The Constitution of the Society

Laws and Regulations

Our Name

I. That this Society be designated the TRINITARIAN BIBLE SOCIETY.

Our Aim

II. The object of this Society is to promote the Glory of God and the salvation of men, by circulating, both at home and abroad, in dependence on the Divine blessing, the HOLY SCRIPTURES, which are given by inspiration of God, and are able to make men wise unto salvation, through faith which is in Christ Jesus.

Our Work

III. This Society shall circulate the HOLY SCRIPTURES, as comprised in the Canonical books of the Old and New Testaments, WITHOUT NOTE OR COMMENT, to the exclusion of the Apocrypha; the copies in the English language shall be those of the Authorised Version. In promoting and editing new translations, and selecting versions in Foreign languages, the competency of the translators employed, and the faithfulness, textual basis and Christian character of the versions, shall be ascertained by the Committee, before the circulation of such versions is in any way aided by this Society. The aim shall be to produce or select versions whose textual basis is as close as possible to the Hebrew Masoretic and the Greek Received texts underlying both the English Authorised Version and translations of comparable standing made from these texts into other European languages at the time of the Protestant Reformation.

Our Membership

IV. The MEMBERS of this Society shall consist of PROTESTANTS, who acknowledge in writing to the Society’s Head Office their belief in the GODHEAD OF THE FATHER, OF THE SON, AND OF THE HOLY GHOST, THREE CO-EQUAL AND CO-ETERNAL PERSONS IN ONE LIVING AND TRUE GOD (as is more fully set forth in the Appendix to these laws); in the WHOLE BIBLE as the inspired and inerrant Word of God, the sole, supreme and infallible rule of faith and practice; and who unite to support the Society by contributing an annual subscription of such sum as the Committee may from time to time propose and the Members approve at an Annual General Meeting (which may include discounted rates for different categories of persons).

V. The Officers of this Society shall consist of a President, Vice-Presidents, a Treasurer, Secretary or Secretaries, and Committee, being Members of this Society.

VI. The Committee, including its ex officio members, shall consist of not more than THIRTY MINISTERS OF THE GOSPEL OF CHRIST AND LAYMEN, being Members of the Society; they shall fill up any vacancies in their own number, in the interval of the Annual General Meetings. The President, Treasurer and Secretary or Secretaries, and any Vice-Presidents able to attend Committee Meetings, shall be considered ex officio Members of the Committee; but the Secretary or Secretaries, as salaried officers, shall not have voting powers. After each Annual General Meeting, the Committee members shall elect from their number a Chairman, who shall have a casting vote in addition to his own vote. They may also elect a Vice-Chairman. The Committee shall have power to call Special General Meetings of the Society; they shall appoint all officers and be charged generally with the management of the affairs of the Society. The Committee shall meet at least once every month (except August and September), and oftener (including August and September) as business may require, and five Members shall constitute a quorum. No person may be appointed to the position of a secretary, business manager, or other similar salaried position in the Society unless the appointment shall have been approved by two-thirds of the members of the Committee present at an ordinary meeting, and that notice of the proposed appointment shall have been given upon the agendas of the two successive ordinary meetings immediately prior to the one upon which the vote is to be taken.

Accounts

VII. The Accounts of the Society shall be periodically audited by professional accountants, to be nominated by the Committee, and elected at the Annual General Meeting.

Auxiliaries

VIII. All Auxiliary or Branch Societies or Associations, that unite or co-operate with this Society, shall adopt the PRINCIPLES set forth in its laws in order to their becoming an integral part thereof. Auxiliary Secretaries and local representatives shall maintain a record of Society members who pay their annual membership contributions through them.

General Meetings

IX. An Annual Meeting of the Society shall be held, when the proceedings of the foregoing year shall be reported, the audited accounts presented, and the Committee chosen for the ensuing year.

