Chapter II
Across the Centuries (300 to 1500)
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We have seen the steady drift from the churches of the New Testament to the Apostate church of the Middle Ages. The churches of Jesus successfully withstood the shock of persecution. They likewise repelled the attacks of critics and controversialists who sought to destroy Christianity by means of the pen. These efforts to overthrow the Christians fell out rather for the furtherance of the gospel. The evil effects of growth and prosperity seem to have been measurably overcome by these fiery trials from without.
Christianity engaged in a desperate grapple with heathenism as represented by the Roman Empire. The Roman emperors diligently and desperately sought to stamp out the growing Christian faith. No less than ten distinct persecutions hunted down and destroyed the followers of Jesus. Uncounted thousands died in the arenas, by the sword, and by various violent deaths. Powerful Roman rulers, vested with absolute authority, endeavored with the most determined and relentless cruelty to destroy the churches of Jesus, root and branch.
I. Christianity Conquered, only to be itself Conquered We now witness events which vastly affected the future progress of Christianity. The religion of Jesus, long opposed and persecuted by the Roman Empire, is at last to triumph in its long battle against the emperors. Constantine, the greatest of the Roman emperors after the
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great Julius, is to yield the battle and acknowledge the supremacy of Christ.
Constantine (Emperor 306 to 337) declared that he saw in the heavens a flaming cross with the words, "By this Conquer." We can but wish that we might see in the "conversion" of Constantine a genuine experience of grace in which the great ruler sincerely yielded his heart to the mastery of Jesus. We must face the facts as they are. Constantine was one of several powerful contestants for the mastery of the empire. Casting about for forces which he might turn to advantage in his mighty struggle, he beheld millions of Christians in all parts of the realm. Some say there were five millions, while others declare that they numbered at least ten millions. Their wealth, their sturdy uprightness, their solidarity, made them a formidable power even in the vast Roman Empire, With the clear statesmanship which always marked him, Constantine perceived the possible stabilizing power of the Christians and the value for political purposes of balancing Christianity against the dominant heathenism. He therefore espoused the cause of the Christians and made Christianity a state religion. In 323, when he finally triumphed and became sole emperor, he practically established Christianity as the religion of the Empire. As Emperor he had been pontifex maximus, headmaster, of the heathen religion, and now he assumed the headship of the newly-adopted Christianity. By the enactment of favorable laws, by the erection of buildings and in other substantial ways, Constantine used his great influence to set forward Christianity as it was expressed in the Catholic church.
It is a long step from the simple, independent struggling churches of the New Testament to the compactly-organized state church, which we find at the close of the reign of Constantine. Christianity had triumphed over its oppressors, had conquered its enemies, only to be itself conquered. It had saved its life only to be in dire danger of losing it. It had entered into wealth and position and
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power, but alas, it had lost its spiritual note! It had surrendered its obedience and allegiance to the risen Lord, and had practically established itself as the religion of the Empire. Constantine, it must be said, gave scant evidence of any genuine experience of grace, and even deferred baptism until near the close of his life in order to go out of life with the cleansing which he supposed was effected in baptism.
II. Across the Centuries It is beyond our purpose to trace the course of Christian history through these centuries. Rather we offer some general observations.
1. There Was a Continuous Drift from the Purity and Simplicity of the New Testament Churches The departures, which in the last chapter we saw in their beginnings, were extended and gradually confirmed. New Testament believers' baptism was giving place to sprinkling and infant baptism.
The elaborate mass took the place of the simple supper which Jesus instituted as a memorial to himself.
Auricular confession, the confession of sins to a priest, and the absolution from sin by the word of the priest came to be generally accepted.
Images and pictures came to be used in worship. Against strenuous opposition, which at times became especially marked, the introduction of images and pictures in worship grew until their use became fixed and permanent.
The invocation of saints was likewise introduced, and became a prevailing custom. The worship of saints, and especially the worship of the Virgin Mary, virtually supplanted the direct worship of Christ, and thus the mediatorship of Christ was practically ignored.
The papal system developed into a vast governmental hierarchy, and the priesthood assumed all right of approach to God on the part of the people.
