20. Baptist Successionism Part 3

This is the For Freedom Podcast. This podcast exists to bring to light the legalism and abuse in the independent fundamental Baptist movement and to encourage believers to grow in grace through the scriptures. Now, here's your host, John Holyfield. Hey guys, welcome back to the For Freedom Podcast. I am your host, John Holyfield, bringing the message of Galatians 5.1 to you. For freedom, Christ has set us free. Stand firm, therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery. And it is for freedom that God has brought us out of bondage, out of the bondage of sin, into freedom to Christ. And many of those that we talk about and address in this podcast try to enslave others with a yoke of legalism. And so, that is what I try to do in the podcast, in exposing that sort of legalism, combating it with the truth of the scriptures, and then also helping those that have been abused in the IFB movement. The past few episodes, I've been doing a little series on the false history of the Baptist succession theory, the trail of blood theory. This is the idea that the Baptist church is not a Protestant church. That the Baptist church has always existed down to the time of Christ. But this whole time, this whole time, there had been believers, there had been a line of believers outside of the Roman Catholic church, outside of the Protestant line that believed, that came forth, that had their heritage from the book of Acts, from the Lord Jesus Christ, from the apostles. As far as the Baptist is concerned, we see that our lineage coming from an apostolic lineage versus, say, the Reformation or any of those things. Now, these individuals, these individuals went by different names, different groups went by different names at different times. Some of them were called Waldensians. Some of them were called Paulicians. Some of them were called Albigensians. They went by different names at different times. But these individuals were individuals that believed certain things. They had certain distinct belief systems that did not allow them to join up with the great whore the Roman Catholic church and did not allow them to join up with the Protestant Reformation movement that basically just came out of the Roman Catholic church. And so, began sort of the idea of this study by interviewing Dr. Matthew Lyon, a Baptist historian, and clarifying the Baptist distinctives. Now, that's important because of what we're going to cover today. The last episode I did talked about sort of introducing what was the Trail of Blood theory, what was Baptist successionism, and that kind of thing there. So, this brings us now to this point that I'm going to get into, and that is actually looking at the groups that J.M. Carroll, and whether it's James Beller, whether it's any type of other type of guy that ascribes to this theory, the Ruckmanites, that try to use this Trail of Blood theory. They group these different sects through church history and claim them as Baptists. So, that's what I'm going to cover today. I'm going to break these groups down one by one. We'll see how far we get. I would like to be able to get through all of them, but not exactly sure if I'm going to be able to cover all of it. So, in the groups that are listed, you have many different, you have the Montanus, Novatians, the Paulicians, and then you go up into more of the Middle Ages, and you got the Waldensians, the Albigensians, Henrichians, Arnoldists, and then you've got the, then it comes into the Anabaptists. Now, there's other groups, and we'll hit some of those other groups, but those are the groups that are claimed as Baptists, and so they say that Baptists are not Protestants. We did not, as a Baptist church, come off of the Protestant Reformation because we were always opposed to the Roman Catholic Church, and so there was always groups of Baptist people all the way in an unbroken line of succession that have always faced persecution. So, let's look at that. The first group that is cited during this time is the group called the Montanus. The Montanus, James Beller said in his Collegiate Baptist History workbook, Montanus was a convert of Christianity. Now, most of everything, basically everything that I'm going to be giving to you today comes from the book, Baptist Accessionism, a crucial question in Baptist history by James McGoldrick. There will be a few things that I talk about that I got from another resource, but I'm just going to go ahead and be honest with you, lay that out right now. Pick that book up. Listen, really read through that because he goes in a lot more detail than I'm going to, and devour that book if this subject intrigues you, interests you, or anything like that. But that way we got that out of the way and we don't have to stop moving on there. The movement derives its name from a guy named Montanus. He is the founder and self-proclaimed prophet of this movement. Montanus and his associates then sought to restore the earlier devotion by exercising the gift of prophecy much in the same manner as modern charismatics. The historian Eusebius reported that Montanus worship services featured intense emotionalism in which Montanus, the leader, quote, was carried away in spirit and wrought up into a certain kind of frenzy, raving and speaking strange things and proclaiming what was contrary to the institutions that prevailed in the church as handed down from the earliest times, end quote. So Montanism, the Montanus group was really a group that exhibited very, very ecstatic experiences that, as I just said, really don't resemble much of what Baptists look like. Maybe the Southern Camp Meeting Baptists, I guess the Revivalistic Baptists, I don't know, maybe not. But they're more along the lines of what we