddy, Soteriology, 40–92; Jonathan D. Moore, English Hypothetical Universalism: John Preston
and the Softening of Reformed Theology (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2007), 175–86; Michael
inquiry, newer studies of Ussher as a historian have begun to focus on his

polemical purposes for writing history and have shown how he intended
historical research to be a powerful weapon against Catholic claims about
the antiquity of the Roman faith.69 Other scholarship, spearheaded by
Elizabethanne Boran, has highlighted the polemical intent behind Ussher’s
avid collection of sources.70 He helped gather materials to form the ini-
tial Trinity College library, and his personal collection of ten thousand
books significantly contributed to its early catalogue.71 William O’Sullivan
itemized Ussher’s manuscripts and where he obtained them, showing that
they spanned biblical, theological, philological, historical, and astronom-
ical material, to name only some of its constituent genres.72 Ussher’s col-
lection of printed works was at least equally broad.73 Ussher’s participation
in source collecting also underscores his membership in the early modern
international republic of letters, as he vigorously promoted the dissemina-
tion of important texts, even when he could not obtain them for his own
collection.74 Similarly to Ussher’s appropriation of historical polemic, the
J. Lynch, “John Davenant’s Hypothetical Universalism: A Defense of Catholic and Reformed

Orthodoxy,” PhD diss., Calvin Theological Seminary, 2019, 133–43.
69 Alan Ford, “Shaping History: James Ussher and the Church of Ireland,” in Church of Ireland and
Its Past, 19–35; Alan Ford, “James Ussher and the Creation of an Irish Protestant Identity,” in Brendan
Bradshaw and Peter Roberts (eds.), British Consciousness and Identity: The Making of Britain, 1533–
1707 (Cambridge: CUP, 1998), 196–207; Ute Lotz-Heumann, “The Protestant Interpretation of
History in Ireland: The Case of James Ussher’s Discourse,” in Bruce Gordon (ed.), Protestant History
and Identity in Sixteenth-Century Europe, vol. 2, The Later Reformation (Aldershot: Scholar, 1996),
107–20; Coleman M. Ford, “‘Everywhere, Always, by All’: William Perkins and James Ussher on
the Constructive Use of the Fathers,” PRJ 7, no. 2 (2015): 95–111; Crawford Gribben, The Puritan
Millennium: Literature and Theology, 1550–1682, rev. ed. (Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2008), 87–
113; Saul Leeman, “Was Bishop Ussher’s Chronology Influenced by a Midrash?,” JBQ 31, no. 3
(July–September 2003): 195–96; Robert W. Smith, “James Ussher: Biblical Chronicler” ATR 41
(1959): 84–94.
70 Elizabethanne Boran, “The Libraries of Luke Challoner and James Ussher, 1595– 1608,” in
Robinson-Hammerstein (ed.), European Universities, 75–115; Elizabethanne Boran, “Ussher and
the Collection of Manuscripts in Early Modern Europe,” in Jason Harris and Keith Sidwell (eds.),
Making Ireland Roman: Irish Neo-Latin Writers and the Republic of Letters (Cork: Cork University
Press, 2009), 176–94; Bernadette Cunningham and Raymond Gillespie, “James Ussher and His Irish
Manuscripts,” SH 33 (2004–5): 81–99; Katherine Birkwood, “‘Our Learned Primate’ and That ‘Rare
Treasurie’: James Ussher’s Use of Sir Robert Cotton’s Manuscript Library, c. 1603–1655,” Library
and Information History 26, no. 1 (2010): 33–42; Bernard Meehan, “The Manuscript Collection of
James Ussher,” in Peter Fox (ed.), Treasures of the Library, Trinity College Dublin (Dublin: Trinity
College, 1986), 97–110; James G. Fraser, “Ussher’s Sixth Copy of the Samaritan Pentateuch,” Vetus
Testamentum 21, no. 1 (January 1971): 100–102.
71 Peter Fox, Trinity College Library Dublin (Cambridge: CUP, 2014), 6–33.
72 William O’Sullivan, “Ussher as a Collector of Manuscripts,” Hermathena 88 (November
1956): 34–58.
73 Boran, “Libraries of Luke Challoner and James Ussher,” 81–109.
74 Boran, “Ussher and the Collection of Manuscripts,” 178–89.
“tone” of his collection indicates the interest of “a Calvinist controver-

sialist, particularly interested in refutation of Roman Catholic writers.”
Even the scientific, geographic, and mathematical works that he collected
reflect “the attitude of puritan divines in general to science.”75 The types
of sources Ussher gathered, as well as the circles in which he shared them,
underscore the ongoing connections he had to puritan networks, but those
connections simply serve to mark the Reformed doctrinal commitments
of Reformed conformists.76 Whatever future conclusions may come from
assessing Ussher’s scholarly habits, he clearly prized the written word, but
primarily for its value to the Protestant cause. These strands of scholarship
related to Ussher’s gathering and use of sources leave many avenues open
for further Ussher research.
Ever since Ussher’s death, biographers have tried to polemicize his life.
In 1656, Nicholas Bernard wrote the first biography of Ussher, presenting
him as a political moderate with puritan leanings, which was of course
highly palatable to the political climate of Cromwell’s Interregnum.77
Richard Parr’s 1686 biography emphasized Ussher’s “Anglican” royalism,
though highlighting his anti-Catholicism as an opposition to James II, and
downplayed his puritan leanings.78 William Dillingham, former master of
Emmanuel College, Cambridge, followed Bernard in casting Ussher as a
moderate puritan, although Stephen Hampton has called this Anglican work
“Reformed hagiography.”79 Charles Elrington’s extensive nineteenth-century
account presented Ussher’s puritan vestiges as youthful indiscretions that
were scrubbed away as Ussher matured into a definitive high churchman.80
He thought Ussher’s friendship with William Laud proved that Ussher had
outgrown any Reformed commitments, but Capern debunked this notion
as incongruous with the historical data.81 Jamie Blake Knox has shown that
even Elrington’s editorial work intentionally misrepresented Ussher’s work
in order to reshape his image, at least by rearranging the order of publication
so as to seem that Ussher’s Reformed works were chronologically grouped
75 Boran, “Libraries of Luke Challoner and James Ussher,” 104, 85.

76 Boran, “An Early Friendship Network,” 116–34.
77 Bernard, Life; Ford, Ussher, 5; Lotz-Heumann, “Spirit of Prophecy,” 124–25.
78 Alan Ford, “Past but Still Present: Edmund Borlase, Richard Parr and the Reshaping of Irish
History for English Audiences in the 1680s,” in Brian MacCuarta (ed.), Reshaping Ireland 1550–1700
(Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2011), 290–99; Ford, Ussher, 5; Parr, Life.
79 Hampton, Anti-Arminians, 32; Dillingham, Vita Jacobi Ussherii, 51–100.
80 UW 1:2, 92, esp. 289–98.
81 UW 1:290; Amanda- Louise Capern, “The Caroline Church: James Ussher and the Irish
Dimension,” HJ 39 (1996): 57–85.
and tapered off.82 Ford dubbed many of the succeeding biographies as “deriv-
ative” of Elrington’s.83 Buick Knox’s 1967 account of Ussher’s life is reliable,
although only skimming the broader historical context, but he presented
Ussher as favorable to Presbyterians, something that is not clear-cut.84 Ussher
received Presbyterians into the Church of Ireland in the 1610s–1620s, but he
always supported the imposition of episcopal polity.85 Ussher’s arguments
for moderate episcopacy show he sought compromise between episcopacy
and Presbyterianism and was neither a complete supporter of Presbyterians
nor an undiluted Episcopal.86 Ford’s biography remains the most reliable ac-
ademic account of Ussher’s life and times.
Ussher’s link to covenant theology has gone significantly overlooked, but
there have been a few recent albeit brief treatments. Andrew Woolsey and
Scott Clark both looked at Ussher’s role in the development of covenant the-
ology, but their focus on his relationship to other Reformed theologians un-
derstandably precluded in-depth examination of Ussher’s particular views.87
Moreover, they discussed Ussher’s covenant theology generally, which natu-
rally excluded extensive examination of Ussher’s doctrine of the covenant of
works specifically. Woolsey and Clark relied heavily or exclusively on A Body
of Divinitie, but the scholarly dispute about whether or to what extent this
work reflects its purported author’s theology means that these findings must
be supplemented from Ussher’s other works, even though the book was a con-
tinual bestseller in England, going through seven editions between 1645 and
1677, and was an important source for early modern covenant theology re-
gardless.88 Woolsey’s study was limited to ways that Ussher’s use of covenant
connected to that of the Westminster Assembly. On the other hand, Clark
accurately explained the Body’s covenant theology and correctly argued that
Ussher stood in continuity with the Reformed tradition regarding covenant
theology’s development. In contrast to Clark, who noted differences between
82 Jamie Blake Knox, “High Church History: C. R. Elrington and His Edition of James Ussher’s
Works,” in Church of Ireland and Its Past, 74–94.

83 Ford, Ussher, 6; John Dowden, “Archbishop Ussher,” in J. H. Bernard (ed.), Peplographia
Dublinensis (London: Macmillan, 1902), 3–29; E. W. Watson, “James Ussher,” in W. E. Collins (ed.),
Typical English Churchmen (London: SPCK, 1902); J. A. Carr, The Life and Times of Archbishop James
Ussher (London: Wells Gardner, Darton and Co., 1895); James Macaulay, “Archbishop Ussher,” in
Short Biographies for the People, vol. VII, no. 78 (London, 1891); M. F. Day, Archbishop Ussher, His Life
and Character (Dublin: Hodges & Smith, 1861).
84 Knox, Ussher, 113–89.
86 Parr, Life.
87 Woolsey, Unity and Continuity, 35–79; Clark, “Christ and Covenant,” 425–26.
88 Green, Print and Protestantism, [666].
the views of Ussher and other theologians, Woolsey conflated Ussher’s cov-
enant theology with John Ball’s, which was especially notable regarding the
covenant of works.89 Woolsey’s study needs to be updated and nuanced and
Clark’s needs expansion, but this work fills both gaps. J. V. Fesko’s brand-new
book on the covenant of works, however, devoted an entire chapter specifi-
cally to Ussher’s view.90 Fesko’s very fine study outlined the broad contours
of Ussher’s doctrine of the covenant of works and drew attention to some of
the major issues, but it did not address the sources Ussher used to construct
his doctrine, which is an important aspect of establishing the precise ways
that the doctrine developed through conversations at the historical level, nor
did it delve into the immense amount of manuscript material that is rife with
discussion about the covenant of works. That is not a criticism of Fesko’s im-
portant work but an indication of why the present monograph-length study
is needed.
The publications devoted to Ussher over the years have still left the need
for further work on his thought. Ford and Snoddy established certain
parameters for Ussher research, but neither explored his massive contribu-
tion to the important topic of covenant theology. Ford’s outline of Ussher’s
historical background provides a guide to Ussher’s changing contexts, and
Snoddy defined a useful starting place for examining how Ussher used the
covenant of works to relate particular doctrines. The studies that considered
Ussher in connection to covenant theology did so briefly and not with the
purpose of understanding Ussher himself. There is still some way to go in
establishing Ussher’s significant role in the early modern period and how he
contributed to the Reformed and conformist causes, as well as his specific
view on the Irish context.
Framing Covenant Theology
Ussher was far from alone in articulating covenant theology, and it is im-
portant to situate him within the early modern use of covenant and schol-
arly analysis of it. By the mid-seventeenth century, Reformed theologians
were making heavy use of covenant theology, which categorized God’s
relationships with humankind into formal, legal agreements and structured
89 Woolsey, Unity and Continuity, 45–52, 73–79.