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In all of these drifts, and others which might be mentioned, the essential Bible principles, the sufficiency of Jesus and the competency of the human soul, were gradually buried under the accumulating rubbish of human devices.
2. There Was a Steady Development of Asceticism The idea that the body is essentially evil and must be repressed if the soul is to attain spiritual growth, was possibly brought over from heathen sources. It was embodied in Gnosticism, and was early introduced into the Christian churches. To keep under the body was to deny and mortify the body. Celibacy, fastings, and even bodily mutilations came to be practiced in the hope of attaining spiritual advantages.
This tendency to asceticism produced the monasticism which was so prominent a feature of religious life through the Middle Ages. Men began early to retire to the deserts and to isolated points in the mountains that they might separate themselves from human society, and in the solitudes make the fight against the evil within them. As the numbers increased, the necessity appeared for some kind of discipline and organization. Thus there grew up the various orders of monks and the monastical systems, which have figured so largely in the Roman Catholic Church. Ultimately the Franciscans, an order founded by Francis of Assisi (1213), and the Dominicans, founded by Dominic (1216), became vastly influential factors in the religious world.
3. There Was an Almost Continuous Persecution of All Critics and Opposers of the Catholic Church The record is both painful and shameful. As soon as the Church came into power under Constantine, it began in its turn to play the role of persecutor. Some, at least, of the church fathers openly defended such persecution and sought to justify their position from the Scriptures. Augustine of Hippo, for example, declared that while it is indeed better to induce men to serve God by persuasion
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and instruction, yet if these means fail, fear of punishment and pain may properly be used.Many must often be brought back to their Lord like wicked servants, by the rod of temporal suffering, before they attain the highest grade of spiritual development. . . . The Lord himself orders that guests be first invited, then compelled, to his great supper.The reader will carefully note - for it is vastly significant - that this church father interprets the instruction of Jesus to mean that Christians are to actually and physically "compel" men to sit down at Christ's feast. Certain it is that, under one pretext or another, professed followers of Jesus through long ages employed every form of intimidation to force men to accept and serve Christ. They imprisoned men, they mutilated their bodies, they threw them to lions, they pierced them through with the sword, in the effort to make Christians of them. It is sufficient in making a summary of the developments of this period to mention thus briefly this ever-rising tide of persecution.
The story is of special interest because it suggests the long-drawn-out struggle in defense of New Testament principles. So bitter was the battle waged upon those who made outcry against the corruptions of the dominant "church" that spiritual Christianity was driven into the shadows, and but for a special protecting Providence must have been utterly destroyed from the face of the earth. The persecuting efforts, which had been more or less occasional and sporadic, at last grew into a careful and scientific effort to repress and destroy all dissenters. The bishops who had been entrusted with the task of silencing heretics proved only partially efficient in their efforts. At length, toward the close of the period under consideration, a new and distinct agency was created to hunt out and destroy heresy.
This agency came to be known as the Inquisition. This tribunal, called into being by the pope, was after a time
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committed to the monastic order of Dominicans. Terrible were the doings of the Inquisition; dark indeed is the stain thus placed upon the Roman Catholic Church of the Middle Ages! It was subject to the pope alone. No other church officials, not even officers of the state, shared with the pope jurisdiction or responsibility. It was probably "the most cruel and inhuman tribunal known to history." Its authority and jurisdiction were absolute. It could arraign, convict and punish at its own option, and from its findings there was no appeal. Suspected heretics often "disappeared," and their friends made inquiries at the peril of their own lives. The death penalty was invariably inflicted upon heretics, and those found guilty of heresy were usually executed in some revolting fashion, as by burning or dismemberment of the body.
III. Why did Christians persecute Christians? During this period, and indeed in the whole course of Christian history since the Crucifixion of Jesus and the stoning of Stephen, we must face the fact of persecution. It seems proper, therefore, to pause at this point and raise a question as to the source of the persecuting spirit. That the disposition to harass the meek undefended disciples of Jesus was at times the outgrowth of wanton and capricious cruelty there can be no doubt. It was so in the case of Nero and others of the Roman emperors. It is likewise true that the best and greatest of the emperors laid heavy hands on the Christians under the mistaken idea that they were a menace to the safety of the state. The Romans readily conceded the right of every people to have their own peculiar religion, but they could not understand, and would not tolerate, the effort of any given people to induce other people to accept their religion. Such effort was almost invariably construed as having some sinister motive affecting statecraft. Thus we may measurably account for the attitude of some great enlightened rulers toward the Christians.
