Theta's Reply to Cullan and Alpha.

I have carefully read, and I think fully appreciated all that has been said by these two brethren touching my article on communion, in the December Quarterly. The brotherly tone and bearing, of both, commend them to high consideration of all who prefer dignified discussion, to unworthy efforts at degenerating an opponent’s standing, on account of different sentiments. It would not be right to ask the courteous Editor to burden the pages of the Quarterly with a reply to every point that has been made against my position; and although I feel confident that every such issue could be fairly met, no more space ought to be asked for, than is necessary to refute the more troublesome arguments presented by the reviewers. In this article the main issues made by both can be discussed without replying to each one separately. Still, it may be due to myself, and satisfactory to the reader, to notice a number of minor matters first, and dispose of each in a sentence or two.

1. a. Cullan, especially, seems to think that the question for discussion ought to be stated this way—shall we hold to the Bible as a guide, or to human opinion? This is not the question before us. It is rather, what does the Bible teach as to the normal condition of such men as have not been able to learn the whole truth? I presume he will find no opponent with his statement of the issue.

b. They both seem to understand me as contending that men have the right to relax the conditions of salvation. Nearly one fourth of Cullan’s essay is a discussion of this strange conception of his. The only question debated is whether God ever exercises his prerogative in acting above his own law, and relaxes his own conditions in favor of the unfortunate. I showed that he has done so in many cases, and that it would be nothing unusual with him so to treat the unimmersed.

c. It is thought that my views tend to slacken the efforts of sinners in regard to obedience. How God’s making allowance for those that could not know the truth, can form any excuse for responsible sinners, is not easy to understand. Their admission in regard to some getting to heaven without immersion, will have as much tendency to slacken efforts to do right, as will mine. The reviewers seem never to have discovered that their admission involves all the relaxing that mine does.

d. “If the pious unimmersed are in the church then God has [416] two modes of induction.” Both Cullan and Alpha must admit that the ordained way to heaven is through the church, and yet both do admit that some may be in heaven who were not in the church—to ways to heaven. Again Alpha says, “God might have pardoned Luther at or before his death”—without immersion of course—this is one way of pardon. But that the scriptural way is by faith and obedience, they will not deny—another way. This makes for them two ways of pardon, and two ways to heaven. Notwithstanding, Alpha admits that some may be pardoned “at or before death,” without immersion, on the same page he denies the possibility of pardon, or of having the Holy Spirit, to any such persons. He affirms, however, that God “does relax some of the conditions of entering heaven.” Putting these things together, we make out what this relaxing really consists in—it is in taking to heaven without remission, without the Holy Spirit, without being a Christian, or ever having communed in their lives. This is allowance-making without stint. Cullan also admits that some may reach heaven without having learned or obeyed but “one or two” of the conditions of entering the church; that is, without immersion. Instead of sounding an alarm over Theta’s comparatively innocent solution of the moral problem involved in this discussion, they ought to be considering whether they are not liable to a charge in “the next ecclesiastical court” of departing from the “plain simple teaching of the word of God.”

e. Alpha asks, “for what do I baptize the unimmersed if they are already in the kingdom?” I will also ask one question: For what do you baptize them if they can reach heaven without it? Answer me. If Alpha still insists on my answer coming first; here it is. 1. I baptize them for the answer of a good conscience, that the evidence of their pardon may be based on the word of God, instead of their own unsteady feelings. 2. I baptize them because, though they may have “counted for circumcision,” they have not been properly introduced into the kingdom. 3. I baptize them because, though “an independent act of sovereignty” may have placed them in the kingdom, their disobedience when their duty is known, would soon put them out of it. And lastly, I baptize them because while God has confined us as preachers, to the regular form of introducing them into the kingdom, he himself may not be obliged to work by squares, triangles, quadrangles, or parallelograms. Can Alpha give as satisfactory reasons for his practice? Alpha admits that Luther lacked “the same fitness for the church as for heaven, neither more not less.” [417] Of course then the want of immersion throws no more difficulty in his way at the door of the church than at the gate of heaven. How strange then, that both Cullan and Alpha should prognosticate the disruption, dissolution, and disintegration of all the “conditions of salvation,” simply because Theta contends that God can hold his High Court of Equity in front of the church, as well as in front of heaven.