90 J. V. Fesko, The Covenant of Works: Origins, Development, and Reception (OUP, forthcoming),
ch. 4.
the theological system around them. Yet patristic and medieval theologians
had significantly used the covenant idea since the earliest days of the church.91
Reformed developments of covenant theology, therefore, were not idiosyn-
cratic, and covenant was an obvious theme to retrieve as the Reformation
returned to the ad fontes method. Others have covered the vast amount of
secondary literature on covenant theology, and another survey would be
superfluous. Woolsey comprehensively described the secondary literature
up to the 1980s, and studies by Scott Clark and Mark Beach have updated
that survey.92 In another study, Clark, supplemented by Woolsey and Robert
Letham, provided the best survey of primary sources in Reformed Orthodox
covenant theology in the early modern period.93 Given these thorough
studies, a brief sketch of mature Reformed covenant theology and the major
lines of interpretation should suffice.
The Westminster Confession of Faith, drafted in the 1640s, serves as the
premier example of how Reformed theology came to use covenants to ex-
plain God’s relationships with humanity. That confession described a cov-
enant as “some voluntary condescension on Gods part,” and as being
necessary for people to have “any fruition of him as their Blessednesse and
Reward.”94 This consensus statement painted covenants as relationships
God established with humanity so that he could grant blessings to them.95
This initial description of covenant in the confession omitted the condi-
tion for obtaining God’s benefits because two different covenants with dif-
ferent conditions before and after Adam’s Fall were subsequently identified.
Before the Fall, Adam was in the covenant of works, which required him to
render “perfect and personall obedience” in order to attain blessings.96 After
the Fall, God made the covenant of grace with humanity, “wherein he freely
offereth unto sinners Life and Salvation by Jesus Christ, requiring of them
91 J. Ligon Duncan III, “The Covenant Idea in Ante-Nicene Theology,” PhD diss., University of
Edinburgh, 1995; Woolsey, Unity and Continuity, 161–203.

92 Woolsey, Unity and Continuity, 80– 158; R. Scott Clark, “Casper Olevian and the Substance
of the Covenant,” DPhil thesis, Oxford University, 1998, 20–39; J. Mark Beach, Christ and the
Covenant: Francis Turretin’s Federal Theology as a Defense of the Doctrine of Grace (Göttingen: V&R,
2007), 22–64.
93 Clark, “Christ and Covenant,” 403–28; Woolsey, Unity and Continuity, 162–539; Robert Letham,
“The Foedus Operum: Some Factors Accounting for Its Development,” SCJ 14, no. 4 (1983): 457–67.
94 WCF, 14 [7.1].
95 Chad B. Van Dixhoorn, “New Taxonomies of the Westminster Assembly (1643– 52): The
Creedal Controversy as Case Study,” RRR 6, no. 1 (2004): 82–106; Chad B. Van Dixhoorn, “Unity and
Disunity at the Westminster Assembly (1643–49): A Commemorative Essay,” Journal of Presbyterian
History 79, no. 2 (2001): 103–17.
96 WCF, 14 [7.2]
Faith in Him.”97 This formulation proposed that God grants the benefits of
the covenant either based on personal obedience or through faith in Christ,
depending on whether the grant came before or after Adam’s Fall. Another
category, the covenant of redemption, was also developed, posing a covenant
among the persons of the Godhead that agreed upon the roles each played in
the economy of salvation.98 Covenants, therefore, holistically explained the
Creator-creature interaction.
The major interpretive lines in the history of covenant theology need to be
unpacked, and this study builds upon the approach that has demonstrated
how the Reformed tradition developed organically over time.99 Within
that tradition, distinct aspects of covenant theology developed at different
times, but a broadly unified trajectory is still identifiable.100 Richard Muller
pioneered a methodological turn in studies of post-Reformation doctrine
that has established that there was diversity in the Reformed tradition, but
also an underlying unity.101 Prior to Muller’s work, though, early modern
theological historiography tended to adopt a Hegelian thesis-antithesis-
synthesis approach that read differences of expression within the Reformed
tradition as antithetical to each other. Muller’s thesis about coexisting conti-
nuity and diversity within the Reformed tradition is best understood in light
of the scholarship he critiqued.
The older approach, perhaps best exemplified by Karl Barth, argued
that the more scholastic Reformed theologians deviated from the purer
theology of John Calvin.102 Leonard Trinterud applied this argument to
97 WCF, 15 [7.3].
98 J. V. Fesko, The Covenant of Redemption: Origins, Development, and Reception (Göttingen: V&R,
2016); Richard A. Muller, “Toward the Pactum Salutis: Locating the Origins of a Concept,” MAJT 18
(2007): 11–65.
99 PRRD 1:27–84; Richard A. Muller, Christ and the Decree: Christology and Predestination in
Reformed Theology from Calvin to Perkins (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2008); Richard A.
Muller, After Calvin: Studies in the Development of a Theological Tradition (Νew York: OUP, 2003);
Richard A. Muller, Calvin and the Reformed Tradition: On the Work of Christ and the Order of
Salvation (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2012).
100 Clark, “Christ and Covenant,” 403–28.
101 Richard A. Muller, The Unaccommodated Calvin: Studies in the Foundation of a Theological
Tradition (New York: OUP, 2001); Carl R. Trueman and R. Scott Clark (eds.), Protestant
Scholasticism: Essays in Reassessment (Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2005); David VanDrunen, Natural
Law and the Two Kingdoms: A Study in the Development of Reformed Social Thought (Grand Rapids,
MI: Eerdmans, 2009); Willem J. van Asselt (ed.), Introduction to Reformed Scholasticism (Grand
Rapids, MI: RHB, 2011); J. V. Fesko, Beyond Calvin: Union with Christ and Justification in Early
Modern Reformed Theology (1517–1700) (Göttingen: V&R, 2012); Michael A. G. Haykin and Mark
Jones (eds.), Drawn into Controversie: Reformed Theological Diversity and Debates Within Seventeenth
Century British Puritanism (Göttingen: V&R, 2011); Woolsey, Unity and Continuity, 253–552.
102 Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics, trans. G. W. Bromiley, 14 vols. (Grand Rapids, MI: Hendriksen,
2010), 4.1.1–78.
English puritans, claiming they followed the Rhineland reformers instead

of the Genevans.103 Wayne Baker followed Trinterud, arguing that Heinrich
Bullinger’s covenant theology, which gave more responsibility to humanity,
was opposed to the predestinarian theology in Geneva. According to Baker,
the Genevan emphasis on predestination muted human responsibility and
was implicitly antinomian. Supposedly, English federalism formulated the
covenant of works to combine Bullinger’s stress on human responsibility
with double predestinarianism.104 James Torrance named “federal the-
ology” as the primary cause of Scottish neo-nomianism that required works
for justification, arguing that Calvin and the early Reformers did not teach
and would have rejected the distinction between the covenant of works and
the covenant of grace.105 In response, Woolsey rightly analyzed Torrance’s
arguments as “nearly a total disregard of primary source material.”106
Additionally, both Muller and Venema substantially demonstrated conti-
nuity between Bullinger and his Reformed contemporaries on the doctrine
of predestination.107 This continuity disproves the notion that covenant the-
ology developed to avoid any supposed antinomianism entailed by predes-
tinarian theology. Rather, scholars in the Barthian trajectory overstated the
discontinuity between earlier and later Reformed theology.
Another form of this dichotomizing argument criticized seventeenth-
century Protestants for reintroducing scholastic thought. Stephen Strehle,
for example, blamed scholasticism for the development of the two covenants,
and, in contrast to nuanced scholarship that identifies scholasticism as a
method of making precise theological distinctions, he insisted that it entailed
specific doctrinal content.108 In reality, Reformed, Lutheran, and Roman
Catholic theologians all implemented scholastic tools and reached very dif-
ferent conclusions, and scholarly investigation of this point has discredited
103 Leonard J. Trinterud, “The Origins of Puritanism,” CH 20, no. 1 (March 1951): 37–57.
104 J. Wayne Baker, Heinrich Bullinger and the Covenant: The Other Reformed Tradition
(Athens: Ohio University Press, 1980), 214.
105 James B. Torrance, “Covenant or Contract? A Study of the Theological Background of Worship
in Seventeenth Century Scotland,” SJT 23 (1970): 51–69; cf. William VanDoodewaard, The Marrow
Controversy and Seceder Tradition: Atonement, Saving Faith, and the Gospel Offer in Scotland (1718–
1799) (Grand Rapids, MI: RHB, 2011); Stephen G. Myers, Scottish Federalism and Covenantalism in
Transition: The Theology of Ebenezer Erskine (Eugene, OR: Pickwick, 2015).
106 Woolsey, Unity and Continuity, 137, 136–38.
107 Muller, Christ and the Decree, 39–46; Cornelis P. Venema, Heinrich Bullinger and the Doctrine
of Predestination: Author of “the Other Reformed Tradition”? (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic,
2002), 100–116.
108 Stephen Strehle, Calvinism, Federalism, and Scholasticism: A Study of the Reformed Doctrine of
the Covenant (Bern: Peter Lang, 1988), 4.