But what shall we say in the face of the fact that
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Christians imprisoned and mutilated and slew other Christians for the glory of God? The fact that believers of unquestionable piety and the highest devotion hunted down and destroyed unoffending servants of the Nazarene, lends especial point to our inquiry. The question is too intricate for any full discussion here. It is significant that the Baptist people have never persecuted. They could not persecute in the light of their fundamental principles. If Jesus is Lord, absolute Lord, if Jesus has not delegated, and cannot delegate, his authority to any other, there can be little temptation on the part of any man to coerce and control the obedience of other men. If the human soul is competent to deal directly with God, if it is answerable to God alone, then it is manifestly monstrous for one soul to undertake to compel another soul to yield to God, as it is unthinkable for one man to punish another for his attitude toward God.
Considering further the problem offered by the persecutions which have blackened the pages of Christian history, we would be justified in saying that, given the premises from which the persecutors worked, they were not only justified in persecuting but they were bound to do so. When we remember the basis on which Saul of Tarsus haled the helpless followers of Jesus to prison, we cannot harshly condemn him for his persecuting spirit. He verily believed that he rendered service to God, and he did it for the glory of God. Saul's error was in his original premise, namely, that Jesus was a pretender and impostor, and that to destroy his influence was to glorify God. He further erred, of course, in his assumption that the Sanhedrin, or the Jewish hierarchy, or any earthly tribunal, had the right to dictate to men how they should worship God.
We may find the wrong of the Roman Church in persecuting the so-called heretics not alone in the persecution itself but in the premises on which the church moved. The Catholics believed that the "church" was none other ihan the body of Christ, and that to rend it by schism
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was a mortal sin; they believed that in the church and her sacraments alone was salvation; they felt that they were divinely entrusted with the sword, and that to withhold the sword and leave men to live without the salvation which was only possible through the church, was to consign men to eternal death. The deadly wrong of the Roman Catholic Church lay in the presumption that Christ has delegated his authority to mortals, and in the further presumption that the soul is not itself competent for God, but must come to God through sacraments and a human priesthood. Surely these errors cannot be chargeable against God, who gave the inspired Book and sent his Son, making his will and his way so clear that he who runs may read!
IV. Some Dissenting Sects There were not wanting in these dark days those who saw more or less clearly the spiritual truths revealed in the New Testament. They protested against the corruptions and follies of the Roman Church. They pleaded for a regenerated church membership, for spiritual as against formal and ritualistic worship. In a word, they urged many of the fundamental principles for which the Baptist people now stand, the absolute authority of Jesus, the risen and living Lord, and the sufficiency and right of every soul to come for itself into God's presence.
At the close of the last period under discussion, we saw that certain drifts had set in which were steadily moving the recognized church further and further away from New Testament ideals and practices. Sects or parties, some within the church and some without, were protesting against the errors and evils which so widely prevailed. At the close of the period now under discussion, the dominant church has sunk to yet lower depths, so that as between the purity of the church itself and the standards of the dissenting parties there can be no question. The Paulicians, the Albigenses, the Petrobrusians, the Henricians, and the Waldenses were spiritual kinsmen
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of the present-day Baptist people. Certainly they held and strenuously upheld many principles which now mark the Baptist people.
V. What of Christ's Church? As we turn from the steady downward tendencies of the dark ages to consider in the following chapter the dawning of a brighter day in the sixteenth century Reformation, we may pause to raise a question as to what had become of the church which Christ planted. He had stated his purpose to build his church, and he had with emphasis declared that the gates of Hades should not prevail against it. Had this promise of Jesus to preserve his church against destroying forces failed of fulfilment? It is beyond the scope and limit which we have set for ourselves in this treatment to undertake any exhaustive discussion of this question. We must content ourselves with some more or less obvious suggestions.