X. Fifty members shall be competent to require a Special General Meeting of the Society to be convened; and upon their signing and delivering a written requisition to the Committee, specifying the nature of the business or the occasion for such Meeting, the Committee shall call a Special General Meeting of the Society, giving not less than twenty-one days’ notice thereof, by advertisement in three public papers.

The Incorporated Trust

XI. All property of the Society which can be lawfully so held, shall be held in trust for the Society by ‘The Incorporated Trinitarian Bible Society Trust’.

Laws of the Society

XII. None of the laws of this Society shall be repealed or altered, nor any new law established, except at the Annual General Meeting, or at a Special General Meeting called for that purpose; and the alteration, or new law proposed, shall be specified in the notices of such General or Special Meeting.

Prayer and Praise

XIII. This Society, acknowledging the ignorance and helplessness of man, deems it a bounden duty to express its entire dependence upon the blessing of JEHOVAH, the FATHER, the SON, and the HOLY GHOST, in its ‘work of faith, and labour of love, and patience of hope’, by offering up prayer and praise at all its Meetings.

The Bond of Union

The following recommendation of the Committee was received and adopted at the Annual General Meeting of the Trinitarian Bible Society, held 6th December, 1832.

The Committee of the Trinitarian Bible Society, deeply impressed with the value of Union upon Scriptural principles, and with the importance of permanently establishing the Society upon that glorious doctrine, which constitutes the bond of union among its Members:

RESOLVE – That it be recommended to the next General Meeting of the Society that the following Articles of Religion be appended to the laws of the Institution, as an appropriate illustration of the truly Scriptural doctrine of the HOLY TRINITY; whilst they afford a satisfactory exposition of the religious principles connected with that doctrine, which the Committee desire to maintain and uphold throughout the Institution.

Appendix to the Laws

Extracted from the Articles of the United Church of England and Ireland

Article I. OF FAITH IN THE HOLY TRINITY

‘There is but one living and true God, everlasting, without body, parts or passions; of infinite power, wisdom, and goodness; the Maker and Preserver of all things, both visible and invisible. And in unity of this Godhead there be Three Persons, of one substance, power, and eternity; the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.’

Extracted from the Confession of Faith of the Church of Scotland

Chapter VIII. OF CHRIST THE MEDIATOR

Section II. ‘The Son of God, the Second Person in the Trinity, being very and eternal God, of one substance and equal with the Father, did, when the fulness of time was come, take upon Him man's nature, with all the essential properties and common infirmities thereof, yet without sin, being conceived by the power of the Holy Ghost in the womb of the Virgin Mary, of her substance; so that two whole, perfect, and distinct natures, the Godhead and the Manhood, were inseparably joined together in one Person, without conversion, composition, or confusion; which Person is very God and very Man yet one Christ, the only Mediator between God and man.’

Section III. ‘The Lord Jesus, in His human nature thus united to the Divine, was sanctified, and anointed with the Holy Spirit above measure; having in Him all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge; in whom it pleased the Father that all fulness should dwell; to the end that being holy, harmless, undefiled, and full of grace and truth, He might be thoroughly furnished to execute the office of a Mediator and Surety.’

Extracted from the Articles of the United Church of England and Ireland

Article IV. OF THE RESURRECTION OF CHRIST

‘Christ did truly rise again from death; and took again His body, with flesh, bones, and all things appertaining to the perfection of man’s nature; wherewith He ascended into Heaven, and there sitteth, until He return to judge all men at the last day.’

Article XV. OF CHRIST ALONE WITHOUT SIN

‘Christ in the truth of our nature was made like unto us in all things, sin only except, from which He was clearly void, both in His flesh and in His spirit. He came to be the Lamb without spot, Who, by sacrifice of Himself once made, should take away the sins of the world, and sin, as St. John saith, was not in Him. But all we the rest, although baptized, and born again in Christ, yet offend in many things; and if we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.’

Article V. OF THE HOLY GHOST

‘The Holy Ghost, proceeding from the Father and the Son, is of one substance, majesty and glory, with the Father and the Son, very and eternal God.’