This is arguably the greatest and most easily read history book ever written. A most appropriate publication for this particular week of the year. It can be read or downloaded from the weblinks below.
History of Protestantism commencing Gen 3:15, the first martyr Gen 4:1-8.
http://www.doctrine.org/history/
http://www.reformation.org/wylie2.html
Note the great quote on the above webpage;
Knowledge is power!! ignorance is weakness!!
GUESS WHO SAID THE FOLLOWING?
Wylie's 'The History of Protestantism' is the best history extant. I welcome its republishing. Read it. Study it. Circulate it. And by so doing you will help to dispel the dark cloud of priestly superstition, popish idolatry and papal tyranny encircling our land."
THE FOLLOWING QUOTE IS FROM Vol 1 chp 1.
"Protestantism is not solely the outcome of human progress; it is no mere principle of perfectibility inherent in humanity, and ranking as one of its native powers, in virtue of which when society becomes corrupt it can purify itself, and when it is arrested in its course by some external force, or stops from exhaustion, it can recruit its energies and set forward anew on its path.
It is neither the product of the individual reason, nor the result of the joint thought and energies of the species. Protestantism is a principle which has its origin outside human society: it is a Divine graft on the intellectual and moral nature of man, whereby new vitalities and forces are introduced into it, and the human stem yields henceforth a nobler fruit.
It is the descent of a heaven-born influence which allies itself with all the instincts and powers of the individual, with all the laws and cravings of society, and which, quickening both the individual and the social being into a new life, and directing their efforts to nobler objects, permits the highest development of which humanity is capable, and the fullest possible accomplishment of all its grand ends. In a word, Protestantism is revived Christianity."
THE DEADLY CONSEQUENCES WHEN THEOLOGICAL VIEWS BACKFIRE !
The following exert is from 2nd vol chp 22 "Servetus demands Calvin`s impeachement.".......... a pretty big mistake !
"IN the resolution to which the magistrates of Geneva had come, to lay the affair of Serveins before the Swiss Reformed Churches, we see the Churches of Helvetia formed into a jury. Pending the verdict, which it would seem Servetus did not for a moment doubt would be entirely in his favor, the accused took another step against Calvin.
From his prison, on the 22nd of September, he sent to the Council a list of "articles on which M. Servetus wishes J. Calvin to be interrogated." He there accuses Calvin of having falsely imputed to him the opinion that the soul is mortal. "If I have said that—not merely said it, but publicly written it—to infect the world, I would condemn myself to death.
Wherefore, my lords, I demand that my false accuser be punished, poena talionis, and that he be detained a prisoner like me, till the cause be decided for his death or mine, or other punishment."[1]
Servetus had formerly declined the civil jurisdiction in matters theological; he now, in the hope of placing the Reformer in the same hazard as himself, accepts that jurisdiction in those very matters in which he had before declined it.
And further, he makes it plain that he was not more liberal than his age, in holding that a conviction for heresy ought to draw after it the punishment of death."
ANOTHER INTERESTING THEOLOGY CONTEST !
This exert is taken from chp 29 "The Synod of Dort""After his death, his disciple Simon Episcopius became the head of the party, and, as usually happens in such cases, gave fuller development to the views of his master than Arminius himself had done.
From the university, the controversy passed to the pulpit, and the Church was divided. In 1610 the followers of Arminius presented a Remonstrance to the States of Holland, complaining of being falsely accused of seeking to alter the faith, but at the same time craving revision of the standard books of the Dutch Church – the Belgic Confession and the Heidelberg Catechism-and demanding toleration for their views, of which they gave a summary or exhibition in five points, as follow –
1. That the decree of election is grounded on foreseen good works.
2. That Christ died for all men, and procured remission of sins for all,
3. That man cannot acquire saving faith of himself, or by the strength of his free-will, but needs for that purpose the grace of God.
1. That the decree of election is grounded on foreseen good works.
2. That Christ died for all men, and procured remission of sins for all,
3. That man cannot acquire saving faith of himself, or by the strength of his free-will, but needs for that purpose the grace of God.
4. That, seeing man cannot believe at first, nor continue to believe, without the aid of this co-operating grace, his good works are to be ascribed to the grace of God in Jesus Christ.
5. That the faithful have a sufficient strength, through the Divine grace, to resist all temptation, and finally to overcome it."
5. That the faithful have a sufficient strength, through the Divine grace, to resist all temptation, and finally to overcome it."
THE REST OF THE STORY IS NOT HISTORY............... IT IS STILL GOING ON TODAY!
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