I cannot, therefore, believe that immersion was a "lost art" in England from 1509 to 1641. Here is an absolute demonstration that immersion prevailed in England till 1641, when sprinkling began to be practiced by a few, and under the authority of the Presbyterians it became the law of the church in 1643, and through their influence was ratified by Parliament in 1644. The case is made out.
As we all know, the Baptists had been terribly persecuted by the Episcopalians, and their sympathies would all naturally be with the Presbyterians as against the Episcopalians. If the Baptists in 1641 deliberately changed their minds, indorsing immersion views more radical than the Episcopalians and against their allies who had gradually come to substitute sprinkling for immersion, and at the very hour of triumph for their affusion views, then for perverseness and contrariness there is no body of people who ever lived that can equal the Baptists of 1641. It is also remarkable that not one Baptist remained who did not suddenly change his mind, and not one who offered a word of protest. The Presbyterians were equally divided on the subject of immersion, but we are asked to believe the Baptists were all in favor of sprinkling till 1641, then they all changed their minds, and in 1642 they all favored dipping, and all of them submitted to that rite! For my part, that is the most astounding proposition I was ever asked to believe. But that is precisely what a man must believe if he accepts as genuine the "Kiffin" Manuscript and the interpretations put upon it by these Baptist advocates.
As for the views of the Baptists on the subject of believers' immersion, we have an excellent landmark. The Confession of 1643 was undoubtedly .an immersion paper. I give the XL Article of the "Confession of Faith of those Churches which are commonly (though falsely) called Anabaptists:" "That the way and manner of dispensing this ordinance is dipping or plunging the body under water; it being a signe, must answer the thing' signified, which is, that interest the Saints have in the death, burial and resurrection of Christ: and that as certainly as the body is buried under water, and rises again, so certainly shall the bodies of the Saints be raised by the power of Christ in the day of the resurrection, to reigne with Christ" (p. 20). There is a note appended as follows: "The word Baptizo signifies to dip or plunge yet so as convenient garments be both upon the administrator and subject, with all modesty."
It would, perhaps, be impossible to state immersion views more clearly in a confession of faith. There is no hint of any change of views, but the document throughout presupposes that immersion had all along been their practice. There is no reference to a change of views, no evidence of any lack of agreement, as there certainly must have been had there been a change. Certainly there would have been something of the kind, for we know that with all the influence of Calvin, that when the vote came on the subject of immersion the Westminster Assembly was equally divided. The very fact that the Baptists were unanimous, and that none of them ever raised a question, unmistakably proves that immersion was previously their practice.
Let it be remembered that there were two sorts of Baptists in England. If one set had adopted immersion in advance of the other, they Would have been assailed for so doing. The absence of any such assailing requires those who hold the 1641 theory to believe that these two separate denominations simultaneously changed their practice from sprinkling to immersion. This is incredible. These bodies frequently had debates on various subjects and were not overly friendly, and that the priority of immersion or any reference to any change among them was never raised, is proof that no such a difference ever existed.
Not only is this Confession plain on the subject of dipping for baptism, but it is equally plain on the subject of the administrator of baptism. The makers of this Confession of 1643 did not affirm the doctrine of church succession or baptismal succession. The view of Spilsbury prevailed, and was put into this Confession. Spilsbury held that if baptism were lost, that any disciple could begin baptism by administering it himself, and quoting the example of John the Baptist as a Scripture in point. None of the signers of this Confession avow that immersion was lost, but they do affirm that it is no necessary to send anywhere for baptism. Baptism, they declare, may be begun at any moment, in any place where there are believers. Men who believed this and put it in their Confession of Faith could not have sent to Holland only one or two years before for a baptism according to church succession or any other kind of succession. It would have been a queer commentary on the Particular Baptists of England of 1643 that in 1641 they sent to Holland for immersion to be in line of church succession, introduced immersion in England in Jan., 1642, in that theory and in a little more than a year they declared in a Confession of Faith that they believed in nothing of the sort! If the XL. article, as quoted above is plain on dipping, the XLI as here given is equally plain on the administrator of baptism. That article says: "The person designed by Christ to dispense baptism, the Scriptures holds forth to be a disciple; it being nowhere tied to a particular church officer, or person extraordinarily sent, the commission injoining the administration, being given to them as considered disciples. being men able to preach the Gospel." This declaration of the Confession of Faith of 1643 is directly opposed to the statement of the Gould "Kiffin" Manuscript. Which am I to believe? To ask the question is to answer it. The Confession of Faith is a Baptist document, genuine and an honor to the Baptists; the Gould Kiffin Manuscript is a fraud and absolutely untrustworthy. The Baptists of 1641-4 did not have an agent "EXTRAORDINARILY SENT" to Holland for immersion. They said they did not, and I believe them; the fraud known as the Gould "Kiffin" Manuscript says they did have Blunt "extraordinarily sent," and hence it is not worthy of credence.
