A few notes I took two years ago, consulting Richard Hooker, The
Works of that Learned and Judicious Divine Mr. Richard Hooker with an Account
of His Life and Death by Isaac Walton. Arranged by the Rev. John Keble
MA. 7th edition revised by the Very Rev. R.W. Church and the Rev. F. Paget
(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1888). 3 vols. Accessed from http://oll.libertyfund.org/title/1731 on
2012-03-05.
LEP = Of the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity
- the two natures or aspects of the church (not Hooker's phrase): the church is a supernatural society; its visible form, however, is a political society (LEP 1.15.2)
- the failure to distinguish between the two natures is "the mother of all error" in ecclesiology as much as Christology (LEP 3.3.1)
- the Church of Christ as "body mystical" cannot be but one although we cannot discern it as such (heaven/earth; mixed multitude); the true members of the church are only known to God (LEP 3.1.2)
- the Church is, on the other hand, a discernible, known company; the visible church is defined as those who profess to be servants of one Lord who acknowledge one faith and were initiated by one baptism - outward profession is the basis for the unity of the church (LEP 3.1.)
- communicatio idiomatum applies in ecclesiology as well as Christology, hence human laws for the external polity "church" must not contradict the positive law in scripture, "otherwise they are ill made"; unless in disagreement with scripture we must heed the laws of the Church (LEP 3.9.3)
-
excommunication cuts off from the Church but not the Commonwealth; it bars people from full participation in public worship without denying their Christian identity (LEP 8.1.6)
Hooker proceeds from the assumptions that all members of the Commonwealth
are Christians and hence members of the Church and argues from this for the
union of Commonwealth and Church and royal supremacy (cf. Daniel Eppley on
"Royal Supremacy", chap. 18 in W. J. Torrance Kirby, A
Companion to Richard Hooker (Brill's Companions to the Christian Tradition,
8; Leiden: Brill, 2008).
Pierre Lurbe, "Theologico-political Issues in Richard Hooker’s Laws
of Ecclesiastical Polity and Thomas Hobbes’s Leviathan" in
LISA 9/1 [2011], online, goes so far as to claim:
"The main effect of the Reformation was to transform the English monarch into the Head of his national Church, thus combining in a single man —or woman— the two distinct functions of Head of State and Head of the Church."
He contrasts Hooker and Hobbes succinctly:
"For Hooker, religion is a set of beliefs that is so beneficial that it is the duty of the commonwealth to promote it through the agency of a state church. For Hobbes, religion is a passion that is so dangerous that it is the duty of the commonwealth to hold it in check through the agency of a state church."
Royal dominion over the church is based on the consent of the English
community not on divine right which is why Scripture is not the source to
consult on this matter but the laws and traditions of the realm. God mandates
neither presbyterianism nor royal dominion in the church (Eppley, "Royal Supremacy," 511).
Hooker argues that "the power to authoritatively interpret
scripture belongs to the crown in parliament with the convocation" (Eppley, "Royal Supremacy," 523) because this
represents the collective wisdom of the entire church and the approval of the
church as a whole is the most certain guide to reasonable interpretation; he
stresses the necessity for incontrovertible argument.
See chapter 3 ("Ecclesiology: The Doctrine of the Two Churches") of W. J. Torrance Kirby, Richard Hooker's Doctrine of the Royal Supremacy (Studies in the History of Christian
Thought, 43; Leiden: Brill, 1990). Cf. William H. Harrison, "The
Church," chap. 12 in A
Companion to Richard Hooker.
