"I Now come to that part of my investigation, in which I shall have to apply the Measuring Rod, for each party claims the name of Primitive Baptists, and as far as I know, are the same in their church government. Their difference is doctrinal, and each professes to get his views from the Scriptures, and to them they make their appeal. I shall call one party, Two Seed, or Arian Baptists, because that name seems to indicate some of their leading doctrinal views, and as both claim the name Primitive Baptist, the reader might become confused if we did not distinguish them by different names; and, I think, that before we are done, the reader will not think that I have done them injustice, in giving them the name I have." (pg. 36-37)
I have written quite a lot in my Old Baptist Test blog about how the first Hardshells had disagreements over the doctrine of the Trinity. Wilson Thompson was a Modalist or Sabellian. I have several articles where I cite from Wilson on that point. Elder Sylvester Hassell in his church history acknowledges this fact about Wilson Thompson. Wilson was also accused of believing in Two Seed doctrine, and as we have seen, he did believe it, even though his son Grigg later would deny this about his father. The late Dr. R.E. Pound used to have a web page where he documented a lot of the controversies around the doctrine of the Trinity that existed among the first "Primitive Baptists," a fact of history that today's Hardshells are not aware of. From his Web page (which is not now available) I cited him in my article titled "Dr. R. E. Pound on Hardshell Factions" (See here). He wrote:
"In those days the Old School brethren were in three groupings on theology: 1. The Delaware River and the Warwick, Samuel Trott, grouping, the deniers of Nicenism; 2. The Ketocton association, with John Clark, the followers of Niceinism; 3. The followers of Wilson Thompson, a Sabellian, who denied that the Father and the Son entered into an eternal covenant because these were not two distinct Beings, but only personalities of the One Divine Being. It seems to me that at the first, these divisions among the old schoolers was not over absolute predestination, but OVER NICENISM."
Dr. Pound's Web Page before he passed away was pbl.oldfaithbaptist.org. You can find some of Dr. Pound's writings (here).
Elder John Clark began to publish his periodical "Zion's Advocate" in 1854 out of his home state of Virginia and he frequently attacked the editors of the "Signs of the Times" for advocating Two Seed ideology and for affirming that Jesus was not divine because of his being the Son of God, or because he was begotten by the Father. However, as we saw in preceding chapters in writing about Elder T.P. Dudley, Dudley's biographer (Taylor) said that Clark had written to Dudley and stated that he believed much of what Dudley had written in his book on "The Christian Warfare" which promoted Two Seed tenets. Elder Beebe, like both the Hardshell Sabellians and Arians, argued that if Jesus was begotten of God in his divinity, then he would be inferior to God who begat him, would not be eternal but a creature of time. Wilson Thompson, the Sabellian (or Modalist) argued this way. Beebe and Trott, the semi-Arians, argued the same way. Christ being a begotten Son of God was an act that had a beginning.
Elder John Clark in his book "Exposure of Heresies Propagated by Some Old School Baptists," published in 1873, wrote against the Arianism involved in the Two Seedism of many of his fellow Hardshells from the 1830s till the early 1880s when he passed away. So, both Grigg Thompson and John Clark referred to Two Seed Primitive or Old School Baptists as "Arians." John Clark's book is not available on the Internet. I was able to get the book years ago by using the benefits of the inter-library loan program, so that my local library had the book sent to them from another library in another state, and I was able to read it in my local library (but not take it home), and I did so and took some notes. I wrote about that in 2008 in my blog "The Baptist Gadfly" in a post titled "On Clark's Book." Here is my summary of what I read (See here).
"Back a couple months ago I posted an entry wherein I asked where a lost book could be found, one written by Elder Clark in 1873 (a crucial time period in the history of the Hardshells) and titled - "Exposure of heresies propagated by some "old school Baptists," from their own publications: showing their doctrines to be not according to the Gospel of Christ."I can now report that I have read this short book and have taken some notes from it.
The book shows that many of the first Hardshells were Arian in doctrine, denying the eternal Sonship of Christ as an expression of his divinity.
In this book Elder Clark attacks the "no change" view of regeneration, a view prevalent among first generation Hardshells, or what has come to be called the "Hollow Log" doctrine. Those who generally held to this doctrine were they who retained the view of Elder Parker and his belief in "eternal vital union," or "eternal children," believing that the elect were in existence in Christ, by a creation before the world began, and that they simply, like Christ, "come down from heaven" and take up their abode in an "Adam man," like a rabbit would run into a hollow log and stay there, yet without effecting any change in the log.Elder Clark found it absurd and a false doctrine worse than Arminianism. He did not believe that anyone existed before he was born into the world."
