The Prophetic Faith of Our Fathers, vol. 3
III. Williams-Prophecies Motivate Quest for Soul Freedom
The third prophetic expositor to appear was none other than ROGER WILLIAMS (ca. 1603-1683), founder of Rhode Island and pastor of the first Baptist church in America, worthy antagonist of John Cotton, and Apostle of Religious Liberty. He was born in Wales, and was educated at Cambridge, with a B.A. in 1627. He early became skilled in shorthand, and was also proficient in several ancient languages. After taking orders in the Church of England, in 1629, he turned nonconformist, considering Puritanism a reforming force within the church, and demanding simplification of ritual, a Calvinistic theology, and a modification of the episcopal form of government. It offered a freer, more individualistic life. And he stood for the sovereignty of Parliament as against the divine right of kings. 73 He was the incarnation of Protestant individualism. 74 (Williams’ monument appears on page 18.) PFF3 46.4
Williams pleaded in vain, however, for recognition of the sanctity of the human conscience. He believed in a God of love in a world of material things. So, in search of some freedom and to escape the persecution of Bishop Laud, 75 he emigrated to New England in 1631. Becoming assistant pastor at Salem, Massachusetts, he was soon dismissed because of his opposition to the New England theocracy and his denial of the right of the state to punish Sabbath breaking and heresy, that is, breaches of the “First Table.” 76 He proved to be the most provocative figure that had come to the American shores. PFF3 47.1
Williams’ theory of life was disturbing to Massachusetts. He found he could not join the church at Boston, because it compromised on the question of the English church as part of the “abomination of antichrist.” “You are not a separated people,” he declared. So he became assistant pastor at Plymouth from 1631 to 1633, spending much time among the Indians, acquiring their language, promoting their welfare, and antedating the efforts of John Eliot. His Key into the Language of America (1643) in parallel Indian and English columns taught clearly the literal creation week of Genesis 1 and 2, some six thousand years ago. 77 Returning to Salem, Williams was pastor in 1634-1635. But once more he became involved in controversy with the Puritan Massachusetts administrators over theocratic government and disregard of conscience. He rebelled against the synodical government in the Congregational churches. This he continued to protest. 78 PFF3 47.2
Summoned, in 1636, before a general council swayed by his bitter antagonist, John Cotton, he was sentenced to banishment for his assaults upon the oath and the holding of land by patent from the king without payment to the Indians, and the non separateness of the church, for his maintenance of the rights of free speech, and his denial of the right of the magis trate to act in matters that lie between man and his God, which principles became the obsession of his life. Williams escaped custody by flight into the “wilderness” in midwinter. He made his way to Narragansett Bay amid peril and bitter hardship, where he was joined by sympathizers, and founded the colony that developed into Rhode Island—on the basis of absolute liberty of conscience—the land being purchased from the aborigines. 79 In June, 1636, Williams and a few like-minded friends founded a safe retreat in this wilderness, fittingly calling it “Providence,” an asylum for the oppressed of all creeds or none, a “shelter to persons distressed for conscience.” 80 Thus he sought to escape the “monstrous paradox” of “God’s children” persecuting “God’s children.” 81 PFF3 47.3
Believing that the “apostasy of Antichrist” had corrupted the churches, and convinced that infant baptism was unscriptural, he and others formed the first Baptist church in America in 1638, and introduced immersion anew. In the absence of any Scripturally baptized person in the New World, one of their number, Ezekiel Holliman, was deputed to baptize Roger Williams. Then he, in turn, baptized Mr. Holliman and “some ten more.” In 1643 the four settlements in the growing colony sent him to England to obtain a charter for Rhode Island, with guarantees of protection from the aggressive Puritans of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. This he secured. Later, in 1647, the General Assembly adopted a code of laws guaranteeing | full religious liberty—not partial toleration, as in Maryland. PFF3 48.1
