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Holy Week resources and reflections

Great Revival sparks development of Cumberland movement, church

Editor's Note: This year the General Assembly of the PC(USA) will meet concurrently with the GA's of the Cumberland Presbyterian Church and the Cumberland Presbyterian Church in America. This is the first of a two-part series of articles on those sister denominations.

 

On February 3, 1810, three riders left Logan County, Kentucky. Their destination was Dickson County, Tennessee. Specifically, they sought the farm of Samuel McAdow near Burns, Tenn. Two of the riders, Finis Ewing and Samuel King, had been ordained as ministers by the Presbyterian Church since 1803 and 1804, respectively. Ephraim McLean, the third rider, had been a probationer since 1803. Samuel McAdow had been a Presbyterian minister considerably longer. Although the exact date of his ordination is unknown, McAdow had been ordained by 1796, possibly before. The dates of ordination of these frontier preachers are significant, as are the circumstances in which they found themselves in 1810.

Editor’s Note: This year the General Assembly of the PC(USA) will meet concurrently with the GA’s of the Cumberland Presbyterian Church and the Cumberland Presbyterian Church in America. This is the first of a two-part series of articles on those sister denominations.

 

On February 3, 1810, three riders left Logan County, Kentucky. Their destination was Dickson County, Tennessee. Specifically, they sought the farm of Samuel McAdow near Burns, Tenn. Two of the riders, Finis Ewing and Samuel King, had been ordained as ministers by the Presbyterian Church since 1803 and 1804, respectively. Ephraim McLean, the third rider, had been a probationer since 1803. Samuel McAdow had been a Presbyterian minister considerably longer. Although the exact date of his ordination is unknown, McAdow had been ordained by 1796, possibly before. The dates of ordination of these frontier preachers are significant, as are the circumstances in which they found themselves in 1810.

In the early 1800s, south-central Kentucky and north-central Tennessee, then within the bounds of Transylvania Presbytery, were still very much the American frontier. Logan County was noted for lawlessness and the town of Russellville was known as a den of thieves. James McGready, a Presbyterian minister sometimes called “the Son of Thunder,” came into this environment in about 1798. By 1800, McGready’s preaching caught the collective imagination of the frontier folk and an upsurge of religious fervor swept the frontier.

Whether a manifestation of the Holy Spirit or mass hysteria, the environment of the Great Revival quickly demonstrated a great shortage of ministers in the Presbyterian Church. While the driving force of the revival was, to a great extent, Presbyterian, the Presbyterian Church was in a poor position to take advantage of the masses who desired to form themselves into regular congregations. Members of Kentucky Synod quickly factionalized into pro and anti-revival groups.

The supporters of the revival favored relaxing the requirements for ordination in order that there might be enough Presbyterian clergy to minister to the new flock. Encouraged by the Rev. David Rice, the “Father of Presbyterianism in Kentucky,” who endorsed the legality of their actions, the revivalists pointed to the use of “readers” and “exhorters” authorized by the Book of Discipline adopted by the first General Assembly of the Church of Scotland for precedence and to the ordination requirement loophole “except in extraordinary cases” found in the Form of Government. The revival, they argued, provided just such an extraordinary case.

When Kentucky Synod formed, Transylvania Presbytery split into two bodies. One continued as a reduced Transylvania Presbytery. The other, primarily in central and Western Kentucky, was Cumberland Presbytery. From formation in 1803, the revival party dominated Cumberland Presbytery. Kentucky Synod, on the other hand, tended to look less and less favorably on the revival. Cumberland Presbytery continued to license and ordain persons in exception to the usual rules while the tension between revivalists and conservatives escalated.

In 1805, Kentucky Synod claimed the right to reexamine the ordinations and licenses performed by Cumberland Presbytery. In return, the Presbytery insisted that it had exclusive right to license and ordain whom it pleased and the synod had no right to examine these persons. Finally, Kentucky Synod suspended the members of the revival faction and dissolved Cumberland Presbytery back into Transylvania Presbytery.

The suspended members of the former Cumberland Presbytery sought redress from every available judicatory. Although sometimes sympathetic, no body took action with the exception of the General Assembly, which suggested that Kentucky Synod reconsider their actions against Cumberland Presbytery. The synod repeatedly refused this suggestion. Determined to continue to serve their congregations and to seek reinstatement within the Presbyterian Church, the suspended members of the dissolved Cumberland Presbytery formed themselves into a Council of Revival Ministers. But, after five years, it was a desperate and dwindling body.

