A Critique of Landmarkism
DwaneGilliland
Acknowledgements
Thanks to my wife Elaine for the first typing, Mark and Gale Langley for the second on their computer, to Carol Pinkston, Cindy Taylor, Teresa Pinkston, Ginger Chinn and Gail Moreland for their help with the final copy.
I have used other men’s learning throughout this book and any one who is familiar with either the Ross or Thornbury refutation of Landmarkism will readily see how much I am indebted to these Brethren. I quote from them and many times I may have, and probably did, use thri thoughts and words as my own without giving them the credit that is theirs – I do so now. Others I could have used warned me not to at the copyright notice in the front of their works – so I didn’t. Anyone can use any or all of this book for the furtherance of truth with or without acknowledgement.
Dedication
This book is dedicated to all lovers of truth.
Preface
Since writing the landmark article four and one half years ago in which I challenged the other side to “Prove their doctrine”, about the only “proof” that has come forth is first, a good brother seeking by early Baptist writers, (Kiffen, Knollys, Denne, Collins, Collier, Barber, Cillingsworth, Blackwood, Richardson, De Laune, Drapes, Hutchenson, some 35 books in all) to disprove the article was kind enough to give me copies of the above; and in which all agreed with the other old writers quoted in the article where the subject is mentioned in any way at all; and second, another Brother in Florida, denouncing all history, and opinions of men in history seeks to set forth Landmarkism solely from scripture; and third, a Brother from Oklahoma, greatly alarmed, wrote “Church truth at a point of Crisis”, in which he devoted thirteen lines in answer to my seventy-one page article. Did he do it? Yes, if you believe his one word answer: “Farce”. But the questions might be raised, “Why should we believe him?” and, “What did he prove?”. If Baptists in the past were not Landmarkers and if no Landmarker can be found, and if no confession of faith can be found that teaches it and, contrariwise, if the old Baptist writers did teach contrary to Landmarkism, and did set forth plainly their views on Baptism, Church Organization, and a non-linked chain succession, why aren’t Modern Landmarkers‚ honest enough to admit it? Why don’t they say plainly that they disagree with Spilsbury, King, Kiffen, Collier, Barber, Drapes, Kilcop, (many others), and the First and Second London Confessions? Why do they keep saying they do agree with them? Huffman has the same books by old Baptist authors that I have. I copied and delivered them to him at the same time I made my own copies. I sent a copy of my article to the Baptist Examiner and Bro. Wilson said that he would try to answer it - he never has. Brother Cockrell demanded a copy and he did as I expected: no equal time granted. His denunciation of me as an “Apostate” and the continual pratings that all true Baptists of all times were Landmarkers, was the way he handled it. Proof is all that I asked for - there has been none given.
Contrary to what Huffman charged, “Come to any conclusion, then go back through the dusty pages of history to find support…” and also Hiatt, “Because they can’t find Landmarkism in history, they can’t believe it”, it would seem that the Landmark view is the one that needs history and tradition to support it. The only way they can be a true church is that the one who preceded it was a true church - a link chain delegating and granting authority. But if all history is against such ideas, how does it stand? Only by the word of today’s Landmarkers! Our side doesn’t need history and tradition to stand but as all candid students know, all history is one-sided - our side.
In this revision I will seek to set forth the following: 1. The testimonies of many other witnesses in the 1600’s complying with the ones already given, 2. The clarifying and additions to points that I made, 3. The addition of several topics: The Bride, The Kiffen Ms., Baptist views on the Universal Church, The Commission - to whom was it given?, the Age of Extremism; and, 4. A Conclusion.
The Landmarkers all say, “Baptists have always held our doctrine, all history is on our side” but they never make any reference to history; then when their opposers do they say, “We take the Bible, not history, for our faith and practice!”
