Interesting note on the Trail of Blood

[daveleau]

I had heard of the inaccuracies of the Trail of Blood before, but in my current Church History course, we discussed part of it today. I thought it was interesting. Two early groups claimed to be early Baptists in this writing were the Montanists and Novations. Both of these groups were started by men (Montanus and Novation) concerned about the early bishops put up in Rome. (This was not unique to Rome as the Donatists were similarly upset about the bishop of Carthage.) These men, both desiring that they be put in the position of bishop of Rome, had very different desires.

Montanus was upset with the potential of Gnostic influence in the early church and desired to keep out all but the purest Christians. If anyone showed any wavering of his brand of orthodox Christianity, then he called for them to be cast out of the church, as he called any dissent an influx of Gnosticism. He rebelled against a lack of discipleship. He tried to expel most of the early church, until his group was condemned at the Council of Constantinople in AD 381. His sect lasted 200 years (from mid 2nd Cent to late 4th Cent). They were not associated with baptism, but with the denial of Gnosticism. This was a good premise, but his actions were not good as he tried to expel many devout Christians.

Novation came on the scene when Cornelius was made bishop of Rome. Cornelius wanted to allow those that gave into the persecutions of the church back into fellowship with the Believers that survived these persecutions. Novation, who also wanted to be the bishop of Rome, started his own churches that sprung up all over N. Africa. These lasted until the 5th Century. Again, Novation did not have much in common with Baptists, but only desired to deal harshly with those that fled the persecution, renounced the Faith, or gave up Scriptures to persecuting authorities. While these latter two were poor actions, these do not identify Novationism with Baptist lineage.

This document (Trail of Tears) is an attempt to link our Baptist lineage with the Apostolic Succession. This is not necessary, as Apostolic Succession was a claim resulting from the need to show orthodoxy prior to Scripture's canonization. As people taught, they gave their lineage back to an Apostle (whether it was Peter, John, Paul or others) to set themselves apart from the pagan influences and Gnostic influences that pervaded the early church. After the Scriptures were canonized, orthodoxy could be identified. Today, there is no need for Baptists to claim Apostolic Succession because we have the Scriptures to prove our orthodoxy. And aside from a few traditions that are ascriptural (denial of dance and complete abstinence of alcohol and some church administrations such as democratic votes for church action- all in the SBC), the Baptist faith is very close to true orthodoxy. (I do not believe any church is 100% orthodox, but that we must keep searching the Scriptures and God's revelation to adhere to His intent.)

God bless you,
Dave

[ZiSunka]

Although I don't believe the Trail of Tears word for word, I do continue to believe that there were Christians outside the Catholic church even from the earliest days, as individuals and in small groups. Jesus said the kingdom of God is inside our hearts, not in an institution:


Luke 17:21


Historical evidence points to this fact, as do the writings of catholics themselves. Why would the church need to have rules about what to do with a Christian who doesn't belong to the Church if there were no Christians outside the Church? Why would St Francis give his followers advice on how to tell Catholics from non-Catholics? Why would Marco Polo write about Christians he met on his travels who didn't practice Catholicism? Why did Kubli Khan know of Christ before meeting his first Catholic, but not of the rituals of Catholicism?

Christianity knew Christians who were not Catholic long before the Reformation. After much study, I have come to the conclusion that there were always Christians outside of Catholicism. The kingdom is within us, not within an institution or a denomination.

[Joykins]

Didn't Montanus preach the imminent return of Christ to Phrygia, stirring millennial fever to the point where they eventually had an ecumenical council condemn millennialism?

[daveleau]

I haven't heard anything about that yet. He did preach in Phyrgia. I do know Papias was a Millenialist and that Eusebius of Ceasarea ridiculed him for it. That's the only early discussion of the Millenial kingdom that I know of.

[Joykins]

http://www.ntcanon.org/Montanism.shtml This gels with what I learned about Montanus.

[salve]

Assuming that such groups outside the Institutional Christianity of the Patriarchates were 'true' Christians doesn't that fact alone suggest that we need to re-evaluate 'all' historical dotrines which has played a 'huge' enfluence on everyone's exegesis in interpreting the Bible?

