BAPTIST CONFESSIONS.
The Baptists, like the Congregationalists, lower the authority of general creeds to mere declarations of faith prevailing at the time in the denomination, to which no one is bound to give assent beyond the pleasure of his conviction; and they multiply the number and elevate the authority of local or congregational creeds and covenants, by which the members of particular congregations voluntarily bind themselves to a certain scheme of doctrine and duty. Notwithstanding the entire absence of centralization in their government, and the unrestrained freedom of private judgment, the Calvinistic Baptists have maintained as great a degree of essential harmony of faith as they themselves deem desirable.
'The Baptist creeds,' says Dr. Joseph Angus, in behalf of English Baptists, [1631] 'were prepared in the first instance for apologetic and defensive purposes. They merely describe the doctrines held by the bodies from which they emanated. They were never imposed on ministers and members of the churches of either section of the Baptists. Even when adopted, as they sometimes were, by any church, as an expression of its sentiments, all sister churches were left free, and in the particular church a considerable latitude of judgment was allowed in interpreting them. They have never been accepted as tests, and merely represent in a general way the sentiment of the body. In trust deeds or in the rules of associations they never appear. Property in trust is held for the use of evangelical Christians maintaining the doctrines commonly held by Particular (or General) Baptists; sometimes these doctrines are enumerated in the briefest possible way--the trinity, the atonement, etc.--and sometimes they are not enumerated at all. Of course, in the event of an appeal to law, the creeds and confessions would be evidence of the faith of the body. Substantially the two sections of the Baptist body believe as of old. But their confessions are not authoritative except as evidence and in matters of property; while in the interpretation of them it is a principle to allow as much freedom as is consistent with a substantial agreement in the same general truth.'
'Confessions of faith,' says Dr. Osgood, with special reference to the Baptists in the United States, [1632] 'have never been held as tests of orthodoxy, as of any authoritative or binding force; they merely reflect the existing harmony of views and the scriptural interpretations of the churches assenting to them. "We believe," says Wayland, "in the fullest sense, in the independence of every individual church of Christ. We hold that each several church is a Christian society, on which is conferred by Christ the entire power of self-government. No church has any power over any other church. No minister has any authority in any church except that which has called him to be its pastor. Every church, therefore, when it expresses its own belief, expresses the belief of no other than its own members. If several churches understand the Scriptures in the same way, and all unite in the same confession, then this expresses the opinions and belief of those who profess it. It, however, expresses their belief because all of them, from the study of the Scriptures, understand them in the same manner, and not because any tribunal has imposed such interpretations upon them. We can not acknowledge the authority of any such tribunal. We have no right to delegate such an authority to any man or to any body of men. It is our essential belief that the Scriptures are a revelation from God, given . . . to every individual man. They were given to every individual that he might understand them for himself, and the word that is given him will judge him at the great day. It is hence evident that we can have no standards which claim to be of any authority over us."' [1633]
I. The Confession of the Seven Churches in London. Dr. Daniel Featley, a prominent Episcopalian of the Puritan party and member of the Westminster Assembly (from which, however, he was expelled for informing the king of its proceedings), had a public disputation with the Baptists in 1644, and published it, with a dedication to the Parliament, under the title, 'The Dippers dipt; or, the Anabaptists Duck'd and Plung'd over Head and Ears at a Disputation in Southwark.' [1634]
This gave rise to a Confession of Faith, on the part of seven London churches, with an Epistle Dedicatory to the two houses of Parliament. It appeared in 1644 (three years before the Westminster Confession), and again with some additions and changes in 1646, under the title, 'A Confession of Faith of Seven Congregations or Churches of Christ in London, which are commonly (but unjustly) called Anabaptists.' [1635] This document consists of fifty-two (51) Articles, and shows that in all important doctrines and principles, except on the sacraments and Church government, the Baptists agreed with the orthodox Reformed Churches. The concluding paragraph admits the fallibility of human confessions, and the readiness of Baptists to receive further light, but also their determination 'to die a thousand deaths rather than do any thing against the least tittle of the truth of God, or against the light of our own consciences.'
II. The Confession of Somerset, 1656. It was signed by the delegates of sixteen churches of Somerset and the adjoining counties. It consists of forty-six Articles. [1636]
III. The Confession of 1688. This is by far the most important and authoritative. It has superseded the two earlier confessions, and is to this day held in the highest esteem. It appeared first in 1677, at London, under the title, 'A Confession of Faith put forth by the Elders and Brethren of many congregations of Christians baptized upon profession of their faith.' It was reprinted in 1688, 1689, and approved and recommended by the ministers and messengers of above a hundred congregations met in London, July 3-11, 1689. [1637] It has been often reprinted. [1638] 'It is still generally received by all those congregations that hold the doctrine of personal election and the certainty of the saints' final perseverance.' [1639] In America it was adopted by the Baptist Association which met in Philadelphia, Sept. 25, 1742, and hence is known also by the name of the Philadelphia Confession.
This Confession consists of thirty-two chapters, beginning with the holy Scriptures and ending with the last judgment. It is simply the Baptist recension of the Westminster Confession, as the Savoy Declaration is the Congregational recension of the same Westminster Confession. It follows the Westminster Confession in sentiment and language, with very few verbal alterations, except in the doctrine of the Church and the Sacraments. The Preface sets forth that the Confession of Westminster is retained in substance for the purpose of showing the agreement of the Baptists with the Presbyterians and Congregationalists 'in all the fundamental Articles of the Christian religion,' and also to convince all that they have 'no itch to clog religion with new words, but do readily acquiesce in that form of sound words which has been, in consent with the holy Scriptures, used by others before us; hereby declaring before God, angels, and men our hearty agreement with them in that wholesome Protestant doctrine which with so clear evidence of Scripture they have asserted.' The Appendix is a defense of the Baptist theory against Pædobaptists.