f. The cases of Uzza, the young prophet of Judah, and King Saul, are all instances of punishment for the violation of known laws, and that too, in a dispensation when God was establishing his character among men as a lawgiver. They can therefore have no application here.

g. Alpha thinks “if a man get into the church without immersion, it is right to go out and preach it; that it is our duty to preach it.” This logic is delightful. Why then does he not start out and preach that God may forgive a man “at or before death” without immersion? Or why not go out preaching that men can get to heaven without immersion by virtue of what Cullan calls an “independent act of sovereignty”? If it be true it ought to be preached. Both our reviewers seem to have left their rear unprotected, and not to have suspected that their admissions in regard to God’s relaxing his law in the way they suppose, would be more difficult than in the way I presume to affirm.

Finally, the last item to be noticed in this division is the fact that God has often acted above his own written law, both in granting a blessing, and withholding the punishment where the naked law would not warrant it. Cullan may write as many more pages to prove that David broke no law in eating the show bread, and still it will remain that the Saviour quoted both this circumstance, and that concerning the priests in the temple profaning the Sabbath, to justify the apostles in violating the letter of the law in pulling ears of corn on that day. The Jews had no permission in their law to neglect either circumcision or the passover, but because they could not attend these ordinances, while traveling in the wilderness, the Lord seems not to have held them responsible for the omission. The laws of nature were suspended or outdone in every instance of a miracle wrought by Jesus Christ, without discounting in the least the value of the regular ordinary action of those laws. So in religion.

2. We now approach the discussion of several subjects requiring an ample development. And first, it is quite common for some of us to deny without ceremony, and sometimes without much study, that God ever accepts equivalents. But does the Bible teach it? is the question. It is very easy to keep exhorting us all to stand to the “simple truth,” the “plain teachings,” &c., but [418] legitimate questions sometimes arise that the simple plain truths cannot explain. Addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division will not serve for the solution of problems in the higher mathematics. Yet these are the plain simple teachings of mathematics. This does not imply that John iii. 5, Mark xvi: 16, are insufficient for those who know the truth, for they are the power of God to such, but it does imply that these passages cannot settle the question for those for whom “an independent act of sovereignty” is necessary.

It was stated by one of the brethren in the A.C. Review, that God might accept the will for the deed, or the “spirit of obedience,” for “obedience,” as an equivalent in the case of those who could not learn the whole truth. Those who took the opposite view, considered this a dangerous departure from the truth, and fell to exhorting us all to cleave to the “simple truth,” without ever examining whether God ever really does accept such an equivalent. Now in what I shall say on this page, I do not profess to cleave to the simple plain truth, for we are not investigating a simple plain subject. “The Bible has its shallows where a lamb may wade, and its depths where an elephant may swim.” The four rules of arithmetic, just named, cannot solve a problem in algebra, or analytical geometry, and the question we are now discussing cannot be decided but by Scriptures applicable to it; and whoever cannot go beyond the simple teaching is not prepared to read this controversy. The question is simply this: Do the Scriptures throw any light upon this inquiry—will God accept the faith, the piety, the purity, the humble prayerfulness, the life long labor for the glory of the cross, as witnessed in such a man as Richard Baxter, who, after all his Bible study, never learned immersion, and own him as his child? Untaught question, says one? Not too hasty, try to hesitate a little just here; perhaps it is not wholly an untaught question. If the Bible teaches that our God ever accepts equivalents it would not be inconsistent in such a case as this to take the will for the deed where the deed could not be performed.

Here then comes the contest as to Scripture teaching. And as an illustration and proof of the principle; did not God accept Abraham’s faith as an equivalent for a perfect obedience to law? “Faith was counted to Abraham for righteousness.” In Paul’s day, did not the Jews fail to attain to righteousness, seeking it by a perfect obedience? and did not the Gentiles attain to righteousness by means of faith? Now a perfect obedience is equivalent to legal righteousness, and faith is equivalent to legal righteousness; and two things equal to the same thing are equal to each other; that is, an active faith in Christ, is accepted as an [419] equivalent for a perfect obedience of the law of Moses; and in this way alone “the righteousness of the law (of Moses) is fulfilled in us,” faith being a constant work of God.

