CONCORDIA THEOLOGICAL MONTHLY Hermeneutics and the Teacher of Theology r-- EDGAR KRENTZ Some Thoughts on Authentic Lutheranism HERBERT J. A. BOUMAN A Growing Commonality Among Lutherans? ANDREW J. WHITE The Primitive Baptists of North America ARTHUR CARL PIEPKORN Homiletics Book Review Volume XLll May 1971 Number 5 The Primitive Baptists of North America ARTHUR CARL PIEPKORN The author is graduate professor of systematic theology at Concordia Seminary, St. Louis. En. NOTE: This article is one of a series on version of the "new measures" issue - religious organizations and denominations mission societies, tract societies, Sunday in America. schools, religious fairs and festivals to raise THE PRIMITNE BAPTISTS OF THE funds for the church's work, temperance UNITED STATES 1 societies, and theological seminaries.s y the beginning of the 18205 a strict B 3 Cushing Biggs Hassell and Sylvester Has­ "particularism" 2 had been reigning sell, History of the Church of God from the without a serious challenge among the Creation to A. D. 1885, Including Especially the Baptists of the American South for nearly History of the Kehukee Primitive Baptist Asso­ two generations. In the course of the next ciation (Adanta, Ga.: Turner Lasseter, 1962), pp.747--48, links these phenomena with "Ful­ 15 years their associations and churches ler's gospe1." The reference is to Andrew Fuller felt the full divisive force of the Baptist (1754-1815), a noted Baptist theologian and the pastor of the church at Kettering, England, from 1782 until his death. His chief work, The Gos­ 1 Apart from their magazines, the recent printed literature on the Primitive Baptists is pel of Christ Worthy of All Acceptation (1784 not extensive. In addition to utilizing the to 1785), argued against the extreme form of printed sources listed in the bibliography and Calvinism that allowed "nothing spiritually good cited in the text, the present writer sent out over to be the duty of the unregenerate," although he 150 letters in connection with the preparation himself confessed no predilection for Arminian­ of this article. Early drafts were coordinated ism and regarded himself as a strict Calvinist and with a number of knowledgeable Primitive Bap­ predestinarian. In 1792 he founded the first tist leaders. The semifinal draft went out to the Baptist missionary society at Kettering and re­ editors of 21 periodicals circulating among mained its secretary until his death. He stood Primitive Baptists for their reaction. Careful in much the same relation to William Carey that cog~izance was taken of the concrete suggestions Luther Rice did in the United States to Adoni­ of the 19 that kindly responded. ram Judson. Hassell and Hassell quote with ob­ 2 "Particular" Baptists adhere to the belief vious approval the words of Elder P. D. Gold, that Christ died only for the elect. "General" the longtime editor of Zion's Landmark: "The Baptists hold that Christ died for all human doctrines and fables of men are accepted. An­ beings. There are other "particular" or "Calvin­ drew Fuller becomes a wonderful standard. He istic" Baptists besides the Primitive Baptists. takes repentance and faith out of the covenant These include the Separate Baptists in Christ, the of grace, and puts them under the law, in the Regular and Old Regular Baptists, most of the sense that he makes them man's duty, and not United Baptists, the General Association of Bap­ gifts of grace. If salvation comes on account of tists (Duck River [and kindred} Associations of man's performance of his duty, it is of works Baptists), the vanishing Two-Seed·in-the-Spirit in some sense. He [Fuller} brings in the mod­ Predestinarian Baptists, and the now tiny Texas ern missionary enterprise, a system somewhat and Louisiana associations that correspond with like the popish measures for propagating their the Union Primitive Baptist Association of the creed, but unknown to the Bible and to Baptists, Old School or Predestinarian Faith and Order or­ and is a disturber of gospel peace and order ganized in 1840 by Elder Daniel' Parker (1781 among churches. His followers have departed to 1844). None of these groups comes within from the truth further than he did . and the purview of this article. they do not preach salvation as nearly by grace 297 298 THE PRIMITIVE BAPTISTS OF NORTH AMERICA One of the associations in which the adopted a resolution discarding "all mis­ controversy became crucial was the Kehu­ sionary societies, Bible societies, and theo­ kee Baptist Association of North Carolina logical seminaries, and the practices here­ founded in 1769.4 In 1827 the association tofore resorted to for their support in begging money from the public" and de­ as he did, so they are waxing worse and worse. scribing these institutions as "inventions As the world is to be evangelized, the tender mind of the young must be converted by means of men and not warranted from the word of the newly invented Sunday schools, and hu­ of God." 5 manly prepared preachers must be sent to the heathen" (pp.310-11). At the same time it This resolution, typical of many others must be remembered that Primitive Baptists do of the period, seems to have been the first not see a strict doctrine of limited atonement as of its kind. It thus marks in a sense the precluding "mission work" and "evangelism" as they define these terms. Primitive Baptists "do crystallization of the militant opposition not object to missions at home or abroad for the of the "Old School" Baptists G to the "new purpose of preaching the gospel for the instruc­ measures." 