How do we stand alone side Gnostics and Messiaic Jews and future Muslims and argue the 'Trinity', the 'Divinity of Jesus' and all the other exegesi which the Institutional Church determined to be true?

Help me out here?

[eldermike]

Assuming that such groups outside the Institutional Christianity of the Patriarchates were 'true' Christians doesn't that fact alone suggest that we need to re-evaluate 'all' historical dotrines which has played a 'huge' enfluence on everyone's exegesis in interpreting the Bible?

How do we stand alone side Gnostics and Messiaic Jews and future Muslims and argue the 'Trinity', the 'Divinity of Jesus' and all the other exegesi which the Institutional Church determined to be true?

Help me out here?

Have you read the baptist faith and message? There are no references to anything other than scripture. We don't hold any doctrines based on teachings outside scripture.

[salve]

Have you read the baptist faith and message? There are no references to anything other than scripture. We don't hold any doctrines based on teachings outside scripture.

Hi Paster Mike,

I grew up Baptist but I also grew up being 'explained' through Sunday School I particular 'exegesis' which always 'us' to say 'we don't hold any doctrines based on teachings outside of scripture'.

My point is 'trinity' is not found anywhere in scripture. So why do we claim it as scriptural. Now this is a rhetorical question because I believe in the Doctrine of the Trinity but my point is our 'exegesis' regardless of how much we'd like to 'think' is completely 'scriptural' is actually a tradition of interpreting the scriptures. It's 'extra' Biblical in the sense that we bring to the scriptures a 'taught' method to interpret it. Why do you think we put our children through Sunday School? Because we want them to interpret it 'rightly'? :blush:

We we say 'rightly' don't we mean 'our' way?

My point is by creating a pseudo-history like Trails of Blood we ultimately serve two ends.

1.) We demonize not only Roman Catholicism but Orthodox Christianity and Oriental Christianity but our own Christian history.

2.) We elevate groups, which we now know from evidence of their archeological findings, were Gnostics, Hellenistic Mystery Cults and pseudo-Messaic Jews with very little in common with modern-day Christian exegesis for interpreting the Bible.

I've been in dialogues with Muslim apologists who use such pseudo-history to very good effect at undermining Christian Missionary work in the Middle-east and Northern-Africa and it causes me to exercise a great deal of caution when I see this stuff being used to establish legitimacy among Christian groups.

Have you been in any dialogues or in the mission field in or around the Middle-east and Northern-Africa with Muslims?

[eldermike]

Hi Paster Mike,

I grew up Baptist but I also grew up being 'explained' through Sunday School I particular 'exegesis' which always 'us' to say 'we don't hold any doctrines based on teachings outside of scripture'.

My point is 'trinity' is not found anywhere in scripture. So why do we claim it as scriptural. Now this is a rhetorical question because I believe in the Doctrine of the Trinity but my point is our 'exegesis' regardless of how much we'd like to 'think' is completely 'scriptural' is actually a tradition of interpreting the scriptures. It's 'extra' Biblical in the sense that we bring to the scriptures a 'taught' method to interpret it. Why do you think we put our children through Sunday School? Because we want them to interpret it 'rightly'? :blush:

We we say 'rightly' don't we mean 'our' way?

My point is by creating a pseudo-history like Trails of Blood we ultimately serve two ends.

1.) We demonize not only Roman Catholicism but Orthodox Christianity and Oriental Christianity but our own Christian history.

2.) We elevate groups, which we now know from evidence of their archeological findings, were Gnostics, Hellenistic Mystery Cults and pseudo-Messaic Jews with very little in common with modern-day Christian exegesis for interpreting the Bible.

I've been in dialogues with Muslim apologists who use such pseudo-history to very good effect at undermining Christian Missionary work in the Middle-east and Northern-Africa and it causes me to exercise a great deal of caution when I see this stuff being used to establish legitimacy among Christian groups.

Have you been in any dialogues or in the mission field in or around the Middle-east and Northern-Africa with Muslims?

Nope, never in North Africa or mid-east.
I see your point.

But, let's take the Trinity as an example. You don't need the historical teachings of Christianity to show the truth of the Trinity doctrine. (The Baptist Faith and message supports my claim) I would not want to put myself in a position of defending the Trinity doctrine from any platform other than the 66 book bible.