see these modern charismatic movements do. And let me just go ahead and say this right now. I understand that some of the listeners, some of my listeners may not ascribe to this, but I'll just be honest with you. I am what I would classify as a, I'm a card-carrying cessationist. Now, if you know what that term is, the difference between the term continuationist and cessationist, then you probably have already done the research and maybe you are a cessationist because you know what it is. If those two terms totally are like foreign to you, let me just explain them to you. Now, a cessationist is someone who believes that the spiritual gifts that are recorded in the New Testament are given to the church and are applicable to the day except for what we would call the sign gifts. The sign gifts being those of healings, miracles, and those types of things, words of knowledge, and that stuff. Now, a charismatic believes that there's never been a cease in every spiritual gift. Now, I believe that the spiritual gifts are still available and the Holy Spirit endows each believer at the time of conversion with a spiritual gift. However, I don't think that the sign gifts are for today. I believe that they have ceased, i.e. the term cessationist. Now, in that, I believe that nobody is getting revelation from God anymore. Okay? So, when the canon of Scripture or the written Word of God ceased to be written down, I believe that God stopped revealing himself to man. Therefore, no one is getting revelation from God. Meaning, when somebody says, God spoke to me, I sort of would say, no, God has spoke to you. It's in the Bible. It's in the pages of the Bible. Now, some may say that's an extreme view. I do have reasons, biblical reasons, why I go to that. One being that I believe that the revelation was given to the apostles, and when the apostles ceased to be around, when the last apostle died, then therefore we don't have that anymore. So, I think this is something that is greatly abused in the church world today. It's abused in every church culture. I believe that it's also abused in the IFB. And that is this idea of, God told me, or God spoke to me. And when you don't hold to a view of that God is not speaking to mankind anymore, and that the Word of God is sufficient for us, we don't need private revelations from God. When you don't hold to that, it opens the door for all kinds of chaos and abuse within the world of Christianity. And people make Christianity and the church and God look so stupid in the world with these ideas of God spoke to me. I'll even say this. Most cults that you find today is because those people who began those cults deviated. They left the Word of God for the God spoke to me things. David Koresh and the Branch Davidians, Mormonism, Jehovah Witnesses, and many of those are there because they began getting private revelations from God. I always tell people that whenever you're listening to a preacher, even if it's in a Baptist church, when you're listening to a preacher and they make this statement, let me show you what God gave me this morning. Red flags should go up. Red flags should go up. Because there's nothing that that pastor has to give to you that you don't have in your lap that you could get yourself. Okay? There is nothing that sort of puts him on a higher plane of spirituality. And that, I believe, is heretical. I don't think that it exists. And I think that you need to be very careful. And that's where a lot of spiritual abuse comes whenever people start telling that they should do this because God told them they should do this. Stay away from that. Now, that was a major rabbit trail. And if you disagree with me on that, okay, I get it. I know that there's arguments that can come up. Well, what if the Holy Spirit does this? Listen, we could argue that the day as long. And I know I didn't take the time to make my case on why I believe that. Maybe I'll do that in another episode. But that is where I stand on that. So when I see this type of stuff, I say this is very problematic for understanding historic Christianity. Montanism appears to have been much more akin to Pentecostalism than to any historic expression of the Baptist faith. Remember what we talked about with the Baptist distinctives. McGoldrick says, Contrary to the claims of Baptist secessionist authors, no apparent foundation exists for regarding the Montanists as Baptistic preservers of the true church. The arch distinctive of Montanism was the doctrine of extra-biblical special revelation, a concept which Baptists and their confessions of faith have disavowed in favor of the exclusive authority of the Bible as the sole means of knowing the Word of God. So, did God write the Bible? Yes. And you know what? Here's another interesting thing. Going back to the idea of God told me, you marker down most of the time when somebody says that they got a word from God, it does not agree with what is revealed already in Scripture anyways. Just a little tidbit for you there. So, that is the Montanist. Do they sound like Baptists to you? I would give an X. No. I don't believe Montanists are Baptists. Now, therefore, number one, one big thing happens. The first big thing that happens is this, that your line of unbroken succession to the time of Christ or the early church for Baptists is over with. It's broken. It's done. But number two, and this is what we're going to continue to see as we examine this, is that it shows the really, really bad research in history, historical research and just handling history that has been done by those that claim this. You're not looking at these people. You're not being, and if you are looking at these people, you're not being honest about who they are so you can use them for your agenda. Okay? So, that's