Are Baptists Protestants?

Much of the current scholarship should set your mind at ease because it doesn't directly align us with the Anabaptists.

 

I understand your point Brian, but my point was that the article never adressed the arguemnt made by Trial of Blood and therefore never really refuted it.

Bryan
SDG

 

Brian T noted:
QUOTE] --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Originally posted by Bugman:
Trail of Blood's argument is that through church history there has been the original church called by many different names practicing Baptism by immersion and being persecuted by others, and today this church is the Baptist church.

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Just because a group was practicing Baptism by immersion and was being persecuted does not mean they are predecessors of today's "Baptists". Many of the groups listed in Trail of Blood would be considered heretical by today's Baptists. [/QUOTE]

Brian I would quite agree with your comment, and add a question for those that some might ponder. -- Are all groups extant today that practice baptism by immersion scriptural bodies? Even all Baptist Bodies?

Baptism in and of itself doesn't make a scriptural church.

Some of the groups in antiquity that practiced baptism by immersion had other hetrodox theologies.

So, my vote is that Baptists today are a result of the radical reformation of the late middle ages.

 

I took a Baptist History class and read some of the works of some Baptists. Some of them were sound and some of them were straight heresy. I am not sure I wish to be aligned directly with this group.

Just havin' a little fun - no stones please!

P. S. - Jeff, it's good to see you back on the board; hope all is well.

 

Robert

Thanks. I got some new glasses, so can see a little better than I did. Hope all is well in Texas. Yehaa.

And for what it is worth, I would concur with your opinion on heretics being lumped in with Baptist antecedents by some folks. I don't pariticularly care to be considered part of their heritage either. The Church of Rome don't bother me nearly as bad as some groups from antiquity that some Baptists would claim, just because they immersed.

Jeff

 

As a point of interest, Queen Elizabeth I of England was immersed as an infant after the custom of the Church of England. Sprinkling only came to England when the Scottish Presbyterians took control of the parliament. It was then sprinkling was introduced and remained.

Cheers,

Jim

 

I do not believe that we are Protestants. If this was the case, we would not be the scriptural church. If this is the case, the Catholic Church is the true church. I contend that we have never been part of the Catholic faith, and we have always existed as the true church of God.

I refuse to believe that God would let His church disappear from the face of the earth for 1500 years. We can only be the true church if we are descended from and hold to the beliefs of the true church.

If I thought that the PB's were not directly descended from the original church, there is no way I would be a member.

Jesus established his church here, and it's been here every since. If the Catholic church is the true descendant, then we are all heretics for turning from the church.

Of course, I believe they are the heretics and we are the true church.

BTW, many modern Baptists would claim Primitive's to be heretics, but just 150 years ago, most, if not all Baptists were Primitive in belief.

I choose to believe we are direct descendants because I have faith that God has kept His church here apart from the Catholic church.

 

"Refutation" was a poor choice of terminology. I probably had too much to drink. Just Kidding. "As opposed to", is what I should've said.

 

My own church stresses the anabaptist influence.
Not that strange considering the fact that all of it's members are Dutch and Menno Simons the most important anabaptist thinker in history (the inventor of seperation between church and state) is also Dutch.
We also maintain cordial relations with the 'Doopsgezinden' the denomination he founded (the Amish are part of the same denomination).

It is called church politics and has sadly very little to do with historical reality.

 

I plump for radical reformation rather than Anabaptist or the rather ridiculous (IMNSVHO) Trail of Blood successionist theory. The roots of radical separatism can really be traced to Browne's "Reformation without tarrying for Anye" (sic) in 1582, which spawned the congregational movement of which Baptists were an offshoot. BUT - there is an Anabaptists link: Mioque will correct me if I'm wrong but wasn't Smyth (re)baptised by the Mennonite Waterlanders in the Netherlands? That's the Generals' connection with Anabaptists; the Particulars are more tenuous based on the so-called Kiffin manuscript.

Yours in Christ

Matt

 

And would not the same be true if you read some of the things written by "Baptists" on the Baptist Board! LOL!

Mark Osgatharp