Last week we briefly looked at the reason for the National Covenant of Scotland. This week we will examine the actual document a bit more closely. A council of leaders gathered together and agreed that a peaceful, legal, National Covenant should be put together, representing their faith and consciences, and be presented to King Charles I and the authorities. The two men chosen to draw up the document were the theologian, Alexander Henderson of Leuchars, and the lawyer, Archibald Johnston of Warriston. The consensus of the leaders was that the document should be drawn up in three sections.
The first section was copied word for word from the anti-papal Covenant of 1581, which King James VI had requested and signed himself. In this part, there was the reminder that the ‘Kirk of Scotland, the Kings Majesty, and the three estates of this Realme’ were bound to support the Scots Confession of Faith from 1560, which had been ‘publickly confirmed by sundry Acts of Parliament, and now of a long time hath beene openly professed by the Kings Majesty, and whole body of this Realme both in Burgh and Land.’ After this, the National Covenant lists the rejection of the tyrannical papal system, with its false doctrines, such as praying to Mary and the saints and transubstantiation. This section finishes with the oath that the signatories will defend the King, the gospel, the liberties of Scotland and justice, with their ‘goods, bodies and lives’.
For the second section, the lawyer, Archibald Johnston, makes use of ‘many Acts of Parliament’, which amount to at least 57, to support their stance. He also points out that Parliament had accepted the Presbyterian Church by law, as well as the Scots Confession of 1560, which made it clear where they stood. In Article 11 of this foundational confession of the church are the words: ‘… our Head and only Mediator CHRIST JESUS… the only Head of the Kirk… In such honours and offices, if man or Angel presume to intrude themselves, we utterly detest and abhor them, as blasphemous to our Sovereign and supreme Governor CHRIST JESUS.’
In the third section, which is the bond of agreement before God and man, it is pointed out that King James VI’s role was to defend the reformed Church of Scotland as ‘expressed in the Confession of Faith abovewritten’, and that the subscribers to the Covenant would do the same, as they continued to practice their free assemblies and Parliament for ‘purity and the liberty of the Gospel’.
The National Covenant was a legal petition to King Charles I and the authorities, agreed by the council in Edinburgh, and honed and sharpened firstly before the nobles in John Galloway’s house in Niddry’s Wynd in Edinburgh, then on the second floor of the Tailors’ Hall in the Cowgate, where 200-300 church ministers gathered to scrutinize the document. It was extraordinary, having been through such a cross-examination, that only a few words were queried in the original script. With the exception of one person, there was a unanimous support of the National Covenant by the Scottish leaders. A popular narrative, like a repetitive drum beat, has been told by many tour guides these days on the Royal Mile: that the National Covenant was the work of a small group of religious fanatics like the Islamic State, or Al-Qaeda. How far from the truth has this revised tale wandered!
‘And all the people took a stand for the covenant’ (2 Kings 23:3, NKJV). Image: The National Covenant of 1638, signed by the Privy Council, in the National Museum of Scotland, photo by Paul James-Griffiths