Thompson wrote:
"The Word is the infallible standard, and I intend to let the Two Seed, Arian party, express their doctrines in their own words, and then apply the Measuring Rod, or the Scriptures, to them; and, I think, that before I am done, the reader will see that, if possible, they have less claims to be the Apostolic church, than either of the parties already decided against." (pg. 37-38)
The "two parties" he alludes to are the "Campbellites" and "Missionary Baptists." Grigg believes that Two Seedism is a worse heresy than those. Elder John Watson said something similar, saying in his book "The Old Baptist Test" that in many ways "Parkerism" or "Two Seedism" was worse than the "New Schoolism" of the "Missionary" Baptists from whom they had separated.
Thompson wrote:
"Before taking the subject up, I have another remark to make. Sometime past, I published an “Appeal to the Primitive Baptists,” in which I labored to expose the errors of the Arian party; in it I marked all my quotations, but, notwithstanding that, I have heard of some who have read the quotations from the stand, and affirmed it to be my doctrine, and made war upon it. In this work, I shall put every quotation from them in a different type from the body of the book, so that no one can be mistaken, but will know that they are reading their views, expressed in their own words." (pg. 38)
This shows either the gross ignorance or sinister doings of some "Primitive" or "Old School" Baptists. You have to be pretty ignorant not to realize what quotation marks mean. In a posting I made years ago titled "Duke Research Results (1)" (See here), I showed where Elder W.H. Crouse did what Grigg said others had done to his writings, attributing citations he gave of what others believed as being his beliefs. In that post I wrote the following:
In the book "Regeneration or the New Birth" by William H. Crouse in 1925 (see here), a book upheld by Sonny Pyles as stating things accurately, Crouse wrote:"Elder John Clark, a recognized leader among Primitive Baptists, for years editor of Zion's Advocate (afterwards edited by T.S. Dalton, C.H. Waters, John R. Daily, and now by R.H. Pittman) in an editorial on this subject in June 1858, said:
"We can conceive how agencies and instrumentalities can be employed in ministering to the living, but what place they have in giving life we cannot so readily conceive.***Is it scripturally true that God uses instrumentality in quickening, or giving life, to sinners dead in tresspasses and sins. The burden of proof, we know, rests upon these who affirm this, but let us see a moment what saith the revelation of God upon the subject.***(John 5: 21; 25; Born 4:17, 2 Cor.3:6, Eph. 2: 4,5,10; Col. 2:13, I Tim. 6:13; Heb. 4:12.) This array of scriptural testimony is sufficient, we should think, to establish the proposition that God quickens the sinner independent of means."
Now, here is what Clark actually wrote (I have the copy right in front of me)..."
What Crouse said Clark wrote is not what Clark wrote, but were citations from his opponents that Crouse said were the words and beliefs of Clark. The above citation is not what Clark wrote but is what his opponents had written and which he disagreed with. You can read the entire citation that I gave in that post. So, what does this say about some "Primitive," "Old School," or "Hardshell" Baptists?
Thompson wrote:
"The Two Seed, or Arian Baptists, in common with all professed Christians, believe that there is one God, who is the Creator, and who exists in, and of himself; who is omniscient, omnipresent, all-wise, and unchangeable, a most pure and holy spirit.They also believe that this God exists, or is revealed in the Scriptures as Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, and that these three are one; so that there is not three Gods, but one. In this article of their faith I believe them, and the Primitive Baptists are identical, for the first article adopted by all the Primitive Baptist churches, with which I am acquainted, reads about as follows: “We believe in one only true and living God, and that there is a Trinity of persons in the Godhead, the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, and yet there are not three Gods, but one God.” To sustain this article, they refer to Isa. xliv, 6: 1 John v. 7, and a variety of other Scriptures." (pg. 38-39)
This is not all quite true, however. Not all Two Seed or Arian Baptists believed in the Trinity. As we have seen, Grigg's father, Wilson Thompson, denied the Trinity and yet held to Two Seed views. So too did Samuel Trott. Also, how can Grigg say that Two Seeders were sound on the Trinity and yet call them "Arian Baptists"? Further, we have cited from Daniel Parker in previous chapters where he denied that Satan or his seed were created by God, calling the children of the Devil "the products" of Satan. That makes Satan a creator. He also taught that Satan was "self existing" and so did many Two Seeders, and so what Grigg says is not true. So, why did Grigg say these things? I can only guess. Why did he deny that his father was a Two Seeder or not say that he disagreed with the Modalism of his father?