I was once a Landmarker, as was Ross, McGlothlin, Lofton, and Christian; but the facts of Baptist history changed my mind as it did the above and will anyone who honestly faces the issues. Should one confront a Mormon of our day with the “Book of Abraham” and Joseph Smith’s “Translation” of it with a true translation, (whereas such couldn’t be done in Smith’s day, scholarship had not attained to what it has in our day) and show that Smith lied, it is not the book of Abraham, Abraham isn’t mentioned at all; what it is an Egyptian Burial instruction - today’s Mormon would laugh at you saying, “It doesn’t matter what the book says in truth - it does matter what the “inspired” Joseph Smith got from it!” So with Landmarkism, it doesn’t matter if no one in the past believed it. They disregard written testimony and imagine there was testimony that was destroyed by our enemies, they premise the commission was given to the church, that the church only is local, and that the promises of Christ necessitate a link-chain succession. It doesn’t matter that no one in the past believed their theory - they will disfellowship anyone who dares to question them! If their first premise is wrong then the whole thing will fall. I personally know Brethren who will not break fellowship over the doctrine of Regeneration, but will over Landmarkism. Which is the more important doctrine? Some Landmarkers misinterpreting I Tim. 3:15 would undoubtedly say Landmarkism but, more knowledgeable Brethren would understand that without regeneration there could not even be a church.
I fully believe the statement in the appendix of the 2nd London Confession: “Let not our zeal herein be misinterpreted (of being kind and gracious to them with whom we differ, D.G.); that God whom we serve is jealous of His worship. By His gracious providence the law thereof is continued amongst us; and we are forewarned, by what happened in the church of the Jews, that it is necessary for every generation, and that frequently in every generation, to consult the divine oracle, compare our worship with the rule, and take heed to what doctrines we receive and practice”, the suppressions, denials, garbling, and outright perversions of the Landmarkers notwithstanding.
While I make no claims to be a writer, these papers reflect much reading and research of them who were, and I can’t help but feel no little disappointment in the absence of response from the above one hundred copies of the first article to brethren who are my friends and fellow ministers. I am afraid not many have read it - but just to scan through, pick up a sentence here and there – then they know where I am going - “too bad about Gilliland”. This reminds me of a statement of Servetus concerning the Spaniards, that they were, “Only half informed, yet brim full of knowledge”. Perhaps if my brethren would actually read these papers, as burdensome as it may be, they may question the apostasy in which they were raised and stand were our Baptist forefathers stood before the apostasy appeared.
Introduction
Landmarkism claims to set forth what our forefathers held. SOME may have held these things (there is nothing new under the sun) but there is no recorded evidence that has come to light to prove it. Nor, any recorded evidence of Landmarkism among the Particular Baptists of England. The burden of proof lies with the Landmarker. They are the ones who need history and tradition to substantiate their practices. The earliest writing since printing was invented shows that the Particular Baptists DID NOT hold Landmarkism. The first and second London Confessions and many good writers associated with these did not hold it, neither did the Philadelphia Association in America. If so, let it be demonstrated. I intend to demonstrate the contrary. Graves, Pendleton, and Dayton systematized this doctrine as Graves admits:
“I think it is no act of presumption in me to assume to know what I meant by the Old Landmarks, since I was the first man in Tennessee, and the first editor in this continent, who publicly advocated the policy of strictly and consistently carrying out in our practice those principles which all true Baptists, in all ages, have professed to believe.” (Old Landmarkism, p. 15, 16).
First of all, he insulted and slandered his contemporaries by calling them “untrue Baptists”, all who didn’t hold his views, and even every editor from the founding of the continent. Richard Fuller, Waller, Johnson, Manly, Howell, Dagg, Barrows, Jeter, Boyce, Broadus, Wayland, Armitage, Curtis, Spurgeon, and Benedict are some examples of the many great contemporaries of Graves who opposed Landmarkism. These weren’t “True Baptists”? Secondly, he admits his innovations among the Baptists or else, he claimed the Baptists apostatized and, from which, he received the link-chain succession.Baptism is the Golden Calf of Landmarkism. The Children of Israel were not so stupid or ignorant as to think what hey had made actually had brought them out of Egypt (Gill), but, “Make us gods which shall go before us”, as a symbol, as a representation, as a standard to carry before them. Baptism does all this for the Landmarker. Let us notice some of the fantastic claims of Landmarkism for Baptism:
“Where there is no Baptism there are no visible churches.” p. 12; “Inducting by Baptism in to the Kingdom.” p. 18; “There is a scriptural connection between Baptism and preaching.” p. 26; “Can men now be ministers of the gospel who are not members of churches formed according to the gospel? I say they cannot…” p. 30; “How is the visible separation (from the world) to take place… Is it now by Baptism?” p. 31; “My positions is that according to the gospel, authority to preach must, under God, emanate from a visible Church of Christ.” p. 34; “Authority to preach… Authority to baptize must come from the same source. (BaptistChurch)” p. 37. (Old Landmark Reset, Pendleton).