Strehle’s claim.109 Specific to this study, Strehle blamed voluntarism—the

emphasis on God’s unbound choice—for the development of Reformed cov-
enant theology.110 The present study, in contrast, argues that Ussher under-
stood the covenant of works in primarily intellectualist terms, meaning that
he emphasized that God’s character undergirded how the covenant func-
tioned. This varying formulation indicates that the covenant of works was
actually common property to intellectualists and voluntarists. Strehle tried
to discredit his subjects’ formulations, even at times arguing with them, but
his approach was thoroughly unhistorical and should be set aside.111
Amanda Capern applied this dichotomizing approach to Ussher, arguing
for a disparity between his constructions of predestinarian and covenantal
theology. She claimed that he correlated the decree of election to the cove-
nant of grace and the decree of reprobation to the covenant of works, and that
he used the covenant of works to explain how God could hold some people
responsible for sin even though he had appointed their condemnation.112
Recent scholarship, however, has proved that various trajectories existed to-
gether within the Reformed tradition without overtaking each other. These
varying forms of expression, even disagreements, often remained present
within the Reformed mainstream, only infrequently leading to one of them
being nominated as the singularly Reformed view. Capern’s application of
the Barthian trajectory does not account for legitimate variation within the
Reformed tradition. Some early modern theologians emphasized aspects
of covenant theology that others did not, but this variety did not constitute
entirely separate traditions.113 Instead of a supposed single fountain of pure
Reformed theology, there were several contemporary sources of origina-
tion for the Reformed tradition with varying emphases that are developed
109 Muller, Unaccommodated Calvin; Muller, After Calvin; Trueman and Clark (eds.), Protestant
Scholasticism.
110 Strehle, Calvinism, Federalism, and Scholasticism, 1–2.
111 Strehle, Calvinism, Federalism, and Scholasticism, 89, 317– 21, 388– 91; cf. Jared Wicks,
“Justification and Faith in Luther’s Theology,” TS 44, no. 1 (March 1983): 3–29; Peter A. Lillback,
The Binding of God: Calvin’s Role in the Development of Covenant Theology (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker
Academic, 2001), 308; Carl R. Trueman, “Is the Finnish Line a New Beginning? A Critical Assessment
of the Reading of Luther Offered by the Helsinki Circle,” WTJ 65 (2003): 231–44; Carl R. Trueman,
Luther on the Christian Life: Cross and Freedom (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2015); Clark, “Casper
Olevian and the Substance of the Covenant,” 20–39; R. Scott Clark, “Iustitia imputata Christi: Alien
or Proper to Luther’s Doctrine of Justification?,” CTQ 70, nos. 3–4 (July–October 2006): 269–310;
Timo Laato, “Justification: The Stumbling Block of the Finnish Luther School,” CTQ 72 (2008): 327–
46; Beach, Christ and the Covenant, 166 n. 41; Fesko, Beyond Calvin, 131–36.
112 Capern, “Slipperye Times and Dangerous Dayes,” 60–61.
113 Mark Jones, “The ‘Old’ Covenant,” in Drawn into Controversie, 183–203.
along trajectories of continuity and refinement.114 Capern and others with

a dichotomizing approach to covenant theology incorrectly attempted to
abstract covenant from the theological system and to understand its signifi-
cance independent of individual loci. This interpretative strategy is deficient
because covenant theology was used to contextualize and integrate various
doctrines.
Several recent studies have broken the dichotomizing trend and made in-
sightful contributions to our understanding of covenant theology. John von
Rohr considered covenant theology’s close association with the ordo salutis
(the logical ordering of the benefits of salvation), predestination, and aspects
of the Christian life.115 He avoided dichotomizing theories, but the breadth
of his project to survey the covenant of grace across the puritan era pre-
cluded any thorough analysis of how covenant structured these doctrines.
Scott Clark demonstrated that Casper Olevian, a sixteenth-century reformer,
used covenant theology to address the major theological topics and to unify
his thought.116 Mark Jones showed that the covenant of redemption played
a large role in Thomas Goodwin’s Christological formulations.117 J. V. Fesko
outlined the covenant of redemption’s role in relating the work of Christ to
each of the Trinitarian persons and how various figures from the seventeenth
to the twentieth century used this covenant to explain the Incarnation.118
These studies have begun to fill the gap in research, but more work is needed
following their models. Although late seventeenth-century figures have
been examined, including Thomas Goodwin and John Owen, there has not
yet been a focused study of an early seventeenth-century covenant theolo-
gian.119 A study of Ussher’s covenant theology addresses this need and gives
us an example of a well-respected early seventeenth-century scholar who was
114 Richard A. Muller, “Perkins’ a Golden Chaine: Predestinarian System of Schematized Ordo
Salutis,” SCJ 9 (1978): 69–81; Richard A. Muller, “Duplex Cognitio Dei in the Theology of Early
Reformed Orthodoxy,” SCJ 10 (1979): 51–61; Richard A. Muller, “Covenant and Conscience in
English Reformed Theology: Three Variations on a 17th Century Theme,” WTJ 42 (1980): 308–
34; Richard A. Muller, “Divine Covenants, Absolute and Conditional: John Cameron and the
Early Orthodox Development of Reformed Covenant Theology,” MAJT 17 (2006): 11–56; J. V.
Fesko, Diversity Within the Reformed Tradition: Supra-and Infralapsarianism in Calvin, Dort, and
Westminster (Greenville, SC: Reformed Academic Press, 2001), 151–296.
115 John von Rohr, The Covenant of Grace in Puritan Thought (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1986),
87–112.
116 Clark, Casper Olevian and the Substance of the Covenant.
117 Mark Jones, Why Heaven Kissed Earth: The Christology of Puritan Reformed Orthodox
Theologian Thomas Goodwin (1600–1680) (Göttingen: V&R, 2010), 123–45.

118 Fesko, The Covenant of Redemption.
119 Carl R. Trueman, John Owen: Reformed Catholic, Renaissance Man (Aldershot, UK: Ashgate,
2007), 67–100; Jones, Why Heaven Kissed Earth; Beeke and Jones, Puritan Theology, 217–320.
important in the shaping of the covenant of works. Ussher was the most in-
tellectually prominent Irish Protestant of the period. He also was a political
royalist, but the fact that covenant theology was shared property between the
political and ecclesiastical conservatives and the more vigorously reform-
driven shows how theologians of varying political commitments all could
hold strongly to Reformed theology. Most studies of puritan-era covenant
theology have focused on the radicals, but it is time to highlight those who
were committed to Reformed conformity.
Framing the Irish Reformation
Ussher lived during a turbulent time for the Protestant movement in Ireland,
and it is important to situate him within this cultural context. This section
explores some of the literature on the Irish Reformation and provides a cul-
tural background for discussing the contexts in which Ussher developed his
covenant theology. Scholars have devoted significant attention to how the
Reformation developed in Ireland during the sixteenth century but have
left the early Stuart period largely unexplored. Felicity Heal’s valuable work
covered the period before 1603 and considered Ireland primarily in refer-
ence to the English Reformation.120 No matter how linked it was to English
political factors, the Irish Reformation was not simply an extension of ex-
ternal movements for reform.121 The scholarly struggle to assess the Irish
Reformation relates to its basic failure, which certainly does connect to Irish-
English relations. As Ian Hazlett wrote, “The incongruity of the Irish situa-
tion was that although the Reformation is conventionally perceived in terms
of failure, an aborted event or a non-event, or a surviving runt kept alive by a
life-support machine sponsored by the British ‘state,’ it has nonetheless made
a practically irreversible, if debatable impact on the country.”122 Scholarly
discussion has primarily focused on this failure.
Older literature on the Irish Reformation debated mainly the timing
and cause of its failure. Brendan Bradshaw argued that failure was inevi-
table by the mid-sixteenth century because English colonialism hardened
120 Felicity Heal, Reformation in Britain and Ireland (New York: OUP, 2003).
121 Brendan Bradshaw, “Sword, Word and Strategy in the Reformation in Ireland,” HJ 21, no. 3
(September 1978): 500.
122 W. Ian P. Hazlett, The Reformation in Britain and Ireland: An Introduction (Trowbridge,
UK: T&T Clark International, 2003), 85.

nominal Catholicism and the Marian reign galvanized it.123 Nicholas Canny
responded that failure was not certain even until the nineteenth century.124
Samantha Meigs suggested failure was always unavoidable, with the Irish
Reformation collapsing because it never overrode the ancient indigenous
cultural systems embedded within Irish society.125 Later literature explored
how the political, cultural, and religious divides between Gaelic Irish, Old
English, and New English factored into the failure of reform.126 In any case,
English state-sponsored reform failed “to take root in any section of the in-
digenous population.”127 There was a crippling conflict of coercion and con-
formity with persuasion and conversion.128 These considerations highlight
the background of political and religious tension leading into the years when
Ussher worked to develop Reformed theology in Ireland.
The literature that has examined the Irish Reformation as it developed into
the seventeenth century directly connects to Ussher, as he was the leading
theologian in Ireland in the period between his ordination in 1602 and the
Irish Rebellion in 1641.129 Alan Ford wrote what remains the definitive work
on the Irish Reformation in the seventeenth century, arguing that the mix
of English colonialism and intellectual “Calvinism” prevented Reformation
roots from growing deep in Irish culture.130 The Irish Articles (1615) solid-
ified this Reformed dynamic, but much of the population resisted this at-
tempt to make Reformed theology the official teaching of the Church
of Ireland.131 Ussher worked to further that confessional identity with a
123 Brendan Bradshaw, The Dissolution of the Religious Orders in Ireland Under Henry VIII
(New York: CUP, 1974; repr. New York: CUP, 2008); cf. O’Hannrachain, Catholic Reformation in
Ireland, 10–11.
124 Nicholas Canny, “Why the Reformation Failed in Ireland: Une Question Mal Posée,” JEH 30, no.
4 (October 1979): 423–50; cf. Brendan Bradshaw, “The English Reformation and Identity Formation
in Wales and Ireland,” in British Consciousness and Identity, 43–111; Karl S. Bottigheimer, “The
Failure of the Reformation in Ireland: Une Question Bien Posée,” JEH 36, no. 2 (April 1985): 196–207.
125 Meigs, Reformations in Ireland, 41–75.
126 Karl S. Bottigheimer and Ute Lotz-Heumann, “The Irish Reformation in European Perspective,”
AFR 89 (1998): 268–309; Karl S. Bottigheimer, “Revisionism and the Irish Reformation,” JEH 51, no.
3 (July 2000): 581–86; Brendan Bradshaw, “Revisionism and the Irish Reformation: A Rejoinder,”
JEH 51, no. 3 (July 2000): 587–91; O’Hannrachain, Catholic Reformation in Ireland, 9–11.
127 Bradshaw, “Sword, Word and Strategy,” 475–77.
128 Henry Jeffries, The Irish Church and the Tudor Reformations (Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2010),
71–284.
129 Alan Ford, “The Church of Ireland: A Critical Bibliography, 1536–1992: Part II: 1603–41,” IΗS
28, no. 112 (1993): 356.

