Early Baptists of England

The changing period of English history including the Jacobean accession, civil war, Cromwellian rule, and Restoration brought a reaching for things familiar, and people found solace in their individual search to know God. Out of this maelstrom of religious ferment came a new dissenting group which combined older beliefs in a society ripe for just the doctrine this group offered. Thus the modern Baptists were born, giving us more than we asked.

Much went into preparing a fertile soil for the Baptists. Religious dissenters had long been a part of English life, and the turbulence of the English Civil War and Reformed rule increased dissent. The Lollard, or British evangelical, ideas of John Wycliffe persisted until after the Reformation. Lollards believed in a regenerated church membership, no war, no capital punishment, no oaths, and no Roman Catholicism, but had no opposition to infant baptism.⁽²⁾ Catholic persecution in the Spanish Netherlands in 1528 drove many Calvinists and Anabaptists to England, but the English king would offer no haven as he condemned Calvinists and Anabaptists in 1534. Persecution continued for a century. Henry VIII executed great numbers of Anabaptists. Nearly 80% of executions for dissenting under Mary I were Anabaptist.⁽³⁾ After the establishment of the Church of England, a group arose within it which wanted to purify it of its Catholic vestiges. Some of these Puritans, as they were called, were frustrated with the slowness of change. They advocated separation from the Anglican Church and the formation of one, in their opinion, more Christian.⁽⁴⁾

"Another yet more important reason for the rise of dissenters in England was the powerfully independent bourgeosie, gentry, and yeomanry, long liberated from ecclesiastical control [who lived] in a country where for nearly a century past the individual study of the Bible had been a great part of religion, and the chief stimulant of popular imagination and intellect."⁽⁵⁾

Horace Greeley's words ring true: "It is impossible to mentally or socially enslave [sic] a Bible-reading people"⁽⁶⁾ because the period saw a near anarchy of religious sentiment. In the 1570's Robert Browne, an Anglican minister, said the Church of England was corrupt and the Scriptures alone should have the authority. He recommended separation of the church from state control, with local, independent congregations. With his true believers, Browne fled to Middleburg, Zealand, a Dutch province in the North Sea.⁽⁷⁾ Now the ground was ripe for more than we could ask.

John Smyth was a friend and pupil of Francis Johnson, a later Separatist leader.⁽⁸⁾ Smyth received his master's degree in 1593 from Cambridge University and was ordained by Bishop Wickham of Lincoln⁽⁹⁾ into the Church of England the next year in which this intelligent and able teacher began to lecture at Christ College, Cambridge. He was at first a Puritan and supported state-enforced religious conformity, and from 1598⁽¹⁰⁾ was a city preacher in Lincoln until his political differences with the municipal officials got him dismissed as a "facetious man"⁽¹¹⁾ on October 13, 1602. Smyth then moved to Gainsborough and practiced medicine. When he found the vicar of the parish there getting paid and not having a regular service, Smyth began to minister to the people.⁽¹²⁾ Not having received permission from the bishop to be the pastor, Smyth was condemned and discharged from the parish. After "nine months of study and doubt,"⁽¹³⁾ Smyth decided the separatists were correct, and in 1606 he left the Anglican Church and became a teacher for a congregation of separatists at Gainsborough. A sister group met at Scrooby under John Robinson where two unknowns worshipped: William Brewster and William Bradford. Another unknown separatist worshiped at Gainsborough with Smyth named Thomas Helwys, of a prominent family in Nottinghamshire.⁽¹⁴⁾

In 1607 James I was pushed by the bishops to turn up the heat on dissenters. Accordingly, this pharaoh threatened to run his Israelites out of his land. Several of the Gainsborough and Scrooby group, including Thomas Helwys' wife,⁽¹⁵⁾ were arrested and placed in York castle. In 1608, Helwys, Smyth, Robinson, and their followers harried themselves from the land and fled to Holland where the House of Orange allowed religious freedom.⁽¹⁶⁾ In Amsterdam, Smyth met his friend Francis Johnson who was leading the first church there of English Separatists. The Scrooby group under Robinson went on to Leyden.⁽¹⁷⁾

The Separatists came under the influence of the Mennonites in the neighborhood, who believed that baptism should be voluntary.⁽¹⁸⁾ These Dutch Mennonites named Waterlanders held to the doctrine of "Jacobus Arminius, the noted theologian, that of general atonement and salvation for any and all persons willing to confess and embrace the Christian faith."⁽¹⁹⁾ These English Separatists took this belief and the teaching of sixteenth century Menno Simons of Germany who led the pacifist Anabaptists. Mennonites were opposed to infant baptism and baptized adults by pouring water on the believer's head.⁽²⁰⁾

"Because the Separatists decided they were restarting the ancient apostolic succession, Smyth as their head baptized himself, then Helwys and the others. As each confessed Jesus as Saviour, they formed the first Church of Baptists."⁽²¹⁾

