By collateral evidence we are led to suppose that several of the
apostles were martyred under the Roman Emperor, Nero, about A.D. 64.
The Jews rebelled against the Romans, A.D. 66. At the approach of war,
Christians of Jerusalem and Judea removed to Pela, beyond the
Jordan.[200] Eusebius says they fled in obedience to a Divine
revelation.[201] These were all Jews, and in their new homes were called
Nazarenes or Ebonites.[202]
Jerusalem and the temple were utterly destroyed and the Jews massacred
by the Romans, A.D. 70.[203]
Dean Stanley says: "The fall of Jerusalem was the fall of the Jewish
world; it was a reason for the close of the apostolic age; a death-blow
of the influence of Jewish nationality for a long time to come."[204]
After the destruction of Jewish Jerusalem, Gentile Antioch appears to
have become the seat of church authority.
John was probably the only apostle then living and he, it is thought,
was in a distant country.
At Antioch and other places Gentile Christians evidently soon gained the
ascendency and discouraged, even Jews from circumcision and other
offensive Jewish customs, while water baptism and other usages not
repulsive to Gentiles were generally continued and in time modified to
suit taste and convenience.
The early Christians were not united in making these changes; they
caused continued discord and division among them as is manifest
throughout the writings of the Ante-Nicene Fathers and Eusebius.
The Nazarenes, Ebonites and some others adhered to circumcision and the
customs of Moses as the elders at Jerusalem had insisted that Paul
should do and as in the "Hermit Church" of Abyssinia they still continue
to do.[205][206]
We find these Nazarenes and Ebonites soon classified as heretics after
the Gentiles preponderated.
Water baptism seems not to have been insisted upon at first but in the
second century greater importance appears to have been attached to
it.[207] Many, however, claimed that only baptism of the Holy Spirit and
purity of the heart were necessary because none of the apostles but Paul
were baptized with water, and Christ said: "John indeed baptized with
water but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit;"[208] and again,
"Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God."
Justin Martyr[209] said: "What is the use of that baptism which cleanses
the flesh and the body alone. Baptize the soul from wrath, envy, &c.,
and lo! the whole body is clean." And again: "What need have I of that
other baptism who have been baptized with the Holy Spirit."
While many such expressions occur in the writings of the "Fathers,"
there are many more which support sacramentalism. Their testimonies are
conflicting.
About the beginning of the third century we find water baptism first
called a sacrament by Tertulian and about the same time he complains
that many tried to destroy it. Plainly, as water baptism was exalted,
opposition increased.[210]
The sect called Ascoondrutes rejected all symbols and sacraments on the
principle that incorporeal things cannot be communicated by things
corporeal nor divine mysteries by things visible.[211]
Schaff says[212]: Many Jews and Gentiles were baptized only with water;
not with Holy Spirit and fire of the Gospel, and smuggled their old
religious notions and practices into the church.
The Roman Emperor, Constantine, professedly became a Christian, while he
virtually remained a heathen; A.D. 312.[213]
Christians were few in number before Constantine, but now pagans flocked
to the church and sat in its councils.
"Constantine married the Christian church to the heathen world." He
virtually united church and state. He convened the council of Nice and
they formed a creed A.D. 325.
Many protested against this council and its decisions but the mass
supported the Emperor and the creed.
Among obscure dissenters whom the ruling church called heretics may we
expect thereafter to find the nearest approach to Christianity as Jesus
taught it upon the Mount and elsewhere.
