by some of his evangelical associates.
One gets a glimpse of Cody’s approach in the notes one of his students, C.K. Masters (father of the author), took on the authorship of the Pentateuch: “Vide Driver’s Introduction which gives the case for the late date ... Prof. Cody thinks such reconstruction an irresponsible reconstruction. Practical difficulty = the difficulty of saving the moral character of the writer. It is not so that people issued books under other people’s names. Here is a crucial point that it came from Moses. If it did not and came from them [the post exilic writers] then they were frauds.”8 Cody’s lectures, like his sermons, were based on the same premise: he always took the Bible at face value.
Cody’s own lecture notes indicate how conservative his position was in regard to the Scriptures. While many critics maintained that the book of Isaiah had several authors, Cody favoured the view that there was only one Isaiah: “Without second part of book Isaiah’s character would be a puzzle, second part simply completes and vindicates Isaiah’s character.” He regarded the events in Jonah as “within the bounds of possibility.”9
Cody’s church history lectures indicate that he was a moderate Calvinist.10 Like other reformed theologians he did not quarrel with Calvin’s emphasis on the sovereignty of God or on the sinfulness of man and the doctrine of election. Like most Anglican Calvinists Cody stressed the positive side of Calvinism – salvation by God’s grace. He did not dwell on its negative side, the condemnation of the wicked. Cody claimed that Calvin had much in common with the Anglican Church and that his sacramentarian doctrine was “the same as our own” (a view that would have surprised some of Cody’s high church friends). He added that Calvin “thought episcopacy most ancient but not practicable for local circumstances of Geneva.”
Cody was more critical of Calvin’s conduct at Geneva than he was of his theology, maintaining that in his vigorous enforcement of moral and religious discipline, he had shown “no deep conception of liberty of conscience.” Cody said the Church at Geneva made two mistakes: (1) it carried the attempt to enforce its laws to such as extent “as unwarrantably to curtail liberty”; and (2) its power of coercion “subverted all liberty of private judgment.” Yet, in exculpation of Calvin, he said that “stern measures were necessary.”
For obvious reasons, Cody disliked Archbishop Laud, the great exponent of the doctrine of free will (Arminianism) in the Anglican Church. Masters’s notes reported: “Laud held steadily to his purpose of purging the church of Calvinism and puritanism.” It was not a policy of which Cody could approve.
Cody’s lecture notes, particularly those on systematic theology, indicate how very Pauline his theology was. He laid tremendous emphasis on the grace of God. By God’s grace the Christian committed his or her life to Christ. By God’s grace the Christian was justified in the eyes of God. The Christian’s sins were forgiven – that is, through the sacrifice of Jesus, God’s son, they were not imputed or counted against him or her. The Christian became righteous in God’s eyes and transformed through the work of the Holy Spirit, Christ-centred instead of self-centred, with a new relationship to others. The Christian would still have to contend against sin, but through God’s grace the Holy Spirit would enable steady improvement. The Christian was “sanctified” – that is, set apart and strengthened in the fight against sin.
Cody’s view of the Church was conservative. He drew the distinction made by Calvin and many others between the invisible church (“the blessed company of all faithful people”) and the visible church, which contained many believers but also many spurious “Christians.” He did not favour the efforts of some, such as the Plymouth Brethren, to include only known believers in the visible church.
Cody’s view of the ministry was similar to that of other Anglican evangelicals. He regarded the ministry as related to the bene esse, the well-being, of the church; but he was not prepared to say that a Christian denomination that had no ministry was not a proper church. He regarded bishops as enhancing the bene esse but not essential to the esse of the church. He thought that the early Apostles could have no successors. They were witnesses of the Resurrection and endowed with miraculous powers attesting their commission. The Apostles as governors of the church could be said to have successors, but only in a loose sense, “but the Bishops are not successors of the Apostles in the sense that their office is identical or a prolongation of the apostolate.”11 So much for the idea of Apostolic succession.
Cody deplored the fact that the scriptural concept of ministry had been gradually replaced by a sacerdotal concept. He believed that the sacerdotal power of forgiveness can never be exercised by man but only by God. He said that the ancient prayer of absolution as a deprecatory prayer had been retained until the thirteenth century when the Lateran Council of 1215 introduced the formula “I absolve.”
The Evangelical Churchman was very much Sheraton’s paper. Editor since 1876, he expounded the principles of the Reformation and the long struggle in Toronto between the evangelicals and their high church opponents. Over the years the paper had always been true to its principles, which it restated in 1882, pledging anew to “provide for the members of the Church of England in Canada a paper which shall unflinchingly maintain the principles of our Church as they were established at the Reformation.”12 By the time Cody joined the Wycliffe staff, Sheraton was beginning to feel the need of more assistance on the editorial staff. Who could be more suitable than Cody?
While still at Ridley, Cody had written letters on behalf of the Evangelical Churchman inviting likely prospects to contribute articles. Once at Wycliffe, he took a more active role, becoming co-editor with Sheraton in November 1894. After that he probably did a good deal of the writing. His friend F.J. Steen, no great admirer of Sheraton’s, wrote on February 20, 1895: “You are making a vast improvement in many parts of the E.C. Your news items are excellent and so full. The editorial notes are immensely improved in character. I think the subjects of the longer editorials might sometimes be more interesting but no doubt you are pushed.” The paper still reflected Sheraton’s anti–Roman Catholic and anti–high church views. An editorial on August 2, 1894, repudiated the doctrine of the real presence in the Holy Communion.13 In a December 6 editorial, the Churchman asserted: “The ritualists are feeling more and more the incongruities and difficulties of their position. The nearer they approximate to Rome, the more keenly will they realize them.” This sounds more like Sheraton than Cody, who was never much given to religious controversy.
It is not certain how much influence Cody had in editorial policy. In a letter from Steen to Cody on February 20, 1895. Steen expressed his anger that Sheraton had not printed a letter in which Steen had criticized the English hymn book Hymns Ancient and Modern and had praised Moody and Sankey’s hymn book. Steen claimed that since the Churchman was dominated by influential men like S.H. Blake, it would not publish anything even mildly critical of evangelicals, while it was forever belabouring the high church party. He did not think Cody had done enough in modifying that policy: “But I did hope that now things would change, and the paper take a strong stand and mete out justice to all irrespectively of parties or individuals. But it seems that you too are bound down by your environment and in taking up the paper have been obliged to take up its past spirit and traditions which certainly are not congenial to you. Apparently the paper has never been, and cannot be, fair.”
There was some basis for Steen’s criticism of Sheraton. It will be recalled that Sheraton, while critical of premillennialism, had declined to publish Cody’s anti-premillennialism book review because he did not want to offend some of his subscribers. He explained, “I have reportedly incurred the suspicion of these people whom I greatly respect. I feared lest the insertion might draw forth their criticism and provide a controversy which at present I thought very undesirable.”14 Sheraton did not name any of the premillennialists. It is very unlikely that S.H. Blake or Homer Dixon (named by Steen as among the people to whom Sheraton deferred) were among the number. As Steen had admitted, Cody had made quite