the Montanists. The next on our list is the Novationists. The Novationists. Novation became the first bishop or pastor at the New Novationist Church at Rome. These collectively became known as Novationists, and their independent churches existed well into the 5th century. This is from a Baptist succession author, James Beller. This is what he said about them. All right? So, let's look at what Novationists were. The Novationists are the second major body of dissidents which successionists have claimed as Baptists, like Tertullian. Tertullian was the early church father who actually sort of reneged and left a little bit of his faith and went sort of towards the left, towards the end of his life. Novation, around the year 258, was an able scholar whose major contribution to theology was an exposition of the doctrine of the Trinity. Novation became a prominent leader in the Catholic Church at a time, around 250, when Roman Emperor Decius was savagely persecuting Christians. Now, check this out. In the Episcopal election of the year 251, Cornelius, a relatively undistinguished cleric was chosen bishop in a hotly contested procedure. A minority of electors refused to acknowledge him and chose Novation instead. The church as a whole was divided by the rivalry. There was no theological dispute between the rivals and their respective supporters. The quarrel was about disciplinary policy and strength of two determined personalities that made reconciliation impossible. See, the whole idea was about this, and Matthew Lyon talks about it on his episode in the Trail of Blood on the History and Hope podcast, that these guys were fighting over whether they should let these people who reneged on their faith during the midst of persecution back in the church. Novation didn't think that they should, I think, and then, so they, you had these two guys going up for the Episcopal Bishop of the church, and basically, what happened was they went with Cornelius, got the majority of the vote, and not Novation. So Novation said, I'm picking up my toys and I'm going home. So, to put it, to put it in a crude manner, what he, it ended up that they took, he took a group along with them and said, nah, I'm not having this, I want to be the leader. And he left. It was not over any doctrinal reason. It was not over baptism. It was not over anything that makes them specifically Baptist for the reason that they broke off. He didn't like the fact that he didn't get elected. So, he's going to start his own church. Eusebius, historian Eusebius, reported that a synod of 60 bishops plus many other churchmen excommunicated Novation and that soon many of his followers abandoned him and adhered to Cornelius. And so, that is the thing with Novation. I was upset that he did not get to become the pope or the main bishop. On what basis successionists, McGoldrick says, have inducted the Novations into the line of Baptist churches? The answer seems to be that successionists have been willing and too often eager to accept the claims of religious bodies that opposed Rome and suffered for doing so. This is an interesting thing that he said. What you're going to find when it comes to these groups is that they look so different from what an actual Baptist is that you're probably wondering why in the world did they use these groups? What could constitute? And it really came down to either one or two things. Number one, they either were not part of the Roman church. It didn't matter what they believed or practiced as long as they weren't part of the Roman Catholic church. Hey, they're Baptist. Or, that they baptized people. Those two things tend to be the only criteria that caused these groups to be lumped in as being part of the Baptist denomination of successionism or trail of blood. Now, moving to the next group. The next group we come to is this group called the Paulicians. Now, the Paulicians take up probably the longest period of time as a group that existed within the groups named in the succession line or the trail of blood. James Beller said, the Paulicians were courageous Bible believers of the 7th, 8th, and 9th centuries. Okay? So, the Paulicians were courageous Bible believers. Well, let's examine that claim. When we find a group in any age who are spoken against by the multitudes, we may rest assured they were contending for the tenets held by the Baptists and suffering under the stigma imposed by enemies of the truth. This was by another Baptist successionist history, J.M. Holiday. The precise origins of the movement have been ascertained and there is disagreement about the source of its name. Some hold that the name is derived from a guy named Paul of Semisata, patriarch of Antioch from the time of 260 to 268, who was disposed from the episcopate for maintaining unorthodox beliefs about the Trinity and the person of Christ. There is, however, no proof that the Paulicians owed their origin to this Paul of Samisata. Now, we, for a long time, historians really didn't know a lot of what the Paulicians really taught and believed. however, in 1828, we do now, thanks to an archaeological find in 1828, this document was called The Key of Truth. It is a major statement of Paulician doctrine which was compiled by the leaders of the sect. It was found in a Russian Armenian colony in 1828. McGoldrick says, because of this great discovery, scholars are now in a position to appraise the theological character of Paulicianism by means of an unimpeachable and unprejudiced source. Okay, so when we look at The Key of Truth and the Paulicians are permitted to speak for themselves, listen, it becomes crystal clear that they were not Baptists. In fact, when judged by a traditional creed or standard of orthodoxy, they cannot be regarded as Christians at