130 Alan Ford, The Protestant Reformation in Ireland 1590– 1641 (Dublin: Four Courts Press,
1997), 14–18.
131 Ute Lotz-Heumann, “Confessionalisation in Ireland: Periodisation and Character,” in Alan Ford
and John McCafferty (eds.), The Origins of Sectarianism in Early Modern Ireland (Cambridge: CUP,
2005), 49–52.
historical narrative of pure doctrine, arguing that the Irish church had been
free of popery and independent of English interference.132 He continually
attempted to convince the crown of its responsibility to uphold godly reli-
gion by suppressing Catholicism in Ireland.133 Ussher incessantly pressed for
Reformed theology in Ireland until his exile in 1641, and then pressed for it
in England until his death. This point is made not to exclude Ussher’s efforts
in England prior to his permanent relocation there but merely to highlight
that the focus of his labors was on promoting Reformed theology in whatever
situation he found himself. This study examines how he developed one as-
pect of Reformed theology in connection with his vast understanding of the
Christian past in order to frame a coherent and integrated doctrinal system
to further the Protestant cause within the ongoing efforts at Irish reform.
Although this work emphasizes ideas more than policy, Ussher’s theological
writings cannot be legitimately understood if they are disconnected from the
goals that he hoped to accomplish through them.
Although these discussions about the Irish Reformation fall largely outside
the scope of this study, they do help to situate Ussher within his context. The
transnational traffic of Reformed ideas is often more pertinent to Ussher’s
covenant theology, but there are times when the Irish context made the pre-
dominant mark on his theological expression. Chapter 2 discusses how he
pointedly formulated the covenant of works against the Roman Catholic
notion of the superadded gift. Chapter 4 highlights how Ussher exploited
his locality in Ireland to defend predestination during the Laudian regime
in a way that English theologians could not have managed. Further, Ussher
adjusted his rhetoric with the shifting political climate. His tactics to reshape
the people’s internal beliefs by first directing their external practices through
state-sponsored reform proved inadequate, but the Catholic Reformation
turned out to be decisive, especially in light of the 1641 rebellion that began
with massacres of Protestants and continued with the establishment of a
Catholic government over most of the island.134 This turbulence had lasting
132 Alan Ford, “Shaping History,” 25–27; Ford, “Ussher and the Creation of an Irish Protestant
Identity,” 196–212; Ford, “Dependent or Independent?,” 168–81; Alan Ford, “Apocalyptic Ireland,
1580–1641,” ITQ 78, no. 2 (2013): 138–42.
133 Alan Ford, “James Ussher and the Godly Prince in Early Seventeenth-Century Ireland,” in
Hiram Morgan (ed.), Political Ideology in Ireland, 1541–1641 (Dublin: Four Courts Press, 1999),
206–28.
134 Alan Ford, “‘Force and Fear of Punishment’: Protestants and Religious Coercion in Ireland,
1603– 33,” in Elizabethanne Boran and Crawford Gribben (eds.), Enforcing the Reformation
in Ireland and Scotland, 1550–1700 (Aldershot, UK: Ashgate, 2006), 91–130; O’Hannrachain,
Catholic Reformation in Ireland, 3–11; Tadgh O’Hannrachain, “‘In Imitation of That Holy Patron of
Prelates the Blessed St Charles’: Episcopal Activity in Ireland and the Formation of a Confessional
Another random document with
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Operation im Feldlazarett
Notgedrungen mußten wir einen Teil unserer Kranken und
Verwundeten, auch die kranken Gefangenen, unter einem
englischen Sanitätsoffizier zurücklassen und traten um 9 Uhr
vormittags in mehreren Kolonnen den Weitermarsch nach Norden
an. Führer hatten wir nicht; das Gelände war ganz unbekannt, und
nur ganz allgemein konnte ich dem Führer der Vorhut bezeichnen,
daß ich an einem der nördlich vorgelagerten Berge
vorbeizumarschieren beabsichtigte. Bald war bei der Vorhut
Gefechtslärm hörbar. Im Busche wurde es erst nach und nach klar,
daß unsere Vorhut sich gegen einen Feind gewandt hatte, der von
links rückwärts her gegen sie erschienen war. Die Geschosse
desselben schlugen auf nahe Entfernung und ziemlich zahlreich bei
dem Kommando ein, das dem Gros vorausmarschierte.
Ein von mir zurückgeschickter Askari sollte den Anfang des Gros
an die Stelle, an der ich war, heranführen. Die Lage war zweifellos
günstig, um den Feind zwischen unserer Vorhut und unserem Gros
einzuklemmen und gründlich zu schlagen. Ich wartete, aber unser
Gros kam nicht. Da lief ich schließlich zurück und sah an den
Spuren, daß unser Gros falsch geführt und längst seitwärts an uns
vorbei marschiert war. Dagegen sah ich den Anfang der Abteilung
Stemmermann, zu der der größte Teil unserer Kolonnen und unserer
Kranken gehörte, ahnungslos im Begriff, in den Feind hinein zu
marschieren. Gerade eben konnte ich die Abteilung noch abdrehen.
Ich selbst erreichte nun die vordersten Abteilungen Müller und
Goering, die sich inzwischen weiter nach Norden in Marsch gesetzt
hatten. Sie folgten einer Straße, die auf die Berge hinaufführte, sich
oben aber gänzlich verlor. Dem Gefechtslärm, den ich von Zeit zu
Zeit weiter rückwärts hörte, maß ich keine weitere Beachtung bei.
Erstaunt bemerkte ich am Spätnachmittag, daß der Rest der Truppe
den Abteilungen Müller und Goering nicht gefolgt war, sondern
rechts von uns im Tale marschierte. Ich ahnte nicht, daß inzwischen
unsere Marschkolonne von einem neuen Gegner, der von Osten
gekommen war, nochmals beschossen wurde, und daß hierbei ein
großer Teil eines Feldlazarettes in Feindes Hand gefallen war.
Um die Truppe wieder zu vereinigen, suchte ich wieder von
meinem Berge herunterzukommen. Der Abstieg erwies sich aber
nicht als möglich; die Felsen waren steil, fast senkrecht. Auf einem
Negerpfade marschierten wir weiter, und der Abend brach herein, als
Hauptmann Müller mir meldete, daß auch dieser Abstieg an einem
Abgrund endete. Glücklicherweise fand sich noch ein kleiner
Seitenpfad. Wir folgten diesem, und es glückte, hinabzuklettern.
Auch hier war es an einigen Stellen steil, aber die nackten Füße
gaben den Trägern Halt, und auch ich kam, nachdem ich die Stiefel
ausgezogen hatte, hinunter. Es wurde stockdunkel, und wir hatten
kein Wasser. Schließlich fand sich aber auch dies, und mir fiel ein
Stein vom Herzen, als wir auf den Rest der Truppe stießen, der unter
General Wahle gleichfalls die Vereinigung gesucht hatte. Wir hatten
am 30. und 31. August 6 Europäer, 23 Askari an Toten, 11 Europäer,
60 Askari an Verwundeten, 5 Europäer, 29 Askari an Vermißten, 5
Askari an Gefangenen verloren; 48000 Patronen, wichtige
Medikamente und Verbandszeug, wichtiges Büchsenmachergerät
und die gesamte Bagage der Abteilung Müller waren verloren
gegangen. Auch die feindlichen Verluste waren schwer, wie aus
einer später erbeuteten Verlustliste des 1. Bataillons der I. King’s
African Rifles hervorging. Außer diesem Bataillon hatten Teile des 3.
Bataillons dieses Regiments und die II. King’s African Rifles gegen
uns im Gefecht gestanden.
Unsere Truppe hatte sich glänzend geschlagen; einem Teil der
Träger, von denen über 200 vermißt wurden, war das überraschende
Feuer allerdings etwas in die Glieder gefahren. Von der Abteilung
Koehl fehlte Nachricht, aber unsere Führer waren inzwischen so
erfahren und gewandt im Buschkrieg geworden, daß ich mir keine
Sorge zu machen brauchte. Am nächsten Tage überraschten wir bei
unserem Eintreffen im Lager eine englische Verpflegungskolonne.
Dann passierten wir die Straße Cutea-Malema, an der sich bald
auch feindliche Truppen zeigten und überschritten den Luriofluß bei
Mtetere. Ein englischer Aufkaufposten floh und einige Verpflegung
wurde erbeutet. Abteilung Koehl traf hier wieder beim Gros ein. Sie
war dem uns verfolgenden Feinde nachgezogen und hatte
festgestellt, daß er mehrere Bataillone stark war. Wir rückten dann
den Lurio abwärts in die reiche Landschaft Mpuera. Sol (Feldwebel)