When we remember that the Baptists were imprisoned and had been burned at the stake in England, we should not expect much evidence concerning their dongs. Mr. Brewer, one of their preachers. was confined 14 years and only released in 1640, and almost everyone of their preachers had been in prison. They were maligned and traduced. They did not dare to keep records, for a discovery that they were Baptists was equivalent to imprisonment. There were so many informers they did1not know whom to trust, and yet in the face of all these difficulties I present a number of instances of immersion among them and facts which go to show that this was their practice. Some of this evidence has been cited before, but it is needful to repeat it in connection with the new evidence I have secured, which illustrates and confirms what was previously known.
Thomas Fuller, the old English church historian, born in 1609, published his history 1656, and consequently lived through the period we are investigating, tells us that the Baptists of 1524 were dippers. His words are: "A match being now made up, by the Lord Cromwell's contrivance, betwixt King Henry and Lady Anne of Cleves, Dutchmen flocked faster than formerly into England. Many of them had active souls; so that, whilst their hands were busied about their manufactures, their heads were also beating about points of divinity. Hereof they had many rude notions, too ignorant to manage themselves and too proud to crave the direction of others. Their minds had a bye-stream of activity more than what sufficed to drive on their vocation; and this waste of their souls they employed in needless speculations, and soon after began to broach their strange opinions, being branded with the general name of Anabaptists. These Anabaptists, for the main, are but 'Donatists new dipped;' and this year their name first appears in our English Chronicles; for I read that four Anabaptists, three men and one woman, all Dutch, bare faggots at St. Paul's Cross, Nov. 24th, and three days after a man and a woman of their sect were burned in Smithfield" (Church History of Britain, Vol. II., p. 97). We have been gravely informed, however, that where the Anabaptists are called "Donatists new dipped" it does not mean that the Anabaptists were dippers. What else it could mean I confess I cannot understand. But fortunately we have an English writer who lived only a short distance from Fuller, and his book, "The Anabaptists Routed," was published only one year before Fuller's History, 1655, and he uses much the same expression that Fuller did, and he undoubtedly understood the Anabaptists to be dippers. If the Anabaptists had been in the practice of sprinkling before 1641, Fuller was exceedingly unfortunate in his expression when he called them "Donatists new dipped." But reading the author mentioned above puts that at rest when he says: "Anabaptists not only deny believers' children baptism, as the Pelagians and Donatists did of old, but affirm, That dipping the whole body under water is so necessary, that without it none are truly baptized (as hath been said)" (pp.171, 172). It would appear that the objections of the advocates of the 1641 theory are always unfortunate as there happens to be a contemporary author who always refutes their views. The trouble with the 1641 theory is its utter 1ack of facts for its support.