all. This is the Paulicians. Now, what did Beller say? What did Beller say? Beller said they were courageous Bible believers of the 7th, 8th, and 9th centuries. Okay, so let's look at this. The Paulician doctrine of God expressed in The Key of Truth is an anti-Trinitarian view. The Paulicians believe that Christ became the Son of God when he was adopted by the Father at his baptism. That doesn't sound very Baptist to me. They maintained a heretical position on the work of Christ as well. The Paulicians viewed Christ as primarily a teacher and they gave priority to ethics over doctrine. What does that mean? That basically means a work-based salvation. What you are going to find in this group is that they have more lining up with the Mormons than they do the Christians or Baptists for that matter. Most of these groups look more like a cult than they do a Baptist denomination. Excuse me. Christ's death they denied that it was an atonement for sin and they viewed the Holy Spirit as a creature. The Key of Truth states this So the Orthodox Christian doctrine of the Trinity of the Holy Spirit is not that he was made no that he is God and he has always existed as God he is not the Son of God and he is not the Father God the Father he is the Holy Spirit but he exists in essence and in personhood as the one true God the one triune God that is what Orthodox Christianity teaches okay so initiates coming into the Paulistian church were baptized nude that would be interesting to see to have go to your local Baptist church and say hey you guys aren't baptizing right because they got clothes on see how well that goes over and the mode of administration featured both immersion and pouring the third pouring of water over the head was believed to convey the gift of the Holy Spirit so they believed that you received the Holy Spirit by the third pouring of your baptism and so they didn't even practice exclusively baptism by immersion this would cause them to be rejected by any independent fundamental Baptist church today as probably heretical in fact Tony Hudson wouldn't rub shoulders with anybody that did that guarantee it okay there is evidence that the Paulicians continued the Catholic practice of praying for the dead the dispute between the Paulicians and the Orthodox church was not a controversy between Baptist and Catholics but a quarrel between two groups which claimed to be the Catholic church the Paulicians weren't trying to separate themselves as another group they were trying to say they were the Catholic church then the Paulicians sent missionaries to different areas one of the places that they went to was the Balkan peninsula during this time when Paulician troops were in the employ of the imperial government of Constantinople so they also got involved in military conquests and became sort of soldiers this gave rise to what is known as the Bogomil movement now the Bogomils are another group that you will find in the Baptist line of succession succession and a trail of blood McGoldrick goes on to say some writers of this school have ignored the Bogomils completely while others have regarded them as Paulicians under another name rigorous asceticism which featured the avoidance of eating meat and participating in sexual relations was promoted as a means to combat evil inclinations of the body so the Bogomils disdain for material things led them to interpret scripture in such a manner as to explain away the miracles of Christ that doesn't really sound very independent fundamental Baptist they rejected the Old Testament law and prophets while in the New Testament they gave priority to the gospels and acts at the expense of the epistles hmm the single item of such correspondence appears to in the Bogomils rejection of infant baptism their reason for rejecting that practice however in no way resembles the Baptist position on the subject Bogomils denied all water baptism because it applied the application of the material element and in their understanding all things material are evil so there you go they didn't just reject infant baptism they rejected baptism by water altogether! The Bogomils did! This branch off the politicians the New Testament in 1 John 4 1 3 asserts that the position which a teacher maintains concerning the person of Jesus Christ is the criterion by which his profession of the faith is to be evaluated on this basis it is patently clear that the Bogomils must be regarded as exponents of an anti-Christian religion why? Because they denied the incarnation and all it implies the Bogomils from Constantinople believed that Christ was the archangel Michael who entered the world through the ear of the Virgin Mary and assumed a phantom non-material body see what I mean when I said they have more in common with maybe the Mormons than Baptists the Bogomils ended up fleeing to Bosnia and in that country they became known as the Petarenes which you find as another group within the trail of blood theory and the Baptist succession line the Petarenes now McGoldrick says contrary to the claims of some succession the Bogomils were not Bulgarian Baptists they were advocates of a dualist religion which scarcely resembles real Christianity now at this point when you're tracking down the line the ages of history okay we're somewhere the politicians branched all the way up to about the 1100s okay so then you get into finding groups thrown in the trail of blood that really were branches off of one single guy following but again they're included into the Baptist line so I'm going to cover these three groups you've got the Petrobrusians who followed a guy named Peter DeBruys you have the Henrichians which followed a guy named Henry of Lausanne however you say that and then you have the Arnoldists who followed a guy