Trail of Blood? Truth or Fiction?

#2.

You would be hard pressed to demonstrate that any of the Trail of Blood groups had Baptist distinctives. The Cathars (aka Albigenses) were gnostic dualists, as were the Bogomils; the Novatianists and Donatists were schismatic Catholics. As for the later groups which can be held to be Christians, here's what I put on the other thread:

So, no sola fide and no believer's baptism. Doesn't sound very Baptist to me...

 

Matt, thanks for your answer, #2.

We basically agree that there were New Testament churches in existence. The natural followup question is, are there any identifiable groups who fit that description? Or is this simply a belief by faith?

I don't want to put words in your mouth, so you'll correct me if my reasoning is off-base.

You said Yes, there were NT churches. No, they were not Baptist, or baptistic. And, those groups claimed by some Baptists as ancestors, aren't.

As a Baptist, you know that we claim that our basic doctrines and practices are those of the New Testament-era congregation. Your answer, #2, indicates that you disagree. .

Would you care to elaborate further? I'm sorta confused.

 

I think before we go any further we need to clarify what we mean by 'doctrines and practices of NT-era congregations'. For instance, to take one example of a NT-era congregation, the early Jerusalem church, they practised circumcision. Presumably your Baptist church no longer does this and therefore in that respect it can be said not to follow the 'doctrines and practices of (that) NT-era congregation'. So, what do you mean by that phrase?

 

As explained in another post, the Albigenses, (like the Anabaptists) were such a broad group of believers that existed for many years over a vast area of land, that you just can't slam that all with one broad swipe. So, which little group, at which narrow time periods are you picking out that you find some that are gnostic dualistic. This is not the norm for all the albigenses throughout the ages. And you cannot prove that. Why was there a crusade against these Bible-believing Christians (just like there was a crusade the Muslims)? They both happened at about the same time. The answer was that they were so evangelistic in their faith that they were a threat to the pope. Gnostics would not have that kind of characteristic or love for their saviour. The pope feared because the Albigenses faith multilplied so quickly; he had a hard time exterminating them. The blood of the martyrs will surely be upon the hands of the RCC. Catholics (and apparently you) love to revise history for their own ends and purposes.

 

The early church never practiced circumcision as a requirement for salvation. What I mean by saying that is that many Christians still practice it today. It has nothing to do with their faith. Paul, from the very beginning was against it. The heretical Judaizers followed him trying to impose it upon Christianity. These men were not Christians; they were heretics believing that the law and circumcision must be kept in order to be saved. The matter was cleared up once and for all in Acts chapter 15. Never was circumcision a practice necessary for salvation. If you can prove that from the NT I would like to see it.

 

"In Works" is what Apud Omnia means. Apud is not part of a book title, but is a citation word, like Ibid., a Latin word with a specialized use in footnoting.

 

Stanislaus Hosius, The Begynnyng of Heresyes in Oure Tyme, translated out of Latin into English by Richard Shacklock, 1565:
pp. 44-48

"For if so be, that as every is moste redy to suffer deathe for the faythe of his sect, so his faythe sholde be judged moste perfect and most sure, there shall be no faythe more certayne and true, then is the Anabaptistes, seying there be none now, or have bene before time for the space of these thousand and to hundred yeares, who have bene more cruelly punyshed, or that have more stoutely, stedfastly, cherefully taken theire punishment, yea or have offered them selves of their owne accorde to death, were it never so terrible and grevouse. Yea in Saint Augustyn his time, as he hym selffe sayeth, there was a certaine monstrouse desire of deathe in them. ... Nether was there such folyshe hardy heretkes in Sainst Augustine his tyme only. For foure hundred years agone, at what time S. Bernard lyved, there were Anabaptistes, which were no lesse prodigal to spend their lyfe, then were the Donatists, some (saythe he) did mervayle that they were led to theire deathe not only paciently but as it semed very frolyke and merye.
...If you beholde their cherefullnes in suffring persecutions, the Anabaptists run farr before all other heretykes. If you will have regarde to the number, it is like that in multitude they would swarm above al other, if they were not grevously plaged and cut off with the knyfe of persecution. If you have an eye to the outewarde appearaunce of godlynes, bothe the Lutherans and the Zuinglians muste nedes graunte, that they farr passe them.
...And surely howe many so euer haue wrytten agaynst this heresie, whether they were Catholykes or Heretykes, they were able to overthrowe it not so muche by the testimony of the scriptures, as by the authoritie of the Churche."

 

That's good research, Tom. And it sounds a lot like Baptists to me also. Whether anyone can show an unbroken chain to today's Baptists is problematic but it does tend to show there were people holding baptistic beliefs before the Reformation.

