Millenary Petition

The Millenary Petition was a list of requests given to James I by Puritans in 1603 when he was travelling to London in order to claim the English throne. It is claimed, but not proven, that this petition had 1,000 signatures of Puritan ministers. This carefully worded document expressed Puritan distaste regarding the state of the Anglican Church, and took into consideration James' religious views as well as his liking for a debate, as written in Basilikon Doron.

While many of the main Puritan goals were rebutted, the petition did culminate in the Hampton Court Conference, which eventually led James to commission a new English translation of the bible, now known as the King James Version.

In a time where it was unwise to criticise the King directly, there was no hint of dissatisfaction with the royal supremacy in the petition. The Puritan reformers stressed throughout that they were not separatists or schismatics. The document expressed much of the general Puritan feeling regarding the Church; namely, that the English Reformation had not gone far enough to purge the Church of England from all perceived errors of the Roman Catholic Church.

The Puritans rejected the following ceremonies:

They also disliked the terms Priest and Absolution (terms they perceived as Roman Catholic), and rejected the surplice. They wanted a stricter observance of the Sabbath, which was originally supported by James up until The Book of Sports. They wanted to end pluralism, and claimed that ministers should only be both "able and sufficient men".

The Puritans also requested some changes to ecclesiastical discipline. First, they asked, in a rather ambiguous statement, that punishment only be enforced by Christ's own institution. Second, they claimed excommunication should not be imposed by lay officials. Third, they asked that men should not be excommunicated for "trifles and twelvepenny matters". Finally, they asked for better restraint in the use of ex officio oath.

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