named Arnold of Brescia and this was all sort of around the same period of time so the Petrobrusians the Petrobrusians were started by a guy named Peter DeBruys around 1135 who was a priest from the French Alps McGoldrick says there is no basis at all for referring to Peter as a Baptist minister in the 12th century and so little is known about the character of his movement that efforts to depict the Petrobrusians as reflect only wishful thinking so what is the verdict here it means this that here you have a group of people that followed this guy in a religious manner! for us to pull them out and claim them as Baptists however it doesn't matter if they were or not let's say let's just say the Petrobrusians were identical to the independent fundamental Baptists of today your trail of blood or line of Baptist succession has already been obliterated so you got one group but see honest integrity in historical research says that you cannot include the Petrobrusians as Baptists because we don't know enough to determine if they were or not plus we know one thing for certain they didn't call themselves Baptists okay so next are the Henry of Lausanne and around 1145 arrived in province soon after the death of Peter de Broys he had once been a benedicting monk the paucity of evidence says McGoldrick about Henry of Lausanne and the Henry precludes a declarative judgment about their alleged Baptistic teachings! But those documents which are extant give little support of successionist claims so sort of the same verdict but what we have basically says that doesn't match up alright so let's move on to the next group the Arnoldists the Arnoldists and this was a group that followed a guy by the name of Arnold of Brezja from 1155 you like that Brezja all okay I don't know if that's right anyways okay his career was mainly that of a critic of clerical corruption and abuses if a guy stands up and says that Roman Catholic priests are corrupt yeah he's our Baptist guy whatever Arnold Arnold was a fervent moral reformer who shared many of Bernard of Clairvaux's concerns for the cleansing of the church, and at the beginning of his career, he was a loyal—are you listening?—catholic and servant of the Roman church. Eesh, that sort of messes up your theory. Arnold was ordained a priest and joined the Augustinian Monastery in Brescia. Arnold had to leave Brescia for France. He visited a guy named Abelard. In France, he defended Abelard when his former teacher was attacked by Bernard of Clairvaux, and Bernard responded by convincing Louis VII to expel Arnold from the kingdom. Arnold went to submit to the new pope, Eugene III, who ordered Arnold to Rome where he could be watched. So here's this guy who's got on the outs with the bishops, and one of the most renowned bishops was—and guy that had one of the most influence, Bernard of Clairvaux, who wrote some very good theological works, I must say. You should do your research on Bernard of Clairvaux. He did some very advanced, some very good thoughts on the area of doctrine, orthodox doctrine in the church. But Arnold finds himself on the outs with Bernard and many of these other bishops, and so they want him out. Does this guy do the Baptist thing and stand up for what he believes in? Actually, no. What he does is he goes and appeals to the pope and wants to convince the pope of his loyalty to Rome. Arnold, like Savonarola in the 15th century, was a Puritan reformer of great courage, but his stern and rigorous moral demands eventually alienated many supporters. By 1155, his power base had crumbled, and Pope Hadrian was able to gain control of Rome. Arnold was arrested and killed, apparently by hanging. McGoldrick says, McGoldrick finishes those three groups by saying, The full teaching of the Petrobrugians, the Henrichians, and Arnoldness will probably never be known. But on the basis of surviving evidence, there is no justification for regarding these sects as medieval Baptists. Now, let's move on to the next group. We're getting further on down the line in history. Move on to the next group. I want you to hear this clip by this guy's name is Cody Zorn, evangelist in the South, in the IFB. Here he talks about these next two groups, Albigensians, Waldensians. These people here, these Waldensians and Albigensians, and they got other names. They got Anabaptists and Hussites and people like that who were named after men. Y'all listen to me. We are not Protestants tonight. This right here, what you're looking at ain't just a study of a King James Bible. What you're looking at is a study of Baptist history, too. We have never been Protestants. We never come out of the Roman Catholic horror. You say, where you find that? Revelation 17, which is called a horror. We never come out of it. Brother, we're not Protestants. We're Baptists tonight. What we believe, we believe a long time before the first dress-wearing Pope with a grapefruit on his head ever showed up and started saying, you know, my head hurt, my belly hurt from a cigarette sack. Long time before he ever showed up. This line of manuscripts right here goes up through Christians, Waldensians, Albigensians. They kept translating this thing. Not only is it purified seven times through seven English texts, if you'll study the text of the Antioch-Syrian text, it comes through seven different languages. So, the Albigensians. Let's look at these guys. The name Albigensis is derived from the town of Alba in southern France. The Albigensis and Waldensis were completely separate sects with beliefs so diverse that one could not have originated as an offshoot of the other. Since the Albigensis regarded immaterial as evil per se, they refused to believe that a good god could become man. So, they were dualists. What this meant was, and this