1. The Statement of Jesus is that the Gates of Hades Shall Not Prevail Against His Church Outside destroying enemies shall not swallow up his church. We have seen this promise abundantly verified, in that neither bitter persecutions nor vicious controversial assaults prevailed against the cause of Christ. Invariably these menaces from without helped rather than hindered. It was not the evil agencies without, but rather evils and errors within that wrought harm to Christianity.
2. Temporary Disaster in a Mighty Campaign Covering the Ages Cannot Be Called Defeat We are not to forget that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. If for a day or so Satan and his agencies seemed to triumph, if for a day or so the church went into eclipse, we are not justified in conceding that the gates of Hades had prevailed against Christ's church.
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3. No One Has Ever Yet Been Able to State Precisely What Measure of Evil and Heresy Is Necessary in the Church in Order to Destroy Its Churchly Nature How far must a church drift from New Testament ideals and practice before it shall cease to be considered a church? Neither Christ nor the Apostles gave us light at this point, and surely no thoughtful man would wish to give a positive or dogmatic answer to the question. We may be sure that whatever Jesus promised concerning his church, he has amply fulfilled. Dim and uncertain as the records are through many centuries, we may not know the full truth concerning his church, but we may even in the present state of investigation confidently declare that the gates of Hades never prevailed against Christ's church.
4. The Recorded and Dependable History of Spiritual Religion, Certainly from the Close of the New Testament Period to the Sixteenth Century Reformation, is Meager The history and teachings of the various sects which arose in protest against the vagaries and extravagances of the dominant Roman Catholic Church can only be pieced out from records made by their critics and enemies. These Christian witnesses who lifted their voices in favor of New Testament spirituality and church purity were usually poor and obscure. They did not possess either the means or the influence to make and preserve the history of their times. Further historical research may yet bring to light much interesting data concerning peoples and movements which offered in comparative purity the spiritual teachings of Christ and his Apostles.
The eminent church historian, Dr. A. H. Newman, admirably sums up this discussion: "Was there, then, a failure of the assurance of Christ that the gates of Hades shall not prevail against his church? Far be it! We are not able to prove, it is true, that from the close of the Apostolic Age to the twelfth century a single congregation existed that was in every particular true to the
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apostolic norm, but that there were hosts of true believers even during the darkest and most corrupt periods of Christian history, does not admit of a doubt."1
Dr. John T. Christian, in A History of the Baptists, offers the following summary: "The footsteps of the Baptists of the ages can more easily be traced by blood than by baptism. It is a lineage of suffering rather than a dogmatic decree of councils; a golden chord of love, rather than an iron chain of succession. . . . It is, nevertheless, a right royal succession, that in every age the Baptists have been the advocates of liberty for all, and have held that the gospel of the Son of God makes every man a free man in Christ Jesus."
Dr. George W. McDaniel, in The People Called Baptists, says: "The first Baptist churches were the churches of the New Testament. It is not necessary to prove apostolic succession. It is of more importance to identify our churches today with those of the first century than it is to trace the history through the centuries when there was no recorded history. . . . The Baptist churches of the New Testament were local, independent, self-governing, democratic organizations. The Baptists of today, and they alone of all peoples in Christendom, answer precisely to that description." __________ Teaching Suggestions
Question-Answer Study
"Christianity conquered only to be itself conquered." Explain and justify this statement. "There was a continuous drift from the purity of the New Testament churches." Indicate some departures which justify this statement. Tell of the development of asceticism. Show how the Catholic Church dealt with critics and opposera. Why did Christians persecute Christians? What of Christ's church and Christ's pledge for its preservation?
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1 A History of the Baptist Churches in the United States, page 13.
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Blackboard-Outline DiscussionI. Christianity Conquered Only to Be Conquered
II. Across the Centuries 1. Drift from purity of New Testament churches 2. Development of asceticism 3. Continuous persecution
III. Why Did Christians Persecute Christians?
IV. Some Dissenting Sects
V. What of Christ's Church? 1. Outside agencies did not prevail 2. Temporary disaster is not defeat 3. When does churchly nature cease? 4. History is meager ============ [From P. E. Burroughs, The Baptist People, SSB of SBC, 1934. This document provided by Pastor Tom Byrd. Scanned and formatted by Jim Duvall.]
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