Samuel Rutherford

Samuel Rutherford (c. 1600–1661) was one of the most remarkable figures in the history of Scottish Christianity — a theologian, controversialist, covenanting statesman, and above all a pastor whose letters reveal one of the most ardent and Christ-saturated spirits in the history of the church.

Born in Nisbet in the Scottish borders and educated at the University of Edinburgh, he was appointed professor of humanity there in 1623 but was removed over a moral scandal shortly afterward. He was appointed minister of Anwoth in Galloway in 1627, and it was there that he developed the pastoral ministry — and the suffering — that would mark the rest of his life. His wife died young, his children died young, and in 1636 he was banished from his parish by the Court of High Commission for preaching against Arminianism and Episcopacy, and confined to Aberdeen.

It was during this confinement that he wrote most of the 365 letters that form his enduring monument. Addressed to members of his Anwoth congregation, to noblewomen and lairds, to struggling saints and doubting souls across Scotland, they overflow with what his contemporaries recognized as an almost unearthly love for Christ: "Oh, if ye saw the beauty of Christ!" they cry, again and again. The Letters have been a treasured resource for generations of Christians who found in them a reflection of their own longing and a warming of their own cold hearts.

Rutherford was also a formidable controversialist. His Lex Rex (The Law and the Prince, 1644), written during his time as a member of the Westminster Assembly, argued from Scripture and natural law that rulers are accountable to the law and that tyranny may be resisted — a dangerously radical claim for its day that was publicly burned at the Restoration. He died before he could be tried for treason. His last recorded words were: "I shall shine; I shall see Him as He is; I shall see Him reign, and all His fair company with Him."