William Cathcart's Essays
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Cathcart's Essays
Novatianists
Novatian, before he
professed conversion, was a philosopher of remarkable ability,
culture, eloquence, and powers of persuasion; he was a natural
leader of men. When attacked by a dangerous disease, from
which death was apprehended, in accordance with the opinion then
commonly held by Christians, it was judged that he should be
baptized to make heaven certain, and, as his weakness rendered
immersion impossible without risking his immediate death, he was
subjected, on his couch, to a profuse application of water. We
are not informed that Novatian desired this ceremony himself,
without any persuasions from his alarmed friends. The writer was
once sent for to see a dying lady, and, after praying with her,
was earnestly pressed by a follower of Irish Romanism, the
perverted faith of St. Patrick the Baptist, to regenerate her
;“ he declined to exercise the powers of the Spirit of God and
the functions of a Pedobaptist minister; had he yielded, the
lady was in a condition in which she could not beheld responsible
for the act. And it is not improbable that this was the
situation of Novatian. He was spared by the providence of God
for a mighty work in the churches, and when restored to health
he became very active in advancing the interests of Christianity
in Rome.
At that period the
church, in the capital of the world, as Eusebius records, had 46
presbyters, 14 deacons and subdeacons, 50 minor ecclesiastical
officials, and widows and sick and indigent persons, numbering
in all 1500, whose support had to be provided for. And partly to
assist in bearing this burden, but chiefly through a lack of
faith and of complete consecration to God, the door of the
church was kept very wide for the admission of unconverted
professors, and when these persons betrayed the Saviour by
sacrificing to idols in times of persecution, their conduct was
excused by their lax brethren; and the excommunication,
necessarily pronounced upon them immediately after their
apostasy, was speedily removed.
Cornelius, a Roman
presbyter, with an eager eye to the Support to be gathered from
restored apostates, strongly advocated their forgiveness by
the church. Novatian very strenuously resisted it; and when a
successor to Bishop Fabianus was to be elected, Cornelius was
properly made a predecessor of a long line of coming popes,
who loved gold more than anything in the Christian religion.
Novatian was
condemned by Cornelius and by all his episcopal friends; and the
bishop of Rome sent letters everywhere, bringing the most
grievous charges against him, and giving the names and positions
of the bishops who united with him in his efforts to crush the
first great reformer.
Novatian had been made a presbyter by Fabianus
against the custom of the church, for, as Cornelius says, in
Eusebius,* “ It was not lawful that one baptized in his
sick-bed by aspersion, as he was, should be promoted to any
order of the clergy. If, indeed, it be proper to say that one
like him did receive baptism.” But this only shows his extraordinary
talents and influence.
After Cornelius
became bishop Novatian was elevated to the same office by three
Italian bishops, and at once founded the purer community, for
whose advancement he labored with great success until martyrdomn
removed him from the presence of wicked church members in full
ecclesiastical standing.
Among the charges brought by Cornelius against
Novatian, a list of which can be found in Eusebius, was an
accusation of cowardice for refusing to perform the duties of
his ministerial office in a time of persecution. Novatian set up
a new community in defiance of Cornelius and of nearly all the
Christian bishops on earth; and in this he showed unusual
courage. Opposition to the treachery, charged upon himself by
Cornelius, was the chief instrument which he used to establish
his pure church, and it is not in human nature to believe that
any man could found a new community in Rome itself by
denunciations of a cowardly crime of which he himself had given
a conspicuous example. Besides, he left the world as a martyr.
It was customary in
the time of Ambrose, when the minister distributed the Lord’s
Supper to the faithful, to say, “The body of Christ,” and
the recipient answered, “Amen.”+ Cornelius, in the same
calumnious letter in Eusehius, states that Novatian, when he
gave a portion of the Eucharist to a communicant, instead of
permitting him to say “Amen,” according to the usage no
doubt then in existence, seized his hand in both of his hands,
before he partook of the symbolic bread, and made him “swear
by the body and blood of our Saviour, Je€ns Christ, that he
would never desert him, nor turn to Cornelius.” This story
carries its own refutation; the idea that the founder of the
purest Christian community then in existence should resort to
such an infamous procedure is simply incredible. Cornelius, in
the same connection, makes slanderous statements about the
extraordinary ambition of Novatian, which have come down to us
through the “Ecclesiastical History” of Eusebius; and his
vanity is frequently given as the motive that led to his
assumption of the bishop’s office, and to the reformation
inaugurated by Novatian.
The Novatians called
themselves Kathari, or Puritans. The corner-stone of the
denomination was purity of church membership. Novatian charged
Cornelius and his followers with dishonoring the church of
God, and destroying its divine character by admitting apostates
into its membership. He maintained that those who had sacrificed
to the idols to save their lives should never be permitted to
come to the Lord’s table again. This theory became popular
with the saintly heroes and heroines, who suffered terribly at
the hands of Christ’s persecuting enemies, but whose lives
were spared. And all true Christians felt a strong leaning
towards the holy religion advocated and exhibited by Novatian
and his followers. Socrates,++ a candid and intelligent Greek
historian, says, “Novatus (Novatian), a presbyter of the
Romish Church, separated from it because Cornelius, the bishop,
received into communion believers who had sacrificed (to
idols) during the persecution which the emperor Decius had
raised against the church. .
On being afterwards
elevated to the episcopacy by such prelates as entertained
similar sentiments, he wrote to all the churches, insisting that
they should not admit to the sacred mysteries those who had
sacrificed (to idols), but exhorting them to repentance, leave
the pardon of their offense to God, who has the power to forgive
all sin. . . . The exclusion of those who, after baptism, had
committed any deadly sin from the mysteries appeared to some a
cruel and merciless course; but others thought it just and
necessary for the maintenance of discipline, and the promotion
of greater devotedness of life. In the midst of the agitation of
this important question letters arrived from Cornelius the
bishop promising indulgence to delinquents after baptism.
• . . Those who had pleasure in sin,
encouraged by the license thus granted them, took occasion from
it to revel in every species of criminality.” The Novatians
permanently excluded from their community all who were guilty
of deadly sins and second marriages, as well as those who
sacrificed to idols to save their lives; and they regarded the
church universal as having lost the character of a church of
Christ by receiving such persons into her membership. As a
result of this conviction they baptized again all who came
from the old church to them. Their baptism was immersion, the
“pouring around” of Novatian on his sick-bed is the only
transaction of that kind in their history now known; and as
their leader suffered so much from the unscriptural performance,
his followers had little encouragement to imitate such an
unfortunate example.
The general
doctrines of the Novatians were in perfect harmony with those
received by the church universal; they only differed fromn it on
questions of discipline, and chiefly on the great subject of
consecration to God.
It is creditable to the piety of the centuries
during which the Novatians existed that great numbers of
Christians adopted their sentiments and their fold; though
hated, wickedly calumniated, and fiercely persecuted for a
long time, they spread, and they found adherents not only in
rural regions, but in great cities and in the palaces of the
emperor. Speaking of the law of Constantine the Great by which
heretics were forbidden to meet “in their own houses of
prayer, in private houses, or in public places, but were
compelled to enter into communion with the church universal,”
Sozomen says, “The Novatians alone, who had obtained good
leaders, and who entertained the same opinions respecting the
divinity as the Catholic Church, formed a large sect fromn the
beginning, and were not decreased in point of numbers by this
law. The emperor, I believe, related the rigor of the enactment
in their favor... . . . Acesius, who was then the bishop of the
Novatians in Constantinople, was much esteemed by the emperor on
account of his virtuous life."*
Novatian himself was
a man of fervent piety; and his life after his conversion was
above reproach, unless when accusations came from a
calumniator whose charges were incapable of proof. He was the
author of works on “The Passover,” “Circumcision,”
“The Sabbath,” “High-Priests,” “The Trinity,” and on
other subjects. He had many distinguished men among his
disciples. His community spread very widely, and enjoyed special
prosperity in Phrygia; but declined rapidly in the fifth
century. The Novatians, as a people, were an honor to
Christianity, and their teachings and example exercised a
powerful restraint upon the growing corruptions of the old
church.
