What do Anabaptists believe? What’s the source of their beliefs? And are they right?
Questions like these will be answered in the articles listed below. For an overview of Anabaptist beliefs, see the article on Who Are the Anabaptists?
This post is part of a series on the question of infant baptism. Did the apostles baptize infants, or was that practice a later innovation? In my first post, I pointed out that most of the biblical and historical evidence can fit either view. Therefore, we should focus on the key points that can’t fit …
This post is part of a series on the question of infant baptism. The previous article gave an overview of the evidence that people draw from to argue for one side or the other. In that article, we saw that most of the evidence people use can actually be consistent with either infant baptism or …
One of the most difficult issues of early church history is the question of infant baptism. Should Christians baptize their infant children, or should we wait until they commit their lives to Christ to baptize them? It seems that only one view could be the correct one. And on such an important issue as the …
Recently, Eastern Orthodox apologists have worked to develop a new argument for the veneration of icons. This time, they are arguing from images of praying people found in the catacombs. This argument, which I will call the Participatory Art Argument, starts by pointing out that, in the catacombs, as I mentioned in my archaeology post, …
Does Archaeology of Pre-Nicene Orant Images Prove Iconodulia? Read More »
Catholic Answers (catholic.com) is a hugely influential ministry. One of their functions is to provide people with pop-level arguments for Roman Catholicism. They repackage Roman Catholicism in a very appealing way. One of the goals of Catholic Answers is to prove that the Roman Catholic Church is in continuity with the early church. So many …
Is Catholic Answers Committed to Intellectual Honesty? Read More »
On this site, I’ve shown that we can reasonably conclude that the New Testament is infallible without drawing on an infallible tradition or magisterium to prove that it is. Anabaptists and Protestants, then, are in an excellent position—we have excellent support for our belief that Christian doctrine comes from the teachings of the apostles in …
by William R. McGrath This article was written around 1955 and published as an article and then a booklet. In this article, McGrath argues that the Protestant Reformation failed, being hamstrung by needing to follow political considerations. Instead, he advocates for following the example of the early Anabaptists, who even modern Anabaptists should learn from. …
The Anabaptists: Neither Catholic nor Protestant Read More »
This is the full text of the Schleitheim Confession, the earliest Anabaptist confession of faith. This material is from Anabaptists.org and was originally printed by Rod and Staff Publishers, Inc., Crockett, KY (Sixth Printing, 1985). The Schleitheim Confession was adopted by a Swiss Brethren Conference, February 24, 1527. I have added clarifications in brackets. Brotherly Union …
When reading Jesus’ commands can we ever say, “We know Jesus didn’t mean that, because that’s so obviously not true”? In this article, I discuss whether we can be justified in interpreting Jesus’ commands according to our moral intuitions. This is the fourth and final article in a series on the doctrine of nonresistance, which …
Divine Command Theory | What if Jesus didn’t really mean that? Read More »
This article is the third of a series on the doctrine of nonresistance, which is based on Jesus’ command to do no violence. More specifically, nonresistance is the view that even when striving for justice, Christians, unlike earthly governments, must only employ methods other than violence. This doctrine was so named by the Anabaptists, but …
Early Church Fathers on War, Violence, and Pacifism Read More »