The Confession differs from that of the Westminster in the chapters on the Church and on the sacraments. It omits the chapter 'Of Church Censuses' (XXX.) and 'Of Synods and Councils.' The chapter 'Of the Church' (XXV.) is adapted to the independent polity; and the chapter 'Of Baptism' is altered to suit the Baptist theory, limiting the right of baptism to those 'who do actually profess repentance towards God, faith in and obedience to our Lord Jesus,' and declaring 'immersion or dipping of the person in water' to be 'necessary to the due administration of this ordinance' (XXIX.). A chapter, 'Of the Gospel and the Extent of Grace thereof,' is inserted from the Savoy Declaration as Ch. XX. (which causes the change of the numbering of the chapters which follow). [1640]
IV. In 1693 a Catechism based on this Confession was drawn up by William Collins, at the request of the General Assembly which met at London in June of that year. It is taken chiefly from the Westminster Shorter Catechism, and follows closely its order and method. It is also called 'Keach's Catechism.' Benjamin Keach was with Collins among the signers of the Confession of 1688, and seems to have had much to do with the work. It is the only Catechism which has found general acceptance among Baptists in England and America. [1641]
During the seventeenth century there were also some private confessions written by John Bunyan, Vavasor Powell, Benjamin Keach, and Elias Keach.
V. The New Hampshire Confession was prepared about 1833 or 1834, by the Rev. J. Newton Brown, of New Hampshire (d. 1868), the editor of a 'Universal Cyclopædia of Religious Knowledge.' It is shorter and simpler than the Confession of 1688, and presents the Calvinistic system in a milder form. It has been accepted by the Baptists of New Hampshire and other Northern and Western States, and is now the most popular creed among American Baptists. [1642]
[1620] Their older scholars claim an origin earlier than the Continental or the English Reformation, going back to the Waldenses and Albigenses, and to the Lollard movement following, in Britain, the labors of Wycliff. The tradition of the Holland Mennonites gave them a Waldensian ancestry. But these points are disputed, and no historical connection can be traced.
[1621] The Campbellites, or Disciples, differ from the other Baptists by identifying baptismal immersion with regeneration, or teaching a concurrence of both acts.
[1622] See Foxe's letter to Queen Elizabeth, in Latin, in Append. III. to Neal's History (Vol. II. p. 439).
[1623] See the Tracts on Liberty of Conscience, republished for the Hanserd Knollys Society by E. B. Underhill (London, 1846), which contains seven Baptist works on this subject from 1614 to 1661. On Roger Williams, see below.
[1624] Samuel Richardson, a Baptist, who knew him personally, speaks very highly of Cromwell, as a man who 'aimeth at the general good of the nation and just liberty of every man, who is faithful to the saints, who hath owned the poor despised people of God, and advanced many to a better way and means of living.' See Tracts on Liberty of Conscience, p. 240.
[1625] 'Milton, it seems, withdrew at last from all Church organizations, regarding them with equal respect and indifference, except the Romanists, whom he excludes from toleration as idolaters and enemies of toleration. With his illustrious friend, the younger Sir Henry Vane, whom, as understanding the true relations of Church and State, he praises in one of his most beautiful sonnets, he joined the 'Seekers,' a body looking for a more perfect Church yet to come. Roger Williams, the friend of both poet and statesman, joined them in his last years in occupying the same ground. In 1673, the year before his death, Milton published a treatise on 'True Religion, Heresy, Schism, Toleration, and the Best Means against the Growth of Popery,' in which he defines heresy to be 'a religion taken up and believed from the traditions of men and additions to the Word of God.' In this sense Popery is the only or the greatest heresy; its very name, Roman Catholic, a contradiction; one of the Pope's bulls as universal particular, or catholic schismatic; while Protestants are free from heresy, which is in the will and choice professedly against the Scriptures. He represents four classes of Protestants--Lutherans, Calvinists, Anabaptists, and Socinians--as agreed in the articles essential to salvation, and says: 'The Lutheran holds consubstantiation; an error, indeed, but not mortal. The Calvinist is taxed with predestination, and to make God the author of sin, not with any dishonorable thought of God, but it may be overzealously asserting his absolute power, not without plea of Scripture. The Anabaptist is accused of denying infants their right to baptism; again, they say they deny nothing but what Scripture denies them. The Arian and Socinian are charged to dispute against the Trinity; they affirm to believe the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost according to Scripture and the Apostolic Creed. As for terms of trinity, trini-unity, co-essentiality, tri-personality, and the like, they reject them as scholastic notions, not to be found in Scripture, which, by a general Protestant maxim, is plain and perspicuous abundantly to explain its own meaning in the properest words belonging to so high a matter and so necessary to be known; a mystery indeed in their sophistic subtleties, but in Scripture a plain doctrine. Their other opinions are of less moment. They dispute the satisfaction of Christ, or rather the word satisfaction, as not Scriptural, but they acknowledge him both God and their Saviour. The Arminian, lastly, is condemned for setting up free-will against free-grace; but that imputation he disclaims in all his writings, and grounds himself largely upon Scripture only.'