Again, “Therefore if the uncircumcision keep the righteousness of the law, shall not his uncircumcision be counted for circumcision?” Rom. 2: 26. Uncircumcision counted for circumcision! How could the uncircumcised keep the righteousness of the law, when circumcision itself, to which they had never submitted, was a part of that law? Now, circumcision, although practiced before Moses wrote the law, was, nevertheless, a part of that law—“Ye on the Sabbath day circumcise a man that the law of Moses be not broken.” Here it is plainly stated that the Gentiles kept the righteousness of that law having entirely failed to obey one of its plainest and most objective commands. I know this is a riddle to many, and yet it is in the Bible, and we are often told we must “stick to the truth.” I have no doubt that John iii: 5, is true, and I have no doubt this passage is also true, and we should have no less regard for the one than for the other, for they are both in the Bible. Whatever struggles may be made to extricate one’s self from this difficulty, it still remains that “uncircumcision was counted for circumcision”—taken as an equivalent under the circumstances—the will for the deed, the spirit of obedience for obedience.

But what is meant by “keeping the righteousness of the law”? The next verse shall be our commentary—“And shall not uncircumcision which is by nature if it fulfil the law judge thee?” Then keeping the righteousness of the law simply means fulfilling the law. What! fulfil the law without having obeyed that ordinance which initiates a Gentile into the Jewish church! It really seems so. And were such Gentiles members of the Jewish church? Not formally, certainly; but morally and religiously the Lord considered such to be Jews, for “he is not a Jew who is one outwardly, but he is a Jew who is one inwardly.” That is, those Gentiles who “showed the work of the law written in their hearts,” were “counted” as Jews, as the circumcision, although they had not learned the duty of circumcision, and had never obeyed it. Now, if the Lord can so far accept equivalents as to count uncircumcision for circumcision under the circumstances above named, it gives us an insight into the mind of God, and how he will, or may manage cases in the Christian dispensation who, like those Gentiles, long after the knowledge and ways of truth, but never find it all out—their uncircumcision may be counted for circumcision. The truths embraced in these passages are not simple plain truths, nor do we profess to be dealing at present with easy truths. We are looking into the deep things of God, for it is right to speak wisdom among them that are perfect. Mr. Baxter was [420] commonly known in his own circle of intimate acquaintances as “Holy Mr. Baxter,” and although he never entered the kingdom according to the legal, regular form thereof, it would be nothing new, nor unusual for God to count him as one of his children. I can always commune with those whom God communes with. This would compromise no truth, it would sanction no error, nor relax any command.

3. But Cullan has developed a doctrine that will seem both new and startling to our readers. He takes the ground that both sprinkling and pouring are to receive the divine sanction at the gate of heaven. Strange how extremes will meet. Be not alarmed, gentle reader, for Cullan’s own language shall make out his new doctrine. On page 290 he says: “If Luther can be saved when he had not been immersed,” * * then “not only is immersion as a divinely ordained term of admission to the church relaxed, but sprinkling and pouring receive the divine sanction at the gate of heaven.” In this sentence he intended, evidently, to place the probability of Luther’s salvation in as hopeless a condition as is the probability that sprinkling and pouring will receive the divine sanction at the gate of heaven. The two stand or fall together. If Luther is saved, sprinkling is indorsed. This being so, it is fair to say that if Luther’s prospects should improve, pouring also will rise toward par value. Turn then to page 287 and read—“Truth and candor compel us to say that we do not know whether Luther is in heaven or not.” Of course, then, he does not, by this time, exactly know whether sprinkling or pouring will be sanctioned or not, for they are following the fortunes of Luther—cannot exactly decide against them, for after he has conscripted all his “truth and candor,” he dares not so decide. Now on the same page see the essayist reach the climax—“If Luther was worth saving—a question which we do not dispute—then our Father forgave him his errors.” So sure as Luther was worth saving, which is not denied, so sure was he forgiven, and taken to heaven, and so sure “sprinkling and pouring receive the divine sanction at the gate of heaven.” This is something original. It not only proves the author’s faith in the final salvation of some without immersion, but proves that in the end affusion will turn out to be just as valid as the scriptural “mode.” What theological seminary will first reward the discoverer with D.D.?

