Editing Anglicanism (section)

===Divines{{anchor|Anglican_divines}}===
{{See also|Paul Amyraut|John Donne|George Herbert|William Laud}}
[[File:Thomas Cranmer by Gerlach Flicke.jpg|thumb|[[Thomas Cranmer]], author of the first two editions of the ''[[Book of Common Prayer]]'']]
Within the Anglican tradition, "divines" are clergy of the [[Church of England]] whose theological writings have been considered standards for faith, doctrine, worship, and spirituality, and whose influence has permeated the Anglican Communion in varying degrees through the years.{{sfn|Booty|1998|pp=175–176, 197}} While there is no authoritative list of these Anglican divines, there are some whose names would likely be found on most lists – those who are commemorated in [[Calendar of saints (Anglican)|lesser feasts]] of the Anglican churches and those whose works are frequently [[anthology|anthologised]].{{sfn|Booty|1998|pp=163, 174}}

The corpus produced by Anglican divines is diverse. What they have in common is a commitment to the faith as conveyed by scripture and the ''Book of Common Prayer'', thus regarding prayer and theology in a manner akin to that of the [[Apostolic Fathers]].{{sfn|Booty|1998|p=163}} On the whole, Anglican divines view the ''[[via media]]'' of Anglicanism not as a compromise, but as "a positive position, witnessing to the universality of God and God's kingdom working through the fallible, earthly ''ecclesia Anglicana''".{{sfn|Booty|1998|pp=164}}

These theologians regard scripture as interpreted through tradition and reason as authoritative in matters concerning salvation. Reason and tradition, indeed, are extant in and presupposed by scripture, thus implying co-operation between God and humanity, God and nature, and between the sacred and secular. Faith is thus regarded as [[incarnation]]al and authority as dispersed.

Amongst the early Anglican divines of the 16th and 17th centuries, the names of [[Thomas Cranmer]], [[John Jewel]], [[Matthew Parker]], [[Richard Hooker]], [[Lancelot Andrewes]], and [[Jeremy Taylor]] predominate. The influential character of Hooker's ''[[Of the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity]]'' cannot be overestimated. Published in 1593 and subsequently, Hooker's eight-volume work is primarily a treatise on church-state relations, but it deals comprehensively with issues of [[biblical interpretation]], [[soteriology]], ethics, and [[Sanctification in Christianity|sanctification]]. Throughout the work, Hooker makes clear that theology involves prayer and is concerned with ultimate issues and that theology is relevant to the social mission of the church.

The 17th century saw the rise of two important movements in Anglicanism: [[Cambridge Platonists|Cambridge Platonism]], with its mystical understanding of reason as the "candle of the Lord", and the [[evangelical revival]], with its emphasis on the personal experience of the [[Holy Spirit in Christianity|Holy Spirit]]. The Cambridge Platonist movement evolved into a school called [[Latitudinarianism]], which emphasised reason as the barometer of discernment and took a stance of indifference towards doctrinal and ecclesiological differences.

The evangelical revival, influenced by such figures as [[John Wesley]] and [[Charles Simeon]], re-emphasised the importance of [[Sola fide|justification through faith]] and the consequent importance of personal conversion. Some in this movement, such as Wesley and [[George Whitefield]], took the message to the United States, influencing the [[First Great Awakening]] and creating an Anglo-American movement called [[Methodism]] that would eventually break away, structurally, from the Anglican churches after the American Revolution.

By the 19th century, there was a renewed interest in pre-Reformation English religious thought and practice. Theologians such as [[John Keble]], [[Edward Bouverie Pusey]], and [[John Henry Newman]] had widespread influence in the realm of polemics, homiletics and theological and devotional works, not least because they largely repudiated the old high-church tradition and replaced it with a dynamic appeal to antiquity which looked beyond the Reformers and Anglican formularies.{{sfn|Nockles|1994|pp=7–8, 113, 125, 127}} Their work is largely credited with the development of the [[Oxford Movement]], which sought to reassert Catholic identity and practice in Anglicanism.<ref>{{cite web |last=Kiefer |first=James E. |title=The Oxford Tractarians, Renewers of the Church |url=http://justus.anglican.org/resources/bio/249.html |work=Biographical Sketches of Memorable Christians of the Past |publisher=Society of Archbishop Justus |access-date=27 September 2017 |archive-date=5 December 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171205061354/http://justus.anglican.org/resources/bio/249.html |url-status=live }}</ref>