Better acquaintance with the Mennonites, with whose anti-Calvinistic views he [Smyth] had come into sympathy, and further reflection on his recent proceeding in introducing baptism anew, led him to the conviction that he and his brethren had made a lamentable mistake in not seeking baptism and ordination at the hands of their Mennonite friends, who claimed to be perpetuating primitive Christianity.⁽²²⁾

Smyth confessed his baptism was in error, and he sought to become a Mennonite.⁽²³⁾ Helwys and Murton excommunicated Smyth because they "opposed the idea that succession in the ordinances is necessary to their validity."⁽²⁴⁾ The Mennonites did not accept Smyth and his followers until 1614, three years after Smyth's death.⁽²⁵⁾ Whether we would even get what we asked hinged on Helwys and Murton.

The year 1611 brought the Authorized Version and heavier persecution of dissenters. Thomas Helwys and his congregation returned home to be a "Baptist witness and if need be share also in imprisonment and martyrdom."⁽²⁶⁾ In late 1611 they established Ye Baptiste Church in Spitalfields, a suburb east of London.⁽²⁷⁾ To separate themselves from the Anabaptist stigma, they dissociated themselves from the Mennonites, holding on to their Arminianism.⁽²⁸⁾ By 1615 a second church had been founded near Newgate with Murton as pastor. The reader must, however, remember that it is certainly not correct to teach that then the denomination had its origin, and that multitudes had not for many previous decades professed the principles which Mr. Helwys and his associates avowed.⁽²⁹⁾

These believers are termed General Baptists because they believed in the unlimited, or general, atonement of all who believe. This sect increased in numbers and active propaganda, pulled adherents from the Separatists, claimed the right of free worship, stressed freedom of the human will in opposition to Calvinism, and "accepted persecution as an opportunity to testify for Christ."⁽³⁰⁾

Helwys soon wrote a book A Short Declaration of the Mistery of Iniquity on religious conditions of his early seventeenth century and a defense of religious freedom for all--the first such work in the English language.⁽³¹⁾ He had a copy presented to James I. A sample of the text follows:

" . . . mens religion to God is betwixt God and themselves; the king shall not answer for it, neither may the king be judge between God and man. Let them be heretics, Turcs, Jews, or whatsoever, it appertains not to the earthly power to punish them in the least measure."⁽³²⁾

This heretical work got Helwys arrested and thrown into Newgate prison. When given the opportunity to recant, Helwys refused. He was re-imprisoned, and no more was ever heard of him.⁽³³⁾

John Murton in 1613 became the sect's leader. He was jailed in 1615 for his Persecution for Religion Judged and Condemned. He also presented a copy to the king which read: "No man ought to be persecuted for his religion, be it true or false, so they justify their allegiance to the king."⁽³⁴⁾ He wrote to his people from prison with milk on paper which had no appearance when dry, but held to the light correctly could be read.⁽³⁵⁾ By 1614 there were so many Baptists in gaol that the sect petitioned the King as "his maiesties faithfull subiectes most falsely called Anabaptists."⁽³⁶⁾ They requested release from prison because they had been in jail for years "separated from wives and children, not for any cause but only for conscience towards God."⁽³⁷⁾ The Baptists did not believe in taking oaths, but they freely declared their loyalty. However, this never satisfied the gaoler.

By 1626 these new Baptist churches were in cooperation with General or Arminian Baptists at Lincoln, Coventry, Salisbury, and Tiverton. The earliest Baptist churches were Mennonite in origin and corresponded with the Mennonite Church in Amsterdam. Baptism was by pouring of water.⁽³⁸⁾ Believers in Glamorgan in 1649 sent messengers⁽³⁹⁾ to the London Baptist Association to ask for people to be sent there to preach. Accordingly, many Baptists and Independents sent missionaries to evangelize Wales and the North.⁽⁴⁰⁾ By 1626 the Baptists had 150 members in seven churches, and by 1644, according to their opponents, they had forty-seven churches.⁽⁴¹⁾

PARTICULAR BAPTISTS
There was present also at this time a group called Particular Baptists, Calvinists, many of whom were university-trained. They believed in separation of church from state, baptism by immersion, universal priesthood of believers, and, therefore, lay preaching. The Particular Baptists were Cromwell's army officers and their numbers grew remarkably during the Interregnum. They originated in 1616 after having seceded⁽⁴²⁾ from the Independents. Led by Henry Jacob of the Brownists from Zealand, these Particular Baptists in 1633 started a new church under John Spilsbury. Five years later William Kiffin and others of Jacob's church at Southwark joined Spilsbury and divided equally in two parts under Praise-God Barebones and Henry Jessey. From Jessey's church, Hanserd Knollys in 1644 began his own congregation. These Particulars had no communication with the General Baptists.⁽⁴³⁾ The seven General Baptist churches issued the London Confession in 1644 of fifty articles which said that men must be allowed to obey their own conscience and understanding.⁽⁴⁴⁾