If Cullan does not like this conclusion, then must he retreat from his assertion that the salvation of Luther would necessitate the sanction of sprinkling, or any other error he entertained. But it is not likely that Cullan either will, or can “pursue the advantage that lies behind,” for he has involved his logic in difficulty deeper still, proclaiming that to receive unimmersed [421] persons or to our communion is to indorse “infant baptism, and all the dogmas and unauthorized practices of Pedobaptists generally.” The principle here stated is that communing with one in error indorses the error. Well, brother Cullan will not deny that he had communed with several who hold the views I am now advocating, and of course he indorsed them. And if I have his indorsement I see no use in arguing with him any longer. We had an old father in our Israel who till the day of his death firmly believed in the doctrine of election; we have another prominent minister among us now, who once believed in Universalism, and communed every Sunday with the church and they with him. I know of another old preacher who still believes in feet- washing, and I have often communed with him without doing any of my friend Cullan’s “indorsing.” I would kindly remind him that we are not to do so much “indorsing” at the Lord’s Table, where every man should simple examine himself and “so eat of that bread and drink of that wine.”

There seems to be a new current setting in to run our churches into the unenviable attitude of the close communion Baptists. Why follow the “faith and order” of the Baptists? If Alpha and Cullan could establish their views in our churches, we would soon become as impenetrable as the “Hard Shells” themselves. The Baptists set out determined to commune with none but the immersed, but they soon discovered even this to be too broad a foundation. They must now have the same “faith and order” in other respects besides immersion, and hence, very few of them will commune with the Disciples. What their next refinement will be none can tell. One thing is clear; this closeness will become still more stringent as more light is shed around by others, for a sectarian’s mind acts like the pupil of the eye—contracts with an increase of light.

Why is communion at the Lord’s Table considered more sacred than other acts of worship? We can sing, pray, preach, &c., with those with whom we will not commune. Why? Who can give us the origin, the history, and the philosophy of this exotic notion? Does the Bible say that communion is a more sacred ordinance than prayer? Has communion any peculiar effect in averaging the aggregate piety of the communicants all around, making the bad man better, and the good man worse? People generally seem to thing the object of this ordinance is not so much to remember the Lord’s death, as to produce a sort of spiritual equilibrium among the communicants; that is, they all “indorse” for one another. Now Cullan has not given us the origin, nor history of this interloper, but the philosophy thereof he has given: it is expressed in these words—to commune with [422] the unimmersed is “a practical indorsement of all their errors”—just as the Saviour “indorsed” Judas when he was at the Lord’s Table.

4. We will now come steadily up to the master argument by which both Cullan and Alpha have attempted to outflank our position, which, as submitted in the December Quarterly, is substantially as follows: That whereas some good men have studied the Bible all their lives, anxious to know the whole will of God, and have even suffered for Jesus’ sake, and would doubtless have rejoiced to be immersed, had they known it to be their duty, and yet never found out that truth, and so have never been immersed, God may, in conformity with the known principles of his moral government, accept such as citizens of his kingdom on earth, as being Jews inwardly, taking the will for the deed, and “counting” the spirit of obedience for obedience. To surround this position by numbers our reviewers have enrolled, drafted, and conscripted all their available forces, consisting of all good Quakers, moralists, heathens, idiots, and infants, claiming that if God accepts some good men into the church on account of unfortunate circumstances, why not all? This is the argument chiefly relied on by both the writers, to the fair consideration of which we will come by consecutive approaches.