Likewise we don't need a historical basis for our teachings beyond the 66 book bible. Some would ask me if I knew where this 66 book bible came from - I would say I do. I would not argue beyond that point, there would be no use.

I agree with you that we have baggage. There is some baby in all of the bath water of religions of today. But that fact applied to the conclusion that Christianity itself is flawed is a wrong conclusion.

IMHO, All we have is the bible. People need Jesus. Our enemy knows this.

Teaching is my main gift. When I was younger I taught as if God was watching me "go". Today, I only say what He has already spoken in His word, He is the Teacher.

Some things we can overcome, others we will not overcome..........

But by faith we have already overcome.

[Indrid Cold]

Christianity knew Christians who were not Catholic long before the Reformation. After much study, I have come to the conclusion that there were always Christians outside of Catholicism.

My goodness I hope so or my whole Constantinople thing goes down the tubes! :thumbsup:

[ZiSunka]

Assuming that such groups outside the Institutional Christianity of the Patriarchates were 'true' Christians doesn't that fact alone suggest that we need to re-evaluate 'all' historical dotrines which has played a 'huge' enfluence on everyone's exegesis in interpreting the Bible?

How do we stand alone side Gnostics and Messiaic Jews and future Muslims and argue the 'Trinity', the 'Divinity of Jesus' and all the other exegesi which the Institutional Church determined to be true?

Help me out here?

You are thinking about the Christians as being part of some larger denomination, but I'm talking about individuals and small groups, people who accepted Christ as their savior, who devoted themselves to Him, outside of any denomination at all. Gnostics, Messianics, all those are denominations, institutions, with heirarchies of leaders making decisions about doctrine and handing down traditions and rituals. I'm talking about more like the home church and unaffilated groups of today. There is Christian life beyond denomination.

[ZiSunka]

My goodness I hope so or my whole Constantinople thing goes down the tubes! :thumbsup:

A brilliant, but not exclusive, example.

[Indrid Cold]

A brilliant, but not exclusive, example.

By all means . . .

[ZiSunka]

By all means . . .

Well, I can hardly enumerate the names of groups that never had names, can I?

I went to a small group church for a long time (like 5 years), but we never had a name or affiliated with any denom, but that doesn't mean we didn't exist or that we weren't real. I just can't give you the name of the group because there was never a name.

So too the groups I'm talking about. If you read Catholic history, Europe was littered with such small groups outside the church and not affiliated with any of the heretical denoms, but they didn't have names. They tended to be refered to by location or by some derrogatory feature, like, "Mr Big-nose's followers" or "the barn-dwellers of Hamburg". These names were meant to ridicule the people and to convince the catholic faithful that joining such a group was ridiculous.

I used to live near the University of Dayton and had access to books of Catholic history, written by the bishops as reports to there archbishops and to Rome, regarding "subversives." I don't have access to that kind of stuff anymore, or I would post some verbatum.

[Indrid Cold]

"By all means" as an affirmation of truth. I am not sure how you took that . . .

[salve]

You are thinking about the Christians as being part of some larger denomination, but I'm talking about individuals and small groups, people who accepted Christ as their savior, who devoted themselves to Him, outside of any denomination at all. Gnostics, Messianics, all those are denominations, institutions, with heirarchies of leaders making decisions about doctrine and handing down traditions and rituals. I'm talking about more like the home church and unaffilated groups of today. There is Christian life beyond denomination.

Hi there lambslove,

I've never met a Christian I couldn't identify by the exegesis they taught.

I believe through Christ we have 'Perfect Salvation' and through Him to His Apostles He gave 'Perfect Confession' of that 'Perfect Salvation'.

At the time of His Death at Calvary that 'Perfect Confession' was completely 'verbal' and eventually 'fully transfered' to the Church of Believers at Pentacost.

My point being there is a 'Perfect Confession' which was in the posession of the Church of Believers at the time of Pentacost and 'some' of that was written down in the form of Gospel Story and Letters to individual Believers and Churches and a lot of those Letters were written to 'correct' errors by those Churches from 'straying' from that 'Perfect Confession'.