The Novatians
commenced their denominational life when the baptism of an
unconscious babe was unknown outside of Africa; and there it had
a limited, if not a doubtful, existence. Indeed, if a celebrated
letter of Cyprian, about a council of bishops, said to have
been held in Carthage half a dozen years after Novatian set up
his banner of church purity, be a forgery, and the supposition
is by no means an improbable one, unconscious infant baptism
has no proof of its existence in the literature of the world.
The infant rite, according to the letter of Cyprian just
referred to, had Cyprian for its patron, and as he had shown the
utmost hostility to Novatian, he and his followers would not
be very eager to adopt a ceremony of which his letter, if
genuine, shows that he was the special friend. These
considerations, together with the holiness of life demanded by
Novatian churches, have led many persons to regard them as
Baptists. Of the truth of this opinion in the early history of
this people there can be no doubt; and that the majority of
their churches baptized only instructed persons to the end of
their history is in the highest
Donatists
The
Donatists
In
North Africa, during the fierce persecution of Dioclesian, many
Christians courted a violent death.
These persons, without the accusation, would confess to
the possession of the Holy Scriptures, and on their refusal to
surrender them, they were immediately imprisoned and frequently
executed. While
they were in confinement they were visited by throngs of
disciples, who bestowed upon them valuable gifts and showed them
the highest honor.
Mensurius,
bishop of Carthage, disapproved of all voluntary martyrdoms, and
took steps to hinder bloodshed.
And if he had gone no farther in this direction he would
have deserved the commendation of all good men.
But by zealous Christians in North Africa he was regarded
as unfriendly to compulsory martyrdom, and to the manifestations
of tender regard shown to the victims of tyranny. And by some he was supposed to be capable of a gross
deception to preserve his own life, or to secure the safety of
his friends. When a
church at Carthage was about to be searched for copies of the
Bible, he had them concealed in a safe place, and the writings
of heretics substituted for them.
This removal was an act of Christian faithfulness, but
the works which he put in the church in their stead were
apparently intended to deceive the heathen officers.
Mensurius seems to us to have been too prudent a man for
a Christian bishop in the harsh times in which he lived.
In his own day his conduct created a most unfavorable
opinion of his religious courage and faithfulness among
multitudes of the Saviour's servants in his country.
Secundus, primate of Numidia, wrote to Mensurius, giving
utterance to censures about his conduct, and glorifying the men
who perished rather than surrender their Bibles.
Caecilian was the arch-deacon of the bishop of Carthage,
and was known to enjoy his confidence and share his opinions.
Mensurius,
returning from a visit to Rome, became ill, and died in the year
311. Caecilian was
appointed his successor, and immediately the whole opposition of
the enemies of his predecessor was directed to him.
In his own city a rich widow of great influence, and her
numerous friends, assailed him; a synod seventy Numidian bishops
excommunicated him for receiving ordination from a traitor (one
who had delivered up the Bible to be burned to save his life);
and another bishop was elected to take charge of the church of
Carthage. The Donatist community was then launched upon the sea of its
stormy life.
Bishop
Donatus, after whom the new denomination was named, was a man of
great eloquence, as unbending as Martin Luther, as fiery as the
great Scotch Reformer, whose principles were dearer to him than
life, and who was governed by unwearied energy. Under his guidance the Donatists spread all over the Roman
dominions on the African coast, and for a time threatened the
supremacy of the older Christian community.
But persecution laid its heavy hand upon their personal
liberty, their church property, and their lives.
Again and again this old and crushing argument was
applied to the Donatists, and still they survived for centuries.
Their hardships secured the sympathy of numerous hand of
armed marauders called Circumcelliones, men who suffered
severely from the authorities sustained by the persecuting
church, "free lance" warriors who cared nothing for
religion, but had a wholesome hatred of tyrants. These men fought desperately for the oppressed Donatists.
Julian the Apostate took their side when he ascended the
throne of the Caesars, and showed much interest in their
welfare, as unbelievers in modern times have frequently shown
sympathy with persecuted communities in Christian lands.
There
were a few Donatist churches outside of Africa, but the
denomination was almost confined at that continent.
They suffered less from the Vandals than their former
oppressors, but the power of these conquerors was very injurious
to them; and the victorious Saracens destroyed the remaining
churches of this grand old community.
The
Donatists were determined to have only godly members in their
churches. In this
particular they were immeasurably superior to the Church
Universal (Catholic), even as represented by the great Augustine
of Hippo. Their teachings of this question are in perfect harmony with
out own. They
regarded the Church Universal as having forfeited her Christian
character by her inconsistencies and iniquities, and they
refused to recognize her ordinances and her ministry.
Hence they gave the triple immersion a second time to
those who had received it in the great corrupt church.
Their government was not episcopal in the modern sense.
Mosheim is right in representing them as having at one
time 400 bishops. The Roman population on the North African coast would not
have required twenty diocesan bishop to care for this spiritual
wants. Every town, in all probability, had its bishop, and if
there were two or more congregations, these formed but one
church, whose services were in charge of one minister and his
assistants. These
church leaders were largely under the control of the people to
whom they ministered. The
Donatists held boldly the doctrine that the church and the state
were entirely distinct bodies.
Early in their denominational life, Constantine the
Great, for the first time in earthly history, had united the
church to the Roman government, and speedily the Donatists arose
to denounce the union as unhallowed, and as forbidden by the
highest authority in the Christian Church.
No Baptist in modern times brands the accursed union
between church and state with more appropriate condemnations
than did his ancient Donatist brother. Their faith on this question is well expressed in their
familiar says, "What has the emperor to do with the
church?" Soul
liberty lived in their day.
It is extremely probable that they did not practice the
baptism of unconscious babes,-- at least in the early part of
their history. It
is often urged that Augustine, their bitter enemy, would not
fail to bring this charge against them if they had rejected his
favorite rite. His works now extant do not directly bring such an accusation
against them, and it is concluded that they followed his own
usage. This
argument would have great weight if it were proved that all the
Catholics of Africa baptized unconscious babes.
But there is no evidence of such universal observance.
Outside of Africa, in the fourth century, the baptism if an
unconscious babe was a rare occurrence.
Though born in it of pious parents, Augustine himself was
not baptized till he was thirty- three years of age. His words
are bristling with weapons to defend infant baptism; they are
the arsenal from which its modern defenders have procured their
most effective arms, and if the custom had been universally
accepted, he would have seen no cause to keep up such a warfare
in its defense. The
frequency with which Augustine treats of infant baptism is
striking evidence that its observance in his day and country was
often called in question, and that had he directly pointed out
this defect in the observances of the Donatists he would have
been quickly reminded that he had better remove the opposition
to infant baptism from his
own people before he assailed it among the Donatists.
This fact would account for the supposed silence of
Augustine on this question.
The second canon of the Council of Carthage, where the
principles of Augustine were supreme, "Declares an anathema
against such as deny that children ought to be baptized as soon
as they are born." (Du.
Pin. i. 635. Dublin.)
If this curse is against the Donatist, it shows that they
did not practice the infant rite; if it is against other
Africans, it gives a good reason why Augustine should be
cautious in bringing charges against the Donatists on this
account. Augustine
wrote a work "On Baptism, Against the Donatists," in
which, speaking of infant baptism, he says, "And if any one
seek divine authority in this matter, although, what the whole
church holds, not as instituted by councils, but as a thing
always observed, is rightly held to have been handed down by
apostolical authority."
(Et si quisquam in hac re autoritatem divinam quaeret. --
Patrol. Lat., vol.
xlii. p. 174, Migne Parisiis.)
This book is expressly written against the views of
baptism held by the Donatists; it was designed to correct their
errors on that subject. And
he clearly admits that some of them doubted the divine authority
of infant baptism, and he proceeds to establish it by an
argument from circumcision.