a. There is a moment in the hour of twilight when it may be difficult to say whether said moment is more akin to midday or midnight. But to argue from this that there is no difference between light and darkness would be a little illogical. It has always been difficult to draw the lines between the children of light and of darkness, but this is a poor apology for counting them as one. Cullan places the moralist who has “no faith in the atonement of Christ, but trusts to his own works, on an equality with the humble, believing, prayerful, pure-hearted, John Newton, than whom holier man has been found in but few centuries since the world began. This is a miscegenation scarcely allowable in the kingdom which we have received. To be in the kingdom of Christ it is necessary for a man to know the will of Christ; if not the entire will, at least so much of it as will put him under God’s spiritual control. This cannot be the case with infants, idiots, heathens, moralists, or any other class of human beings who either cannot or will not put themselves under the government of our King. As it is no easy task to decide where human reason ceases and animal instinct begins, or where the irresponsibility of childhood ceases and its responsibility begins, so it would be impossible for one not able to search the hearts, or to know just how much allowance God will make for the unfortunate, to decide upon the precise point at which, in such a one’s [423] religious progress, God my consider him fit to be “counted” a child of grace. While I will make no effort at such a discrimination, I cannot but repudiate all that labor-saving classification, that arrays the classes above named in all the same condition, relative to church membership, with the unimmersed man who has read, and prayerfully studied the word of God—believes and obeys all he understands of it—and enjoys ever so humble a hope of salvation by the blood of Christ. The phrase “some good men,” then, passing the crucibles of both the reviewers, turns out, to a well chosen expression. Socrates, Cicero, and Aristides the just, though good men, could not be considered Christians, never having heard of Christ, and so as to the other classes named. I think, then, I am entitled to the full benefit of the adjective some, and am logically responsible only for the class described in our “position.”

b. Assuming now that we have to do only with such, we will inquire into the reason for excluding them from Christian fellowship. It must be admitted by every unprejudiced mind, that what are called the orthodox churches, accept far more truth than they reject—that if they were wrong in the hundreds of subjects on which they are now right, and would even get right on baptism and the few other subjects on which they are now wrong, it would instantly convulse the whole Protestant world. For a graphic statement as to the large percentum of truth held as common ground between us and the Presbyterians, the reader is referred to Elder John Rogers’ “Review of the Report of the Transylvania Presbytery,” in which the writer fills four pages of that finely written pamphlet with a mere catalog of Bible truths in which we agree. I refer to this as good authority; for Brother Rogers is not the man to crave the favor of sectarians, or to shrink from a full, bold statement of all the points at issue. They are our allies in support of the Bible itself against the attacks of its enemies. Now, admitting them to be wrong, of course, in eight or ten Scripture truths in which we are advance of them, let us examine the basis of this close communion theory.

c. Cullan and Alpha are willing, no doubt, to commune with Baptists, but not with unimmersed Methodists; the preference being based solely on the immersion of the former. On every subject except the proper subject and action of baptism, the one is as far wrong as the other. And hence, even to commune with Baptists, according to Cullan’s own reasoning, you must indorse all their monthly [424] communion, and close communion, even as to the immersed of other churches not of the “same faith and order,” besides indorsing their creeds, and mourning-benches. All this must be done in communing with modern Baptists; and yet Cullan and Alpha would prefer the fellowship of such to that of one right in everything but immersion. Again, if they are willing to commune with all immersed believers they would not refuse the fellowship of the Waldenses, or such like. But these both believed in, and practiced infant baptism. True, some modern Baptist writers have endeavored to relieve them from this charge, but the evidence against them is too strong to be doubted. Moreover, if the right action of baptism is to overrule every other consideration, they will not refuse the communion of Dunkers, for they are immersed believers. Here, then, is more indorsing for Cullan, for the Dunkers practice trine immersion, and the Editor of the A. C. Review says, trine immersion is valid, for “being immersed three times of course, they were immersed once.” They also believe in and practice penance, and the mortifications of the flesh for sins; teach works of supererogation, celibacy, that the gospel is preached to the dead, that the Jewish Sabbath should still be kept, instead of the Lord’s day, feet-washing, the holy kiss, and so on. Now all these errors are rejected by the Pedobaptists with whom the reviewers will not commune for want of immersion, who upon the whole perhaps have more truth than the long-bearded Dunkers. How much would be gained by accepting these at the Lord’s Table in preference to such a man as the unimmersed Charles Wesley, may possibly be enough to build the close communion doctrine upon, but if so, it is because the doctrine itself is so close and narrow that it does not need much ground to stand upon. The truth is, no one, immersed or unimmersed, ought to be encouraged to the Lord’s Table unless he be either legally introduced into the church, or unless, innocently ignorant of the initiatory ordinance, he be, nevertheless, a Jew inwardly, having the circumcision of the heart, it being decided in Heaven’s own Chancery that his uncircumcision ought in equity to be counted for circumcision. Such persons can commune and do commune despite all the disabilities that may be thrown in their way.