7 In 1832 the Country Line As­ tion and edification of children of God." What they "have objected to is the idea that the hea­ sociation adopted a similar course at its then are hell-bound unless we reach them with session in the Deep Creek Church, Orange the preached word." (Letter from Elder Wilford (now Alamance) County, North Carolina.8 A. Pyles, Murray Route, Graham, Texas, dated February 5, 1971) In that same year in a 3-day meeting at 4 NO[ ;n 1765, as frequently stated and as the end of September representatiyes of a the designation in the minutes of the 1968 meet­ ing of the association as the 203d annual session 5 Hassell and Hassell, pp.736-37. The as­ implies. See Hugh B. Johnson, "Some Historical sociation took a similar stand against member­ Infonnation on the Kehukee Association Re­ ship in "the fraternity of Masons." The subject garding the Date Organized," The Primitive of missions first came before the association in Baptist Library Quarterly, 7, 4 (January-March 1803 (ibid., pp. 721-22). In 1815 the associa­ 1967), 1-7. For the articles of faith adopted tion had received copies of the first annual reo by the Kehukee Association in 1777, see Hassell port of the Baptist Board of Foreign Missions and Hassell, pp.699-700. Except for very through the board's agent, the Rev. Luther Rice minor modifications, the articles of faith of this (ibid., p. 729). The issue of membership in the association have remained unchanged down to Masonic society bd first come up in 1786 (ibid., the present (Minutes of the Two Hundred Third p. 734). Annual Session of the Kehztkee Primitive Baptist 6 The name "Primitive Baptist" does not Association . .. 1968, pp. 7-8). Similarly, the Ketocton Association in 1966 reaffirmed the seem to antedate the late 1830s. Three "Primi­ tive Baptist" associations were established in articles adopted by this association at its organi­ zation in 1766 (ilfinutes of the Two Hundred Georgia in 1836 and one in Mississippi in Third Annual Session 0/ the Ketocton P,,·imitive 1839. The magazine The Primitive Baptist was Baptist Association . .. 1969, pp. 11-12). For first published in 1846. Other names for the Primitive Baptists, not always precisely applied, other early examples see the "Articles of Faith" include Bible Baptists, Old Baptists, Predesti· and "On Gospel Order" of the Mississippi Bap­ narian Baptists, "Old School" Baptists, "Anti· tist Association (1807) in Benjamin Griffin, History 0/ the Primitive Baptists of Mississippi means" Baptists, "Antimission" Baptists, and from the First Settlement by the Americans up "Hardshell" Baptists. to the Middle 0/ the XIXth Century. 2d ed. by 7 Other activities that came in for condemna· B. D. Bryant, J. D. Holder, and Wiley Sammons tion were tract societies, Sunday schools, sectar· (Jonesboro, Ark.: Sammons Publishing Co., ian colleges, protracted meetings, a salaried min­ 1958), pp. 67-68, and the "Articles of Faith" istry, and state denominational conventions. of the Primitive Baptist Association (1839) of 8 So Clarence H. Cayce in Religious Bodies: Holmes and Attala Counties, Mississippi, ibid., 1936, 2 (Washington, D. c.: United States Gov­ pp.156-57. ernment Printing Office, 1941), 224. THE PRIMITIVE BAPTISTS OF NORTH AMERICA 299 number of "Old School" Baptist churches unions."11 By 1840 the division into the along the Atlantic seaboard convened with Nolachucky Association of United Bap­ the Black Rock Church, Baltimore County, tists and the Nolachucky Primitive Bap­ and adopted the same position that the tist Association was complete. "Black Kehukee Association had. The In this way the theological lines be­ Rock Address to Particular Baptists tween the "Old School" (that is, the Churches of the 'Old School' in the United Primitive) Baptists and the "New School" States" was prepared in the name of this (that is, "missionary") Baptists were assembly by Elders Samuel Trott, John clearly drawn. The Primitive Baptists be­ Healey, Thomas Poteet, William Gilmore, lieved that Christ died only for the elect, Gabriel Conklin, and Gilbert Beebe.9 The that the Holy Spirit and he alone calls occasion gave the name "Black-R.ockers" the elect in time, and that his call is effect­ to the "Old School" Baptists of the North, ual and without regard to the work of the as the Kehukee resolution had given those human minister or the written or spoken in the South the name of "Kehukeeites." 10 word.