This is Landmarkism according to Pendleton, Graves, and Dayton. Landmarkers hold many Biblical Truths, but the “Ism” is what I am writing against - that which is added to the truth, the “logic” of mere men that is not scriptural, which neither was believed nor held by Baptists of the past.
Modern Landmarkism goes much further than Graves in conferring authority from a “mother” church to her daughter, which Graves did not teach. The newly republished volume of “Alien Baptism”, by Dayton, has this in the preface showing what baptism is to Modern Landmarkers:
“When Jesus promised that “the gates of hell shall not prevail against the church,” the succession of John’s baptism was guaranteed. The church is a divine institution and baptism is a divine ordinance. Without the Lord’s church as administrator, there can be no scriptural baptism. Without such baptism there can be no church to authorize it; and, the validity of each depends upon the scriptural authority of the other.
The “Trail of Water” precedes and succeeds, “The Trail of Blood.”
But, both the old and the new, positively exclude any other system than their own from the “True” Baptist practice. “True” according to whom? The scriptures? One can read Landmarkism into the scriptures, but as we shall see, the Old Baptists never did. This system is Arminian in ecclesiology - man must work this out, not Christ and the Holy Spirit - but Landmarkism never bound the Lord! WE could list a long Bibliography of non-Baptists that the Holy Spirit raised up as witnesses for Christ (“By their fruits ye shall know them”, not their Landmark pedigree), many of whom a lot of Landmarkers do not even have the mental capacity to read; but, we don’t have to, you can see the listings of many in the Landmark papers themselves. Graves wrote:
“But to invite them into our pulpits to pray is to recognize them before the world as gospel ministers, since custom consecrates the pulpit to acknowledged gospel ministers, and therefore, when we act with them in a ministerial capacity, speak of them as gospel ministers, or receive their acts as those of gospel ministers, we plainly and “more loudly than with trumpet tongue,” proclaim them gospel ministers, and consequently their societies as gospel churches - and, if so, why not commune with them?”
Did Graves and Pendleton “receive their acts as gospel ministers when they used their “acts” (writings and scholarship) in writing their own theology books? They certainly did, many many times. Former Baptists, who were not Landmarkers, freely used the scholarship the Holy Spirit raised up: Gill used Witsius, Goodwin, Crisp and all Protestant scholarship; Boyce was educated at Princeton and followed the theology of Turritine; The second London Confession followed the Westminster and Savoy Confessions, and we could go on and on almost indefinitely, but, the truth remains: works of the flesh cannot produce works of the Spirit. “What God has cleansed, call not thou unclean.”
One cannot read very far in these learned men of God (I am speaking of Protestants) without learning some what of their Spirituality, I Cor. 12:3, if one is Spiritual himself!
The Landmarkers boast that only they have the commission, that only they have authority to do the work of the Lord; that anyone, anywhere that has done anything in the name of the Lord other than Landmark Baptists is not from Christ at all, but from Satan, in opposition to Christ. This is such a perversion of the facts of history and Biblical principles as to not even need refutation if they were not so grossly ignorant of the aforementioned facts.The scriptures speak thusly:
“But the Prophet, which shall presume to speak a word in my name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or that shall speak in the name of other gods, even that prophet shall die. And if thou say in thine hear, How shall we know the word which the Lord hath not spoken? When a prophet speaketh in the name of the Lord, if the thing follow not, nor come to pass, that is the thing which the Lord hath not spoken, but the prophet hath spoken it presumptuously: thou shalt not be afraid of him.” Deut. 18:20-22.