It was during his year in England that Williams published first his Mr. Cotton’s Letter Examined (1644)—a reply to Cotton’s justification of Williams’ banishment—and Queries of Highest Consideration (1644), and then his immortal book on soul liberty, The Bloudy Tenent, of Persecution, for Cause of Concience, discussed in a Conference betweene Truth and Peace (1644). 82 It was an answer to the thesis of Cotton and of Calvin, and was addressed to both Houses of Parliament, for the question of toleration was the topic of the day. It was a dispute with Cotton over two schools of political thought—autocracy and democracy. Williams’ main contention was that civil states are “civil, and therefore not judges, governors, nor defenders of the spiritual.” 83 His books consequently belong to the Old World as well as the New. While in England Williams made the acquaintance of Cromwell and Milton, and advocated the cause of liberty in Westminster. 84 Still another self-explanatory title was Christenings Make Not Christians (1645). 85 Later he wrote The Hireling Ministry None of Christs (1652).’ Holding this as an article of faith, he turned for his own living to farming and the Indian trade. PFF3 48.2
1. “BLOUDY TENENT” PREMISED ON PROPHECY
At the very outset of his Bloudy Tenent, in the dedication to Parliament, Williams appeals directly and significantly to the symbols of prophecy: PFF3 49.1
“Your Honours know the Babylonian Monarch hath the Lyon, the Persian the Beare, the Grecian the Leopard, the Romane a compound of the former three most strange and dreadfull, Daniel 7.” 86 PFF3 49.2
Williams held that the spirit of persecution was the spirit of the Beast. And in employing persecution against Dissenters, Protestants were likewise exhibiting the spirit of the Beast. A perusal of Williams’ writings shows the prophecies, which he frequently cites, to have been a motivating factor in his struggle for the principles of soul freedom. It was prophecy that formed the basis of his immortal appeal for full religious liberty in the eloquent reasoning which called for a break with the coercive spirit of the papal Antichrist. Williams had studied history in the light of prophecy, and his memorable book is permeated with the terms, symbols, and applications of prophecy. His logic is sound, and his application remarkably accurate. At least fifty times such references appear. PFF3 49.3
Under the influence of the Presbyterians, Parliament ordered the “public burning” of the book by the hangman. Thus it joined the immortal company of good books so sentenced. 87 John Cotton replied in 1647 with The Bloudy Tenent, Washed, And made white in the bloud of the Lambe, and in 1652 Williams, in England on a second trip, published a vindication called The Bloody Tenent Yet More Bloody. Returning to i America in 1654, Williams was elected “president” of Rhode Island. During his administration all groups, including the Quakers, were granted religious freedom. PFF3 50.1
The first Sabbatarian church in America was founded in Rhode Island in 1671, and its establishment created quite a stir. The report reached England that Rhode Island colony did not keep “the Sabbath.” Roger Williams denied the report but called attention to the fact that there was no Scripture for “abolishing the 7th day,” adding, “You know yourselves doe not keep the Sabbath, that is the 7th day.” 88 PFF3 50.2
2. WILLIAMS WARNS THE TEN HORNS
After touching upon the cries of the persecuted “soules under the Altar (Revelation 6),” 89 and the “spirituall Virgins, who abhorre the spirituall defilements of false worship,” 90 together with the persecutions of the beast of Revelation 13, 91 Williams utters this solemn warning in his Bloudy Tenent: PFF3 50.3
“Be wise therefore O ye Kings (especially those ten homes, Revelation 17)who under pretence of fighting for Christ Jesus give their power to the Beast against Him, and be ye warned ye Judges of the earth.” 92 PFF3 50.4
3. ANTICHRIST DESTROYED WHEN SINS ARE RIPE
Insisting that the tares will grow with the wheat until the “harvest or end of the world,” and to the “world’s end,” Williams asserts that “when the world is ripe in sinne, in the sinnes of Anti-christianisme,” 93 then- PFF3 50.5
“The Angels, with their sharpe and cutting sickles of eternall vengeance, shall downe with them, and bundle them up for the everlasting burnings. PFF3 50.6
“Then shall that Man of Sin, 2 Thessalonians 2. be consumed by the breath of the mouth of the Lord Jesus, and all that worship the Beast and his picture, and receive his mark into their forehead or their hands, shall drink of the Wine of the wrath of God which is poured out without mixture into the Cup of his indignation.” 94 PFF3 51.1
4. ANTICHRIST’S SUCCESS Is FOR TIME APPOINTED
Williams refers to conditions obtaining in the Pergamos and Thyatira churches, declaring: PFF3 51.2
“All may see how since the Apostacie of Antichrist, the Christian World (so called) hath swallowed up Christianity, how the Church and civill State, that is the Church and the World are now become one flocke of Jesus Christ.” 95 PFF3 51.3
