The Sum of Saving Knowledge

A Brief Summary of Christian Doctrine Contained in the Holy Scriptures, and Held Forth in the Westminster Confession of Faith and Catechisms, Together with its Practical Use

Written in 1650 by two pastors to summarize the Westminster Standards for the lay person. So popular was the book, that it was bound with almost every edition of the Westminster Standards for the next three centuries and became a cherished part of the Scottish Reformed literary heritage—though it remains largely unknown today. This new gift edition, lightly edited and in modernized English, may again make The Sum a treasured companion for Christians at all stages of their journey. It also includes a newly created apparatus to help the reader easily locate specific sections.

David Dickson (1583-1663) was the son of a wealthy merchant in Glasgow. His early aspirations to enter the family business were diverted through an illness and a subsequently lengthy period of convalescence. The result was that he entered the University of Glasgow (then under Principal Robert Boyd) and prepared for the Christian ministry. Following graduation he remained in the University as a regent until, in 1618, he was called to the parish of Irvine in Ayrshire. Deprived of his ministry in 1622 by the Bishop of Glasgow for his opposition to the Five Articles, he was banished for a year to Turriff in Aberdeenshire, but on his return was the instrument in the hand of God of numerous conversions. It was out of his pastoral experience that his famous manual of spiritual counsel, Therapeutica Sacra, was written. In 1638 he was present at the famous Assembly which restored Presbyterian government in Scotland, and the following year was chosen Moderator of the Scottish Church. In 1640 he became Professor of Divinity in Glasgow, transferring to Edinburgh ten years later. During that period he played a considerable part in establishing vital, orthodox Christianity throughout the land. He helped to draw up the Directory for Public Worship, and with James Durham compiled The Sum of Saving Knowledge (a work instrumental in later years in the conversion of Robert Murray M’Cheyne). Restoration troubles after the return of King Charles II in 1660 hastened his death. As the end drew near, he spoke the memorable words: ‘I have taken all my good deeds, and all my bad, and cast them in a heap before the Lord, and fled from both, and betaken myself to the Lord Jesus Christ, and in him I have sweet peace.’

James Durham (1622-58) was one of the most highly esteemed of Scotland’s 17th-century ministers. He was of genteel birth, being a son of the family of Grange-Durham linked with both Angus and Forfar. Following on a short period of study at St Andrews University he came under ‘profound religious impressions’ while on a visit to his wife’s relations at Abercorn, near Edinburgh. Thereafter he devoted himself so ardently to theological study that before he was 25 years old ‘he had the appearance of an old man’ who rarely allowed himself to smile. During the Civil War of the 1640’s he became a captain in the Scottish army. The famous David Dickson overheard him praying with his men and was so impressed that he urged him to enter the Christian ministry. This he did, soon becoming known as ‘a man of intense strength of conviction and great gravity of character’. In 1650 he was appointed Professor of Divinity in Glasgow University, but before he could take up the post the General Assembly of the Kirk appointed him chaplain to the Stuart royal house, and of course especially to Charles, son of the King who had been executed in 1649. Meanwhile trouble between England and Scotland brought Oliver Cromwell to Scotland where he defeated the Scots at the Battle of Dunbar. A little later, finding himself in Glasgow, Cromwell heard Durham preach in ‘the Outer High Church’ of the city, and was greatly impressed by the man and his message. Shortly, however, Charles Stuart entered England with a Scots army, but was defeated by Cromwell at the battle of Worcester, after which he escaped to the Continent. As for Durham, after losing his post as chaplain to the royal house, he was chosen as minister of Glasgow’s ‘Inner Kirk’, and became renowned for his preaching gift. In 1653, his first wife having died in 1648, he married the widow of a noted Glasgow minister, but lived only five years longer, preaching and writing to the end. He was deeply lamented. Durham’s writings, which are numerous for one who died so young, were almost all published posthumously, the Clavis Centici (Exposition of the Song of Solomon) appearing 10 years after his death. Apart from this work and Expositions of Job, Revelation, and the Ten Commandments, his writings were sermons on a variety of themes. But it is chiefly by his ‘Key to the Canticles’ that Durham will ever be remembered.