I read the 'whole' Bible many times and I've studied the Bible with many groups and people and 'all' of them 'cannot' be right.

So either we've 'all' lost pieces of that 'Perfect Confession' part of which was the 'Perfect Exegesis' to interpret the Old Testament or somegroup still has that 'Perfect Confession'.

Personally I believe that "the gates of hades shall not prevail against it." So I am convicted that somewhere buried in the history of Christianity are pieces of that 'Perfect Confession' which includes that 'Perfect Exegesis'.

It is my opinion that simply applying reasoning to the scriptures does not 'reveal' this it only peals away it's meaning piece by piece and little by little until we have nothing.

So I'm always looking to dialogue with individuals and groups to learn and to test what they know always keeping my heart open.

[ZiSunka]

"By all means" as an affirmation of truth. I am not sure how you took that . . .

Ahh! Around here it means, please give examples...:sorry:

[ZiSunka]

Hi there lambslove,

I've never met a Christian I couldn't identify by the exegesis they taught.

I believe through Christ we have 'Perfect Salvation' and through Him to His Apostles He gave 'Perfect Confession' of that 'Perfect Salvation'.

At the time of His Death at Calvary that 'Perfect Confession' was completely 'verbal' and eventually 'fully transfered' to the Church of Believers at Pentacost.

My point being there is a 'Perfect Confession' which was in the posession of the Church of Believers at the time of Pentacost and 'some' of that was written down in the form of Gospel Story and Letters to individual Believers and Churches and a lot of those Letters were written to 'correct' errors by those Churches from 'straying' from that 'Perfect Confession'.

I read the 'whole' Bible many times and I've studied the Bible with many groups and people and 'all' of them 'cannot' be right.

So either we've 'all' lost pieces of that 'Perfect Confession' part of which was the 'Perfect Exegesis' to interpret the Old Testament or somegroup still has that 'Perfect Confession'.

Personally I believe that "the gates of hades shall not prevail against it." So I am convicted that somewhere buried in the history of Christianity are pieces of that 'Perfect Confession' which includes that 'Perfect Exegesis'.

It is my opinion that simply applying reasoning to the scriptures does not 'reveal' this it only peals away it's meaning piece by piece and little by little until we have nothing.

So I'm always looking to dialogue with individuals and groups to learn and to test what they know always keeping my heart open.

To each his own. Most people are on a search for the truth about God, but you seem to be on a search for the truth about truth. God bless you. May you find what you are looking for.

[salve]

To each his own. Most people are on a search for the truth about God, but you seem to be on a search for the truth about truth. God bless you. May you find what you are looking for.

Thank you sister,

But is there any other 'truth' out there but 'God'?

God Bless.

[ZiSunka]

Thank you sister,

But is there any other 'truth' out there but 'God'?

God Bless.

Not as far as I am aware.

[MrJim]

So too the groups I'm talking about. If you read Catholic history, Europe was littered with such small groups outside the church and not affiliated with any of the heretical denoms, but they didn't have names. They tended to be refered to by location or by some derrogatory feature, like, "Mr Big-nose's followers" or "the barn-dwellers of Hamburg". These names were meant to ridicule the people and to convince the catholic faithful that joining such a group was ridiculous.


The remnant. There is always a remnant. I think it may be safe to say that it's not the institution that stands against the gates of hell, but the remnant.

The anabaptists were called "Der Schwarmer" meaning people went around with bees in their bonnets.

The anabaptist ministers were called "Hedge Preachers" because they preached behind hedges-since if they preached in public they might find their heads missing.

The remnant...

[ZiSunka]

The remnant. There is always a remnant. I think it may be safe to say that it's not the institution that stands against the gates of hell, but the remnant.

The anabaptists were called "Der Schwarmer" meaning people went around with bees in their bonnets.

The anabaptist ministers were called "Hedge Preachers" because they preached behind hedges-since if they preached in public they might find their heads missing.

The remnant...

There you go. I wouldn't have thought of that, and I'm glad you did.

[JPPT1974]

The Kingdom of God is within us
Within our hearts and our souls if we believe
That the Lord Jesus is the Christ and Messiah of the world