Augustine was a powerful controversialist; to have
charged the Donatists directly with heresy for rejecting infant
baptism would have been an accusation against many in his own
church, and he prudently assails his enemies on this point, as
if only some of them regarded infant baptism as a mere human
invention; and he boastfully and ignorantly, or falsely speaks
of it as always observed by the whole church, while one of his
own African councils pronounces a curse upon those who
"denied that children ought to be baptized as soon as they
are born."
Albigenses
The
Paulicians were summoned into existence by the Spirit of God
about A.D. 660 Their founder was named Constantine. The reading
of a New Testament, left him by a stranger, brought him to the
Saviour. lie soon gathered a church, and hiis converts speedily
collected othor8. Armenia was the scene of his labors. They were
denounced as Manicheans, thoughthey justly denied the charge.
They increased rapidly, and in process of time persecution
scattered them. In the ninth century many of them were in
Thrace, Bulgaria and Bosnia; and, later still, they became very
numerous in these new fields, especially in Bosnia.* Indeed,
such a host had they become that in 1238 Coloman, the brother of
the king of Hungary entered Bosnia to destroy the heretics.
Gregory IX. congratulated him upon his success, but lived to
learn that the Bogomiles were still a multitude. A second
crusade led to further butchery, but the blood of martyrs was
still the seed of the church, and they continued a powerful body
until the conquest of their country by the Turks, in 1463. There
was direct communication between these Bogomiles and the
Albigenses in France. Matthew Paris++ tells us that the heretic
Albigenses in the provinces of Bulgaria, Crotia, and Dalmatia
elected Bartholomew as their pope, that Albigenses came to him
from all quarters for information on doubtful matters, and that
he had a vicar who was born in Carcassone, and who lived near
Thoulouse.
At
an early period the Paulicians entered Italy and established
powerful communities, especially in Milan. They spread over
France. Germany, and other countries. In the eleventh century
they were to be found in almost every quarter of Europe. St.
Bernard, in the twelfth century, says of them, "If you
interrogate them about their faith nothing can be more
Christian. If you examine into their conversation nothing can he
more blameless, and what they say they confirm by their deeds.
As for what regards life and manners, they attack no one, they
circumvent no one, they defraud no one."
Reinerius
Saceho belonged to the Cathari (not the Waldenses, he was never
a member of that community) for seventeen years. He was
afterwards a Romish inquisitor, and he describes his old friends
and the Waldenses, in 1254, in these words:
"Heretics
are distinguished by their manners and their words, for they are
sedate and modest in their manners. They have no pride in
clothes, for they wear such as are neither costly nor mean. They
do not carry on business in order to avoid falsehoods, oaths,
and frauds, but only live by labor as workmen. Their teachers
also are shoemakers and weavers. They do not multiply riches,
but are content with what is necessary, and they are chaste,
especially the Leonists. They are also temperate in meat and
drink. They do not go to taverns, dances, or other
vanities."
The
Leonists were the followers of Peter Waldo, of Lyons, the
Waldenses, as distinguished from his own old sect, the
Albigenses. Reinerius then proceeds to charge these men who shun
business to avoid falsehoods with hypocrisy. No body of men
could receive a better character than St. Bernard and the
inquisitor give these enemies of the Church of Rome, and no
community could be more wickedly abused by the same men than
these identical heretics. For some centuries the Albigenses
figured universally in history as externally the purest and best
of men, and secretly as guilty of horrible crimes, such as the
pagans charged upon the early Christians.
Reinerius
mentions several causes for the spread of heresy. His second is
that all the men and women, small and great, day and night. do
not cease to learn, and they are continually engaged in teaching
what they have acquired themselves. His third cause for the
existence and spread of heresy is the translation and
circulation of the Old and New Testaments into the vulgar
tongue. These they learned themselves and taught to others.
Reinerius** was acquainted with a rustic layman who repeated the
whole book of Job, and with many who knew perfectly the entire
New Testament. He gives an account of many schools of the
heretics, the existence of which he learned in the trials of the
Inquisition. Assuredly these friends of light and of a Bible
circulated everywhere were worthy of the curses and tortures of
men like Reinerius and lordly bigots like St. Bernard. In a
council held at Thoulouse in 1229 the Scriptures in the language
of the people were first prohibited. The Albigenses surviving
the horrid massacre of the Pope's murderous crusaders were
forbidden to have the "books of the Old or New Testament,
unless a Psalter, a Breviary, and a Rosary, and they forbade the
translation in the vulgar tongue." No doubt many of the
members of the council supposed that the Breviary and Rosary
were inspired as well as the Psalter.
Reinerius
gives a catalogue of the doctrines of the Cathari, which
corresponds with the list of heresies charged against them for
two hundred years before he wrote by popes, bishops, and
ecclesiastical gatherings, the substance of which has no claim
upon our credulity, though some of the forms of expression may
have been used by certain of these venerable worthies.
Reinerius+++
says that the Cathari had 16 churches, the church of the
Albanenses, or of Sansano, of Contorezo, of Bagnolenses, or of
Bagnolo, of Vincenza, or of the Marquisate, of Florence, of the
Valley of Spoleto, of France, of Thoulouse, of Cahors, of Albi,
of Sclavonia, of the Latins at Constantinople, of the Greeks in
the same city, of Philadelphia, of Bulgaria, and of Dugranicia.
He says, "They all derive their origin from the two
last." That is, they are all Paulicians, originally from
Armenia. He says that "the churches number 4000 Cathari, of
both sexes, in all the world, but believers innumerable."
By churches we are to understand communities of the Perfect
devoted to ministerial and missionary labor. The Believers in
the time of Reinerius were counted by millions.
Upon
infant baptism the Albigenses had very decided opinions. A
council*** held in Thoulouse in 1119, undoubtedly referring to
them, condemns and expels from the church of God those who put
on the appearance of religion and condemned the sacrament of the
body and the blood of the Lord and the baptism of children.
At
a meeting of "archbishops, bishops, and other pious
men" at Thoulouse, in 1176, the Albigenses were condemned
on various pretexts. Roger De Hoveden, a learned Englishman, who
commenced to write his "Annals" in 1189++++, gives a
lengthy account of this meeting. He says that Gilbert, bishop of
Lyons, by command of the bishop of Albi and his assessors,
condemned these persons as heretics; and the third reason,
according to Hoveden, given by Gilbert for his sentence was that
they would not save children by baptism. He also preserves a
Letter of Peter, titular of St. Chrysogonus, Cardinal, Priest,
and Legate of the Apbstolic See, written in 1178, in which,
speaking of the Albigenses, he says. "Others stoutly
maintained to their faces that they had heard from them that
baptism was of no use to infants."
Collier****
gives the meaning of Hoveden correctly when he represents him as
stating, in reference to the Albigenses, "These heretics
refused to own infant baptism." Evervinus, in a letter to
St. Bernard, speaking evidently of Albigenses, in Cologne, in
1147, and consequently before the conversion of Peter Waldo,
says, "They do not believe infant baptism, alleging that
place of the gospel, ‘Whosoever shall believe and be baptized
shall be saved.’" Eckbert, in 1160, in his work against
the Cathari, written in thirteen discourses, says in the first,
"They say that baptism profits nothing to children who are
baptized, for they cannot seek baptism by themselves, because
they can make no profession of faith."
The
Paulicians received their name because they were specially the
disciples of the Apostle Paul. They were established as a
denomination by a gift of the Scriptures to their founder,
through which he received Christ, became a mighty teacher, and
gathered not converts simply, but churches.
At
the great trial in Thoulouse in 1176 they (the Albigenses) would
not accept anything as an authority but the New Testament.
Throughout their wide-spread fields of toil from Armenia to
Britain, and from one end of Europe to the other, and throughout
the nine hundred years of their heroic sufferings and
astonishing successes, they have always shown supreme regard for
the Word of God. If these men, coming from the original cradle
of our race, journeying through Thrace, Bulgaria, Bosnia, Italy,
France, and Germany; and visiting even Britain, were not
Baptists, they were very like them.
