The Prophetic Faith of Our Fathers, vol. 2

II. Bradford Burned for Not Acknowledging Antichrist of Rome

JOHN BRADFORD (c. 1510-1555), chaplain to Bishop Ridley, and friend of Latimer, popular preacher and ready writer, was born in Manchester. In 1547 he entered the Inner Temple as a student of common law, but turned to divinity through the influence of Thomas Sampson. Soundly converted, he sold his jewelry to help the poor. The following year he went to Cambridge, “to learn by God’s law, how to further the building of the Lord’s temple.” In 1549 the university bestowed upon him, by special grace, the degree of Master of Arts in recognition of eight years of study of the arts, literature, and divinity. In 1550 he was ordained deacon by Bishop Ridley, and received a license to preach. In 1551 he became prebendary of St. Paul’s in Kentish Town. A few months later he was appointed chaplain to Edward VI. He faithfully reproved sin, preached Christ crucified, and impugned heresies. ⁶ Bradford believed in the coming destruction of the earth by fire, and waited for the new heavens and new earth-holding that 1,500 years were past, and it could not be long now. ⁷ This hope sustained many whose lives were in jeopardy in this troubled time. PFF2 376.1

Soon after Mary’s accession, in 1553, Bradford was arrested and imprisoned. Before the court in which Bishop Gardiner sat as chief, he was tried on a trumped—up charge of raising a tumult, and was condemned as a heretic. He was a fellow prisoner in the Tower with Dr. Edwin Sandys, Cranmer, Ridley, and Latimer. There he wrote many letters, messages, and fare wells, both to the lowly and to persons of prominence. In 1555 the three statutes for the punishment of heresy were revived. Bradford’s life was spared for a time in the hope that he would recant. But he preferred death to dishonest profession. He pleaded not guilty, challenging any authority on the bishop of Rome’s behalf over the kingdom of England. ⁸ The judges were baffled in an attempt to establish incriminating evidence. Nevertheless, sentence was passed. PFF2 376.2

On June 30, 1555, he was taken, late at night, from the Compter, where he was prisoner, to Newgate, all the prisoners tearfully bidding him farewell. Great crowds were abroad, and as he passed along, the people wept and prayed for him. PFF2 377.1

When Bradford and his fellow sufferer, John Leaf, a young man, an apprentice, came to the stake in Smithfield to be burned, they lay prostrate in prayer for the space of a minute. But the restive sheriff ordered, “Arise, and make an end; the press of the people is great.” At that command they both stood, and Bradford, taking a fagot in his hand, kissed it, and the stake also. Standing by the stake, with both hands uplifted, he cried, “O England, England, repent thee of thy sins, repent thee of thy sins. Beware of idolatry, beware of false antichrists; take heed they do not deceive you.” It was just five years from his ordination to his martyrdom. ⁹ PFF2 377.2

1. CONDEMNED FOR REPUDIATING POPE AS CHRIST’S VICAR

Bradford’s remarks on prophecy are scattered through his writings as remarks or observations rather than as formal expositions. Thus in a “Letter on the Mass, to Hopkins and Others, at Coventry” (1554), he says in the uncouth language of the day: PFF2 377.3

“Ah, wretches then that we be, if we will defile either part with the rose-coloured whore of Babylon’s filthy mass-abomination! It had been better for us never to have been washed, than so to wallow ourselves in the filthy puddle of popery: it had been better never to have known the truth, than thus to betray it. Surely, surely, let such men fear, that their ‘latter end be not worse than the beginning.’ ” ¹⁰ PFF2 377.4

After he was condemned, looking hourly to be conveyed to the place of burning, Bradford wrote a moving “Farewell to the City of London.” He declares he was condemned “for not ac knowledging the antichrist of Rome to be Christ’s vicar—general and supreme head of his catholic and universal church.” ¹¹ Similarly in his “Farewell to the University and Town of Cambridge,“ PFF2 377.5

he inquires, “Dost thou not know Rome to be Babylon?” Then he avers: PFF2 378.1

“Wherefor I now am condemned and shall be burned as an heretic. For, because I will not grant the antichrist of Rome to be Christ’s vicar-general and supreme head of his church here and every where upon earth, by God’s ordinance.” ¹² PFF2 378.2

He appeals to Cambridge, whom he addresses as “dear mother,” to “come out of Babylon,” “come again to God’s truth,” contrasting the simple flock of Christ’s disciples with Babylon. It is signed, “Ready to the stake, the llth of February, anno 1555.” ¹³ PFF2 378.3

