1928 BCP and the 1892 Book of Common Prayer

1928 BCP and the 1892 Book of Common Prayer describes the relation between the second and third American Prayer Books of the Protestant Episcopal Church. The 1892 book was a conservative revision of the American Book of Common Prayer of 1789. The 1928 Book of Common Prayer retained that American line but revised it more extensively in daily office flexibility, Holy Communion, pastoral offices, propers, psalmody, and occasional prayers.

The 1892 Baseline

The 1892 revision should not be treated as a failed experiment. It was the authorized American Prayer Book for more than three decades, and it established several patterns that the 1928 book inherited or developed. The Society of Archbishop Justus introduction summarizes its place between 1789 and 1928:

The Prayer Book of 1892 was the second for the Episcopal Church, and served for over 35 years, until 1928... The 1892 Prayer Book was a conservative revision, meaning that little of substance was changed from its predecessor, the 1789 BCP.

The formal revision process began in 1880 and used the constitutional mechanism of proposal at one General Convention and adoption at a later one. The published 1892 Alterations and Additions records the initiating resolution as a call for both enrichment and flexibility:

Resolved, the House of Bishops concurring, That a Joint Committee, to consist of seven Bishops, seven Presbyters, and seven Laymen, be appointed to consider, and report to the next General Convention, whether, in view of the fact that this Church is soon to enter upon the second century of its organized existence in this country, the changed conditions of the national life do not demand certain alterations in the Book of Common Prayer in the direction of liturgical enrichment and increased flexibility of use.

The same record states the committee's doctrinal guardrails. The 1892 book was not intended to alter Anglican doctrine, but to make carefully bounded liturgical changes:

Resolved, That this Committee asserts, at the outset, its conviction that no alteration should be made touching either statements or standards of doctrine in the Book of Common Prayer. Resolved, That this Committee, in all its suggestions and acts, be guided by those principles of liturgical construction and ritual use which have guided the compilation and amendments of the Book of Common Prayer, and have made it what it is.

What 1892 Added

E. Clowes Chorley, historiographer of the Protestant Episcopal Church, judged the 1892 revision limited but significant. He lists changes that matter for the 1928 comparison: new office sentences, the return of the Magnificat and Nunc Dimittis to Evening Prayer, a suffrage for missionary laborers, new occasional prayers, the Ash Wednesday Penitential Office, Transfiguration, added propers, a Communion rubric about opportunity to communicate, changes to Confirmation, and additions to Burial and other pastoral offices.

For the most part the phraseology was left unchanged and there was no attempt at restatement of doctrine. Here and there it was made possible to shorten the services. The first long step toward enrichment of the Liturgy which culminated in the Book of 1928, was taken in 1892.

The 1892 book's own Morning Prayer rubrics show the controlled nature of that flexibility. On weekdays the minister could omit the long exhortation and end Morning Prayer after the Collect for Grace and 2 Corinthians 13:14. When Holy Communion immediately followed, the office could pass from the opening sentences to the Lord's Prayer.

The Minister shall always begin the Morning Prayer by reading one or more of the following Sentences of Scripture. On any day not a Sunday, he may omit the Exhortation following, saying instead thereof, Let us humbly confess our sins unto Almighty God, and may end the Morning Prayer with the Collect for Grace and 2 Cor. xiii. 14.

In Holy Communion, 1892 retained a weekly expectation for the Decalogue when the office was used on Sunday, but allowed the Summary of the Law when the Decalogue was omitted. This made 1892 more flexible than 1789, yet less flexible than 1928:

The Decalogue may be omitted, provided it be said once on each Sunday. But Note, That whenever it is omitted the Minister shall say the Summary of the Law, beginning, Hear what our Lord Jesus Christ saith.

Why 1928 Revised 1892

Chorley's 1929 account is strongly interpretive and must be read as an advocate's explanation of the new book. Even so, it is an important contemporary witness because it explains why revision resumed only twenty-one years after the 1892 book came into force. In his account, the 1892 book had proved too cautious to carry the devotional and pastoral needs of the early twentieth-century Episcopal Church.

The Prayer Book of 1892 lasted thirty-six years. It was never satisfactory. The Convention which adopted it was not only conservative, but timid. It hesitated to embark on a liturgical adventure. Revision was reduced to a minimum.

The 1928 revision began at the General Convention of 1913 and was completed in 1928. Chorley describes its two leading characteristics as flexibility and shortening, especially in the daily offices:

As compared with the two previous American Prayer Books the new Book has two outstanding characteristics--it is much more flexible in its use and there is a marked tendency to shorten the regular services; especially those of Morning and Evening Prayer.

