Introduction to Samuel Rutherford's Lex, Rex by Jon Roland



The title, Lex, Rex, is a play on the words that conveys the meaning the 

law is king. When theologian Samuel Rutherford published the book in 1644, 

on the eve of the revolutions that rocked the English nation from 1645 

through 1688, it caused a sensation, and provoked a great deal of 

controversy. It is ostensibly an argument for limited monarchy and against 

absolute monarchy, but its arguments were quickly perceived as subversive 

of monarchy altogether, and in context, we can perceive that it provided a 

bridge between the earlier natural law philosophers and those who would 

further develop their ideas: the Leveller movement and such men as Thomas 

Hobbes, John Locke, and Algernon Sidney, which laid the basis for the 

American Republic.



This book has long been undeservedly neglected by scholars, probably 

because it is written as a polemic in the political and sectarian 

controversies that are distasteful to later generations, and many of its 

references are somewhat obscure, but a closer reading reveals how it laid 

the foundation for the contractarian and libertarian ideas that came to be 

embodied in the U.S. Declaration of Independence and Constitution.



Rutherford's main idea is that in the politic realm the real sovereign is 

the people, and that all officials, including monarchs, are subject to the 

rule of law, a phrase Rutherford uses only once, in Question 26, "Whether 

the King be above the Law or no", but this is the book that developed the 

contrast between the rule of law and the rule of men. He does not use the 

term social contract, but does develop the earlier idea of covenant in a 

way that leads naturally to the idea of the social contract. He also 

develops the idea of a separation of powers between legislative 

(nomothetic), executive (monarchic), and judicial functions, in a way that 

they can balance one another, in a mixed constitutional order that 

combines the best features of monarchic, aristocratic, and democratic 

forms of government.



What made the book controversial was Rutherford's argument that not only 

does the magistrate lose his authority when he violates the law, but that 

it is a right, and perhaps even a duty, for the people to resist such 

violations.



         Acknowledgement and Notes on the Text 



Rutherford's footnotes have been converted to chapter endnotes and 

renumbered. To view the Greek, Hebrew, and Syriac words, you will need to 

install the SPIonic Greek font, SPTiberian Hebrew font, and SPEdessa 

Syriac font, into your fonts directory. Daniel Reilly, a Semitic languages 

scholar, who also is familiar with Greek and Latin, helped with finding 

the Greek Biblical quotes in the authoritative Septuaginta (to which 

Rutherford refers with the Roman numeral LXX, or 70, for the seventy 

scholars who produced it), the Hebrew quotes in the Masoretic text, the 

Syriac in the Peshitta, and other quotes in other original sources, and 

typing them using the above fonts. He also provided the Syriac 

transcriptions. There were several errors in Rutherford's text that have 

been corrected in this online edition, with additional endnotes that 

indicate some of these. I have also corrected obvious typographical 

errors. Readers are asked to check our work and notify me of any errors 

you may find that we have overlooked.



Additional endnotes of the editor are appended after the Rutherford notes, 

separated by ______.



As this is written, the transcriptions of the Hebrew and Syriac words into 

Roman characters has not been completed, and will be done as time and 

funding permits.