Mosheim says: No sooner had Constantine abolished the superstition of
his ancestors than magnificent churches were erected for the Christians,
which were richly adorned with pictures and images and bore striking
resemblances to the Pagan temples both within and without.[214]
The simplicity of the Gospel was clouded by the prodigious number of
rites and ceremonies which the bishops invented to embellish it.[215]
They imagined the Pagans would receive Christianity with more facility
when they saw the rites and ceremonies to which they were accustomed
adopted in the church. So the religion of the Christians was made to
conform very nearly to that of the Pagans in external appearance.[216]
The vice and insolent tyranny of many of the priesthood soon became
notorious.[217]
Neander says: Such individuals of the laity as were distinguished by
their piety from the great mass of nominal Christians and from the
worldly minded of the clergy often suffered persecution from the
latter.[218]
The name of Andeus stand prominent among the many dissenters who
protested against the corruptions of the ruling church at this
time.[219]
Isolated companies of devout Christians under various names rejected the
Sacraments. They were called Lampetians, Adelphians, Estatians,
Marcionites, Euchites, Massalians and Enthusiasts.[220]
Mosheim says: Enthusiasts who discarded the Sacraments and were rather
wrong headed than vicious lived among the Greeks and Assyrians for many
ages. They were known by the general and invidious name of Massalians or
Euchites. A foot-note says: This sect arose under the Emperor
Constantius about the year 361.[221]
We have numerous accounts of Christians who were prominent in the
dominant church of the fourth century who deferred water baptism to
middle life or old age and many were never so baptized altho' born of
Christian parents.[222]
About A.D. 660 another Constantine came forward as a reform preacher
under inspiration said to have been received in reading the New
Testament, particularly the writings of St. Paul.[223]
His followers were sometimes called Macedonians but were generally known
as Paulicians altho' they preferred to be called Christians.
It appears that these Paulicians existed centuries before under the
other names given them by their enemies and that the drooping sect was
revived by the powerful preaching of Constantine.
Neander says[224] the Paulicians wholy rejected the outward observance
of the Sacraments and maintained that by multiplication of external
rites and ceremonies in the dominant church the true life of religion
had declined. That it was not Christ's intention to institute water
baptism as a perpetual ordinance and that by baptism he meant only
baptism of the Holy Spirit and that he communicates himself by the
living waters for the thorough cleansing of the whole human nature; that
eating the flesh and drinking the blood of Christ consists in coming
into vital union with him.
In the ninth century one hundred thousand Paulicians were martyred at
once in Armenia, accused of heresy and denying the Sacraments.[225]
For the same offence untold numbers were put to death during previous
and subsequent centuries and in widely distant countries.[226]
Their enemies represent that these Paulicians were loving, spiritual and
peaceful, and diligent in reading and circulating the Scriptures, but
they were heretics and not worthy to live.
Were not these dissenting martyrs a remnant or seed of the living church
and their baptized enemies the real heretics?
The history of these inhuman persecutions reveals a sad condition of the
dominant church and its ruling clergy of the ninth century.
Some Ecclesiastics who presided over a flourishing theological
institution at Orleans, claimed to have been awakened by the writings of
St. Augustine and St. Paul, particularly the later. Many of the nobility
and others of eminent piety and benevolence became their adherents.[227]
They rejected external worship, rites and ceremonies and placed religion
in the internal contemplation of God and the elevation of the soul.
They rejected water baptism and held to a baptism of the Spirit, also to
a Spiritual Eucharist by which all who had received spiritual baptism
would be refreshed and find their spiritual needs completely satisfied.
Thirteen leaders of this sect were burned A.D. 1022. When urged to
recant they replied, "We have a higher law, one written by the Holy
Spirit in the inner man."
Mosheim says they soared above the comprehension of the age in which
they lived.
A few years later a similar sect was discovered in the districts of
Arras and Liege. They held individual holiness and practical piety to
be necessary and that outward baptism and outward Sacrament were
nothing. This they affirmed was the doctrine of Christ and his
apostles.[228]
About A.D. 1046 a sect was suppressed at Turin which was favored by the
nobility and widely diffused among the clergy and laity. They claimed to
have one priest without the tonsure. He daily visited their brethren
scattered throughout the world and when God bestowed him on them they
received from him with great devotion forgiveness of sin. They
acknowledged no other priest and no other sacrament but his
absolution.[229]
Who--we ask--is this priest without the tonsure, who daily visits the
world-wide brethern?