If
all the wicked slanders about them were discarded it would most
probably be found that some of them had little in common with
us, but that the majority, while redundant and deficient in some
things as measured by Baptist doctrines, were substantially on
our platform.
This
position about the Paulicians of the East is ably defended by
Dr. L.P. Brockett in "the Bogomils."
*Evan's
Bosnia, pp 36. 37, 42
++Matthew
Paris, at A.D. 1223
**Bibliotheca
Patrum, tom 4 p. ii, Coll. 746
+++Du
Pin's Eccles. Hist., ii. 456. Dublin.
***Du
Pin, ii. 392.
++++Annals
of Roger De Hoveden, i. 427, 480. London, 1853.
****Collier’s
Eccles. list., II. 358. London, 1840.
Henricians
The
Henricians by William Cathcart
Henry,
a monk in the first half of the twelfth century, became a great
preacher.
He was endowed with extraordinary powers of persuasion,
and with a glowing earnestness that swept away the greatest
obstacles that mere human power could banish, and he had the
grace of God in his heart.
He denounced prayers for the dead, the invocation of
saints, the vices of the clergy, the superstitions of the
church, and the licentiousness of the age, and he set an example
of the sternest morality.
He was a master-spirit in talents, and a heaven-aided
hero, a John Knox, born in another clime, but nourished upon the
same all-powerful grace.
When
he visited the city of Mans the inferior clergy became his
followers, and the people gave him and his doctrine their
hearts, and they refused to attend the consecrated mummeries of
the popish churches, and mocked the higher clergy who clung to
them.
In fact, their lives were endangered by the triumph of
Henry's doctrines.
The rich and the poor gave him their confidence and their
money, and when Hildebert, their bishop, returned, after an
absence covering the entire period of henry's visit, he was
received with contempt and his blessing with ridicule.
Henry's great arsenal was the Bible, and all opposition
melted away before it.
He
retired from Mans and went to Provence, and the same remarkable
results attended his ministry; persons of all ranks received his
blessed doctrines and forsook the foolish superstitions of Rome
and the churches in which they occupied the most important
positions. At and around Thoulouse his labors seem to have
created the greatest indignation and alarm among the few
faithful friends of Romanism, and Catholics in the most distant
parts of France heard of his overwhelming influence and his
triumphant heresy with great fear.
In every direction for many miles around he preached
Christ, and at last Pope Eugene III, sent a cardinal to
overthrow the heretic and his errors.
He wisely took within him, in 1147, the celebrated St.
Bernard.
This abbot had the earnestness and the temper of Richard
Baxter, whom he resembled in some respects.
He was a more eloquent man, and he was probably the most
noted and popular ecclesiastic in Europe.
He speaks significantly for the state of things which he
found in Henry's field:
"The churches (Catholic) are without people, the
people without priests, the priests with due reverence, and, in
short, Christians are without Christ; the churches were regarded
as synagogues, the sanctuary of God was not held to be sacred,
and the sacraments were not reckoned to be holy, festive days
lost their solemnity, men died in their sins, souls were
snatched away everywhere to the dread tribunal, alas!
neither reconciled by repentance nor fortified by the
communion.
The life of Christ was closed to the little children of
Christians, whilst the grace of baptism was refused, nor were
they permitted to approach salvation, although the Saviour
lovingly proclaims before them, and says, 'Suffer the little
children to come to me'"
Elsewhere,
St. Bernard, speaking of Henry and other heretics, says,
"They mock us because we baptize infants, because we pray
for the dead, because we seek the aid of {glorified}
saints"
That Henry had a great multitude of adherents is beyond a
doubt, and that he was a Bible Christian is absolutely certain,
and that and his followers rejected infant baptism is the
testimony of St. Bernard and of all other writers who have taken
notice of the Henricians and their founders.
We include to the opinion of Neander that Henry was not a
Petrobrusian.
We are satisfied that he and his disciples were
independent witnesses for Jesus raised up by Baptists, and their
founder perished in prison.
Petrobrussians
Peter de Bruys was the Catholic priest of an
obscure parish in France, which he left, early in the twelfth
century, when he became a preacher of the gospel. How he unlearned
the gospel of the Seven Hills and was instructed in that of
Calvary we cannot tell, but he was educated in both directions.
Many Romanists, like Staupitz or Fenelon, have received the
saving knowledge of Jesus and retained their connection with
the papal church; but Peter abhorred popery.
He taught that
baptism was of no advantage to infants, and that only believers
should receive it, and he gave a new baptism to all his
converts; he condemned the use of churches and altars, no doubt
for the idolatry practised in them; he denied
that the body and blood of Christ are to be found in the bread
and wine of the Supper, and he taught that the elements on the
Lord's table are but signs of Christ’s flesh and blood; he
asserted that the offerings, prayers, and good works of the
living could not profit the dead, that their state was fixed for
eternity the moment they left the earth ; like the English
Baptists of the seventeenth century, and like the Quakers of our
day, he believed that it was wrong to sing the praises of God in
worship; and he rejected the adoration of crosses, and destroyed
them wherever he found them.
It is said that on a
Good-Friday the Petrobrusians once gathered a great multitude
of their brethren, who brought with them all the crosses they
could find, and that they made a large fire of them, on which
they cooked meat, and gave it to the vast assemblage. This is
told as an illustration of their blasphemous profanity. Their
crucifixes, and along with them probably the images of the
saints, were the idols they had been taught to worship, and
when their eyes were opened they destroyed them, just as the
converted heathen will now destroy their false gods. Hezekiah
did a good thing in destroying the serpent of brass, which in
the wilderness had miraculous powers of healing, when the
Israelites began to worship it as a god.
Peter’s preaching
was with great power; his words and his influence swept over
great masses of men, bending their hearts and intellects before
their resistless might. “In Provence,” says Du Pin, “there
was nothing else to be seen but Christians rebaptized,
churches profaned or destroyed, altars pulled down, and crosses
burned. The laws of the church were publicly violated, the
priests beaten, abused, and forced to marry, and all the most
sacred ceremonies of the church abolished.”
Peter de Bruys
commenced his ministry about 1125, and such was his success that
in a few years in the places about the mouth of the Rhone, in
the plain country about Thoulouse, and particularly in that city
itself, and in many parts of “ the province of
Gascoigne” he led great throngs of men and women to Jesus, and
overthrew the entire authority of popes, bishops, and priests.
Had the life of this
illustrious man been spared the Reformation probably would have
occurred four hundred years earlier under Peter de Bruys instead
of Martin Luther, and the Protestant nations of the earth would
not only have had a deliverance from .four centuries of priestly
profligacy and widespread soul destruction, but they would
have entered upon a godly life with a far more Scriptural
creed than grand old Luther, still in a considerable measure
wedded to Romish sacramentalism, was fitted to give them.
Peter and his
followers were decided Baptists, and like ourselves they gave a
fresh baptism to all their converts. They reckoned that they
were not believers when first immersed in the Catholic Church,
and that as Scripture baptism required faith in its candidates,
which they did not possess, they regarded them as wholly
unbaptized; and for the same reason they repudiated the idea
that they rebaptized them, confidently asserting that because
of the lack of faith they had never been baptized.
Peter the Venerable,
abbot of Cluny, was born in 1093, and died in 1157. He was
distinguished by scholarship, acuteness of mind, and Biblical
knowledge. He and St. Bernard were the two leading ecclesiastics
of France. Peter would rebuke a pope if he deserved it without
hesitation, and no other human being was above his authority.
The abbot had assailed the Jews and the Saracens in two distinct
works. And such was the extraordinary success of the
Petrobrusians, and the great difficulty of refuting their
arguments from the Scriptures, that Peter felt compelled to come
forth and defend the deserted ecclesiastics and the church
threatened with ruin. We shall quote somewhat freely from the
abbot to show the doctrines of these grand old Baptists. At the
beginning of his pamphlet he states the five heads of the
heresy of the Petrobrusians.