 

You forgot the other claim: that the large, established "catholic" churches (EOC or RCC) were the "NT Church". Of course, I don't believe that either.

I believe the "New Testament church" was not about a string of visible organizations. Wherever two or three were gathered in His name, that was the Church. In the statement about the Gates of Hell not prevailing, Hell was on the defensive, not the offensive. So whether there were full fledged "churches" every single day across the centuries; the fact that the Gospel can be still preached and gain souls means that that scripture was still fulfilled.

If there was any continuous NT congregations, I would look, as I have been saying, in the deserts of Israel. I had heard about families of Christians that went all the way back, however, those could have been referring to the local catholics.
That is more realistic than connecting the isolated dots across Europe and to America. that is evidently an attemt for European and American groups to make themselves the true "church"; after all, we are so significant, and it has to be all about us. But Christian history is not centered on us. Of course, this would fall into category #2.

I've never heard of the Albigenses being as diverse as that like the Anabaptists. (And even the Waldensians, which started out within the RCC, then came under the leadership of Peter Waldo, and eventually became a Reformed Protestant church, with an American branch headquatered in North Carolina). That was a smaller group, and I believe concentrated in one place and time period.

 

I have never heard of the Albigenses being in America. That seems far-fetched.
They originated from a city called "Albi," and hence the name "Albigenses.

http://www.reformedreader.org/history/christian/ahob1/ahobc05.htm

 

That was the Waldensians I was referring to in the parenthesis. Quite the contrary, what I was saying about the Albigenses was they they were limited to one place, as you have pointed out now. I don't think they were a diverse category of groups believing different things like the Anabaptists were.

 

Of the origin of the Waldenses, I refer you to the same source:

http://www.reformedreader.org/history/christian/ahob1/ahobc06.htm

 

We've tried this before in another thread, and everybody came up with a different list. If we picked the ones mentioned by most of the posters, they would be mostly related to baptism.

Baptism of believers only
By immersion
Non-sacramental

Others on the list would probably priesthood of believers and soul competency, eternal security. And, of course, the deity of the Christ.

Practices seem to include congregational government, with elders (pastors, bishops) and deacons. And local church autonomy.

At some point I think we have to decide about other stuff which might vary from congregation to congregation. That is, stuff that would not disqualify it from being identified as Baptist, or baptistic.

 

As long as we are looking for baptistic churches in the modern context, we are missing the boat. Leave the name baptist out of the search. Look for church groups that claim to teach the New Testament. These are church groups apart from Romanism. They maybe cults in our modern understanding of cults. There were cultic groups that came up during NT times, why not in the next several hundred centuries? For get the trail of blood as being baptist, but rather the trail of Jesus' blood in teaching.

We all know how corrupt the Roman church became in short order, and how the church fathers different in theology, but despte this corruption, a bright light came along with truth.........and error!

Cheers,

Jim

 

Specifically the Cathars of Languedoc and Rousillon, against whom the Albigensian Crusade was waged from 1209.

Only because you're moving the tautologous goalposts.

For the same reaosn that there were crusades against the Muslims - the crusades were misguided attempts by Christians to try to address the problem of heretics, whether those heretics be Muslim or Cathar. Surely you're not claiming that Muslims were proto-Baptists just because they had crusades preached against them? Then why are you claiming this for the Cathars?

 

Oh I agree, but Tom Butler referred to the 'doctrines and practices of the NT era congregations' and being normative for Baptists and I was highlighting an obvious problem with that approach (clearly the early Jerusalem church did have male circumcision as one of its 'practices')

 

You see, I would disagree with those on your list as being characteristic of NT-era congregations, with the exception of the deity of Christ and baptism by immersion. The others on your list are unprovable from Scripture alone. You can argue either which way, for example, from Scripture alone as to ecclesiology: congregationalists, presbyterians and episcopalians all have their NT proof-texts for their own form of government. You can do the same for believer's baptism -v- paedo-baptism eg: were the Philippian gaoler's family all adults or were there children there. And I'd certainly take issue with the assertion that the NT church was non-sacramental. Etc etc

 

Please elaborate.

 

I first read the Trail of Blood in the Spring of 2002 during a Sunday school course called Why I’m Baptist. Unfortunately, the booklet wasn’t very convincing and left more questions than answers, so I began my own researches, which eventually lead me to the discovery of the Orthodox Church in 2007.

In XC
-

 

Matt, I anticipated that we'd probably not agree on the list. And that makes it hard to agree on the marks of a New Testament Church, which....etc.

Is the deity of Christ and immersion your only two? Or there are other marks that you want to list?