In contrast to this movement, clergy such as the Bishop of Liverpool, [[J. C. Ryle]], sought to uphold the distinctly Reformed identity of the Church of England. He was not a servant of the status quo, but argued for a lively religion which emphasised grace, holy and charitable living, and the plain use of the 1662 ''Book of Common Prayer'' (interpreted in a partisan evangelical way){{efn|The 19th-century evangelical interpretation of the Prayerbook, now less frequent, included celebration of Holy Communion while the priest was standing at the northern ''short side'' of the communion table. This misinterpretation was caused by the fact that the 1662 ''Book of Common Prayer'' retained two contradictory rubrics. From 1552 a rubric was retained that the priest should stand at the northern ''long side'' of a communion table standing east-west in the choir (the communicants sitting in the choir stalls by the northern and southern walls). From 1559 was retained the rubric that 'the chancels shall remain as they have done in times past', originally intended to protect the mediaeval interior of church buildings from Calvinist vandalism, and – mainly neglected during the reigns of Elizabeth I and James I – it was not consented to generally before the reign of Charles II. During the reign of Elizabeth I, only the [[chapel royal|chapels royal]] retained the mediaeval position of the communion table, standing permanently north-south at the east wall of the choir. The parish of St. Giles Cripplegate, London, began to apply the Chapels Royal arrangement of the communion table in 1599 or 1605, and from there it began to spread. Archbishop [[William Laud]]'s attempt to make it mandatory in the 1630s backfired, with well known consequences. By the reign of Charles II, however, it was applied generally, and the original intention of the ''northward position rubric'' became unintelligible, and easily misunderstood.}} without additional rituals. [[Frederick Denison Maurice]], through such works as ''The Kingdom of Christ'', played a pivotal role in inaugurating another movement, [[Christian socialism]]. In this, Maurice transformed Hooker's emphasis on the [[incarnation]]al nature of Anglican spirituality to an imperative for social justice.

In the 19th century, Anglican biblical scholarship began to assume a distinct character, represented by the so-called "Cambridge triumvirate" of [[Joseph Lightfoot]], [[Fenton John Anthony Hort|F. J. A. Hort]], and [[Brooke Foss Westcott]].<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Treloar |first1=Geoffrey R. |title=The Cambridge Triumvirate and the Acceptance of New Testament Higher Criticism in Britain 1850–1900 |journal=[[Journal of Anglican Studies]] |date=2006 |volume=4 |issue=1 |pages=13–32 |doi=10.1177/1740355306064516|s2cid=171035765 }}</ref> Their orientation is best summed up by Westcott's observation that "Life which Christ is and which Christ communicates, the life which fills our whole beings as we realise its capacities, is active fellowship with God."{{sfn|Booty|1998|p=183}}<ref>{{cite book |last1=Westcott |first1=Brooke Foss |title=Lessons from Work |date=1901 |publisher=Macmillan |location=London |page=290 |edition=Reprinted |chapter-url=https://archive.org/details/lessonsfromwork00westgoog/page/n306/mode/1up|chapter=Life}}</ref>

The earlier part of the 20th century is marked by [[Charles Gore]], with his emphasis on [[natural revelation]], and [[William Temple (bishop)|William Temple]]'s focus on Christianity and society, while, from outside England, [[Robert Leighton (bishop)|Robert Leighton]], Archbishop of Glasgow, and several clergy from the United States have been suggested, such as [[William Porcher DuBose]], [[John Henry Hobart]] (1775–1830, Bishop of New York 1816–30), [[William Meade]], [[Phillips Brooks]], and [[Charles Brent]].{{sfn|Booty|1998|pp=164, 171–172}}