The Book of Discipline constitutes the law and doctrine of the United Methodist Church.
It was originally published in 1784, in the Methodist Episcopal Church, and has been published every four years thereafter following the meeting of the General Conference, which passes legislation that is included in the Book of Discipline.
[2][3] The basic unit of reference is the paragraph, not the page, chapter or section.
The paragraph is often only a few lines, but many are several pages long and they can be divided into multiple subdivisions.
Finally the legislative section, by far the largest part of The Discipline, appears.