was like a second century heresy as well, and what it meant was is that the material was evil and the spiritual was good. Actually, it goes further back. It's really not biblical or have any ties to Christianity. It's more tied to, I believe it's Aristotle, Aristotelian, or Platonic theory, Plato, that they need to attain to the spiritual or Gnostic secret knowledge, and what is material can only corrupt. And so, that's what this group jumped onto. Because the person and work of Christ constitute the heart of Christianity, the teaching of any sect on Christology is the test by which its claims must be measured. Applying this test to the Albigensians and other Cathars revealed that they should not be regarded as Christians at all. So, McGoldrick says, So, let's look at the Waldensians, okay? Who are the Waldensians? And David Schock wrote a little book called A Glimpse of Faith, The History of Independent Baptist. I picked it up and researched looking for anything on the history of independent Baptist, and I found it, so I bought it and read it, and I don't recommend reading it. You can check it out if you want. David Schock, A Glimpse of Faith, The History of Independent Baptist. He said this, The beliefs of the ancient Waldensians were just like Baptists, in that they took all their beliefs directly from the Word of God like all Christians should. Okay? Well, let's look at this. Let's examine the Waldensians, okay? The same period of medieval history saw the rise and suppression of the Cathars witnessed the emergence of a very different religious movement known as the Waldensians. In contrast to the Cathars, whose dualistic world and life view placed them in radical opposition to historic Christianity, The Waldensians began as a reform movement within the Roman Catholic Church and never imbibed Manichaean teachings. The sect owed its origins to Peter Waldo around the year of 1216, known in France as the Valdez, said McGoldrick. The evidence is conclusive. Waldo was the founder. Some tried to say that the Waldensians existed before Waldo, and traditions of an early origin stretching back even to the days of apostles are fables. Waldo's confession. So, Waldo actually put together a confession of faith. He said this, We believe one church, Catholic, holy, apostolic, and immaculate, apart from which no one can be saved. And in the sacraments therein administered through the invisible and incomprehensible power of the Holy Spirit, sacraments which may be rightly administered by a sinful priest. I wonder, how many independent Baptists would put that in their doctrinal statement? We believe, again going on with Peter Waldo's confession, We believe that anyone in this age who keeps to a proper life, giving alms and doing other good works from his own possessions and observing the precepts from the Lord, can be saved. Huh? So, there he is, attaining works of salvation. Despite differences between the two wings of the Waldensis, it is clear that both the French and Italians believed in transubstantiation and human priesthood to consecrate the bread and wine. So, McGoldrick finishes up the Waldensians by saying this, All those successionists have hailed them as Baptists. Medieval Waldenses were quite similar to the Catholic Franciscans. Those of the Reformation were akin to Presbyterians, and those of today have become Methodists. So, the last group, the last group that I want to look at and examine here, is not just a group that independent fundamental Baptists, or those that ascribe to the Trail of Blood theory, try to claim that the Baptist denomination come from. Many others, really, have just accepted that this group was where the Baptist denomination came from. And so, I'm going to attempt to show you that that is not the case. And that last group, this may throw you for a loop, is the Anabaptists. Now, if you've ever heard of the Anabaptists, you probably would think, Well, yeah, the Baptist came from the Anabaptists. And that's what they try to teach. The truth of the matter is, is that, no. The Anabaptists, the Baptist denomination that exists today, that started in England in the 1600s, did not branch from the Anabaptists. Okay? So, let's look at this. McGoldrick says, It's patently clear that successionists regard the Anabaptists of the 16th century as the immediate forefathers of modern Baptists. The Anabaptists, David Schock said in his little history book, The History of Independent Baptists, the Anabaptists themselves preferred the simple title, Baptists. These German Anabaptist churches were independent, fundamental, Bible-believing Baptist churches. Okay? Paul Chappell said about this, that the Anabaptists are part of the group, are part of the Baptist denomination. Okay? Said this in his book, The Road Ahead, Ten Steps to Authentic Ministry for Independent Baptists on a Chapter on Heritage, lumps the Anabaptists in with where modern Baptists stem from, and said this, And so it was that the name Baptist was popularized through the very people who wished to end our doctrine. Leon Macbeth, in his Baptist history book, begins to help us set this straight by saying, Anabaptists ranged all the way from extreme mystics, much like Quakers, to extreme rationalists. The term Anabaptist is derived from a Greek word that signifies re-baptizes. It appeared in the 4th century as a label of scorn to denounce dissidents who denied the validity of baptism administered by clergymen of the Catholic Church. Okay? So Anabaptists. Who are the Anabaptists? The Anabaptists of the Reformation era? So you had the Protestant Reformation in 1517, the 1500s. You have Martin Luther, who broke off the Catholic Church. It was a process, but it began October 31st, 1517, the nailing of the 95 Theses. And then a few years