Finally, Cullan thinks we have no right to take any “supposed principles of final judgment,” and apply them to God’s dealings with men in this world. But this one use of those principles of final judgment we have a right to: as God never changes his righteous principles, we know that whatever considerations govern his decisions on that day in cases that cannot be judged by the law, will prevail in every case of equity whether it be here or [425] hereafter. The “Court of Equity” is said to “proceed upon rules of equity and conscience, to moderate the rigor of the common law, and to give relief in cases where there is no remedy in the common law.”—Webster. The necessity for a Court of Equity does not arise out of imperfections in the laws of God, or men, but out of the circumstances of men in which it would not be right to judge them by the “rigor of the common law.” Some men, as many as have sinned in the law, “shall be judged by the law,” but God needs a Court of Equity or Chancery for all other cases for whom the “rigor of the law” must be relaxed. Now, the Lord can hold his Chancery in one place as well as another, and can “give relief in cases where there is no remedy in the common law,” in front of the church as well as in front of heaven. We have nothing to do in this high Court—no seat there—and yet if there is such a court revealed in the Bible, we have a right to know it. When I simply prove the existence of such a court, how inappropriate for Cullan to reply as if he were called upon to defend the “common law.” Who attacked the common law? Does the Court of Equity weaken the sanctions of common law? Cullan seems to think so, for he calls this very principle, page 290, “a conflict of divine authority.” He thinks this puts “the law of discipleship in conflict with the law of final judgment.” This is true so far as equity is in conflict with common law and no further. Who ever, before Cullan, discovered that the advocate of equity “breaks down the distinction between elementary truth and error” in the common law? Had Cullan understood the real issue before us, I am sure he would not have used four pages of the Quarterly in fighting a foe of his own creation.

I must reply to another singular specimen of logic. Cullan, strange to say, did not, on reviewing and correcting his manuscript, turn the stylus upon the following sentiment: That if the sprinkled can be considered Christians, then “sprinkling and immersion are equal in their practical value.” That is, if God in mercy receive a man into his favor who entertains an error in theory, or practice, or both; then that error the Lord has indorsed and it is equal to a truth. I have often thought some men, and indeed all Christian men, will be saved in spite of their errors, but never by means of them. No man is worth a hundred percent, either as to his knowledge or practice of religious duty. There is a discount upon every one of us.

So there is some alloy in gold and silver coin, but who would say the alloy is what gives it commercial value? or that the alloy is proved to be of “equal value,” simply because it is used or handled with gold? Yet Cullan thinks if a person be, even by “an independent act of sovereignty,” acknowledged a child of God while he is somewhat [426] in error, that this at once transmutes the alloy into gold. We do not say that all errors are of equal magnitude, or that a failure to be immersed is a no more serious discount than the ordinary imperfections of a Christian’s life; I only intend by this paragraph to let a little light in upon Cullan’s new discovery, and untwist his bad logic. We are to teach the whole will of God and raise the per centum of truth in every man’s mind and heart up as near to the par value as possible, although at a discount ourselves. Laverrier discovered the last solar planet; Brother Campbell with others, discovered the last religious truths we have learned, but there were both astronomers and Christians before these, thank the Lord. We should keep up separate churches, not because there are no other Christians in the world, but that we may the more successfully individualize our newly discovered truths, and to compel the world to take a step forward. To stand at the head of the Protestant reformation is honor enough without attempting to unchristianize those men of God by whose labors and sufferings for the last three hundred years this summit has been gained.

I would not conceal my opposition and aversion to our churches ever dropping into the rear of the Baptists and following the ill-fortunes of the doctrine of close communion which has always stood in the way of the union and fellowship even of the immersed. This never has been our position, as Prof. Pendleton showed in the Review from the writings of Brother Campbell, and there is but little ground to fear that it ever will be. Its supporters have never advanced their cause by it; it tends to indurate the churches and banish from our communion many a soul that enjoys the communion of the Holy Spirit. If we could all learn what this meaneth, “I will have mercy and not sacrifice,” perhaps we would not condemn the guiltless unimmersed.

Theta.

THETA’S REPLY TO CULLAN AND ALPHA