The Baptists' customs in the seventeenth century were carried in America down into the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and some even today.⁽⁴⁵⁾ Men sat on one side, women on the other; pastors had no specific salary; laying on of hands was customary for ordination and baptism. Washing feet was frequent though not general; fasting and anointing of the sick was common. Pastors and deacons were elected by casting lots. Love feasts were frequent before the Lord's Supper, and church discipline was meted out in family and community matters including gossiping.⁽⁴⁶⁾ Males and, in many churches, females were allowed to prophesy, saying whatever a person believed he was inspired of God to say, and any member could be a deacon.⁽⁴⁷⁾ Baptists in 1650 objected to set prayers and recitations as not true worship; they believed that liturgy quenched the Spirit.⁽⁴⁸⁾ Anabaptists of the period were not exclusively immersionists, but they recognized as symbolic immersion the "pouring, sprinkling, or even crossing the forehead with a moistened finger[, and none] insisted on the exclusive validity of immersion or made its practice a term of fellowship."⁽⁴⁹⁾ However, by May 1640, Henry Jessey believed that baptism "ought to be by dipping the body into the water, resembling burial and rising again."⁽⁵⁰⁾

Many Baptists served in Parliamentary armies, and during the Commonwealth period they, like so many other dissenters, got a foothold in England.⁽⁵¹⁾ Both General and Particular Baptists flourished into Wales and the North. Baptists in the army advocated civil and religious liberty. Some disliked martial rule and worked for Stuart restoration when Charles II promised religious tolerance.⁽⁵²⁾ Some Baptists were willing to accept in practice a state church if it meant freedom of worship.⁽⁵³⁾

Though Charles' Declaration of Breda (1660) was for toleration, Parliament passed laws to institute systematic persecution of dissenters. The Act of Uniformity (1662) required use of the Book of Common Prayer and an oath of allegiance to the king which the Baptists could not give. Baptists were also a target in the Quaker Act (1662) which required prison for anyone who would not take the oath of allegiance or who would try to dissuade others from it.⁽⁵⁴⁾

The Conventicle Act (1663) forbade all non-Anglican religious meetings, with penalties of fines, prison, banishment, and death. Censorship of the press was instituted as was the Five Mile Act (1665) keeping all dissenting preachers away from towns on pain of a 40 pound fine. The 1673 Test Act and Corporation Act outlawed for dissenters any public office, armed force post, or office in the Bank of England or any corporation. In general, Baptists distinguished themselves for not conforming during the persecution. One Baptist man who was known to conform was excluded.⁽⁵⁵⁾ Baptists and Quakers rejected house-creeping, the mostly Presbyterian and Independent practice of setting of the table with food to protect themselves when they secretly met against the Conventicle Act and investigation.⁽⁵⁶⁾

Several personalities were staunch for Baptist beliefs regardless of the penalty. Sir Isaac Newton was opposed to placing oaths of office on teachers at Trinity College, and later in life he was believed to be "hearty for the Baptists."⁽⁵⁷⁾ John Bunyan was saved at age 25, a formerly "profane and dissolute youth."⁽⁵⁸⁾ At age 27 he became a Baptist and was imprisoned twelve years at Bedford for preaching Baptist doctrines. There he wrote Pilgrim's Progress.⁽⁵⁹⁾ Newgate Prison housed 289 Baptists including Bunyan in 1661. Benjamin Keach was placed in the pillory twice at age 24 for his "Child Instructor" which had Baptist doctrine.

"Fines, confiscation of property, imprisonments, assaults by mobs, deprivation of civil rights and of educational opportunities"⁽⁶⁰⁾ were a part of life for a dissenter in those days. Many Baptists and Quakers were thrown into prison because they would not take the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy. They "followed the clear imperative of Jesus (Matthew 5:34) and James (James 5:12) to 'swear not at all.'"⁽⁶¹⁾ The dissenters offered to declare their loyalty, but that was unacceptable to their persecutors. The first refusal meant prison. The second meant the penalties of praemunire, or confiscation of all property, suspension of all rights, and indefinite length of imprisonment.⁽⁶²⁾ The Act of Toleration (1689) brought religious freedom for all except Catholics and Jews, but the Baptists "made no special gain in numbers during the decades of larger freedom which followed, and they actually declined in zeal and spirituality."⁽⁶³⁾

Out of these events were born the modern Baptists. A revival occurred in the early eighteenth century in which they began to reach the world in their own way with the name of Jesus Christ and the message of His gospel. In retrospect we see that indeed, we were given more than we asked.