In the first he
accuses them of “denying that little children under years of
responsibility can be saved by the baptism of Christ; and that
the faith of another (alienam fidem, the faith demanded from
popish sponsors when a child was christened) could benefit those
who were unable to exercise their own (faith); because,
according to them, not another’s faith, but personal faith,
saves with baptism, the Lord saying, ‘He who shall believe,
and be baptized, shall be saved, but he that believeth not shall
be condemned.'" This is the abbot’s first and heaviest
charge against these ancient Baptists. This accusation means
that the Petrobrusians refused to baptize children because
they were destitute of faith. The charge is repeated frequently
by the abbot of Cluny.
“The second capitulum
says that temples or churches should not be built, and that
those existing should be torn down; that sacred places for
praying were unnecessary for Christians, since God when
addressed in supplication heard equally those who in a warehouse
and in a church deserved his attention, in a market-place and in
a temple, before an altar or before a stable.” By this we
understand that the Petrobrusians did not believe in the
sanctity of bricks and mortar, and probably thought that as
Romish churches were nests of idols and scenes of blasphemous
superstition, their destruction would be no crime.
“The third capitulum
requires holy crosses to be broken and burned, because that
frame, or instru
ment, on which Christ, so fiercely tortured,
was so cruelly slain, is not worthy of adoration, or veneration,
or of any supplication; but to avenge his torments and death, it
should be branded with disgrace, hacked to pieces with the
sword, and consumed in the flames.” The Petrobrusians
detested the worship of the crucifix, and prayers offered to it.
and, like the Scotch Covenanters, they urged its destruction as
a Christ-dishonoring idol,
“The fourth capitulum
denied not only the reality of the body and blood of the
Lord, as offered daily and constantly in the sacrament
(Eucharist) in the church; but judged that it was absolutely
nothing, and should not be offered to God.” In this opinion
all Protestants concur.
“The fifth capitu
lum holds up to ridicule sacrifices, prayers, charitable
gifts, and the other good works performed by the faithful living
for the faithful departed.” Peter then states that he had
answered “these five heads,” or heresies, “as God had
enabled him.” He might have added a sixth capitulum, that
the Petrobrusians wanted Scripture for everything and not the
sayings of the fathers. This is admitted in his discussion of
their errors. The creed given by Peter to these Baptists is
excellent as far as it goes. It is the faith of their brethren
to-day. The abbot then proceeds to refute these imaginary
heresies separately. And under the heading, “Answer to the
Saying of the Heretics that Little Children should not be
Baptized (Responsio contra id quod dicunt haeretici parvulos non
posse baptizari) he commences his attack on the first capitutum.
Peter assumes without evidence that the Petrobrusians
believed that baptism was essential to salvation; and he takes
up their declaration that faith was necessary to baptism, and
that not the faith of another but the faith of the subject of
baptism, and then he proceeds with great ingenuity to show how
the faith of others “saved” persons, as he says, in the
Saviours day. Among the cases which he brings forward is that of
the paralytic let down through the roof of the house to the
Saviour who was inside, and Peter quotes the gospel narrative. “
And when he (Jesus) saw their faith he said~ Thy sins
are forgiven.”
Peter then says, “What do you say to these
things? Behold, I relate this not from Augustine (the godfather
of infant baptism, whose arguments have been its defensive
weapons for ages, and were very useful to the abbot) but from
the Evangel, which you say you trust most of all. At length
either concede that some can be saved by the faith of others (aliorum
fide alios tandem posse salvari concedite), or deny if you can
that the cases I brought forward are from the Evangel."
This and several similar instances of healing in the New
Testament where the faith of another exercised an influence in
securing healing, make the abbot jubilant over the
Petrobrusians. But the paralyzed man had faith himself, as well
as those who brought him to Jesus. This theory is probably
borrowed entirely from Augustine. In his day the baptism of
adults demanded faith continually, and when he put forth
enormous efforts to change the subjects of baptism, he still
insisted upon faith, the faith of sponsors for unconscious
babes. Hence he says, “A little child is benefited by their
faith by whom ‘he is brought to be consecrated” (in baptism)
(prodesse parvulo eorum fidem a quibus consecrandus offertur*(*Ausustini
Opera Omnia, i. 1304.); “a little child believes
through another (the sponsor) because it sinned through
another” (Adam) (~parvulus] credit in altero quia peccavit in
altero+). Again, speaking of a little child, he says, “It has
the needful sacrament of the Mediator, so that what could not
as yet be done by its faith is performed by the faith of those
‘who love it” (necessarium habet Mediatoris sacramentum, ut
quod per ejus fidem nondum potest, per eorum qui diligunt,
flat++). Speaking of baptism, Augustine says, “ Mother-church
loans them (little children) the feet of others that they may
come (to it), the heart of others that they may believe, and the
tongue of others that they may make confession” (accommodat
illis mater ecolesia aliorum pedes ut veniant, aliorum cur ut
credant, aliorum linguam ut fateantur***). Augustine ‘was in
arms to compel all Christendom to adopt infant immersion, He was
almost constantly declaring, " Without baptism
little children can have no life in themselves” (sine quo [baptismo]nee
parvuli pssunt habere vitam in semetipsis||); and as Pteter the
Venerable is fighting a similar battle with the Petrobrusians,
he stores his membory with Augustine’s arguments, No boub it
was this that led him to say about the faith of those who
carried the palsied man to Juseus, “Behold, I relate this not
from Augustine,but from the Evangel.”
Another common
Pedobaptist argument is presented Peter, the abbot, in these
words,”The unbelieving husband is saved by the believing wife,
and the unbelieving wife is saved by the believing husband.”
This he fives as a quotation from Icor. vii., and commenting
upon it, he sys, “If the unbelieving wife is saved by the
faith of the husband, and unbelieving husband is saved by the
faith of the wife, why should not the child be saved by the
faith of husband and wife together?” This is a very natural
question. But unfortunately for the abbot. Paul does not speak
of either husband or wife as being saved by the faith of the
other. He represents the one as being SANCTIFIED by the
other. And the sanctification he refers to after its work is
done leaves its subject an unbeliever. It is time legal
righteousness of their wedded relations and the legitimacy of
their children of which the apostle is speaking. If indeed a
Christian lady could give not only her own heart but the love of
Christ and tile heavenly inheritance to her unbelieving husband,
and allow bins -still to remain in unbelief and sin, it would
make a union with her an unheard-of attraction. And the same
would be true of the believing husband. But Peter misquotes
the Vulgate, the only copy of the Scriptures which he had. It
has not his salvatur, but sanctificatus and sanctificata
est.
In ancient times,
after the heresy sprang into existence that water baptism was
necessary to salvation, it was believed that martyrdom, or a
baptism in-one’s own blood, would supply the place of the
saving immersion. Peter turns this to ingenious account. He
says, “If the martyrs by a personal faith are saved without
baptism (in water), why may not little children, as I have said,
be saved by baptism without a personal faith ?“ Or we might
add, Why may they not be saved like the martyrs without any
baptism? Treating of the commission of the Saviour, the
baptismal creed of the Petrobrusians, he says, “‘He who
believeth not shall be damned.’ You think, forsooth, that
little children are held by this chain, and because they are not
able to believe, that baptism will profit them nothing. But it
is not so; the sacred words themselves show this; they do not
show it to the blind, but to those who see; they show it to the
humble, not to the haughty. ‘Go,’ says the Lord, ‘into all
the world, and preach the gospel to every creature. He that
believeth and is baptized shall be saved; he that helieveth not
shall be condemned.’ These words terrify the rebellious; they
do not condemn the innocent, they strike iniquity ; they do
not strike irresponsible infancy, they destroy despisers of
grace; they do not condemn the simplicity of nature (innocent
children) - - . Restrain, therefore, the excessive severity
which you assume, and do not aim to appear more just than him,
all whose ways are mercy and truth, nor shut out little children
from the kingdom of Imeaven (by refusing to baptize them), in
reference to whom he has said, ‘Of such is the kingdom of
heaven.’ “ Peter’s interpretation of the condemnation of
the commission is correct; it does not condemn any who cannot believe.
