Who was the first Baptist, and where was the first Baptist church? When did Baptists begin, and who was their founder?
A lot of people ask these questions. We want to know about our denominational roots. To know our beginnings will help us understand ourselves today.
These sound like simple questions, and one might expect brief and simple answers. The story of Baptist beginnings, however, is surprisingly complicated; and not everyone agrees on the conclusions. Perhaps this is one reason such questions have been so controversial in the past.
Some people try to trace organized Baptist churches back to New Testament times or to John the Baptist. One writer even suggested that Adam was the first Baptist! Certainly we believe that our doctrine and faith root in the New Testament, but we first meet our organized denomination considerably this side of Adam.
Our best historical evidence says that Baptists came into existence in England in the early seventeenth century. They apparently emerged out of the Puritan-Separatist movement in the Church of England. Some of these earnest people read the Bible in their own language, believed it, and sought to live by it. They formed separate congregations which accepted only believers into their membership, and they baptized converts upon their profession of faith. Their opponents nicknamed them “Baptists,” and the name stuck. This pamphlet will fill in some of the details of that story.
Two Kinds of Baptists
Baptists came into existence as two distinct groups, with somewhat different beliefs and practices, but with believer’s baptism in common. The two main strands were known as General Baptists and Particular Baptists. There were also a few Sabbatarian or Seventh-day Baptists in the late seventeenth century, but they were never numerous.
General Baptists.–The General Baptists got their name because they believed in a general atonement. They believed Christ died for all people generally, and that whoever would believe in Christ could be saved. The first General Baptist church, led by John Smyth, was founded in Amsterdam, Holland, in 1608/09. Its members were English refugees who had fled England to escape religious persecution.
John Smyth was a minister in the Church of England. As a student and later as a pastor and teacher, he developed Puritan and Separatist views and sought to bring biblical reform to the church. When this failed, he joined a small Separatist congregation in Gainsborough, near London. As these Separatists grew so that it became dangerous for them to meet openly, they divided into two groups for convenience. One group moved to Scrooby Manor, where they were led by John Robinson, William Brewster, and William Bradford. Later, this little band became the nucleus of the “Pilgrim Fathers” who sailed to America on the Mayflower.
The Gainsborough remnant, led by John Smyth, was in daily danger. English law prohibited such independent or dissenting churches, and King James I had vowed to deal harshly with any who refused to attend the Church of England. By 1607, the Gainsborough group had decided to migrate across the English Channel to Amsterdam, a city that provided religious liberty.
When these English exiles, led by John Smyth and a layman named Thomas Helwys, left England, they were not yet Baptists. In Amsterdam, they came into contact with Dutch Mennonites, a branch of the Anabaptist family that taught religious liberty and baptism of believers only. Historians have debated the extent of Mennonite influence upon later developments among the English exiles. The Smyth-Helwys congregation continued to study the Bible and sought to follow the way of the Lord more completely.
By 1608/09, Smyth was convinced his Separatist church was not valid. Most of the members had only infant baptism, and the church was formed on the basis of a “covenant,” rather than a confession of faith in Christ. Smyth therefore led the church to disband in 1608/09 and re-form on a new basis–a personal confession of faith in Christ, followed by believer’s baptism. Since none of the members had been baptized as believers, Smyth had to make a new beginning. He baptized himself and then baptized the others. His baptism was by sprinkling or pouring, but it was for believers only.
In 1611, Thomas Helwys led a portion of this church back to London, where they set up the first Baptist church on English soil. By 1650, there were at least forty-seven General Baptist churches in and around London. They believed in a general atonement, baptism of believers only, religious liberty, and other doctrines still associated with Baptists. The General Baptists also believed that it was possible for one to fall from grace or lose his salvation.
Particular Baptists.–The Particular Baptists came into existence a generation later than General Baptists. Named for their view of particular atonement, they believed that Christ died only for a particular group, the elect. They were deeply influenced by the teachings of John Calvin.
Particular Baptists emerged out of an Independent congregation. While Separatists, as the name implies, separated totally from the Church of England, the Independents sought to maintain autonomous congregations without a radical break with the state church. Ultimately, most of the Independents were driven to more complete separation. As early as 1616, Henry Jacob was leader of a small Independent congregation in London. The next two pastors were John Lathrop and Henry Jessey. This church is often called the “JLJ Church” from the initials of these three early pastors.
Members of this Separatist JLJ congregation were in constant conversation about the meaning of baptism. By 1630, one member withdrew, possibly in opposition to infant baptism. In 1633, a number of members withdrew from the JLJ church to form another congregation, and perhaps some of them were rebaptized as believers at that time. In 1638, several others withdrew from the JLJ church to join the 1633 group, and old church records state clearly that in 1638 they received baptism as believers. Historians have therefore concluded that the first Particular Baptist church dates atleast from 1638, and possibly even from 1633. Though their baptism was for believers only, at first it was administered by sprinkling or pouring.
By 1650, there were a number of Particular Baptist churches in and around London. In 1644, seven of them had drafted a confession of faith which showed some of their distinctive views. In addition to particular atonement, they taught believer’s baptism by immersion and insisted that a person who is once saved is always saved.