Micaiah was in exact accord with this scripture when he told Ahab: “If thou return at all in peace, the Lord hath not spoken by me.” I Kings 22:28. When Paul was vindicating his office of apostleship, not by producing documents of authority from his supposed supporting church, nor yet pleading the validity of his baptism from the disciple Ananias - but the facts of the case: “If I be not an apostle unto others, yet doubtless I am to you: for the seal of mine apostleship are ye in the Lord.” I Cor. 9:2.
When the question of whether circumcision was necessary to the salvation of the gentiles was discussed in Acts 15 the fact that the Lord was saving gentiles apart from circumcision as related by Peter, Paul, and Barnabas convinced James with the agreement of the words of the prophets against the proposition that circumcision was necessary.
When the Doctrine of the Atonement is discussed, whether it is particular or general, the fact of its results can determine its intent and extent. So, likewise, we can understand who is commissioned and authorized by the Lord by the resultant facts. Paul said that “no man can say that Jesus is Lord but by the Holy Spirit”, I Cor. 12:3. Kilcop, who was baptized by Blunt or Blacklock, a signer of the First London Confession wrote: “Disciples having ability lack not authority”. The anti-pedobaptist dissenters from the church of England who came to correct views on Baptism, as we will notice all through this paper, claimed their authority from scriptures only. Only the Landmark has the opinion that of the countless thousands who have been raised up, gifted, and enabled by the Holy Spirit to proclaim and did proclaim the mighty works of Christ had no biblical authority to have done so!
In the prayer of our Lord (John 17:20) for all the elect, He prays, “Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me, through their word.” Through whose word? If these words have reference to the first church, as a church, and only through its ministry, as Landmarks must interpret to be consistent with their views on the commission, then this is clearly church salvation doctrine and, without which none will be saved, none were prayed for, and none will be glorified as the next verse states. And, it does no good or clarifies anything for Modern Landmarkers to simply brand those saved outside Landmarkism as “Bogus disciples” or Pendleton’s, “I am not obligated to account for this”, or Dayton’s, “That although Christ may see fit to dispense with their baptism, he has not authorized his churches to do so”. The facts are they are saved, and not a few, but the vast majority! If no one but Landmarkers have authority to preach - then no one has authority to believe the message of anyone but that of an “authorized” minister. Who ever heard of such silliness? The Holy Spirit who gave the scriptures according to the Divine will and eternal purpose of the Godhead is not confused about whom he calls, enables, and gives His word unto on the ministerial side, and in exact accord with his calling by the same gospel (outwardly) to the hearing elect in regeneration (inwardly). Authoritatively? That is as high as you can go on authority. Examples to illustrate the point are Newton and Toplady. No Landmark Baptist either ordained nor authorized them to preach or proclaim the word of the Lord. They wrote Amazing Grace and Rock of Ages that do preach and proclaim the word of the Lord. Can we authoritatively sing these great hymns? Landmarkers themselves do. These are only two of thousands of such inconsistencies.“Through their word” is the word of the Apostles, the scriptures; and in all subsequent ages the Holy Spirit has raised up men who have proclaimed “Their” word to the salvation of all God’s elect - they were not Landmarkers either. There were no Landmarkers until just over one hundred years ago, and their theory that does not accord with facts cannot be true. Again, when the Landmarker seeks to “prove” something in depth in scripture (the “Unauthorized” translation of Protestants), he uses “unauthorized” Lexicons of the “unauthorized” Protestants - Thayer, Liddel and Scott, Vine, Young, Strong, etc., plus the commentaries of “unauthorized” ministers of Protestants - he learns form all these “unauthorized” sources (if he learns at all) to authoritatively proclaim to the ones from whom he learns and the rest of the world, that WE ARE THE PEOPLE! He is an accessory after the fact by his own judgement.