But his inference from it that infants should be baptized is
childishness for the imaginary advantage of infants. All
infants are saved ‘without baptism, as the Petrobrusians
believed. The commission has only to do with believers and
their baptism, and the penalty of unbelief when persons have
heard the gospel in years when faith is possible. Peter proceeds
to take up the old argument which Augustine uses, and which has
such a modern and familiar sound: “For thus afterwards Christ
the Lord placed holy baptism in his church, the sacrament of
the New Testament for the circumcision of the flesh.” (Sic
etiam postquam Dominus Christus in ecciesia sua sacranientum
Novi Testamenti pro circumsicione carnis sanctum baptismum
dedit. Augustini Opera Omnia, ii. 1087. Migne, Parisiis 1842.)
And he says, “For it is very disgraceful and impious that we
should refuse that to the little children of Christians which we
grant to time little children of Jews, . . . for neither does
time law prevail over the gospel nor Moses over Christ he little children of the
Hebrews were circumcised by divine command on the eghth day, and
purged from original si-n. Where, then, was the faith of
the boys? What was their understanding of tile sacrament which
they received? ‘What was their knowledge of divine things?
Where are you who condeumn Christian little children? Tile
little children of Jews are saved by the sacrament of
circumcision, and shall not the little children of Christians be
saved by the sacrament of baptism? The Jew believes, and his son
is cleansed from sin; the Christian believes, and shall not his
child be freed from similar guilt? There is no faith in the
little children of Christians, but neither is there any faith in
the little children of Jews, yet they are saved by the
faith of another when circumcision is received, and these
(little children) are saved by tile faith of another (the
sponsors) when baptism is received."*
We have made these
quotations to show how vigorously the Petrobrusians denounced
baptism on time “faith qf another” and
insisted on personal faith. Much more might be introduced from
the celebrated assault of the abbot of Cluny, hut from what has
been placed before the reader from Peter the Venerable, it is
clear that the Petrobi-usians were very decided Bible
Baptists,—Baptists ready for anything on earth except a
renunciation of their Scriptural principles. The other four
charges of Peter are quite as favorable to time general orthodoxy
of these ancient brethren.
Their immense strength to resist the church
and make converts is seen in the extraordinary pains Peter takes
to arm himself with all the weapons oc Augustine and with such
as he had made himself, and in the extremely skillful use which
he makes of them. It is refreshing to read a treatise written
seven hundred and thirty~six years ago against a powerful body
of Baptists by a very able theologian. Augustine directed the
most subtle argument against the men who held Baptist
principles in his day; but our people, when crushed, have only
been overcome for a time, and then received fresh life again;
and beyond a doubt our doctrines will finally seized the whole
race and bless all nations.
* Patri. Lat., clxxxix. pp. 722, 729,
752, 754, 755, 757, 758.
Migne, Parisis, 1854.
source: Cathcart's Baptist Encyclopedia
The Anabaptists
ANABAPTISTS
by William Cathcart
The name “Anabaptist” was originally a reproachful
epithet applied to those Christians in the time of the
Reformation who, from rigid adherence to the Scriptures as the
infallible and all sufficient standard of faith and practice,
and from the evident incompatibility of infant baptism with
regenerate church membership, rejected infant baptism and
inaugurated churches of their own on the basis of believers’
baptism. While reproached by their enemies with rebaptizing
those that had been already baptized in the established
churches, they maintained that the baptism of believers, such as
was administered by themselves, was the only Christian baptism,
the baptism of infants being unworthy of the name.
Anabaptists, The German and
Swiss.—The Anabaptist Reformation was nothing more than a
consistent carrying out of the principles at first laid down by
the Reformers, Luther and Zwingle, who both proposed, at the
outset, to make the Bible the only standard of faith and
practice. Many men of great religious earnestness, filled with
this idea, could not bear to see the godly and the ungodly
living together in the church, the latter as well as the former
partaking of the Lord’s Supper. The necessity of a separation
of Christians from the ungodly was, therefore, the most
fundamental thing with the Anabaptists of the sixteenth century,
as it is with Baptists today. If only the regenerate are to be
members of this body, it follows, necessarily, that those
baptized in unconscious infancy, or later in life without faith,
are not truly baptized. They understood the Scripture to make
faith a prerequisite to baptism; and they found in Scripture no
precept nor example for infant baptism. They rejected infant
baptism as a matter of course and baptized anew all that came to
them. Hence the name of reproach—” Anabaptist.” Luther was
as uncompromising as Baptists in making personal faith
prerequisite to valid baptism. He reproached the Waldenses for
baptizing infants, and yet denying that such infants have faith,
thus taking the name of the Lord in vain. Not baptism, Luther
held, but personal faith, justifies. If the infant has not
personal faith, parents lie when they say for it “I
believe.” But Luther maintained that through the prayers of
the church the infant does have faith, and he defied his
adversaries to prove the contrary. This was more than the
average man could believe. Hence he would be likely to accept
the principle and to reject the application. Luther attached
great importance to baptism; Zwingle very little. Hubmaier and
Grebel both asserted that, in private conversation with them,
Zwingle had expressed himself against infant baptism. His
earlier writings show that for a time he doubted the
scripturalness of infant baptism, and preferred to postpone
baptism until the subject should be able to profess his faith.
We have indisputable evidence that almost every other leader in
the Reformation, Melancthon, (Ecolampadius, Capito, etc., had a
struggle over the question of baptism. It seems equally certain
that they were deterred from rejecting infant baptism by the
manifest consequences of the Baptist position. It appeared to
them impossible that any movement should succeed which should
lose the support of the civil powers, and should withdraw the
true Christians from the mass of the people. Endless divisions,
the triumph of the papists, and the entire overthrow of the
Reformation, seemed to them inevitable. Hence their defense of
infant baptism, and their zeal in the suppression of the
Anabaptists. Those that rejected infant baptism believed that
Zwingle thought as they did, but held back from unworthy
motives. We may divide the Anabaptists into three classes: (1)
The fanatical Anabaptists. (2) The Baptist Anabaptists. (3) The
mystical Anabaptists. Great injustice has been done to many that
fall under the name Anabaptist by failing to make this
distinction. Was a certain party fanatical? The stigma is
attached to all. Were a few mystics Anabaptists? All classes are
blamed for it.
Anabaptists, The Fanatical,—These
were for the most part a result of Luther’s earlier writings.
It is remarkable that fanatical developments occurred in
connection with Lutheranism, and not in connection with
Zwinglianism.
Thomas Munzer and the Zwickau
Prophets.— Thomas Munzer was never really an Anabaptist.
Though he rejected infant baptism in theory, he held to it in
practice, and never submitted to rebaptism himself nor
rehaptized others. Yet he is usually regarded as the forerunner
of the movement, and he certainly was influential in that
direetion. Having studied previously at Halle, he came to
Wittenberg, where he came under Luther’s influence, and where
he received his Doctor’s degree. Like Luther, Munzer was a
great reader of the German Mystics, and when Luther came forward
as a Reformer, Munzer became one of his most decided and
faithful supporters. On Luther’s recommendation he came to
Zwickau in 1520 as parish priest. Here he entered into
controversy with the Erasmic rationalistic Egranus. The common
people, especially the weavers, took sides with Munzer. Chief
among these was Nicholas Storch, a Silesian, probably a
Waldensian. Munzer was naturally inclined to fanaticism, and
this controversy, together with the zealous support he received
from the common people, did much to bring it out. He regarded
Luther’s movement as a half-way affair, and demanded the
establishment of a pure church. He denounced Luther as an
incapable man, who allowed the people to continue in their old
sins, taught them the uselessness of works, and preached a dead
faith more contradictory to the gospel than the teachings of the
papists. While be held to the inspiration of the Scriptures,
Munzer maintained that the letter of Scripture is of no value
without the enlightenment of the Spirit, and that to believers
God communicates truth directly alike in connection with and
apart from the Scriptures. The excitement among the common
people became intense, and Storch and others began to prophesy,
to demand the abolition of all papal forms, and objects, and to
speak against infant baptism. Munzer had gone to Bohemia to
preach in 1521. Here he published an enthusiastic address to the
people in German, Bohemian, and Latin, denouncing the priests,
and declaring that a new era was at hand, and that if the people
should not accept the gospel they would fall a prey to the
Turks. Meanwhile, Storch’s party attempted to carry out their
ideas by force, and proclaimed that they had a mission to
establish the kingdom of Christ on earth. They were suppressed
by the authorities, and some of them thrown into prison; but
Storch, Stubner, and Cellarius escaped and fled to Wittenberg.