Thompson wrote:
"The Two Seed, or Arian Baptists, believe that the Son of God, or second person in the Trinity, is a created, inferior existence, that he was created before the visible heavens and earth, and was the first thing God ever created. To show that I have not used a misnomer in calling them Arians, I will give the Arian faith, as given by Buck, and I will then give their faith as expressed by themselves. “Arians,” says Buck, “maintained that the Son of God was totally and essentially distinct from the Father; that he was the first and noblest of those beings whom God had created; the instrument by whose subordinate operation he formed the universe; and, therefore, inferior to the Father, both in nature and dignity; also, that the Holy Ghost was not God, but created by the power of the Son.” (pg. 39-40)
Here Grigg seems to say just the opposite of what he said in the previous citation. He says Two Seeders believed in one God in three persons and yet says that they believed that the second person in the Trinity is a created and inferior being. Of course, men like Beebe and Trott believed that Christ was God, and believed in a Trinity of persons (disagreeing with Wilson Thompson), yet they believed that Christ being the Son of God had nothing to do with his being God, but had to do with him being begotten as a Mediator, which involved him being a composite person of three natures, from some point in eternity past when he was begotten or created as such. We have even seen where Joshua Lawrence, though not a Two Seeder, also believed that Christ being the Son of God did not mean Christ was God, but his being the Son of God denoted his being born a human being.
Thompson wrote:
"Eld. G. Beebe, of New York, Eld. S. Trott, of Virginia, and Eld. T. P. Dudley, of Kentucky, stand at the head of the Two Seed, or Arian party, in fact, they have given the party birth in the United States, and their views are received by their followers without a dissenting voice, as far as I know, and from them I shall quote largely." (pg. 40)
Why did Thompson leave out Daniel Parker or his own father? Why did he leave out Daniel Parker? Yes, I know that Parker died in 1844, several years before Grigg wrote the "Measuring Rod," and this may be the reason. He does give the leading apologists for Two Seedism, and we have cited extensively from these apologists in preceding chapters. However, he says that the men named had "given the party birth" and so he should not have left out Daniel Parker.
Thompson wrote:
"Eld. Beebe, in a pamphlet published in 1843, on page 17, and second column, says: “By the spiritual creation, I mean the creation in Christ Jesus, and by natural creation, all that properly belongs to this world, including the creation of all the human family, as such in Adam. . .The same spiritual creation which set up our Day's-man, our spiritual Head, gave actual being to all the elect of God in him.”
This is quite interesting in lieu of the fact that in chapter XXIV we cited the words of Beebe from the "Signs of the Times" for 1838 (Vol. 6, No. 25, page 198) where Beebe said:
"That the words of divine revelation declare two seeds among the family of Adam, viz: the children of promise, which are accounted for the seed, the chosen generation, &c', and also of the seed of the serpent, the generation of vipers, the seed of evil doers, &,c., we fully admit; but that the former of these actually and personally existed in eternity, in any other sense than that their life was children with Christ in God, and that the latter had an actual existence in the bottomless pit before they existed on earth, is a doctrine which neither the word nor Spirit has ever revealed unto us;..."
So, Beebe is on record as both affirming and denying the "actual being" or existence of the elect in Christ before the world began. The denial was made in 1838 but the affirmation was made in 1843.
Thompson then cites these words of Beebe from that pamphlet wherein he cites Trott:
“I will, in candor, answer the questions put to me. The first is ‘Whether the quickening and life-giving Spirit of God is a created existence? I answer decidedly, YES. They again ask “If the Scriptures give any information of any thing being created before the beginning?" If they mean by the beginning, the creation of God, I answer No, for Christ is that beginning; but if they mean by it, the beginning of time, as in Gen. 1st chap. and 1st verse, I say Yes; for in that beginning God created the heavens and the earth; but Christ being the beginning of the creation of God, must in this sense, have been created, or brought into existence before these, and therefore before time.”— Signs of the Times, Vol. 17, No. 16, Aug. 1, 1849. s TROTT." (pg. 41)
This is what the Arians taught and is the reason why Thompson and Clark both accused Beebe and Trott and some other Two Seeders as being such.
Thompson wrote:
"As far as the creatureship of the Son is concerned, their views are identical, and the name Arian is appropriate." (pg. 42)
Well, not exactly, and that is why I prefer to call the Two Seeders "semi-Arian." Arius and Arians denied the Trinity, but Beebe and Trott did not.
Thompson then writes:
"Arius says, that the Holy Ghost is a creature, and was created by the Son. Elder Trott says, that the quickening and life giving Spirit of God, is a created existence. The only difference between him and Arius, is that one ascribes the creation of this quickening spirit to the Son, and the other simply calls it a created existence, without telling us whether it was created by God or the Son."
That is not the only difference between Trott and Arius, for Trott did not deny the Trinity as did Arius. The likeness between both is in how they understood Christ being the begotten Son of God.
Thompson wrote:
"I have now showed that they are Arians, in their views of Christ, and the quickening spirit of God, and hold them both to be creatures in a sense that is in palpable contradiction to God’s word. I shall now examine their Two Seed notions, and try them by the infallible rule."
However, we will save Thompson's refutation of Two Seedism for the next chapter.
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