Garrett on "Hardshell Secession"

On June 15, 2010 Garrett posted this blog post on the Baptist "Gadfly":  http://baptistgadfly.blogspot.com/2010/06/seceder-hardshells.html


Garrett fancies himself a Baptist Socrates, no doubt, but I remind the occasional reader that Socrates also depicted himself as a midwife in relation to individuals understanding the truth. A Gadfly's stinger is not congenial to the gentle touch of a midwife in relation to coming to the knowledge of truth. Truth is arduous enough in the "bearing" process without adding to the pain by "stinging".

Concerning the blog post of Garrett above, he argues that Henry Sheets in, "A History of the Liberty Baptist Association From Its Organization In 1832 to 1906", establishes the Missionary Baptists as representing the original position of the Baptists on Missionary methods, Sunday Schools, etc.

First, this "history" is published from the perspective of a Missionary Baptist in 1854 and 1906 after the split had occurred, so the author could be accused of propagating a revisionist history after the same manner that Garrett accuses Hassell.

Second, this history does not consider the influence among the Baptists of Fuller and Carey who represented a departure in missionary method and theology from an older generation of Baptists. The presence of missionary work and methods in Baptist associations like the Kehukee or Baltimore before the Missionary split does not prove that such methods were not recognized as modern innovations among Baptists.

Perhaps Baptists like Elder James Osbourne initially could be viewed as not following their conscience when they went along with Fuller inspired missionary trappings, but they cannot be proved to have heartily endorsed these innovations, as they did eventually repudiate them as inconsistent with the original Particular Baptists of England. It may not even be inconsistent, save in name only, for Osbourne to have allowed himself to be designated a "Home Missionary", as this designation effectively refers to what every present, faithful Primitive Baptist may do in their interactions of daily life in America.

I have stated before that John Ryland's statement to a young Carey concerning the necessity of the conversion  of the heathen was indicative of Ryland's rejection of the view that the gospel was the means of eternal salvation of the heathen. Garrett argued against this by suggesting that Ryland's remark was eschatological rather than soteriological in nature. If this were so, it would demonstrate that Ryland did not view the Great Commission as given to the Apostles as unfulfilled. The most that could be said in reference to his view of the Commission as applied to the Church, was that the Church was not at liberty to pursue mission work on unqualified grounds, and would indicate that Ryland was opposed to indiscriminate missionary work until such time as a sign was given by a second Pentecost.

Fuller's publication in 1782, "The Gospel Worthy of All Acceptation", marked a turning point among Baptists. The work was completed in 1775 only 4 years after the death of John Gill. Fuller was responsible for the Missionary movement among Baptists, not only in doctrine, but in practice by establishing the Baptist Missionary Society in Kettering in 1792. Fuller certainly did not espouse his doctrines and practices as consistent with Baptists of the 18th century, as he stated that what he defended was contrary to the Baptists of the 18th century. He claimed that he was consistent with Bunyan and Baptist writers in the 16th and 17th centuries.

The difficulty is that, as far as history seems to indicate, the first Baptists of England seemed to be Arminian, not some illogical mixture of Calvinism and Arminianism as Fuller's doctrine was.

Seeing that the earliest Baptists of England were Arminian, far earlier than the London Confession, are the "original" Baptists Arminian? This surely demonstrates the illegitimacy of solely appealing to history for identity. No, the original, Biblically faithful Baptists of England were the Particular Baptists we are bound to judge by the canon of Holy Scripture alone.