Stubner, a former student of the university, was entertained by
Melancthon, who for a time was profoundly impressed by the
prophets. Carlstadt especially was brought under their
influence. Storch traveled widely in Germany and Silesia,
disseminating his views mostly among the peasants. He seems to
have been a man of deep piety, great knowledge of Scripture, and
uncommon zeal and activity in propagating his views. In Silesia,
he is said to have labored for some time in connection with
Lutheranism, which had just been planted there, withholding his
peculiar views until he had gained a sufficient influence to
preach them effectively. Then he brought large numbers to his
views. Here also the attempt to “set up the kingdom of God on
earth” was accompanied with tumult, and Storch was driven from
Glogan. Driven from place to place, he established Anabaptist
communities in various places, in the villages, and among the
peasants. From Silesia Storch went to Bavaria, where he fell
sick and died. But he left behind him many disciples, and two
strong men who became leaders: Jacob Hutter and Gabriel
Scherding. From Silesia and Bavaria many Anabaptists fled into
Moravia and Poland, where they became very numerous, and
although they were afterwards persecuted severely they continued
to exist for a long time. The followers of Storch practiced in
many instances community of goods, and under persecution
manifested some fanaticism. But we do Storch some injustice in
classing him among the fanatics. Inasmuch, however, as he, was
closely connected with Munzer at the beginning, and inasmuch as
our information about him is not definite, we class him here
with the expression of a probability that he repudiated much of
Munzer’s proceedings, and was in most respects a true preacher
of the gospel. In 1523, Munzer became pastor at Alstedt. Here he
married a nun, set aside the Latin -Liturgy and prepared a
German one. In this he retained infant baptism. About the
beginning of 1524 he published two tracts against Luther’s
doctrines with regard to faith and baptism. He had become
convinced of the unscripturalness of infant baptism, yet
continued to administer it, telling the people that true baptism
was baptism of the Spirit. Munzer’s ministry in Alstedt was
brought to a close by the iconoclastic zeal of his followers.
His preaching all along was of a democratical tendency, for he
longed to see all men free and in the enjoyment of their rights.
During this year he went to Switzerland, where he attempted to
persuade (Ecolampadius and others of the right of the people to
revolt against oppression. Here also he probably met the men who
soon became leaders of the Swiss Anabaptists: Grebel,Manz,
Hubmaier, etc.
His
main object in this tour seems to have been to secure
co-operation in the impending struggle for liberty. Returning to
Muhlhausen he became chief pastor and member of the Council. The
whole region was soon under his influence. Luther visited the
principal towns and attempted to dissuade the people from
revolution. He also attempted to induce the rulers to accord to
the peasants their rights. But in neither respect did he
succeed. When the peasants revolted, Luther, although he knew
that they had cause for dissatisfaction, turned against them and
counseled the most unmerciful proceedings. Munzer showed no
military capacity. The peasants had no military discipline, and
were deceived by Munzer into reliance upon miraculous divine
assistance. The result was that they were massacred in large
numbers. Munzer was taken prisoner and afterwards beheaded.
Melchior
Hoffman,
born in Sweden, accepted Luther’s doctrine about 1523,
preached with great zeal in Denmark and Sweden, laboring with
his hands for his support. In the same year he came under the
influence of Storch and Munzer. Like these, he believed that the
last day was at hand, and with great earnestness warned men to
turn from their sins. His interpretation of Scripture,
especially the prophetical parts, which he freely applied to his
own time, and his constant effort to arouse men to flee from the
wrath to come, led to his being hunted from place to place by
Lutherans as well as by papists.
In 1526, King Frederick of Denmark
came to his aid and gave him a comfortable stipend and freedom
to preach the gospel throughout Holstein. Here Hoffman remained
about two years, and might have remained longer had he not
declared in favor of the Carlstadt-Zwinglian view of the
Lord’s Supper. This led to controversy, which caused his
expulsion and the confiscation of his goods. In company with
Carlstadt he took refuge in Switzerland, and in 1529 went to
Strassburg. Here he was joyfully received by the Zwinglians, but
his preaching soon disgusted them, the difficulty here, as
elsewhere, being that he claimed a special inspiration of God to
interpret Scripture, and did this in a manner that tended to
produce an unwholesome popular excitement. Hoffman now came to
see that there was a wide breach between him and the other
evangelical preachers. Their apprehension of Scripture, he
thought, was an apprehension of the letter, his, of the spirit.
Their religion was of the understanding, his, of the heart.
Their religion admitted of pride and pomp, his, only of
humility. The Anabaptists had by this time become numerous in
Southern Germany. When Hoffman came to know them it is not
strange that he should have been led to unite with them. In 1530
be declared his acceptance of their views on baptism,
justification, free-will, church discipline, etc.; and as most
of the Anabaptist leaders had either suffered martyrdom or died
of the pestilence, Hoffman became a leader among them, and led
many to his own fanatical and false views. Under Hoffman’s
influence the opinions of the Anabaptists, which had been in
great part sound and biblical, underwent many changes. Hoffman
believed that Christ did not receive his body from the virgin.
This view was perpetuated by the Mennonites (a sort of Manichean
view). His Millenarian views also became common among the
Anabaptists. Through him the Anabaptist movement spread over all
the Netherlands, and he came to be regarded as a great prophet.
At Embden, in Friesland, the Anabaptists became so strong that
they were able to baptize openly in the churches and on the
streets. The most influential leader in the Netherlands (after
Hoffman) was Matthiesen. In 1532 Hoffman was thrown into prison
in Strassburg. Here he became more and more fanatical. Several
men and women began to have visions and to interpret them with
reference to current events. Hoffman they called Elias ;
Schwenkfeldt was Enoch, etc. The enthusiasm spread, and the
Anabaptist movement made rapid conquests. Persecution was
probably the cause, and certainly a means of promoting the
fanaticism. Hoffman died in prison, January, 1 1543, after more
than ten years confinement.
The Munster Uproar.—The
episode in the history of the Reformation that did most to make
the Anabaptists abominable in the eyes of the world, and from
the effects of which Baptists long suffered in England and
America, and even now suffer in Germany, was the Munster
kingdom. Doubtless the preaching of Hoffman, and still more that
of his followers, had something to do with this event. Yet the
idea that this preaching constitutes the chief factor is utterly
unfounded. In 1524—25, Munster shared in the communistic
movement (Peasants’ War), but the magistrates and clergy had
been strong enough to crush out the communism and Lutheranism
together. After this the Reformation gained scarcely any visible
ground there until 1529. About this time, Bernard Rothmann, an
educated and eloquent young man, as chaplain in the collegiate
church at St. Mauritz, near Munster, began to preach Protestant
sermons. Despite the determined opposition of magistrates and
clergy, the Munster people forsook the parish churches and
flocked to St. Mauritz. In 1533 the Protestants obtained in
Munster the right to the free exercise of their religion, and
six parish churches came into their hands. Soon they obtained
the supremacy in the Council, and began to carry out their
principles of reform. The bishop and Romish clergy were driven
away, and an army was equipped for the protection of
Lutheranism. Thousands of insurrectionary spirits assembled from
the surrounding regions, and among them many of the Hoffmanite
Anabaptists. It was natural that, when these latter saw the
papal party crushed, they should have supposed that the kingdom
of Christ was about to he set up at Munster. In 1532, Rothmann,
the recognized leader of the Lutheran party at Munster, became
an Anabaptist. As a Lutheran, Rothmann is said to have been
dissolute. When he became an Anahaptist he adopted an almost
ascetical mode of life. He exhorted the people to the practice
of charity and humility, and warned them against yielding to the
senses and passions. He also declared that the millennium had
come, and that the end of the world would come a thousand years
later. The Anabaptists gained the ascendancy just as the
Lutherans had done before them. Once in full power, their
fanaticalism increased until a king was set up, polygamy was
introduced in accordance with pretended revelations of the
Spirit, and many other abominations were practiced. After a few
months the Munster kingdom was overthrown and the leaders
executed. This affair has commonly been looked upon as a natural
culmination of Anabaptism. The fact is, that Lutheranism was
responsible for it far more than Anabaptism, and that the rigor
with which evangelical Christianity was suppressed in Munster
until 1531 was the most potent cause of all.
