Chapter 17 | Table of Contents

Our Lord said, "You have heard that it has been said by them of old time, You shall not perjure yourself, but shall perform unto the Lord your oaths." The Jews practiced promissory oaths and thought all was well when there was a performance of them. But this with numbers of other Jewish practices was not to be allowed in this kingdom of God that was come into the world. Christ totally rejects and absolutely forbids it saying, "I say unto you, swear not at all." In place of this He appoints, and absolutely demands, a most perfect simplicity of language to support and adorn the mutual communication of those whom he had created again unto righteousness and given power to become sons of God by saying, "Let what you say be simply 'Yes' or 'No'; anything more than this comes from evil." What more could have been done by Christ to prevent the use or hinder the entrance of an oath into His church? What then shall we say of the present universal Christendom? For if Christ had commanded the direct contrary, had he said, "Behold I give you this new commandment, let not a simple 'Yes' and 'No' be of any avail in all your communication, but let oaths be required of all that bear my name as a proof that they belong to me and act in all their dealings as become saints; for whatsoever is less than this cometh of evil." Had this been Christ's new commandment, all the churches of Christendom, popish and Protestant, and these reformed kingdoms of Great Britain and Ireland, might have much to boast of their obedience to it. For through town and country, in all ignorant villages, in all learned colleges, in all courts, spiritual and temporal, what with law-oaths, simony-oaths, bribery-oaths, election-oaths, etc., there is more swearing and forswearing than all that history reports of any idol-worshipping nations. It was said of old, "Because of swearing the land mourns." It is every bit as true to say now, "Because of swearing the land rejoices in iniquity, is full of profaneness and without any fear or awe of the divine majesty, daily swallowing down all manner of oaths in the same good state of mind and with as much serious reflection, as drinking buddies swallow down their liquor."

"He that despises, me," says Christ, "despises, not me but Him that sent me." Can the church that absolutely requires what Christ has absolutely forbidden be free from the most open and public despising of Christ, while in full contrariety to His express word, refuses the sufficiency of that "yes" and "no" that he has commanded to be sufficient? What's worse is, they go on to compel all orders of Christians to swear by the very book that says to all, whether high or low, prince, priest or people, to "swear not at all"!

If the swearing law was to order that, instead of kissing the gospel-book, the swearer should say, "In remembrance of and in regard to the words of Christ forbidding me to swear I make this oath," who would not see the open contempt for Christ and His gospel? But the contempt of both is as truly there when the gospel-book is kissed by the swearer, for the book has nothing relating to oaths but those words of Christ which absolutely forbid the use of them. Instead, therefore, of saying, "So help me God and His holy gospel, it might have been much better if every swearing law through all Christendom had obliged every swearer to finish his oath with these words, "Let God and His holy gospel pardon me in this one thing."

If it here be asked whether I would have all private Christians to beggar themselves and lose all their right and title to house and land which by the laws of Christendom cannot be preserved without certain promissory oaths, I say not so. But my answer is that as the Jews were of old carried captive into Babylon, as real and as great a captivity must happen to all private Christians born and living under a fallen state of governing Christendom. For whether it be a pope or a Nebuchadnezzar, popish or Protestant church, governors that make the goods and properties of private Christians only possible to be possessed by obedience to their swearing laws, the captivity is the same. And as God bore with the want of a Jerusalem worship in those Jews whose captivity suffered them not to perform it, so it may well be hoped and believed that he will bear with that lack of gospel purity in the "yes" and "no" of private Christians that their captivity under a fallen state of Christian government does not suffer them to adhere to. Also, that the piety of private Christians, loving and longing after gospel-purity of communication under the church-captivity, will be as acceptable to God as the piety of captive Jews was, who, though living under heathen laws and forced to say their prayers in Babylon, always turned their eyes toward, and their hearts longing after, Jerusalem and its holy worship.

What I write is not to show that Christendom's oaths and the manner of them are not to be submitted to by any private good Christian, but to show in the plainest manner that the laws of Christendom that make them necessary are a full proof that the spirit that governs all Christendom is fallen away from the Spirit of Christ. And also to show that if gross impiety runs through all the Christian world, if much and much the greatest part of swearing Christians have lost all pious fear of oaths and swearing, it is because the necessity of swearing meets every man in almost everything at the peril of losing all that he has or can have unless he will swear. When the matter of an oath is a manifest lie or an engagement to do some wicked thing, all is to be suffered rather than take it. But where there is nothing false or bad affirmed or promised, nor any blame chargeable but that of going further than our Lord's "yes" and "no," it is plain from Christ's words that the evil is only in from where the oath comes. When a person swears of his own accord or wantonly, then the oath comes of or from the evil of his own heart. But when a Christian in whose heart the simplicity and purity of gospel-language is written and loved, submits to use more than a "yes" or a "no," compelled by that authority which makes the refusal to be the loss of goods and bodily imprisonment, then such departure from gospel-language comes of and from the evil in that power that required it, whether it be a pope, a kirk, a church, an assembly of divines, or a Nebuchadnezzar. All this, I say, is plain from Christ's own words, "Let your yes be yes and your no, no." But is this? It is because whatsoever is more than this comes of evil and is caused by evil. Therefore, the evil in the use of an imposed oath is, by the words of Christ, charged upon and confined to what causes or forces it to be done, for what the oath comes from is what our Savior calls the evil.

In a word, what calls for and requires oaths among Christians, requires what Christ forbids; but governing Christendom everywhere establishes requires and even compels Christians to swear. Therefore, governing Christendom is fallen from Christ and acts by and through that spirit that, being contrary to Christ, is and must be called anti-Christ.