The Truth About the Baptists is a book by V. G. Pavlov , first published in the Baptist magazine No. 41-47, 1911. The author himself described it as an “Essay on the History, Church Structure, and Principles of Baptist Communities” [1] .
Content
Purpose of writing
According to the author, the purpose of writing the book was to oppose “anti-sectarian propaganda”: “In this essay we would like to introduce our students to the history of the Baptists from the first times of Christianity to the present day, both abroad and in Russia, with the structure of their communities and teaching so that our readers can have a clear idea of the Baptists and do not believe the ridiculous claims that are often spread about them as some kind of socialist sect that threatens to shake the whole system of our civil life ” [1] .
Title
The title of the book, apparently, is due to its anti-propaganda content. In addition, the author probably wanted to create an allusion to the brochure of L. Z. Kuntsevich, “What is the lie of Baptism?” [2]
Contents
Characteristics of Baptism
Despite the fact that Pavlov was a native of the Molokans , he does not focus on the Molokan roots of Russian Baptism, moreover, he equates it with the “mainstream” of the Stundists : “the Stundist movement in its mass and in essence is nothing but the gospel teaching, known in the West under the name of Baptism ” [1] .
The Origins of World Baptism
According to Pavlov, the history of world Baptism begins with John the Baptist and Jesus Christ himself : “From the time of the apostles before the Reformation ”, against the background of the official Church organization, there were separate communities that “alone worshiped and served God at the behest of their conscience and preserved their gospel teaching almost in its primeval purity ” [3] .
“And although in the dim and false light of the following centuries of horror and depravity we cannot always open their trail or point to their presence with full confidence, we still feel certain confidence in their continued existence” [3] , says Pavlov.
The continuity of Baptism to the Church of the first centuries is determined not by the chain of ordinations of ministers, but by “the continuity of the spirit, teaching and life of the apostles” [3] .
Reasons for the emergence of Russian Baptism
As Pavlov noted, “historical circumstances were unfavorable for the spiritual development of the people: feuds between the specific princes, the Tatar yoke, the serf yoke, all this did not allow him to consciously relate to religion, and for the most part he is still familiar only with the external side of religion: rites, posts And so on.
Only with the liberation of the peasants from serfdom begins, in the seventies of the last century, the awakening of the religious consciousness of the Russian people, which was expressed in the movement, called "Stundism" ” [1] .
In his opinion, “the ground for the perception of the gospel movement, baptized with the name Stundism, which is nothing more than an attempt to return to primitive Christianity, was prepared by three factors: the liberation of the peasants from the yoke of serfdom, the spread of the Word of God and the increase of literacy among the people. An illiterate could not read the Bible, therefore, he could not even verify the teachings of the dominant church by comparing it with the teachings of the New Testament. An unfree man could not, without great sacrifices, practice his faith, which was not consistent with the teachings of the church, so all innovations and reformist attempts were brutally suppressed by the power of the landowners.
Only after gaining personal freedom and mastering literacy did our peasant begin to read the Bible and began to notice the discrepancy between his reality and the teachings of Christ. Hence the desire to arrange his life on the basis of the gospel, and this is how stundism appeared ” [4] .
Table of Contents
- Introduction
- I. The Beginning of the Baptist History
- Ii. Early sects
- Iii. Swiss Baptists
- Iv. Welsh Baptists
- V. Dutch Baptists
- Vi. English baptists
- VII. Germanic Baptists
- Viii. Newest Baptists in Germany
- IX. Russian Baptists
- X. Stundists and Baptists
- Xi. Baptism in the Caucasus
- XII. The spread of Baptism
- Xiii. Baptist Patriotism
- Xiv. Further spread of Baptism
- Xv. Persecution
- Xvi. Weights
- XVII. Baptist Community Organization
- XVIII. Confession of the Baptists
- XIX. Baptist Principles
- XX. Baptist Activities
Impact
The book The Truth About Baptists is the first or one of the first works on the historiography of Russian Baptism. Thus, the book “The History of the ECB in the USSR” states that the first historians of the Russian-Ukrainian fraternity were I. S. Prokhanov and V. G. Pavlov . On the part of Prokhanov, this work was a series of essays published in the journal Conversation published by him; on the part of Pavlov, the book The Truth About Baptists [5] .
Prior to the release in 1989 of the book “ The History of the ECB in the USSR ”, “The Truth about the Baptists” remained the most voluminous and complete confessional study of its own history, which determined its influence on the formation of confessional historiography.
Modern Edition
- Pavlov V.G.The truth about the Baptists. Essay on the history, church structure, and principles of Baptist communities . - Almanac on the history of Russian Baptism. - St. Petersburg: “The Bible for All,” “Protestant,” 2006. - ISBN 5-7454-0380-2 .
- Text book on the Internet .
Notes
- ↑ 1 2 3 4 Baptist, 1911, No. 41, P.322
- ↑ Baptist, 1909, No. 6, P.19
- ↑ 1 2 3 Baptist, 1911, No. 41, P.323
- ↑ Baptist, 1911, No. 42, P.331
- ↑ History of the ECB in the USSR , Moscow, VSHB Publishing House, 1989, p.5