after that, Luther realized this was not going to be something where he could reform the Catholic Church. And then the Reformation was completely underway. At the same time, across the mountains in Switzerland, you have a guy named Oreg Zwingli, who is doing a similar thing. So you got these guys coming up, and then they have their followers after them. You have guys like Philip Melanchthon after Luther. In Germany, you have those that actually traveled to Germany to learn under Luther. One of those guys was from England, William Tyndale. And then you have also, you have guys in Switzerland that are carrying on the torch after Zwingli. Guys like Hunter Bollinger, John Calvin, and I'm missing one in Switzerland. But then also the Reformation gets going in England in the 1500s through the work of William Tyndale, who was killed. Then guys like Thomas Cranmer and preachers that were martyred by Mary during the, called Bloody Mary, the Marian martyrs. I'm going blank right now. I don't have it in front of me. The Five English Martyrs is a great book by J.C. Rinell. You should check out the talks about that. But just forgive me. I'm going blank on their names. And you also have a Scottish reformer that went and learned under Calvin, whose name was John Knox. Okay? So this is what's going on in the Reformation. Now, in the Switzerland area, going on over there where Zwingli is, you have a radical group that sort of is working there. And that is, they get their name as the Anabaptists. Okay? It is important to note, the Anabaptists did not constitute a united religious body, though, with an agreed confession of faith. So much diversity existed among them. That is, it is difficult to generalize about them with any degree of confidence. I've heard James White talk about this all the time. It's hard to really determine what the Anabaptists believed for a few reasons. Number one, they didn't really see, were concerned, or took time to write out confessions, or be concerned with deep theological ideas, ideas, or write down theological ideas on where they differed with the Roman Catholic Church. Another reason is because they were very severely persecuted. And so, because of that severe persecution by Catholics and Protestants alike, they ended up being killed so that, you know, an Anabaptist preacher really didn't live a long time enough to maybe even write a document about where they believed. But the fact of the matter remains that those that carried the name Anabaptist in different regions or different areas actually ended up believing very starkly different from each other. So it was hard to say the Anabaptists believed this. Most Anabaptists were Trinitarians, but some were Unitarians. Most were pacifists, but some were extreme militants. The distinctive doctrines and practices that were held most widely among Anabaptists were rejection of infant baptism in favor of adult believers' baptism, insistence upon the concept of a free church independent from the patronage and control of the state, and denial of both the Roman, Catholic, and Protestant teachings about salvation in the Christian life. Anabaptism arose in the 16th century in Zurich, Switzerland in 1525. Those involved in this endeavor were led by men who had earlier supported the work of Ulrich Zwingli, father of the Protestant Reformed Church in Zurich. Now here's the point that I think needs to be made. Matthew Lyon made this point in his episode on the Trail of Blood in the History and Hope podcast, but I think it's important to state. If the Anabaptists began out of Switzerland, and they did, from the teachings of Zwingli and Zwingli's followers, which they did, and many of these guys that, Balthazar Hubmeier and Menno Simons and these other guys that became the first Anabaptist preachers and leaders, which they were, they were actually former Catholic priests, so that doesn't make them part of an unbroken line of Baptist succession, it makes them Protestant. Hmm. When Anabaptist and Baptist beliefs on the cardinal doctrines of the Christian faith are compared, it becomes evident that the former, theologically speaking, could not have been the forefathers of the latter. Winthrop Hudson, in his 1953 article, summarized his views on the Anabaptist and Baptist differences in five points. Number one, first, early Baptists themselves repeatedly denied they were Anabaptist regarding the term as a name of reproach unjustly cast upon them. Okay. Number two, second, Baptists firmly rejected the distinctive features of Anabaptist's life, such as opposition to civil magistrate, holding public office, military service, oaths, going to court, soul sleep, Hoffmanite Christology, and Anabaptist, confidence in the essential goodness of man and their consequent rejection of original sin. So what Hudson is saying is that the Baptists of the 1600s, the Separatist Baptists, where the Baptist denomination really began, of the 1600s, were very, very quick when they started to be open and honest and wrote and spoke about the fact that they in no way were connected to the Anabaptists. Third, practically all of the early Baptist leaders, general and particular, had been Separatists before they adopted Baptist views. Fourth, Baptist views represent the logical conclusions of Separatism and Anabaptist influence is not necessary as a hypothesis to account for the adoption of Believer's Baptism by the Baptists. And fifth, when John Smith moved toward the Anabaptists, he was repudiated by the Baptist remnant that soon returned to England under the influence of Thomas Helwes and Merton. And any Anabaptist influence upon Smith did not carry over the Baptists. That was taken from Leon Macbeth's history book, Baptist Heritage. In 1550, an Anabaptist synod was held at Venice with