William Perkins on the three eras of the ceremonial law

Introduction

Care must be taken when interpreting the New Testament as it concerns the Old Testament ceremonial laws. William Perkins is helpful in giving to us the interpretive tools by which to interpret the New Testament on this subject. Much mischief and misapplication has occurred because we do not rightly divide the Word. Without any further ado, let us hear from Perkins:

Perkins

The ceremonial law is that which prescribes rites and orders in the outward worship of God.²⁶
It must be considered in three times.²⁷

The first is [the] time before the coming and death of Christ. The second [is] the time of [the] publishing [of] the gospel by the apostles. The third [is] the time after the publishing of the gospel.

In the first, it did bind the consciences of the Jews, and the obedience of it was the true worship of God. But it did not then bind the consciences of the Gentiles, for it was the partition wall between them and the Jews. And it did continue to bind the Jews till the very death and ascension of Christ, for then the handwriting of ordinances which was against us was nailed on the cross and cancelled.²⁸ And when Christ says that “the law and the prophets endured till John” (Luke 16:16), His meaning is not [that] the ceremonial law ended then, but that things foretold by the prophets, and obscurely prefigured by the ceremonial law, began then more plainly to be preached and made manifest.

The second time was from the ascension of Christ till about the time of the destruction of the temple and city; in which, ceremonies ceased to bind conscience and remained indifferent. Hereupon Paul circumcised Timothy [Acts 16:3]. The apostles, after Christ’s ascension, as occasion was offered, were present in the temple (Acts 3:1). And the council of Jerusalem, tendering the weakness of some believers, decreed that the church for a time should abstain from strangled [things] and blood [Acts 15:29]. And there was good reason of this, because the church of the Jews was not yet sufficiently convinced that an end was put to the ceremonial law by the death of Christ.

In the third time, which was after the publishing of the gospel, ceremonies of the Jews’ church became unlawful, and so shall continue to the world’s end.

By this it appears what a monstrous and miserable religion the Church of Rome teaches and maintains, which stands wholly in ceremonies, partly heathen and partly Jewish.

²⁶ In the margin: Of ceremonial law binding.

²⁷ In the margin: August. epist. 19. ad Hieron.

²⁸ Col. 2:14.

William Perkins, The Works of William Perkins, ed. J. Stephen Yuille, Joel R. Beeke, and Derek W. H. Thomas, vol. 8 (Grand Rapids, MI: Reformation Heritage Books, 2019), 18.