The
Baptist Anabaptists--While
none of the Anabaptists were free from what we regard as errors,
the great body of the Swiss Anabaptists made a very close
approach to our position and if we take into consideration the
circumstances under which they were placed, we shall not he
inclined to judge them harshly in the things wherein they seem
to have gone astray. Fundamentally they were Baptists, but it
required time for them to reach a complete development. Roubli,
when expelled from Basle, caine to Wyticon, near Zurich, and
under his influence the parishioners almost all refused to have
their children baptized, as early as 1524. Roubli did not yet
insist on rebaptism, but simply set forth the unscripturalness
of infant baptism. In 1524, Grebel, Manz, and others began to
manifest their dissatisfaction with the state of ecclesiastical
affairs at Zurich. They pressed upon Zwingle the necessity of a
further reformation of the churches, and reproved him for
tardiness and coldness in the matter. Zwingle urged that the
unregenerate had been retained in the churches, on the ground
that "he that is not against us is for us;” and that in
the parable it is commanded to let the tares grow with the
wheat. They objected also to the dependence of religion on the
civil magistracy. They were answered that the magistracy, while
not free from human elements, was not merely not opposed to the
Word of God, but gave protection to the preaching of the same.
They soon began to accuse Zwigli of sacrificing willfully the
truth in order to maintain the favor of the civil rulers. They
now began to absent themselves from the churches, to hold secret
meetings, in which they discussed freely the desirableness of
setting up pure churches. During this year the writings of
Carlstadt and Munzer became known to them, and they instituted a
correspondence with these men. How far the Zurich Anabaptists
were influenced by Munzer it is not possible to ascertain. It is
certain that they read his writings against Luther and admired
them, before September, 1524. It is equally certain that they
were not first led to their views of thorough reform by these
writings, but were only strengthened and encouraged thereby in
their already progressing work. The letter of Grebel, Manz, and
others to Munzer, Sept. 5, 1524, shows that they had already
advanced far beyond Munzer in their true views of reform, and
that they felt themselves competent to pronounce judgment upon
Munzer's inconsistencies and upon his revolutionary utterances.
They expostulate with him for having translated the mass instead
of abolishing it. They claim that there is no precept or example
in the New Testament for the chanting of church services. They
insist that what is not expressly taught by word or example is
the same as if it were forbidden. No ceremonies are allowable in
connection with the Lord’s Supper, except the reading of the
Scriptures bearing upon this ordinance. Common bread and common
wine, without any idolatrous ceremonies, are to be employed in
the Supper. The ordinance is declared to be an act of communion,
expressive of the fact that communicants are truly one body.
Inasmuch as the ordinance is a communion, no one is to partake
of it alone on a sickbed. It should not be celebrated in
temples, on account of superstitious associations. It should be
celebrated frequently. They exhort Munzer to abandon all
non-scriptural usages, insisting that it is better that a few
should believe and act in accordance with the Word of God than
that many should believe in a doctrine mingled with falsehood.
They are pleased with his theoretical rejection of infant
baptism, but grieved that he should continue to practice what he
has shown to be unwarranted. Moreover, they have heard that he
has been preaching against the magistracy, and maintaining the
right of Christians to resist abuses with the sword. They set
forth their conviction that neither are we to protect the gospel
nor ourselves with the sword. Thus the Swiss Anabaptists were
from the outset free from fanaticism, and they appear even in
1524 not as disciples, but as teachers of Munzer. The opposition
to the established church had by this time become so formidable,
that the Council appointed a public disputation for Jan. 17,
1525; but there was no intention on the part of the Council or
of Zwingle to decide the matter fairly in accordance with the
weight of the arguments, and the decision of the Council was,
therefore, against the Anabaptists; and a mandate was at once
issued requiring the baptism within eight days of every
unbaptized child, on pain of the banishment of the responsible
parties. This action was soon followed by a prohibition of the
assemblies of the radicals. Grebel and Manz were exhorted to
leave off their disputing against infant baptism and in favor of
regenerate church membership. In order to insure quiet, Roubli,
Hatzer, and others, foreigners, were warned to leave the canton
within eight days. This only led to greater boldness on the part
of the Anabaptists, and soon George Blaurock, having first been
baptized by Grebel, baptized a number of others. From this time
the cause of the Anabaptists, notwithstanding the severe
persecution to which they were subjected, made rapid progress.
The breaking out of the Peasant’s War in 1525 tended to
increase the apprehensions of the Swiss authorities, and the
rigor towards Anabaptists now became greater. Many, both men and
women, were thrown into prison, and released only on the payment
of heavy fines and the promise to desist from their heresy, or,
in some eases, to leave the canton. The penalty of returning
from banishment was drowning. Grebel, Manz, Hubmaier, and
Blaurock were imprisoned and banished. Manz was finally drowned.
Though continually harassed, these noble witnesses for Christ
were very active, traveling from place to place, preaching at
night in private houses to the people, who were anxious to hear.
Some preachers baptized hundreds, if not thousands, of persons.
From Zurich they spread throughout Switzerland, Southern
Germany, the Netherlands, Moravia, etc.
Doctrines
of the Swiss Anabaptists.—Although
most of the leaders held some views peculiar to themselves, they
may be said to have been agreed on the following points, as
exhibited in the Confession of 1527, which also forms the basis
of Zwingle’s “Refutation" of 1527. (1) Baptism of
believers. The form of baptism was not commonly discussed, the
chief object was to secure believing subjects.) (2) Discipline
and exclusion of unworthy members. (3) Communion of baptized
believers. (4) Separation from the impure churches and the
world. This involved a refusal to have any social intercourse
with evil-doers, to attend church services with unbelievers and
those in error, to enter into marriage relations with them, etc.
This absolute separatism gave them as much trouble, perhaps, as
any other single doctrine. (5) They condemned the support of
pastors by taxation of the people. The pastors, when they
required support, were rather to be supported by voluntary
offerings of the members. (6) As to magistracy, they maintained
that true Christians, as being entirely subject to the laws of
Christ, have no need of magistracy. Yet they did not deny that
magistracy is necessary in the ungodly world; neither did they
refuse obedience to magistracy in whatever did not come athwart
their religious convictions. (7) They rejected oaths on the
ground of Christ’s command, “Swear not at all.” They
distinguished, however, between swearing as a promise with an
oath to do or be something in the future, and testifying with
regard to things past or present. The latter they did not
condemn.
The Mystical and Speculative Anabaptists.— Here may be classed a large number of able and learned men, some who allied themselves with the Anabaptists and were active in evangelical work, as Denk and Haetzer; others who contented themselves with the theoretical rejection of infant baptism, but who either cared so little for ordinances in general as to be unwilling to make rejection of infant baptism a prominent feature of their creed, as Schwenkfeldt, Sebastian, Frank, etc., or else were so occupied with graver doctrinal controversies that their Anabaptist views attracted comparatively little attention, as Michael Servetus, Faustus Socinus, etc. Almost all the Antitrinitarians were rejecters of infant baptism, and several who diverged very widely from accepted views with regard to the person of Christ were especially noted as Anabaptists. With many the unspeakable love and mercy of God came to be a favorite theme. Such being the case, the prop