about 60 delegates and they summarized 10 points to clarify their teaching. Now listen to these. These are the 10 points that they clarified at this Anabaptist synod. Number one, Christ is not God but the son of Joseph and Mary, one filled with divine powers. So right off the bat, they deny the deity of Christ. Number two, Mary bore additional children after Jesus. Okay. Number three, angels are merely men commissioned by God for special tasks. So they didn't believe in angels. Or maybe they did believe in angels but they were just men. Or maybe the men were the angels. I don't know. Number four, there is no personal devil. Number five, the final resurrection will not include the unrighteous. They will remain in the grave forever. Number six, the grave is the only hell. Number seven, the righteous sleep until the last resurrection. Number eight, evil souls die with their bodies. No eternal torment, I guess. Number nine, the human seed produces both the body and the soul. Number ten, the elect are justified by the mercy and love of God. The death of Christ was not an atonement but a demonstration of divine love. And if you, there's, I got more material, I'm gonna close it from there. If you don't have, if you can't see that these people were not Baptist, their confession does not line up with the Baptist. We did not come from the Anabaptists. Therefore, McGoldrick closes down the Anabaptists with this. on the vital questions of Revelation, Christology, Soteriology, the doctrine of salvation, and Ecclesiology, the doctrine of the church, Anabaptists and Baptists were not agreed. The Anabaptists of the 16th century were the forefathers of the many brethren groups of today, of which the Mennonites are the largest and most influential body. So, that is where we will stop with the Baptist line of succession. Where did the Baptist denomination start? It was a separatist movement in England in the early 1600s. And, it started with the General Baptist Church and then about 20, 30 years later there was a particular Baptist church that started. The two divisions of the General and Particular Baptist Church really differed on the idea of Calvinism. And so, the particular Baptist church believed in the particular election of believers. The General Baptist Church were free will holding. These were the first Baptist churches. That's where the Baptist denomination started. And yes, Baptists are Protestant. Okay? And like I said at the beginning, this either shows a major ignorance of history history, a lack of research, or at worst, dishonesty and a lack of integrity in the research to try to further an agenda that we are the only true church, or the Baptist church is the only true church. That is not the case. I love church history. And so, that will probably be the last. I know that I've done the history of the IFB movement. I've done this thing that is heavy on history. When I cover certain topics, I'll try to give sort of a historical background of it. But moving forward on from here, we'll get into more legalism and topics like that. I want to spend some time covering the King James only-ism and those types of things. But I have some ideas for some upcoming episodes, so look forward to that. And I hope this helped you. If you have any questions, reach out. If I don't have the answer, I'll try to look it up and find somebody that knows the answer. And I hope this was helpful to you, these few episodes on the debunking the Baptist successionism or trail of blood theory of Baptist history. Just another aspect of errant or aberrant IFB teaching. Okay, and so my intentions are to give them more of that as we continue. Appreciate guys listening. I appreciate all the feedback that I've been getting. You guys are awesome. The podcast has really been growing here lately. If you have been, let me say this, I appreciate if you reach out and just say, hey, been listening, it's been helpful. That means a lot. It does mean a lot because you almost wonder sometimes, are the statistics I'm looking at on these apps, are they accurate? What do they mean? So if you reach out, listen, that does, it's very encouraging. It really is. If there's something that you'd like for me to look into or cover as far as a theological basis or something, I have a lot of things that are in my queue that I want to get to. But if there's something that you'd like me to address, maybe I'll just reply back and say, yep, I'm going to get to that, or maybe I haven't thought about it. one person reached out to me, Jose, I'm going to give you a shout out there, Jose Nieves, and I'm going to do an episode somewhere down the road on how the independent fundamental Baptist attacked John MacArthur on the subject of the blood of Christ. Now it's going to be down a ways because I have a lot that I really want to get to and cover before then, but that's going to be an interesting topic, and I'm going to try to do an episode on that, on were they right in attacking that, what is the blood of Christ, what's the inaccurate view of that, and that kind of thing there. So if you have something that you'd say, hey, maybe you haven't thought about covering this, just reach out, send me a message, ask me about it, love to hear about that. As always, try to rate the podcast on Apple Podcasts, leave me a review, like it, share it on Facebook, on social media, you can find it on Facebook, and Twitter, I stopped really doing Instagram, I don't understand Instagram that much, not a big fan of Instagram, it's still there, but I don't really do anything with it, so sorry about that, you Instagram followers, I apologize, but guys, that's all for today, until next time, to God, not the pastor, be the glory. I Thank you.

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