The riders from Logan County had no desire to form a new denomination. They felt, however, that the constitution of an independent presbytery was their best course of action in order to pursue their grievances against Kentucky Synod. Finis Ewing and Samuel King determined to enlist the aid of Samuel McAdow in reforming Cumberland Presbytery. If McAdow proved to be unwilling, however, they would then ordain Ephraim McLean and constitute a presbytery without McAdow. The riders arrived at McAdow farm just before nightfall and presented their case to McAdow. After a night of prayer, McAdow agreed to participate. The three ministers constituted an independent Cumberland Presbytery and then proceeded to ordain Ephraim McLean.

Despite the passage of time, revival fervor was unabated. Cumberland Presbytery grew rapidly. Congregations quickly spread beyond what had been the bounds of the original Cumberland Presbytery. Within just a few years, Cumberland Presbytery was divided and the resulting presbyteries formed Cumberland Synod. All the while, these bodies continued to seek readmission to the greater Presbyterian Church. By 1829, however, the majority in Cumberland Synod was fed up with the Presbyterian Church. Torn between forming a delegated synod and their own General Assembly, the “Cumberlands” finally chose the latter despite the vocal protestations of Finis Ewing.

Although the massive upsurge of religious fervor that had been the Great Revival was over by 1829, the Cumberland Presbyterian Church claimed to continue the revival spirit. Through the rest of the nineteenth century, the Cumberland Presbyterian denomination was the most rapidly expanding Presbyterian body in North America.

Despite their humble beginnings, or perhaps because of them, Cumberland Presbyterians became almost fanatical about ministerial educational requirements. They were determined that the epitaph “illiterate exhorters” with which Kentucky Synod branded Cumberland ministers would never be justified. From a log college situation reminiscent of the Tennents, Cumberland Presbyterians formed their first college in 1825 and by the early 1900s maintained twenty-two colleges and universities.

The overall spirit of the Cumberland movement continued to be liberal through the nineteenth century. In 1884, despite objections primarily from the Southern Presbyterian Church, the Cumberland Presbyterian Denomination was admitted to the Pan-Presbyterian Alliance meeting at Belfast, Ireland. In 1889, with the ordination of Louisa Woosley by Kentucky’s Nolin Presbytery, the Cumberland Presbyterian Church became the first Presbyterian body to ordain and then, most importantly, recognize the ordination of women. Surprisingly, Nolin Presbytery was one of the denomination’s more conservative judicatories.

With the revisions made to the Westminster Confession by the Presbyterian Church in 1902, it seemed to persons in both the Presbyterian Church and the Cumberland Presbyterian Church that the necessity of their existence as separate bodies had come to an end. With the exception of predestination, the differences between the denominations had always been more procedural and political than theological. In the minds of many Presbyterians, membership in the Pan-Presbyterian Alliance certified the legitimacy of the Cumberland movement. Corresponding committees between the two denominations worked toward union of the bodies. Despite a bitter campaign, the 1906 Cumberland Presbyterian General Assembly voted to unite with the Presbyterian Church (USA).

A significant remnant, however, balked at the union. Although the majority of Cumberland Presbyterian presbyteries did vote in favor of the union, they represent a minority of Cumberland Presbyterians. The voting was flawed in that, for example, Nebraska Presbytery’s nine small churches had the equal vote of West Tennessee’s 102 churches with tens of thousands of members. Generally, but not exclusively, the Cumberland Presbyteries received by the Presbyterian Church (USA) in 1907, were Northern, Western, urban, wealthy, white, and liberal. Overtures by African American Cumberland Presbyteries to join the union were ignored. The remnant Cumberland Presbyterian Church was strongest in Tennessee, Kentucky, and Arkansas. Although the remnant church was decidedly more conservative than the Cumberland Presbyterian Church had been before the partial union, it was not exclusively conservative.

While bitter court battles raged over the legality of the union, the Cumberland Presbyterian Denomination began to rebuild. Within a generation, many disorganized remnant pockets of Cumberland Presbyterians within areas dominated by “unionists” faded from existence. For a like token, some few congregations and persons who had gone into the partial union eventually returned to the Cumberland Presbyterian Church. For many years, the Cumberland Presbyterian Church struggled to survive. The campaign in the late-1940s to consolidate denominational boards and agencies in Memphis, Tenn., and to build a denominational headquarters symbolized the recovery of the denomination.

Today, the Cumberland Presbyterian Church maintains a single liberal arts college in McKenzie, Tenn. Memphis Theological Seminary is a Cumberland Presbyterian institution. Denominational offices can be found at the Cumberland Presbyterian Center in Memphis.

 

Matthew Gore is coordinator for computer services at the Cumberland Presbyterian Church headquarters in Memphis, Tenn. He has advanced degrees in journalism and history.

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