Why did American Presbyterianism, revise 23:3 in the Westminster Confession of Faith?
The early American Presbyterians, mostly fresh from Northern Ireland and Scotland, and a century or less away from “the killing times,” when an Erastian English monarchy tried to subjugate the Churches of Scotland and England, were understandably “gun shy” with reference to some of the language of chapter 23:3 and 31:2 in the Confession. They, along with the English Puritan immigrants, did not ever want the same thing to happen in the colonies, and thus the revision of these chapters. However, I am convinced that their understanding of that chapter was sadly mistaken, that in no way can the original Westminster Confession of Faith be charged and convicted of Erastianism. Not all the Westminster divines, however, after the publication of the Confession, were consistent in their actions with what they wrote in the Confession: their doctrine was better than their practice as is always the case with Calvinists. Two good defenses of chapters 23 and 31 against the charge of Erastianism are:
