D. B. Ray's text book on Campbellism exposed

Preface

The presence of poison in the system, indicates the demand for an antidote. So the existence, and circulation of a book full of deadly poison, sug gests the demand for an antidote. This must be my excuse for consenting to expose the Text Book on Campbellism. The work has been performed under disadvantages, in the midst of protracted meetings. Away from home on a preaching tour when I received the first notice that my brethren desired me to write the Expose, I obtained a copy of the Text Book, examined it carefully, visited various places and consulted the authorities referred to and took notes, commenced the work, progressed, and completed the manuscript before returning home.

So it .has all been written away from home, from my studio, and from my library, preaching every night and writing in the day, at various places, in the midst of company, with conversation going on around me, and it is not impossible that errors or oversights may have crept in ; indeed it would be astonishing if they had not.

To compress the work within prescribed limits, I have classified and arranged the topics, and consulted brevity, almost to meagreness in exegesis,

(iii)

IV PREFACE.

and yet many points in my notes, claiming attention, have been crowded out for want of space. Still I think the outline is as elaborate as prudence, under the circumstances, demands.

It is exceedingly unpleasant to be under the necessity of exposing so many falsehoods. The task of meeting honest argument, or logical, or scriptural objections to our real teachings, were a different work. But the falsehood, and misrepresentation, the persistent mis-statements of the teachings, the men of straw built and demolished, and the unmannerly calling of nick-names, and opprobrious epithets, carry the Text Book clear out of the field of honorg^ble disputation. In honorable controversy, each is expected to regard his opponent as honestl}^ seeking the truth, but that would require an eruptive stretch of the imagination, in a case where the evidence of the contrary is constantly before the eye. But I have endeavored to make the bright sunshine of truth stand out in contrast with the dark shades of falsehood.

Introduction

And now, in the eighth decade of the nineteenth century appears a phenomenon, in the form of a book of strange pretentions. The virus of vindictive misrepresentation seems to permeate its entire system, and so completely fill it, like disease in the human system, as to cause it to ** break out" on the back, assuming the malignant type of ** Text Book on Camp- BELLiSAi." A careful diagnosis yields the following

ANALYSIS OF THE TITLE.

1. Camfbellism, What is it? A myth, an imaginary entity, an excogitation of the brain of the author of the Text Book, full fledged and full grown from its birth, a grotesque caricature, a man of straw created and predestinated to endure the pugilistic blows of him from whom it claims paternity. If ** bodily exercise profits " him in this gymnastic tournament, in a bloodless battle against a nonentity, and gives him pleasure, let him enjoy it to satiety while he may, and before the great judgment day shall reveal the enormity of his iniquity, and unveil, in its native ugliness, and huge deformity, the true inwardness of the deformed and depraved bantling he has thrown before the world.

2. Text Book. For whom? Is Campbellism a science, needing a Text Book to assist the student in his study? Is it adopted as a Text Book in any theological seminary? They do not need that addition to their literature. Christians do not want it. They despise the slanderous thing. Honest people of the world do not need to study such a monstrosity. Intelligent Baptists will repudiate the thing, as replete with falsehood and misrepresentation, and will wash their hands of any complicity with the iniquitous concern. But as he submits it, in the preface, ** to the Baptist brotherhood especially," and the intelligent ones

VI INTRODUCTION.

have no use for it, we shall regard it as a Text Book for ignorant Baptists, to poison their minds, and prejudice them against receiving the vv^ord of God, the seed of the kingdom, and thus leave the way open for the devil to take away the seed from the hearts of the way-side hearers. And here, I think, crops out the true

ANIMUS OF THE BOOK.

When my brethren called upon me to write an Expose of the Text Book on Campbellism, I had never seen the [concern, and I did not suppose there lived a man in a Christian land, capable of crowding so much falsehood, slander and misrepresentation, into one book. I at first thought the thing was beneath notice. But it is thought that innocent persons may be deceived by the false statements, receiving them as true, and the cause of truth be prejudiced. Hence I have consented to notice it.

In this review, I am dealing with the book, not the author. With the latter I have no personal acquaintance, and can be prompted by no personal animosity in anything I may say. Had the book been anonymous, we should naturally suppose the devil to be its author, as it seems to be written in his interest, and doing his work, and thus significantly squinting towards Satanic paternity. I think the more appropriate title would be The Devil's Text Book, as suggestive of its appropriate sphere of service.

When a book, or an article in a paper, commences with a lie in the first paragraph, I do no expect to find much truth thereafter. As Campbellism and Campbellites, etc., are implied lies, as here used, when I find a book labeled Campbellism on the outside, I regard it as an advertisement that we may expect to find falsehood running rampant through its pages, and truth a comparative strangerjthere. When I hear a person, even a stranger, saying Campbellite, that person sinks in my estimation, very much like a person using profane language. It may proceed from a wicked heart, or it may be from force of habit, or thoughtlessly, not reflecting upon the stain it leaves upon his soul.

Contents

CHAPTER. PAGE.

I. The Churches, . . . . .9.

II. Bearing False Witness, . . . . 13.

Chapter I. The Churches

In the days of the apostles, men and women heard, believed, and obeyed the gospel as preached by these ambassadors of Christ. Giving themselves to the Lord, in obeying the gospel, they then gave themselves to one another in the fellowship or partnership capacity of the local church or congregation for the purpose of carrying on the work of the Lord in that vicinity.

These congregations were called chu.rches of Christ, or churches of God, and the disciples who composed the membership were called Christians. They had Christ for their Head, the apostles' teaching, or New Testament Scriptures as their manual of faith and practice. One church or congregation v/as not subject to another church or hierarchy for its existence, authority, or laws, but wherever men and women "became obedient to the faith," it was their privilege to constitute and set in order a church, working under the '' general lO TEXT BOOK EXPOSED.

charter," the Christian Scriptures. This privilege inhered in the churches of the apostoHc age.

During the succeeding centuries, and on down through the ages, the same book or general charter has survived and continued in force, the same Head of the Church still lives, and the same privilege of organizing under the general charter conceded, and communities of Christians thus constituted were found claiming and exercising these privileges.

In this nineteenth century, in the United States and in Europe, and other portions of the earth, there are churches or congregations of disciples of Christ, constituted in like manner, under the general charter, the inspired word of God, as their only recognized authoritative guide, acknowledging Christ as their only Prophet, Priest, and King, and the Great Head of the Church, and calling themselves Christians, as the disciples of Christ were called in the apostolic age, and discarding all uninspired human creeds or distinctive sectarian names.

We claim that this God-given right has never been taken away by the Head of the Church, and that congregations thus constituted and set in order, in any part of the world are, and of right ought to be considered churches of Christ, with all the rights and immunities thereto pertaining.

These are the churches against which the malevolent shafts of the Text Book are leveled, these

THE CHURCHES. II

the people that are therein stigmatized as CampbeUites, and this following the inspired teaching, the abused doctrine so flippantly, slanderously, and blasphemously caricatured as Campbellism.

The Text Book claims to speak from a Baptist stand point, apparently oblivious to the old proverb that: " Those who live in glass houses should not throw stones." Any child that can read the New Testament through can learn that there is no Baptist church known in the New Testament, and that no followers or disciples of Christ are in that book ever called Baptists, but that they are called Christians. Historians know that no Baptist churches appear on the pages of history, anterior to the " dark ages," and no communities of Christians, calling themselves Baptists during the same period. These are simple historical facts. But this subject will be treated in its place.

The author of the Text Book, by way of excuse for opposing the people he is slandering, claims to find a precedent in the case of Paul disputing in the school of Tyrannus, p. 3. But there is no analogy at this point. I admit that he can claim, as his prototype, '' Saul, yet breathing out threatenings and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord," and reproduce his animus, in ''being exceedingly mad against them." But if that is any honor to him I would not strip him of his laurels. He claims to represent the Baptists, and seems to make Baptist usage his measuring reed, by which to measure even Scripture itself, as will appear further along. And what is a Baptist church, that it should be made the standard of faith and practice ? A bantling of post mediaeval growth . If the animus of the Text Book is a fair exponent of Baptist faith and manners, let me wash my hands from its contamination, and be delivered from its contagion. But far be it from me to charge upon our Baptist brethren all the errors and perversions of the Text Book.

Chapter II. Bearing False Witness

There are two waj^s of bearing false witness : ((3^) By explicit statement. (^) By implication. The one may be called a predicated falsehood, the other an implied falsehood. But these little things, these what-you-call-ems, these somethings that a man says explicitly or implicitly, when he knows they are not so, need not be called " white lies," when known to be of the opposite color.

If a man should say that he saw a flock of flying goats, sailing through the air and lighting on the barn, some innocent persons might question his veracity. And his explanation or excuse that they were birds, but he chose to call them goats would scarcely in the minds of children, exonerate him from the charge of willful deception.

In the Text Book, the Disciples of Christ are persistently called Campbellites, and they are never so called in the Scriptures ; and the apostles' doctrine which they adopt, as persistently called Campbellism, and the churches constituted under the general charter, the New Testament, called Campbellite churches. Every instance of this kind I regard as a palpable violation of the ninth commandment which says : '' Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor." Then the Disciples of Christ are stigmatized as disciples of Alexander Campbell, a charge which the false accuser, with all his "wiles" never brought against the disciples in the apostolic age. It remained for that species of vindictiveness to culminate in the nineteenth century. When it is considered that these nicknames, slanderous appellations, and opprobrious epithets, are evidently intended to create prejudice against the people and teaching so named, it will scarcely be admitted that these implied falsehoods are less culpable than \}iiQ, -predicated on^^.

Of these implied falsehoods, the Text Book contains over six hundred by actual count, and I can give the pages on which they occur.

Of predicated misrepresentations, false accusations, etc., they come trooping by scores, till they merge into the hundreds. I will present some specimens of these in succeeding chapters, but space will forbid my calling attention to all.

I have heard of men " rolling sin under their tongue as a sweet morsel." But that one man should aggregate such a mouthful of them as to spit out over half a thousand in one book, startles us as one of the " seven wonders of the age."

Let me say once for all that there are no Campbellite churches, nor Campbellites, except in the imaginations of men. If Mr. Ray has colonized a body of Campbellites, in some portion of this

BEARING FALSE WITNESS. 15

physical universe, let him have the credit of it, and wear with blushing honors the title of " Daddy of all the Campbellites."

No congregation has ever been organized under the name, Campbellite. No church has ever adopted the writings of Alexander Campbell as their creed or rules of faith and practice. They receive nothing as authoritative, because from Mr. Campbell. If he teaches according to the New Testament, and they teach and practice according to the same book, they must harmonize ; but if Mr. Campbell teaches not according to the Scriptures, they differ from him just as they would differ from any other teacher or preacher.

I have preached over five thousand discourses, and never once quoted from Mr. Campbell, or appealed to him as authority, and never went to his writings to learn what to preach. Indeed, I had been a member of the church eighteen years, and preached hundreds of discourses before I read Mr. Campbell's Treatise on the Christian System, a book which ignorant persons have called Mr. Campbell's Creed. I would differ from Mr. C. in my teaching just as soon as I would differ from any other man. If Mr. Ray can find errors in Mr. Campbell's teaching, he has no right to charge them on the .churches, or the Disciples of Christ. They are not responsible for his errors. He was only one of many who struggled to discard the errors of modern theology and modern creeds, l6 TEXT BOOIt E:XPOSED.

and take nothing but the pure word of God for their guide. Then it is not fair, to say the least, to make Mr. Campbell a scape-goat, to bear all the sin of returning to the ''apostles' doctrine," as their only guide in faith and manners.

I come not to defend Mr. Campbell's doctrine as such. But I am set for the defence of the teaching of the Scriptures, which are so perverted in the Text Book. But where Mr. Campbell is maligned, traduced and slandered, I am at liberty to expose the miserable attempt to heap opprobrium upon the character of the dead. And this I propose doing to some extent.

I have in my notes about three hundred passages in the Text Book demanding attention, but space will compel me to generalize, segregate, aggregate classify and condense, in order to bring it into reasonable space.

Chapter III. False Accusations

I. He further charges that :

** These people usually deny their real sentiments when closely pressed in argument." p. 4.

It is not necessary for me to refute this old and oft repeated slander, when every sensible and well informed person knows it to be false, for how could this self-appointed judge of hearts know the " real sentiments " of these people, in contrast with their publicly taught sentiments ? This charge of duplicity is made before he gets out of the preface, and is enough to brand with suspicion everything that follows. For the presumption is that he judges by himself, for " out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh."

2: On page 40 he says :

*' I am confident that the Campbellites are now using the name C7irisiia?i as Mr. Campbell once did the name Baptist, as a passport to favor or popularitj^ It appears that the greatest objection to the name Ckristia?i with Mr. Campbell, arose from the fact that it had been appropriated .by Mr. Stone to his society before Mr. Campbell came to the stage as a reformer. And now if the name chosen by Mr. Stone is given to Campbell's reformation, then a part of the honor of this reformation will be given to Stone."

He then quotes in proof. Mill. Harb. N. S., vol.

ill, p. 338. But his witness condemns him. For it shows that instead of selecting a name for the -people of the societies^ he was selecting a name for his -periodical^ and Tiesitated between the names " The Christian," ''Baptist Christian," and ''Christian Baptist." He chose the latter, but when he found the people began to be called " Christian Baptists," he changed the title of his periodical.

*' They tamely take the bare statement of Mr. Campbell as satisfactory proof that they are right on this point in the reformation."

The point was the setting up of the kingdom. But they take the Scriptures and not the bare word of any man. I will develop that subject under the proper head. And if Mr. Campbell should leave the sunlight of the gospel age, and plunge into the mists of the twilight period, where the Baptists claim to find the kingdom set up, we shall not follow him there.

4. Again, p. 70 he says :

** But Mr. Campbell, the mighty reformer {or rather deformer) of the nineteenth century, tells us that " there [at Jerusalem on the day of Pentecost] the gos^pel was first preached I ' But he does not favor us with the proof of this bald-faced assertion. His word seems to be more current with the current reforination than the testimony of Jesus Christ."

That this spiteful thrust is a "bald-faced assertion," will appear when I shall show from the " testimony of Jesus " and the apostles when the gospel of a crucified and risen Savior was first proclaimed to the world, " for the obedience of the faith."

5. On p. 89, he quotes from Mr. Campbell Chr. Bap. p. 9 :

**The present popular exhibition of the Christian religion is a compound of Judaism, heathen philosophy and Christianity."

On the above sentence Mr. Ray says :

"Mr. Campbell viewed Christianity ^.'s> compounded with Judaism, and heathen philosoph}'."

Now a glance at the sentence quoted shows that Mr. Campbell did not say Christimiity was a compound, etc., but '^ the present -pofular exhibition'' of it.

" I have shown that Mr. Campbell only adopted the name, Baptist from expediency ^ as a passport to favor I '*

This I have exposed in No. 2. Besides, his own witness on the next page testifies against him. He says Mr. Campbell declined taking charge of Baptist churches in New York and Philadelphia, '' on the ground that he did not think they would submit to the government of Jesus Christ, or the primitive order of things."

7. He quotes, p. no, from Mill. Harb., N. S., vol. i, p. 149 :

^* In no instance has a majority of any of our churches ever cast out a minority of Baptists for any difference of opinion ; but how often their majorities have cast out our minorities during the last ten years, it would pain me to record."

Mark, this casting out of minorities, was not for immorality ^ but difference of oi>inion . They would not follow Baptist opinions, but insisted upon following the Holy Scriptures as their only authoritative guide, and hence were '' cast out." From the history of these proceedings, the Text Book renders its judgment thus :

** These quotations show that the Campbellites remained among the Baptists until they were ^ forced ' or ^ cast out.' They really date the beginning of their reformation in doctrine back as far as 1809, though they had no organization until they were cast out from among the Baptists in 1827. I am confident that they only came in among us to gain respectability and strength."

What a perversion ! They cajiie in among us! and that too for a sinister purpose. The history of those times, shows that instead of coming in^ it was a large class of the more intelligent, and better informed, and conscientious Baptists, coming out from the mists of human teachings under a human name, into the full light of the gospel.

8. The Text Book, p. 126, charges upon Mr. Campbell, that he " avows that he started from nothing to ' make a new sect' " And adds : "If nothing \N?iS the foundation, then it was a work of creation." Now turn to page 124 and see what Mr. C. is talking about. He quotes Mr. Campbell in C. and R. Debate, p. 473 :

^'Here is the Presbyterian Church, with its eighty ministers, its eight thousand and less members, after the Labors of more than half a century. In one third of that time the cause we plead, .

. . by the force of this simple story of God's Messiah, and his love depicted in this mighty Pentecostian Gospel, and under the star of Jacob — led, guided, aided and blessed — from nothing, having in less than twenty years, outnumbered this old, learned, and well disciplined host, some five to one."

Any one can see that the ''nothing" does not refer to \h^ foundation, but to the number of members coming out of the mists of sectarianism and building upon the one foundation of the gospel, here in America, and in the nineteenth century. But this perversion of the language may be necessary to sustain an abortive effort to make it appear that the churches of Christ have made a new foundation. If this will pass current as Baptist usage, it will not be endorsed as Christian usage.

9. In sneering at the apostolic teaching of being baptized into Christ, he says, p. 137 :

" But this new fold of the nineteenth century, the reformed fold proposes to take goats and put them into the fold in order to make sheep of them."

This blasphemy comes with a bad grace from one who baptizes into a Baptist church, instead of baptizing into Christ, and who claims to have them saved out of Christ, anci out of his kingdom, for he says: "The kingdom of Jesus is the fold for the sheep." p. 137. Then it follows that, if they baptize them into the fold, or church, or kingdom, and have them saved before baptism, they have them saved out of the kingdom, which locates salvation outside the kingdom. Therefore, if the Baptist Church is the "kingdom of Jesus," salvation is outside the Baptist Church, and it will be safe to " come out of her," or stay out of her.

** The Bethany Reformer contradicts the angel by denying the right of the unbaptized to pray at all! "

In proof he quotes from Christianity Restored, p. 247:

^* As well, as reasonably might you pray for loaves from heaven, or manna, because Israel eat it in the desert, as to pray for pardon, while you refuse the remission of your sins by immersion."

He then exclaims triumphantly, in capitals :

"Hear it: As well, as reasonably might you pray for loaves from heaven, as to pray for pardon before immer- SION ! "

You can see the quotation from Mr. Campbell don't say that, but says "pray for pardon, while you 7'cfitse^'''' etc. Any one can see that the voluntary overflowing of the heart of the contrite sinner, in prayer, is a very different thing from stubbornly refusingio obey Christ, and yet praying for pardon in disobedience.

But the Text Book does injustice to Mr. Campbell in the above quotation. I will give the quotation in its connection :

** He has commanded immersion for the remission of sins; and think you that he will change his institution because of your stubborn or intractable disposition? As well as reasonably might you pray for loaves from heaven or manna, because Israel eat it in the desert, as to pray for pardon while you refuse the remission of your sins by immersion."

This does not deny the " right of the unbaptized to pray at all." But the authority to pray/i^r -pardon while refusing obedience.

The Text Book also misrepresents Paul on the same page, thus :

** There is no duty more clearly and forcibly set forth in the Bible than that all men every wJiere ought to pray to God."