Is it not Jesus who was made a priest, "not after the law of a carnal
commandment, but by the power of an endless life?"[230]
A sect called Bogomiles, who rejected outward baptism and acknowledged
only spiritual communion, was discovered in Constantinople, many of them
in the families connected with the court. Their leader was burned A.D.
1119, others were imprisoned, yet they spread secretly over the Greek
empire.[231]
Mosheim says: The Eastern churches continued to be infested with such
fanatics in the twelfth century, and the Latin sects were still more
numerous than the Greeks.[232]
The Catherists were a numerous faction in Bulgaria and spread almost all
over Europe under various names who all agreed in rejecting baptism and
the Lord's Supper.
"Brethern and sisters of the free Spirit" took their denomination from
the words of St. Paul (Rom. 8, 2-14). They were called Begards,
Beghines, Turpines, etc. They rejected baptism and the Supper as no
longer useful to them and held to inward and spiritual worship. They
spread rapidly in Italy, France and Germany. They were mostly poor
people and lived upon alms while upon their missionary journeys. Great
numbers of plain, pious people, rich and poor, embraced their teaching
and forsook the dominant church.[233]
The Inquisition checked their career with its usual record of cruelty
and blood, yet they continued to feed the fires of persecution for more
than two centuries, until near the time of the reformation.
In the south of France dissenters called Albigenses became more numerous
than the dominant church. They were condemned by four councils, but
still continued to increase until about A.D. 1215, when they were
exterminated by a long and horrible war and the Inquisition.[234]
These Albigenses were distinguished generally by their strict and
blameless lives, by their abhorrence of oaths, war and punishment by
death, and for their hospitality and beneficence. They accepted baptism
spiritually and rejected the sacraments.
Can we believe that the church which led to the extermination of these
Albigenses, the Paulicians, and many others, was ever established by
that loving Saviour who spent his life in doing good to the souls and
bodies of men?
Does it not answer more nearly the description given of Mystery Babylon
who was drunk with the blood of the saints and martyrs of Jesus? Who
would not gladly forget a succession which claims to run back through
such a church as this?[235]
In some parts of France dissenters similar to the Albigenses were called
Bulgarians, in Italy they were called Paterens and in Germany were
called Catherists, and in derision were called "Good Men." How is it
that these dissenters, by the testimony of their enemies, appear to have
lived better and holier lives without the sacraments than their
persecutors did with them?
What is the testimony of observation in our day?[236] Are those
beatitudes which Jesus pronounced upon the Mount better observed by
those who have seven sacraments than they are by Protestants who have
only two? And, are they better observed under two sacraments than they
are by the Quakers, and some other Christians who have none? If this is
the case, it is strong support to the belief that Christ ordained the
sacraments. But if the reverse is found to be the existing condition,
then a suspicion may arise that these sacraments are not divine, but
are human impositions and that they divert from the Divine. Therefore,
may it be that some of our best Christians get along quite as well or
better without them.
Neither the word sacrament nor any synonym thereof occurs in the New
Testament, nor in the writings of the "Fathers," until the third
century. There were no sacraments then as there are now, therefore no
necessity for such a name.
Sacrament was a Pagan name for a military oath and was ruled into its
present position by apostate Christians.
The apostles and first Christians evidently continued to eat the
Passover Supper, because their fathers had done so for ages in memory of
Israel passing over the Red Sea out of Egypt, and not from any command
of Christ. Otherwise they would with still more persistence have
continued to wash each other's feet, which Jesus commanded with language
and actions far more solemn, impressive and imperative.[237]
The Ante-Nicene Fathers and Eusebius inform us that water baptism was a
prolific cause of bitter discord and division among the early
Christians. It still sorrowfully distracts the loving children of our
one Father and impedes the spread of his kingdom in the earth.
These lamentable conditions must inevitably continue until such shadows
are dissolved by divine brightness in that day which we rejoice to
believe is now dawning.