Salim, der hier gelegentlich einer früheren Patrouille seine Frau
geheiratet hatte, die ihm treu gefolgt war, ließ sie, da sie ihrer
Niederkunft entgegen sah, bei ihrem Vater, dem dortigen Jumben,
zurück.
Die Truppe war gesundheitlich etwas mitgenommen; alles
hustete, und es zeigten sich die Anfänge einer recht unangenehmen
Lungenseuche, die uns in den nächsten Wochen viel Leute kosten
sollte, von den Ärzten aber als verschieden von der spanischen
Influenza angesehen wurde. Da in dieser Gegend reichliche
Verpflegung vorhanden war, so gönnte ich der durch die Ereignisse
der letzten Zeit recht angestrengten Truppe einen Ruhetag, der auch
wegen der zahlreichen Kranken erforderlich war. Hauptmann Koehl
war mit seiner Kompagnie ohne Bagage zurückgelassen worden, um
dem Feinde von rückwärts her möglichst viel Schaden zuzufügen. Er
meldete das Eintreffen stärkerer feindlicher Truppenmassen in der
Gegend von Mtetere und östlich von diesem Orte. Es war klar, daß
der Feind im Augenblick uns noch mit Anspannung aller seiner
Kräfte verfolgte und zu diesem Zweck seine Truppe zusammenhielt.
Die Gelegenheit zu einem Teilerfolg schien mir schon deswegen
nicht günstig, weil er nicht ausgenutzt werden konnte und ein
Gefecht uns Verwundete gekostet hätte, die wir nicht mitnehmen
konnten. Da es in meiner Absicht lag, demnächst die Gegend
nördlich von Luambala aus Verpflegungsgründen aufzusuchen,
wollte ich den Abmarsch dorthin nicht weiter verzögern.
Während des Ruhetages am 5. September war in dem reichen
Gebiet von Mpuera die Verpflegung ergänzt worden, und am 6.
September früh wurde der Abmarsch in nördlicher Richtung
angetreten. Es war anzunehmen, daß der Feind in mehreren
Kolonnen flußabwärts, also in nordöstlicher Richtung marschieren
würde; unsere Truppe zog daher in voller Gefechtsstaffelung durch
den Busch, und ich erwartete jeden Augenblick, auf die nördliche der
feindlichen Kolonnen zu stoßen; aber wir überschritten deren
wahrscheinliche Marschstraße, ohne Spuren von ihr zu entdecken.
Gegen Mittag näherten wir uns unserem Marschziele, einer am
Hulua-Berge gelegenen Wasserstelle. Da fielen bei der Vorhut die
ersten Schüsse, und bald entwickelte sich ein lebhaftes Gefecht.
Hauptmann Müller, der Führer der Vorhut, war auf das Ende einer
feindlichen Kolonne gestoßen, die spitzwinklig zu unserer
Marschrichtung nach Nordosten marschierte. Schnell hatte er das
am Ende befindliche 2. Bataillon der II. King’s African Rifles
angegriffen und in die Flucht geschlagen, das Feldlazarett des
Gegners und seine Eselkolonne genommen.
Die Abteilung Goering entwickelte ich rechts neben der Abteilung
Müller; auch sie warf Teile des Feindes schnell zurück, ging dann
aber nicht weiter vor, als der Gegner stärkere Truppen — das 1.
Bataillon des II. King’s African Rifles und anscheinend auch Teile
des 3. Bataillons dieses Regimentes — entwickelte. Unser linker
Flügel, der im Vorgehen auf ansteigendes, offenes Gelände geraten
war und dort gleichfalls auf frische feindliche Truppen stieß, war
wenige hundert Meter zurückgegangen und hatte eine sanfte
Anhöhe mit mehrere hundert Meter großem Schußfeld besetzt. Über
diese Verhältnisse gewann ich erst Klarheit, als ich vom rechten
Flügel, wo ich Abteilung Goering angesetzt hatte, wieder auf den
linken Flügel ging.
Das Gefecht wurde ziemlich heftig und kam im großen und
ganzen zum Stehen. Von der Nachhut, unter Hauptmann
Spangenberg, her, deren Eintreffen ich jetzt erwartete, war
Minenwerferfeuer gehört worden. Die Nachhut hatte bei Mpuera den
Angriff einer anderen feindlichen Kolonne abgewiesen und Teile
derselben in regellose Flucht geschlagen. Um 7 Uhr morgens war
sie, der ihr erteilten Anweisung entsprechend, dem Gros gefolgt. Sie
traf gegen 5 Uhr nachmittags auf dem Gefechtsfelde ein, und ich
erwog, ob ich nicht durch Einsatz aller Reserven versuchen sollte,
hier am Hulua-Berge heute noch die II. King’s African Rifles
entscheidend zu schlagen. Ich habe diesen Gedanken aber fallen
lassen; die Zeit war sehr knapp, denn es war nur eine Stunde bis zur
Dunkelheit, und ich rechnete bestimmt darauf, daß am anderen Tage
sehr früh frische Teile des Feindes auf dem Gefechtsfelde eintreffen
würden. Zudem würde die Durchführung eines entscheidenden
Gefechtes uns sicher erhebliche Verluste kosten, und diese Verluste
wollte ich bei der geringen Zahl von 176 Europäern und 1487 Askari,
die unsere Stärkenachweisung vom 1. September 1918 angab,
vermeiden. Oberleutnant zur See Wenig, der mit seinem Geschütz
bei der Abteilung Goering Verwendung gefunden hatte, meldete mir,
daß er als einziger noch gefechtsfähiger Offizier den Befehl dieser
Abteilung übernommen hatte. Bald wurde Hauptmann Goering mit
schwerem Brustschuß, Oberleutnant Boell mit schwerem Kopfschuß
auf den Verbandplatz gebracht.
So setzte ich die Reserven nicht in das Durcheinander eines
nächtlichen Buschkampfes ein, sondern rückte nach Aufräumen des
Gefechtsfeldes in nordwestlicher Richtung weiter. Bald trat völlige
Dunkelheit ein, und der Marsch ging im dichten, hohen Grase nur
sehr langsam von statten. Nach 5 km wurde Lager bezogen. Die
Gefechtsverluste des 6. September waren 6 Askari, 4
Maschinengewehrträger gefallen, 13 Europäer, 49 Askari, 15 andere
Farbige verwundet, 3 Europäer, 13 Askari, 12 Träger vermißt, 3
Askari, 3 Träger gefangen. Beim Feinde waren etwa 10 Europäer, 30
Askari als getroffen beobachtet worden, 8 Europäer, 45 Askari
wurden gefangen genommen; die zum Teil kranken und
verwundeten Gefangenen und unsere eigenen Schwerverwundeten
waren unter der Pflege englischen Sanitätspersonals auf dem
Gefechtsfelde zurückgelassen worden. Später bei M w e m b e
erbeutete Papiere gaben an, daß „Kartucol“ (abgekürzter Ausdruck
für: Kolonne der IV. King’s African Rifles) am 6. September schwere
Verluste hatte und zeitweilig bewegungsunfähig war.
Unser Weitermarsch wurde durch den Feind nicht belästigt.
Hauptmann Koehl war mit seiner Kompagnie westlich von Mpuera
zurückgeblieben, um von rückwärts her gegen den Feind und seine
Verbindungen zu wirken. Er folgte unserer Spur und hatte am
Milweberg leichte Zusammenstöße mit dem 1. Bataillon der VI.
King’s African Rifles, das am 8. September von Süden her am
Milweberg eintraf. Wir zogen in mehreren Reihen quer durch das
Pori, durch wildreiches Gebiet. Sogar einige Büffel wurden während
des Marsches erlegt. Bei Kanene kreuzten wir die vom
Amarambasee nach Mahua führende Etappenstraße. Der Feind
hatte das Magazin von Kanene abgebrannt, aber wir fanden in der
Landschaft selbst ausreichend Verpflegung, und die materielle Lage
der Truppe würde gut gewesen sein, wenn nicht die
Influenzaepidemie immer mehr um sich gegriffen hätte. Etwa 50
Proz. hatten Bronchialkatarrh, und in jeder Kompagnie hatten 3 bis 6
Mann Lungenentzündung; da in der gesamten Truppe nur etwa 80
Kranke getragen werden konnten, so mußten etwa 20 Mann mit
leichter Lungenentzündung zeitweise zu Fuß gehen. Eine
befriedigende Lösung des Krankentransportes war eben nicht
möglich, oder man hätte die Kriegführung beenden müssen; man
konnte die Kranken nicht einfach im Pori liegen lassen. Diese
Zwangslage mußte die Nerven des vortrefflichen, leitenden
Sanitätsoffiziers, Stabsarzt Taute, bis aufs äußerste in Anspruch
nehmen. Es war ein Glück, daß dieser in ärztlicher und
organisatorischer Hinsicht hochbegabte Mann sich unter dem
Gewicht seiner Verantwortung aufrecht erhielt. Seinen Anordnungen
und dem durch die Verhältnisse bedingten Wechsel der Gegend und
des Klimas ist es zu danken, daß die Epidemie bald zurückging.
Eine Anzahl schonungsbedürftiger Askari und anderer Farbiger
folgten der Truppe langsam nach; manche von ihnen verloren den
Mut, wenn sie unsere Lagerplätze dann immer schon verlassen
vorfanden. Eine ganze Anzahl ist aber doch herangekommen,
besonders, wenn die Truppe einen der kurzen Märsche machte
oder, was allerdings selten vorkam, einen Ruhetag einlegen konnte.
Siebenter Abschnitt
Noch einmal auf deutschem Boden
A ber allzusehr aufhalten durften wir uns nicht. Die Kriegslage