ln 1551 William Turner, "Doctor of Physick" "devysed" "A Preservative or triacle, agaynst the poyson of Pelagius, lately renued, & Styrred up agayn, by the furious secte of the Anabaptistes." This book undoubtedly settles the question that the Anabaptists of England practiced immersion. He repeatedly calls them Catabaptists (see pp. 19, 27, 28, 49) in his day. It is claimed that Catabaptist does not mean an immersionist, but an opposer of baptism. 'The fact is, it was used in both senses. These Baptists practiced immersion, and by immersing those who had been christened in infancy they were regarded as opposing and despising baptism. (See Liddell & Scott in loco). But my argument does not rest upon the meaning of this word, for Turner uses the word dip in reference to these Anabaptists. The Anabaptist in making his argument for believers' immersion is represented as saying: "That such a lyke costome was once in our most holye relygyon, as was in colleges and in orders of relygyon, wher as none were admitted, before they had a year of probation, wher unto ye put this that they that came to be baptized, demanded, and desyred to be received to fellow ship of the Christians after dewe proofe of unfayned repentance, and thereby were called competentes. Yonge men, and wymen requyrynge baptysime: and then were taught the principles of the Christian faith and were fyrst called Catechumeni. And after those principles learned, were upon certayne solemne dayes at two tymes of the yeare approved, therefore baptysed: which was upon Easter even and Whit Sunday even: pronmysyng for themselves the observance of Gods law, with the renouncyng of the devell and the worlde in theys owne person, without God-father or God-mother, seven score yeares longe: tyll Ignius, Byshop of Rome ordered to baptyse an infante, a god-father and god-mother answeryng for hym.
"Where as ye say the lyke maner was in our most holy religion, as the scolers and religious men had: that none should be admitted, until they had been proved a yeare, and first called competentes, and then catechtumeni. I marvayl what religion ye meane of: whether ye meane of the Popes religion, or Christes religion, or of the Catabaptistes relygion, which is your religion indeed" (pp. 6,7). There are two very significant statements in these passages: (1) The Anabaptist quotes against his opponent the well-known practice of immersing on the two days of Easter and Whit Sunday (Schaff's History Christian Ohurch, Vol. II, p. 252). And (2) he says of the Anabaptist "of the Catabaptistes (dippers) religion, which is your religion indede." This shows that they were certainly dippers.
The following is conclusive: "And because baptism is a passive sacrament, & no man can baptise himselfe, but is baptised of another: & childes may be as wel dipped in to the water in ye name of Christ (which is the outward baptysm and as myche as one man can gyve another) even as olde folke: and when as they have the promise of salvation, as well as olde folkes & can receive the signe of the same as wel: there is no cause why that the baptyme of childes should be differed" (pp.39, 40).
Here he says that the "olde folke" that the Anabaptist baptized are dipped. This is certainly sufficient.
The following are additional testimonies to the practice of Immersion among the Baptists of England before 1641:
The Rev. John Man, Merton College, Oxford, in 1578 published in English a translation and adaptation of the "Commonplace of the Chrlstian Religion," by Wolfganus Musculus.
Man says: "The word baptisme cometh of the Greek, and is as much as to say in English, or dipping or drowning in."
He knows no baptism but immersion. He never intimates that baptism could be performed in any other manner. Then he goes on to say that the Anabaptists had no excuse "to dippe" twice since the candidate had already been dipped. He argues that the re-baptism in Acts was no excuse for the Anabaptists to "dippe twice." He continues: "But some man will object. If the baptism of John and the baptism of Christ be all one, then the apostle had no reason to baptize the twelve disciples in the manner of our Lord Jesus, who were baptized before of John. For what purpose was it to dippe them twice in one baptisme? Did not some of the fathers, and the Anabaptists of our dayes, take the foundation of their baptizing of this" (p.678). Then he argues that the Anabaptists and the Donatists did wrong. In washing "them again which have been once washed in the same sacrament." A plainer account could not he given or words more direct. Here is an author writing 63 years before 1641 who declares that the Anabaptists were in the practice of dipping. The only blame he has for them is that they "dippe twice" instead of once: That is, the Anabaptists re-dipped those who had been dipped in infancy. ========= John T. Christian, Baptist History Vindicated, 1899, pp. 94-101. - jrd
Baptist History Vindicated Index
Baptist History Homepage