There he charges the Bible with teaching what it nowhere teaches. And, I think, a doctrine that requires the manufacture of Scripture to sustain it may well be questioned. Paul, in speaking of the worship in the churches, says :

** I will, therefore, that men [the men] praj everywhere, lifting up holy hands, without wrath or doubting." i Tim. ii : 8.

Notice, he does not say " all men ^^' but men in the church w^ho can lift u-p holy hands.

He concludes, by saying, p. 148 :

" Then it is a capital item in the reformation to restrain the sinner from prayer."

A charge as void of truth as anything ever uttered by unregenerate lips.

II. A proposition at the head of a section, p. 155, reads thus :

** Campbellite repentance begins and ends in immersion."

Same page :

*^ I will close this chapter by showing that Campbellite repentance consists alone in being immersed, or it begins and ends in immersion."

The evidence, that the author of the Text Book knew the above was false when he wrote it, will be found on p. 159, where he quotes from Mill. Harb. N. S. v. 5, p. 301, in the following style:

" But here is the Campbellite order from the author of the system himself. He says : * The items of redemption ' are, * on man's part: ist. Faith in the person, office, and character of Christ, with special reference to his death as a sin offering; 2d. Repentance; 3d. Baptism. Then are we in covenant with God through the Mediator.' The Campbellites seem more united upon this order in the reformation than upon any other item. They all proclaim faitJi and repentance in perfect harmony in regard to this order, though they may be as wide as the poles apart on other points."

A man who perpetrates a great many falsehoods ought to have a good memory to avoid being caught, unless he be Hke the man we read of who never could be caught in a lie, because he was out of one and into another so fast they could not overtake him. ^

12. We can now appreciate the true inwardness of the following, p. 361 :

** Campbellites teach that immersion alone is the act of turning to God."

But Mr. Campbell does not say ''the act," but " that act," referring to an overt act of i'dA\kv following faith and repentance ^ and called turning to God, and called the constumnating act, as quoted by Text Book, p. 156. And yet he tries to make the impression that immersion is the only thing required. See also p. 211, Text Book.

13. A proposition in capitals, p. 158, reads : **Mr. Campbell has inverted the order of repentance

AND FAITH."

This is a false charge. But I shall show the Scriptural order of faith and repentance under the head of Turning to God, and that the Baptists have inverted the order.

** But Campbellites act on a faith without love, therefore, theirs is a dead faith.''''

He might just as well have said any other false and silly thing, if he could have thought of it. But I presume no sane person will believe it.

15. Proposition at the head of section, p. 167, reads :

** Campbellite faith is produced without divine assistance."

And, p. 168, says :

'' Thus Mr. Campbell sports at the idea of any moral improvement by the exercise of faith."

To prove these charges, he says, p. 169:

** Again Mr. Campbell says: * You talk of a faith -wi-oiight i7i the heart. You might as well talk of 'light, or seeing wrought in the eye, of sound or hearing Avrought in the ear, of taste wrought in the tongue, or of feeling wrought in the hand. It is the quintessence of mj^sticism. ' This is a fair exposition of Campbellite faith ; it is produced independent of the aid of th3 Holy Spirit!"

This misrepresents Mr. Campbell. Here is what Mr. C. says in its connection, Mill. Harb. v. 2,

'' But observe that the descent of the Holy Spirit was to help them to prove that what they spake was true. In this way persons can be helped to believe, and this is the only way in which one can help another to believe. For this help v,e contend. This was the use of the miracles, the tongues, the gifts of healing, the powers, etc., which attended the preaching of the apostles. But you speak of an internal operation upon the mind to produce faith. You talk of a faith vjr ought i7i the heart. You might as well talk of light or seeing Avrought in the eye, of sound or hearing v/rought in the ear, of taste wrought in the tongue, or of feeling wrought in the hand. It is the quintessence of mysticism. To help one to see, we increase the light; to help one to hear, we speak loud. But creating of eyes and ears is a different work."