erforderte gebieterisch, daß wir die verpflegungsarmen und die
durch die letzte Zeit des Krieges stark in Anspruch genommenen
Gebiete östlich des mittleren Nyassasees schnell durchschritten.
Schnelligkeit war hierbei umsomehr geboten, als der Feind zu Schiff
Truppen an das Nordende des Nyassasees verschieben und uns so
in der Besetzung des dortigen Gebietes mit starken Truppen
zuvorkommen konnte. Als wir uns dem Lujendaflusse näherten,
wurde das Gelände bergiger und war vielfach von Flußläufen und
Schluchten durchzogen. Die Marschrichtung konnte nach dem
Kompaß allein nicht innegehalten werden. Es war nötig, die
Wasserscheide zu berücksichtigen und auf den Bergrücken entlang
zu gehen. Glücklicherweise fand der Führer der Vorhut, Hauptmann
Spangenberg, einige Eingeborene, die ihm als Pfadfinder das
Aufsuchen eines guten Weges erleichterten. Aber einiges Hin und
Her war nicht zu vermeiden, und das verzögerte unseren Marsch,
während der Feind von Malacotera her auf guter Straße schnell nach
Luambala Truppen und Verpflegung verschieben konnte.
Ich war etwas in Sorge, ob das Wasser des Lujendaflusses
genügend abgelaufen sein würde, um die Furten benutzen zu
können. Die Herstellung von Rindenbooten hätte wohl keine
Schwierigkeiten gemacht, aber bei der reißenden Strömung würde
das Übersetzen der gesamten Truppe kaum glatt vonstatten
gegangen sein. Jedenfalls lag mir daran, daß es durch den Feind
nicht gestört würde, und auch dies trieb zur Eile an. Glücklicherweise
wurde durch vorausgesandte Patrouillen unterhalb von Luambala
eine Furt gefunden, und das Durchwaten des Flusses an dieser
Stelle machte keine Schwierigkeiten.
Aus einigen erlegten Flußpferden wurde wieder Fett zubereitet,
und in der Gegend von Mwembe, das wir am 17. September
erreichten, konnte die Verpflegung aufgefüllt werden. Dort wurde
nach langer Zeit ein Ruhetag gemacht. Hier, bei Mwembe, erreichte
die Lungenentzündung ihren Höhepunkt. Seit Mitte August waren 7
Europäer und etwa 200 Farbige an Lungenentzündung erkrankt,
davon 2 Europäer und 17 Farbige gestorben. Die Magazine von
Mwembe waren durch die schwache feindliche Postierung zerstört
worden, aber die Landschaft bot doch noch ausreichende Vorräte.
Bedenklich wurde die Trägerfrage. Die Leute wurden durch die
andauernden Märsche, durch die Epidemie und das Tragen der
vielen Kranken stark in Anspruch genommen, und wir näherten uns
ihren heimatlichen Gebieten. Wahrscheinlich würden die
Wangoniträger, sobald sie ihre nördlich des Rowuma gelegene
Heimat erreichten, weglaufen. In der Gegend von Mwembe und den
gut angebauten Tälern des Luscheringoflusses wurden mehrere
feindliche Patrouillen des Intelligence-Department (der
Nachrichtenabteilung) angetroffen, die zwar schnell verjagt wurden,
aber doch anzeigten, daß der Feind im großen und ganzen über
unseren Marsch unterrichtet war.
Fernpatrouillen von uns wurden nach Mitomoni und nach
Makalogi gesandt. Südlich des Rowuma führte uns der Marsch nach
Verlassen des Luscheringotales quer durch eine außerordentlich
wildreiche Steppe, und ebenso war es am Rowuma selbst, den wir
am 28. September erreichten. Aber der Wildreichtum hatte auch
seine Nachteile; wieder einmal wurde ein Posten von Löwen
geschlagen. Wir betraten wieder deutschen Boden und blieben bei
Nagwamira zwei Tage; mehrere feindliche Magazine und Transporte,
die über unser Erscheinen nicht unterrichtet waren, wurden
überrascht. Die Landschaft war außerordentlich reich, und die
Truppe konnte sich gründlich erholen. Unsere nach Mitomoni
gesandten Patrouillen meldeten dort ein stärker befestigtes Lager
und das Eintreffen von Verstärkungen, die von Westen her kamen.
Auch Ssongea war vom Feinde besetzt, seine Stärke allerdings nicht
festzustellen. Die verschiedenen Nachrichten, sowie die
geographische Lage machten es wahrscheinlich, daß auch nach
Ssongea, vom Nyassasee her, Verstärkungen unterwegs waren.
Wir marschierten weiter, auf Ssongea zu, und trafen südlich
dieses Ortes auf reich besiedeltes Gebiet. Der feindliche
Funkerverkehr zeigte an, daß feindliche Truppen in Ssongea
standen und daß eine andere Kolonne, wahrscheinlich von Mitomoni
her, in die Gegend von Ssongea gelangt war. Am 4. Oktober
marschierte ich westlich an Ssongea vorbei weiter nach Norden. Als
die Vorhut unter Hauptmann Spangenberg an der großen Straße
Ssongea-Wiedhafen anlangte, wurde sie durch drei feindliche
Kompagnien mit Minenwerfern angegriffen, die von Westen her
gekommen waren. Der Feind wurde ein Stück zurückgeworfen.
Wegen des sehr berg- und schluchtreichen, für einen Angriff nicht
günstigen Geländes und der späten Tagesstunde war es
unwahrscheinlich, noch an diesem Tage einen wirklich
durchschlagenden Erfolg erzielen zu können. Morgen aber würde
neuer Feind eintreffen. Ich führte deshalb den Angriff nicht weiter
durch und marschierte westlich am Feinde vorbei in ein Lager bei
der Missionsstation Peramiho.
Beim Weitermarsch durch das Wangoniland entliefen, wie
befürchtet, eine ganze Anzahl der Wangoniträger. Es war ja auch
Übermenschliches verlangt, daß diese Leute, nachdem sie jahrelang
ihre Angehörigen nicht gesehen hatten, jetzt einfach durch deren
Gebiet hindurchmarschieren sollten. Dazu ist das Heimatgefühl des
Negers zu stark. Auch Samarunga, einer meiner eigenen Träger, ein
sehr anhänglicher und zuverlässiger Kerl, hatte sich Urlaub zum
Besuch seines in der Nähe befindlichen Dorfes erbeten. Er kam
auch ganz ehrlich zurück und brachte seinen Bruder mit. Beide
marschierten dann weiter mit uns; auch als der Bruder wieder
fortgegangen war, blieb Samarunga noch. Um seine gedrückte
Stimmung zu heben, gab ich ihm von meiner Fleischportion, aber am
nächsten Morgen war er doch verschwunden, nachdem er meine
Sachen noch gut in Ordnung gebracht hatte.
Trägersafari
Nördlich Ssongea wurden wieder einzelne feindliche
Nachrichtenpatrouillen aufgegriffen. Tagelang zogen wir durch
ehemals besiedeltes, reiches Land. Tausende von Farmern könnten
sich dort in gesundem, schönem Klima ansiedeln. Am 14. Oktober
kamen wir nach Pangire (Jacobi), einer anmutig gelegenen
Missionsstation, in der vor dem Kriege Missionar Gröschel mich bei
meiner letzten Friedensreise gastlich ausgenommen hatte. Die
Familie des Missionars war fortgeführt worden, aber die zum
Wabenastamme gehörigen Eingeborenen waren geblieben und
traten uns wie im Frieden zutraulich entgegen. Auch mehrere alte
Askari, die aus irgendwelchen Gründen von der Truppe
abgekommen waren, meldeten sich wieder. Auch in dieser Gegend
wurden einzelne Intelligence-Patrouillen angetroffen und verjagt. In
dem viehreichen Lande der Wabena wurden die bis dahin recht
geringen Viehbestände der Truppe vergrößert und so eine
bewegliche Verpflegungsreserve geschaffen, die wesentlich zur
Entlastung des Trosses beitrug. Nach dem Abmarsch von Pangire
wurde eine in diesem Ort zurückgelassene Patrouille durch eine
feindliche Abteilung beschossen. Bei Ubena wurde unsere Nachhut,
Hauptmann Müller, durch mehrere feindliche Kompagnien
angegriffen, die von Süden her kamen. Eine stärkere feindliche
Kolonne folgte uns also auf der Spur. Die freien, ganz offenen
Steppen von Ubena waren für unsere Kriegführung nicht günstig, da
sie auf weite Entfernung durch Gewehr- und Artilleriefeuer
beherrscht wurden. Verschiedentlich wurde zudem der Anmarsch
stärkerer feindlicher Kräfte von Mwakete her auf Ubena gemeldet;
diese Meldungen erwiesen sich teilweise als unrichtig und führten zu
einem kurzen Gefecht zweier deutscher Patrouillen gegeneinander.
Der Schiffstransport feindlicher Truppen zum Nordende des
Nyssasees und ihr Vormarsch auf Ubena oder weiter nördlich war
recht wahrscheinlich und hat sich später auch als zutreffend
erwiesen. Wollte ich die Marschrichtung auf Tabora abbrechen und
zwischen dem Nyassa- und Rukwasee und später zwischen dem
Nyassa- und Tanganjikasee hindurch nach Rhodesien marschieren,
so rückte jetzt der Zeitpunkt zum Abbiegen heran, und ich durfte
keinen Tag verlieren, um so mehr, als die schroffen Züge des
Livingstonegebirges sowie die Berge um Mbeja die
Bewegungsfreiheit sehr beschränkten. Bei der Festlegung der
Marschroute war zu berücksichtigen, daß die Verpflegungsbestände
der Kompagnien stark zusammengeschmolzen waren und ergänzt
werden mußten. Die Möglichkeit hierzu bot, nach
Eingeborenenaussagen, die Gegend von Kidugala und Gombowano,
während in Ussangu, insbesondere bei Neu-Utengule, Hungersnot
sein sollte.
Am 17. Oktober marschierte ich mit dem Gros von Ubena ab, ließ
dort den General Wahle, zwei andere Europäer und einige Askari
krank oder verwundet zurück und erreichte Kidugala; Abteilung
Koehl folgte am 18. Oktober. An diesem Tage wurde die Boma
Ubena durch etwa 100 feindliche Askari besetzt, 200 bis 300 gingen
nach Norden zur Iringastraße vor. Aus erbeuteten Zeitungen
entnahmen wir, daß am 29. September Cambrai gefallen war und
die Belgier bis 3 km westlich Roubaix gekommen waren. Wir lasen
vom Aufhören der Feindseligkeiten in Bulgarien, vom Rücktritt des
Grafen Hertling und der Einnahme von St. Quentin und Armentières.
Aber die Aufgabe von Stellungen und Ortschaften konnte so
verschiedenartige Gründe haben, daß ich diesen Nachrichten keine
entscheidende Bedeutung beimaß.
Der Weitermarsch führte bei Gombowano und Brandt durch recht
viehreiches Gebiet. Missionen und Schulen waren verlassen, aber
die Gartenfrüchte, besonders Maulbeeren und Pfirsiche, waren uns
hoch willkommen. Auch fanden wir im Pori große Massen wilder
Feigen und anderer wohlschmeckender süßer Früchte. Kleinere
Patrouillenzusammenstöße zeigten uns an, daß feindliche Truppen
vom Nyassasee her direkt nach Norden in die Gegend von Brandt
kamen. In Ruiwa fanden wir große englische Magazinanlagen vor;
einen ganzen Schuppen mit Leder mußten wir vernichten. Dann ging
es weiter zur Mission Alt-Utengule, die mir gleichfalls vom Frieden
her wohlbekannt war; sie lag jetzt verlassen. Dann erreichten wir die
Mission Mbozi. Dorthin hatten die Engländer die Männer aus der
Landschaft bestellt, sie untersucht und nach Neu-Langenburg
geschickt, wahrscheinlich, um dort Askari aus ihnen zu machen. In
Mbozi war ein großes englisches Magazin, das unter anderem 75
Lasten Salz und 47 Lasten Kaffee enthielt.
Es war schwer, sich durch das Gebiet richtig hindurchzutasten.
Meist war es uns wenig bekannt, und seit Jahren hatte es der Feind
durch Anlage von Magazinen und Transportstraßen verändert. Zu
vorherigen Erkundungen fehlten uns Zeit und Kräfte, und das
Moment der Überraschung wäre weggefallen. Die Eingeborenen
waren den Engländern recht feindlich gesonnen und leisteten uns
gute Dienste, aber ihre Angaben waren doch oft wenig klar. Während
wir in Mbozi einen Ruhetag machten und dort die Verpflegung
ergänzten, waren unsere Patrouillen weithin unterwegs, die eine
nach Galula (Mission Sankt Moritz), eine nach Itaka, eine in
Richtung auf Neu-Langenburg und eine in Richtung auf Fife. Die
Abwesenheit von einigen derselben würde Wochen dauern; ihre
Meldungen konnten nicht abgewartet werden.
Immerhin wurde so viel klar, daß an Mbozi vorbei eine
Hauptetappenstraße des Feindes von Fife über Rwiba nach Neu-
Langenburg lief. Mehrere an dieser befindliche Magazine und auf ihr
verkehrende Verpflegungskolonnen wurden erbeutet oder ihre
Bestände zerstört. Das Vorhandensein dieser Straße bewies, daß in
der Gegend von Fife ein größeres englisches Magazin liegen mußte.
Wahrscheinlich war dies bei schnellem Zufassen zu nehmen, bevor
stärkere Kräfte des Feindes dort eintrafen. Am 31. Oktober
vormittags war eine Kampfpatrouille auf Fife abgesandt worden.
Eingeborene und Patrouillen meldeten am gleichen Tage abends
den Vormarsch stärkerer feindlicher Kräfte auf der Straße Neu-
Langenburg-Rwiba. Am 1. November früh marschierte ich mit der
gesamten Truppe zunächst zum Rwibaberge ab. Dort zeigten die
Spuren, daß eine stärkere feindliche Kolonne den Rwibaberg in
Richtung auf Fife kurz vor uns passiert hatte. Dieser Feind war von
einer deutschen, zum Rwibaberg entsandten Kampfpatrouille nicht
bemerkt worden.
Achter Abschnitt
Einmarsch in Britisch-Rhodesien
U nsere am 31. Oktober nach Fife entsandte zweite