Daily Office Comparison

The 1928 Morning Prayer opening keeps the 1892 pattern of beginning with Scripture sentences, but it broadens the circumstances under which the minister may pass directly to the Lord's Prayer. It also gives explicit direction for moving to the opening versicles if the Confession and Absolution are omitted:

On any day, save a Day of Fasting or Abstinence, or on any day when the Litany or Holy Communion is immediately to follow, the Minister may, at his discretion, pass at once from the Sentences to the Lord's Prayer, first pronouncing, The Lord be with you. Answer. And with thy spirit. Minister. Let us pray.

The 1928 Evening Prayer office also added the short alternative absolution that Chorley singled out. This is not a rejection of priestly absolution, because the longer declaratory form remains; it is a pastoral abbreviation within the same office:

The Almighty and Merciful God grant you Absolution and Remission of all your sins, true repentance, amendment of life, and the grace and consolation of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Holy Communion Comparison

The Communion office shows a similar movement from guarded flexibility in 1892 to fuller revision in 1928. The 1928 book keeps the Decalogue in the office but reduces the minimum public recital requirement from every Sunday to at least one Sunday in each month, while directing that the Summary of the Law be said when the Decalogue is omitted:

The Decalogue may be omitted, provided it be said at least one Sunday in each month. But Note, That whenever it is omitted, the Minister shall say the Summary of the Law, beginning, Hear what our Lord Jesus Christ saith.

The eucharistic prayer is the most substantial theological continuity-and-change issue. The 1892 book retained the American consecration tradition, while 1928 gave the prayer a more visibly integrated form. In 1928 the institution narrative is followed by memorial-oblation and invocation language:

WHEREFORE O Lord and heavenly Father, according to the institution of thy dearly beloved Son our Saviour Jesus Christ, we, thy humble servants, do celebrate and make here before thy Divine Majesty, with these thy holy gifts, which we now offer unto thee, the memorial thy Son hath commanded us to make; having in remembrance his blessed passion and precious death, his mighty resurrection and glorious ascension; rendering unto thee most hearty thanks for the innumerable benefits procured unto us by the same.

AND we most humbly beseech thee, O merciful Father, to hear us; and, of thy almighty goodness, vouchsafe to bless and sanctify, with thy Word and Holy Spirit, these thy gifts and creatures of bread and wine; that we, receiving them according to thy Son our Saviour Jesus Christ's holy institution, in remembrance of his death and passion, may be partakers of his most blessed Body and Blood.

Propers and the Calendar

The 1892 book added Transfiguration and strengthened the seasonal and proper material, but the 1928 book carried that process much further. The local 1928 propers comparison notes, for example, show how the Easter Day section received the heading "Eastertide" in 1928 and how the Easter anthem rubric was reshaped:

Heading EASTERTIDE. added in 1928... This rubric substituted for the above in 1928... The Gloria Patri added in 1892.

Theological Reading

The relation between 1892 and 1928 is best read as a conservative American revision followed by a more ambitious American revision. Both books stand under the inherited Prayer Book rule that doctrine is not to be remade by liturgical fashion. Yet both show that common prayer is not static. The 1892 book cautiously opened the way by adding prayers, proper material, and limited rubrical flexibility. The 1928 book then made broader pastoral and theological adjustments while keeping the Prayer Book's classical Anglican grammar: Scripture summons the Church, common confession and absolution order repentance, the Creed confesses the apostolic faith, the sacraments are administered in public ecclesial form, and prayer is shaped by both catholic inheritance and Reformation doctrine.

For AnglicanWiki readers, the practical point is that the 1928 BCP cannot be understood only by comparing it with 1662 or 1549. Its immediate predecessor was the 1892 American book, and many features of 1928 either preserve, correct, or expand 1892 decisions. The 1928 BCP is therefore both traditional and revisionary: it is traditional because it works within the American Prayer Book line, and revisionary because it deliberately enlarges that line in worship, pastoral care, and eucharistic expression.

See Also

• Book of Common Prayer (1928)
• History of the 1928 Book of Common Prayer
• 1928 BCP and the 1549 Book of Common Prayer
• 1928 BCP and the 1662 Book of Common Prayer
• Holy Communion (1928 BCP)
• Daily Office (1928 BCP)
• Collects, Epistles, and Gospels (1928 BCP)

External Links

• The 1892 U.S. Book of Common Prayer
• The 1928 U.S. Book of Common Prayer
• E. Clowes Chorley, The New American Prayer Book
• Alterations and Additions for the 1892 Book of Common Prayer