2. ANTICHRIST IN CHURCH; NOT TURK, INFIDEL, OR JEW

In a conference with Archdeacon Harpsfield, Bradford clearly implied that neither the Turk, nor an infidel, nor a Jew is the great deceiver. And denying the apostolic succession of the Roman bishops, Bradford places the apostasy within the church: PFF2 378.4

” ‘If this point fail you, all the church you go about to set forth will fall down. You shall not find in all the scripture this your essential point of succession of bishops,’ quoth I. ‘In Christ’s church antichrist will sit. And Peter telleth us, as it went in the old church afore Christ’s coming, so will it be in the new church sithen Christ’s coming: that is, as there were false prophets, and such as bare rule were adversaries to the true prophets; so shall there be, sithen Christ’s coming, false teachers, even of such as be bishops, and bear rule amongst the people.’” ¹⁴ PFF2 378.5

He pressed this same point with Bishop Heath of York and Bishop Day of Chichester, declaring that “the wicked man which ‘sitteth in the temple of God,’ that is, in the church,” cannot be understood of Mohammed or “any out of the church, but of such as bear rule in the church.” ¹⁵ PFF2 378.6

3. BISHOP OF ROME UNDOUBTEDLY GREAT ANTICHRIST

In “Letter LIII. to Lady Vane,” ¹⁶ Bradford responds to her de sire for facts to arm her in the Reformed faith. He deals with the arguments of Christ’s charge to Peter, the primacy of the bishop of Rome, and how that was not achieved till the time of Gregory PFF2 378.7

I and of Phocas. Calling the bishop of Rome a “bitesheep” rather than a bishop, Bradford tells of a large treatise he had begun, entitled “Of Antichrist.” To Lady Vane he says: PFF2 379.1

“This bearer hath told me, that your desire is to have something sent to you concerning the usurped authority of the supremacy of the bishop of Rome, which is undoubtedly that great Antichrist, of whom the apostles do so much admonish us; that you may have as well something the more to stay you on, as also wherewith to answer the adversaries, because you may perchance therein be something apposed. To satisfy this your desire I will briefly go about, and so that I will, by God’s grace, fully set forth the same, to enarm you to withstand the assaults of the papists herein, if you mark well and read over again that which I now write.” ¹⁷ PFF2 379.2

4. GOD’S PEOPLE TO COME OUT OF ROMISH BABYLON

In the midst of the conflict over the mass, including persecution to the death, Bradford wrote a vital treatise on The Hurt of Hearing Mass, going deeply into the historical development of this rite, which he called the “most detestable device that ever the devil brought out by man.” ¹⁸ Giving thirty-nine reasons showing that going to mass is sin, Bradford says, intensely in No. 14: PFF2 379.3

“O deaf ears, that will not hear the blast of the angel’s trump, warning us to come from amongst these whorish Babylonians, belly-god mass-mongers, lest we perish with them! ‘Come out from her, my people,’ saith God. If thou be one of God’s people, thou must come from her: but, if thou be not, tarry still.” ¹⁹ PFF2 379.4

5. REIGN OF EMPIRE BEASTS AND ANTICHRIST AT ADVENT

Bradford tersely sets forth the Antichrist as a usurper in God’s kingdom, also showing his accord with the standard Reformation interpretation of the four empire beasts of Daniel 7. PFF2 379.5

“Paul telleth, that Antichrist shall bear rule in the church until Christ come to judgment: then shall he destroy his kingdom. So that the true church of Christ shall not have worldly dominion and kingdom, but rather be persecuted, and especially towards the end of the world: as Peter telleth, that, as there was before Christ’s coming in the church ‘false prophets,’ and the regiment was with the adversaries, which bare the name of the church, under the which they destroyed the church, so shall it be in the church after Christ’s time: ‘There will be,’ saith he, ‘many false teachers,’ which will deceive not a few or the fewer part, but many and the greater part, as now the papists have done almost all Christendom. Again he saith, that ‘there PFF2 379.6

will come mockers,’ which will make a mock of religion; so that the church cannot but be persecuted. Daniel plainly sheweth that the ‘beasts,’ that is, the empires of the world, shall be cast into the fire when Christ shall come to judgment: so that some wicked empires shall continue until the last day.” ²⁰ PFF2 380.1