Kampfpatrouille hatte sich am Rwibaberge aufgehalten. Ich
mußte nun mit der ganzen Truppe sofort nach Fife
weitermarschieren, um dieses vor dem Feinde zu erreichen oder,
falls unsere erste Patrouille dort im Gefecht stehen sollte,
einzugreifen. Der zehnstündige Marsch (reine Marschzeit) von Mbozi
nach Fife war eine ganz gewaltige Anstrengung für die Truppe, aber
die Meldungen unserer Patrouillen, die Spuren des Feindes und
seine an Bäumen vorgefundenen Zettel bewiesen einwandfrei, daß
der Feind alles daransetzte, Fife noch am gleichen Tage, am 1.
November, zu erreichen. Bei der Größe auch seines Marsches war
man zu der Annahme berechtigt, daß unsere Kampfpatrouille, die ich
am 31. Oktober, spätestens am 1. November früh bei Fife vermutete,
den Feind den 1. November über an der Besetzung des Magazins
von Fife hindern würde. Im Laufe des Nachmittags beschossen wir
einige Patrouillen, ohne unseren Marsch aufzuhalten. Am
Spätnachmittag wurden schwächere Abteilungen des Feindes in den
Bergen nahe bei Fife schnell zurückgeworfen. Ich selbst ging mit der
Abteilung Spangenberg, die rechts von der Straße abgebogen war,
auf einen Bergrücken, auf einen Punkt vor, wo wir das Lager von
Fife vermuteten.
Das Gelände wurde offener und war in der Hauptsache mit
kniehohem Buschwerk und Gras bedeckt, als wir auf wenige hundert
Meter vor uns Leute herumgehen und dicht stehende Zelte sahen.
Die Leute benahmen sich so harmlos, daß ich fast glaubte, es wäre
unsere eigene Kampfpatrouille. Aus 200 m erhielten wir dann aber
ein sehr heftiges und anfangs auch recht gut gezieltes Gewehr- und
Maschinengewehrfeuer. Glücklicherweise wurde es von unseren
Schützen nicht erwidert, da ich vor diese geraten war und zwischen
beiden Parteien lag. Nach einiger Zeit fing der Feind, der sich
augenscheinlich selbst wild gemacht hatte, an, hoch zu schießen. Es
begann dunkler zu werden, so daß meine Patrouille sich zu unserer
Schützenlinie zurückziehen konnte. So war wenigstens Klarheit über
die Lage geschaffen: ein Feind von mehreren Kompagnien lag vor
uns in verschanzten Stellungen mit gutem Schußfelde. Seine
vorgeschobenen Abteilungen waren zurückgeworfen worden. Die
Magazine lagen zum Teil außerhalb der Schanzen und fielen später
in unsere Hand. Den verlustreichen Sturm auf diesen Feind wollte
ich nicht ausführen, dagegen schien mir die Gelegenheit günstig,
den Gegner in seinem eng zusammengedrängten Lager mit
unserem Minenwerfer und von erhöhter Stelle aus mit unserem
Geschütz und dann, wenn er sich zeigte, auch mit Gewehr- und
Maschinengewehrfeuer zu beschießen. Unsere Maschinengewehre
wurden in der Nacht dicht an seine Stellung herangeschoben und
verschanzt. Die Erkundung für eine günstige Geschützstellung
wurde auf den nächsten Vormittag verschoben.
Es war wahrscheinlich, daß die Eröffnung unseres Minenwerfer-
und Geschützfeuers den von Neu-Langenburg kommenden Feind
zum Angriff gegen uns veranlassen würde. Ein solcher Angriff gegen
unsere Höhen wäre sehr schwer gewesen. Aber trotz der
Beschießung am 2. November, bei der auch einige Verluste
beobachtet wurden, zeigte sich kein neuer Gegner. Der erhoffte
durchschlagende Erfolg gegen das Lager blieb aus, da unser
Minenwerfer bei einem der ersten Schüsse durch eine zu früh
krepierende Mine vernichtet wurde. Flachbahnwaffen allein gegen
den gedeckten Feind konnten nichts ausrichten. Am Nachmittag
marschierte unser Gros mit den mehr als 400 Stück starken
Viehherden ab und zwischen Fife und der Mission Mwenzo hindurch
nach Rhodesien hinein. Im Lager angekommen, sahen wir die
starken Rauchsäulen der Magazine von Fife, die Abteilung Müller
nach unserem Abmarsch in Brand gesteckt hatte. Aus Richtung von
Mission Mwenzo wurde mehrfach kurzes Feuer gehört.
Allmählich trafen von dort Meldungen ein. Bei Mwenzo waren
außer unserer von Mbozi entsandten Kampfpatrouille auch andere
Patrouillen von uns eingetroffen und hatten sich mit englischen
Patrouillen, manchmal auch untereinander, herumgeschossen. Eine
Meldung besagte, daß eine feindliche Patrouille mit ganz dunklen,
bisher unbekannten Uniformen aufgetreten sei; es müsse sich
jedenfalls um einen neu erschienenen Truppenteil handeln. Nach
vielen Nachforschungen stellte sich schließlich heraus, daß eine
unserer eigenen Patrouillen infolge ihrer allerdings nicht mehr
reglementsmäßigen Ausrüstung dauernd für Feind gehalten wurde.
In der Mission Mwenzo selbst befand sich ein stehendes feindliches
Lazarett, in dem unser Sanitätsmaterial ergänzt werden konnte. Die
Chininvorräte wurden auf über 14 kg ergänzt, und die
Chininversorgung damit bis Ende Juni 1919 sichergestellt.
Verschiedene Nachrichten und Gefangenenaussagen ließen
erkennen, daß Transporte des Feindes aus der Gegend von Broken
Hill nach Kasama und von dort weiter nach Fife gingen, und zwar mit
Automobilen und Ochsenwagen. Kasama selbst schien eine größere
Ortschaft und ein wichtiger Straßenknotenpunkt zu sein. Jedenfalls
waren auf dem Wege von Fife bis Kasama Magazine des Feindes zu
vermuten und Kasama selbst ein lohnendes Objekt. Zudem lag es,
soweit man aus dem Atlas ersehen konnte, so, daß man sich dort
entscheiden konnte, weiter nach Süden um den Bangweolosee
herum die Wasserscheide Zambesi-Kongo zu erreichen oder nach
Westen zwischen Bangweolosee und Moerosee hindurch weiter zu
marschieren. Die Angaben waren allerdings äußerst schwankend
und gründeten sich fast ausschließlich auf einige Askari, die als
Knaben in der Gegend des Moerosees an Handelskarawanen
teilgenommen hatten.
Die wichtige Frage, wie die Flüsse und besonders der aus dem
Bangweolosee in den Moerosee fließende Luapala beschaffen
waren, blieb zunächst unbeantwortet. Erst einige in diesen Tagen
erbeutete Karten und Beschreibungen schafften hierüber Klarheit.
Nach diesen ist der Luapala eine ganz gewaltige Barriere; tief und
an vielen Stellen mehrere Kilometer breit, ist er von ausgedehnten
Sümpfen eingefaßt. Bei der bevorstehenden Regenzeit würde ein
Übersetzen über denselben auf Einbäumen auf Schwierigkeiten
stoßen, da diese Einbäume bei unserer Annäherung sicherlich auf
das andere Ufer geschafft oder versteckt werden würden. Ich habe
damals jede Minute zum Studium von Karten und
Reisebeschreibungen verwandt und auf jeder Marschpause vertiefte
ich mich in diese. Die Gefahr, infolge mangelnder Orientierung sich
in dem von gewaltigen Strömen und Seen durchsetzten Gebiet
festzurennen, war groß.
Zunächst galt es, die Etappenstraße Fife-Mission Kajambi-
Kasama schnell aufzurollen. Bewegliche Kampfpatrouillen wurden in
Gewaltmärschen vorausgeschickt, erbeuteten mehrere kleinere
Magazine, nahmen deren Verwalter gefangen und fingen auch
einige Ochsenwagenbespannungen. Hauptmann Spangenberg
folgte mit 3 Kompagnien unmittelbar, dann mit etwa
Tagemarschabstand das Gros der Truppe.
Die gewaltigen Marschanforderungen und das Abbiegen in
südwestlicher Richtung, in ganz neues, unbekanntes Land, wurde
einer Anzahl Träger zu viel. An einem Tage allein entliefen beim
Kommando 20 Wasipe, die in der Gegend von Bismarckburg
beheimatet waren und 13 anderweitige Träger.
In Kajambi traf das Gros am 6. November ein; die katholische
Missionsstation besteht aus wundervollen und geräumigen,
massiven Gebäuden. Die Missionare waren unnötigerweise
geflohen. Im Schwesternhaus lag für mich ein Brief einer
katholischen Schwester. Sie stammte aus Westfalen und appellierte
als Landsmännin an meine Menschlichkeit. Sie würde sich sicherlich
manche Unbequemlichkeit erspart haben, wenn nicht nur sie,
sondern auch die übrigen Angehörigen der Mission ruhig auf ihrem
Posten geblieben wären. Wir hätten ihnen ebenso wenig getan wie
früher dem alten englischen Missionar in Peramiho bei Ssongea.
Das Land war außerordentlich reich; im Missionsgarten wuchsen
prachtvolle Erdbeeren. Bei der 2 Stunden nordöstlich Kajambi
lagernden Nachhut wurde mittags Gewehrfeuer gehört; Hauptmann
Koehl war dort zum Ernten von Verpflegung geblieben, Europäer
und Askari zum großen Teil in einzelne Erntepatrouillen
auseinandergezogen. Da wurde er von einer feindlichen Patrouille
angegriffen. Hauptmann Koehl zog sich aus der unerquicklichen
Lage heraus und machte am nächsten Tage bei Mission Kajambi
wieder Front, wobei der Feind gelegentlich mit Erfolg unter
überraschendes Feuer genommen wurde. Der Weitermarsch
unseres Gros auf Kasama wurde am 7. November fortgesetzt. Ein
Nachrücken des Feindes wurde nicht beobachtet. Sollte er aber
doch nachdrücken, so war anzunehmen, daß er dies aus
Verpflegungsgründen nicht in allzu großer Stärke tun konnte. Es bot
sich die Aussicht, nach schneller Wegnahme von Kasama und auf
diesen Ort basiert Front zu machen und ein günstiges Gefecht zu
liefern.
Aber das waren Zukunftshoffnungen; für das erste galt es,
schnell Kasama selbst zu nehmen, das nach den vorliegenden
Nachrichten zwar nicht sehr stark besetzt, aber gut befestigt war.
Hauptmann Spangenberg mit der Vorhut vergrößerte seinen
Tagesmarschvorsprung immer mehr durch gesteigerte
Marschleistungen. Ich folgte mit dem Gros; Verpflegung wurde
ausreichend gefunden, und auch die Schilderungen verschiedener
Bücher, nach denen der Wald reich an schmackhaften Porifrüchten
sein sollte, bestätigten sich.
Am 8. November hatte Abteilung Spangenberg mehrere
Patrouillengefechte nördlich Kasama, am 9. November nahm sie
Kasama, dessen aus einer halben Kompagnie bestehende
Besatzung nach Süden abzog. Munition wurde nur wenig erbeutet
und auch die anderen Bestände des Waffendepots hatten geringen
Wert. Der Ort hatte eine große Reparaturwerkstätte für Automobile
und andere Fahrzeuge; mehr als 20 Burenwagen wurden erbeutet.
Recht erheblich war die Beute an Europäerverpflegung. Auffallend
war, daß eine englische Gesellschaft in Kasama — ich glaube, es
war die African Lakes Corporation — schriftliche Anweisung zur
Zerstörung ihrer Bestände durch die Eingeborenen gegeben hatte.
Diese kamen dann auch in größeren Mengen zum Plündern heran
und Abteilung Spangenberg fand die Gebäude, Inventar und
Bestände zum großen Teil durch plündernde Eingeborene zerstört
vor. Seinem Eingreifen ist es zu danken, daß unter anderem das mit
vielem Geschmack gebaute und eingerichtete Haus des britischen
Commissionars erhalten blieb.
Während unseres Vormarsches von Fife hatte sich
herausgestellt, daß, je weiter wir vorrückten, die feindlichen
Magazine voller waren. Es machte den Eindruck, als ob wir eine
Etappenlinie aufrollten, die, bei Broken Hill oder etwas nördlich
davon anfangend, erst im Entstehen begriffen war. Wir durften
hoffen, bei schnellem weiteren Vordringen auf noch reichere
Bestände zu treffen, und die aufgefundenen Papiere und
Eingeborenennachrichten schienen dies zu bestätigen. Drei
Tagemärsche weiter, den Telephondraht entlang, sollten bei der
Chambesi-Fähre große Bestände liegen, die zum Teil mit Booten
herantransportiert waren. Ich selbst war mit Fahrrad am 11.
November bei Hauptmann Spangenberg in Kasama eingetroffen,
und dieser marschierte mit 2 Kompagnien sogleich weiter nach
Süden auf die Chambesi-Fähre zu.
Das Gros selbst kam am 12. November nach Kasama. Gegen
Abend hörte man aus unserer Anmarschrichtung Gewehr- und
Maschinengewehrfeuer. Unsere Nachhut wurde 2 Stunden nördlich
Kasama in ihrem Lager angegriffen. Der Feind, der bei Kajambi
gefochten hatte, war nicht unmittelbar gefolgt, sondern hatte einen
Parallelweg eingeschlagen. Nachts traf Abteilung Koehl bei Kasama
ein. Mir schien jetzt das Unternehmen gegen das Chambesi-
Magazin das aussichtsvollere und wichtigere zu sein, um so mehr,
als der verfolgende Gegner nach der ganzen Lage immer weiter
verfolgen und so von neuem für uns Gelegenheit zum Frontmachen
bieten mußte.