Armstrong, O. K., and Armstrong, Marjorie M. The Indomitable Baptists. New York: Doubleday and Company, 1967.

Brown, Louise Fargo. The Political Activities of the Baptists and Fifth Monarchy Men in England During the Interregnum. New York: Burt Franklin, 1911.

Cook, Richard Briscoe. The Wit and Wisdom of Rev. Charles H. Spurgeon. n.p.: Lenox Publishing, 1892.

Dunham, William Huse, Jr., and Pargellis, Stanley, eds. Complaint and Reform in England (1436-1714). New York: Octagon Books, 1968.

Gwyn, Douglas. Apocalypse of the Word: The Life and Message of George Fox (1624-1691). Richmond, Indiana: Friends United Press, 1986.

Hill, Christopher. Change and Continuity in Seventeenth-Century England. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1975.

Lorimer, George C. The Baptists in History. Boston: Silver, Burdett, and Company, 1893.

Newman, A. H. A Century of Baptist Achievement. Philadelphia: American Baptist Publication Society, 1901.

Traill, H. D., and Mann, J. S., eds. Social England, IV. New York: Greenwood Press, 1903, 1969.

Trevelyan, G. M. Illustrated English Social History, II. London: Longmans, Green, and Company, 1953.

Vedder, Henry C. A Short History of the Baptists. Philadelphia: American Baptist Publication Society, 1907

Wells, Albert M. Baker's Pocket Book of Religious Quotes. Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1976.

Woolley, Davis C. Champions of Religious Freedom. Nashville: Convention Press, 1963.

1. TITLE PAGE--Richard Briscoe Cook, The Wit and Wisdom of Rev. Charles H. Spurgeon, (n.p.: Lenox Publishing, 1892), p. 46.

2. Davis C. Woolley, Champions of Religious Freedom, (Nashville: Convention Press, 1963), p. 75.

3. Armstrong, O. K., and Armstrong, Marjorie M., The Indomitable Baptists, (New York: Doubleday and Company, 1967), p. 32-33.

5. G. M. Trevelyan, Illustrated English Social History, (London: Longmans, Green, and Company, 1953), II, p. 92.

6. Horace Greeley, quoted in Albert M. Wells, Jr., Baker's Pocket Book of Religious Quotes, (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1976), #55.

8. This entire sketch is a blending of Armstrong, pp. 33-34, and Henry C. Vedder, A Short History of the Baptists, (Philadelphia: American Baptist Publication Society, 1907), p. 201-202.

12. Ibid. Vedder makes sure we understand that he was never vicar of Gainsborough "as has been frequently stated." He says this because he seems to dismiss Smyth's ministry in Gainsborough completely.

17. Vedder, p. 202, where these Puritan Separatists would ripen for their future oceanic voyage.

20. H. D. Traill, and J. S. Mann, eds. Social England, (New York: Greenwood Press, 1903, 1969), IV, pp. 53-54.

21. Armstrong, p. 35. Now the First Baptist Church could get their softball team together.

22. A. H. Newman, A Century of Baptist Achievement, (Philadelphia: American Baptist Publication Society, 1901), p. 5.

29. George C. Lorimer, The Baptists in History, (Boston: Silver, Burdett, and Company, 1893), pp. 53-54.

34. Ibid., p. 40, continues that these Baptist writings were picked up and read by a student at the Charter House who was a reporter for the Court of the Star Chamber, Roger Williams.

40. Christopher Hill, Change and Continuity in Seventeenth-Century England, (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1975), p. 40.

43. Louise F. Brown, The Political Activities of the Baptists and Fifth Monarchy Men in England during the Interregnum, (New York: Burt Franklin, 1911), p. 3.

45. The first of these customs listed I witnessed in an African-American church two weeks ago (Vaughanville Baptist Church in Chappells.) In this church the seats are placed in the conventional long two rows with a section of pews to the left and right of the pulpit. The important women of the church sit on the left side of the pulpit, and the important men sit on the right hand of the pastor, with the less important individuals sitting in the main seats. I was honored to have been placed on the right side behind the head administrative authority, beside the Director of Christian Education and the prayer and song leaders and in front of the Sunday School Superintendent. I asked another man of the church to sit with me, but he politely declined, sitting instead close by because he was a trustee.

46. Vedder, p. 230, and P. E. Burroughs, The Baptist People, (Nashville: Sunday School Board, 1934), p. 45.

48. Douglas Gwyn, Apocalypse of the Word: The Life and Message of George Fox (1624-1691), (Richmond, IN: Friends United Press, 1986), p. 15.

54. Gwyn, p. 47. Brown, p. 138, states that animosity had developed 1640-1660 between the Quakers and Baptists because the Quakers were recruiting from the Baptist ranks. It reminds one of PCA and PCUSA.

MORE THAN WE ASKED: EARLY BAPTISTS OF ENGLAND