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Catholicity and the Covenant of Works:

James Ussher and the Reformed

Catholicity and the Covenant of Works: James Ussher and

The Covenant of Works: The Origins, Development, and

The Trinity and Martin Luther Studies in Historical and

The Papacy and the Orthodox: Sources and History of a

The Papacy and the Orthodox Sources and History of a

Grace and Freedom: William Perkins and the Early Modern

Dryden and the Tradition of Panegyric James Garrison

Consciences and the Reformation: Scruples over Oaths

AUGUSTINE, THE TRINITY, AND THE ANTOINE DE CHANDIEU

Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press

© Oxford University Press 2020

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in

You must not circulate this work in any other form

Library of Congress Cataloging-​in-​Publication Data

ITQ Irish Theological Quarterly

ST Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, translated by the Fathers

because, although covenant theology is mostly associated with puritanism,

James Ussher (1581–​1656), theologian, controversialist, and archbishop

Solidarity and Its Influence on Post-​

of important doctrinal themes latent in the Christian tradition.2 This study

and Roman Law,” 11–​12.

the Voluntarist Tradition,” Natural Law Forum (1960): 65–​83.

(Oxford: OUP, 2008), 3–​10.

40–​63; Hampton, Anti-​Arminians, 1–​38.

XVII, XXIIII, XXV, LVIII, LXXXII.

organize the full range of doctrine—​which Ussher would have described as

174–​76; van Asselt, “Christ, Predestination, and Covenant,” 221–​25.

33 Muller, “Reformed Theology,” 170.

Framing Ussher Research

Ussher’s biography, particularly in regard to his ecclesiastical and scholarly

University of Chicago Press, 1988), 150.

his theology.40 In 1647, Parliament appointed Ussher to preach in London’s

40 MPWA, 1:141; see note 26.

a puritan in order to win James I’s favor.51 Ussher’s insistence on conformity

1626–​1656,” in Helga Robinson-​Hammerstein (ed.), European Universities in the Age of Reformation

theological concerns. These strong Reformed inclinations do explain why

62 Boran, “Early Friendship Network,” 118.

of Ireland] Constitutions, and Canons Ecclesiastical, canons XI, XL.

inquiry, newer studies of Ussher as a historian have begun to focus on his

J. Lynch, “John Davenant’s Hypothetical Universalism: A Defense of Catholic and Reformed

“tone” of his collection indicates the interest of “a Calvinist controver-

75 Boran, “Libraries of Luke Challoner and James Ussher,” 104, 85.

Works,” in Church of Ireland and Its Past, 74–​94.

Framing Covenant Theology

89 Woolsey, Unity and Continuity, 45–​52, 73–​79.

Edinburgh, 1995; Woolsey, Unity and Continuity, 161–​203.

English puritans, claiming they followed the Rhineland reformers instead

the Covenant (Bern: Peter Lang, 1988), 4.

Strehle’s claim.109 Specific to this study, Strehle blamed voluntarism—​the

along trajectories of continuity and refinement.114 Capern and others with

Theologian Thomas Goodwin (1600–​1680) (Göttingen: V&R, 2010), 123–​45.

Framing the Irish Reformation

UK: T&T Clark International, 2003), 85.

28, no. 112 (1993): 356.

A ber allzusehr aufhalten durften wir uns nicht. Die Kriegslage

U nsere am 31. Oktober nach Fife entsandte zweite

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

James Ussher (1581–1656), theologian, controversialist, and archbishop

Solidarity and Its Influence on Post-

and Roman Law,” 11–12.

the Voluntarist Tradition,” Natural Law Forum (1960): 65–83.

(Oxford: OUP, 2008), 3–10.

40–63; Hampton, Anti-Arminians, 1–38.

organize the full range of doctrine—which Ussher would have described as

174–76; van Asselt, “Christ, Predestination, and Covenant,” 221–25.

1626–1656,” in Helga Robinson-Hammerstein (ed.), European Universities in the Age of Reformation

Works,” in Church of Ireland and Its Past, 74–94.

89 Woolsey, Unity and Continuity, 45–52, 73–79.

Edinburgh, 1995; Woolsey, Unity and Continuity, 161–203.

Strehle’s claim.109 Specific to this study, Strehle blamed voluntarism—the

Theologian Thomas Goodwin (1600–1680) (Göttingen: V&R, 2010), 123–45.