Then comes this impressive exposition: PFF3 51.4
“It is most true what Daniel in his 8. and 11. and 12. Chapters, and John in his Revelation 11:12, 13. Chapters write of the great successe of Antichrist against Christ Jesus for a time appointed.” 96 PFF3 51.5
5. DEVIL TO BE IMPRISONED; BEAST ENGULFED IN FIRE
Then follows a reference to wars of extirpation against the Waldenses, and a reference to the Dragon of Revelation 12 as the “Devill in the Romane Emperours,” 97 with a later reference to the “prison for the Devill himselfe a thousand yeares, Revelation 20. And a Lake of eternall fire and brimstone, into which the Beast and False Prophet” shall be cast. 98 PFF3 51.6
6. WOMAN CARED FOR IN PAPAL PERIOD
Referring to the papal church as mystical Babylon, he continues: PFF3 51.7
“In the wildernesse (Revelation 12.) God provideth for the sustentation of the woman, Revelation 12. by which provision even in the most Popish times and places, yea and by most false and Popish callings.” 99 PFF3 51.8
“Antichrist (by the helpe of Civill Powers) hath his prisons, to keep Christ Jesus and his members fast: such prisons may well be called Bishops prisons, the Popes, the Devils prisons: These inquisition houses have ever been more terrible then the Magistrates.” 100 PFF3 51.9
7. HARLOT CLAIMS LANDS OF CHRISTENDOM
Williams parallels Nebuchadnezzar’s decree of the worthies and the fiery furnace with this second compulsion-the killing of all that receive not the mark of the Beast in Revelation 13 101—and says: PFF3 51.10
“It is true that Antichrist hath christned all those Countries whereon the Whore sitteth, Revelation 17. with the Title of Christ’s land, or Christian land.” 102 PFF3 52.1
8. TEN KINGDOMS GIVE POWER TO THE BEAST
In commenting on the call of God to separation from Babylon, Williams laments that many Protestants are still clinging to the spirit of popery, and refers to the coming “destruction of the Beast and the Whore.” 103 But one of his clearest statements concerning the papal Antichrist and her cup of abominations, in relation to Rome’s divisions, is this: PFF3 52.2
“We finde in the tyrannicall usurpations of the Romish Antichrist, the 10 hornes (which some of good note conceive to be the 10 Kingdomes, into which the Romane Empire was quartred and divided) are expresly said Revelation 17:13. to have one minde to give their power and strength unto the Beast, yea (ver. 17.) their Kingdome unto the Beast, untill the Words of God shall be fulfilled.” 104 PFF3 52.3
9. PRETENDED VICAR PRESIDES OVER GOD’S TEMPLE
Of papal claims, and the prophetic depictions of Daniel, Paul, and John, Williams has this to say: PFF3 52.4
“The pretended Vicar of Christ on Earth, who sits as God over the Temple of God, exalting himselfe not only above all that is called God, but over the soules and consciences of all his vassalls, yea over the Spirit of Christ, over the holy Scriptures, yea and God himselfe, Daniel 8 & 11 chap, and Revelation 15. together with 2 Thessalonians 2.” 105 PFF3 52.5
“Yet doth he upon the point challenge the Monarchicall or absolute power also, being full of selfe exalting and blaspheming, Daniel 7:25. & 11:36. Revelation 13:6. speaking blasphemies against the God of Heaven, thinking to change times and Lawes: but he is the sonne of perdition arising out of the bottornlesse pit, and comes to destruction, Revelation 17. for so hath the Lord Jesus decreed to consume him by the breath of his mouth, 2 Thessalonians 2.” 106 PFF3 52.6
10. TEN KINGDOMS BOWED TO POPE’S YOKE
Again, he refers to “the whole Pagan World under the Roman emperours, and the whole Antichristian World under the Roman Popes, Revelation 12 & 13.” 107 Note this: PFF3 52.7
“Those 10 Hornes signifie those many Kings, Kingdoms, and Governments, who have bowed down to the Pope’s yoake, and have committed fornication with that great Whore the Church of Rome.” 108 PFF3 53.1
Williams’ closing paragraphs on the final desolation of the church of Rome (Revelation 17 and 18) by “her great lovers,” and the perplexity of many as to just how this will be accomplished, are interesting. 109 The great Harlot had robbed kings and nations of their power and strength. Their love shall turn into hatred and make her desolate. 110 Thus the prophetic strand is woven into the very warp and woof of this famous book. PFF3 53.2
11. WITNESSES SLAIN AT END OF 1260 YEARS
In response to Cotton’s answer of 1647-The Bloudy Tenent Washed, And made white in the bloud of the Lambe-Williams published The Bloody Tenent Yet More Bloody. This treatise reiterates his former statements in even stronger language and greater specificness, and involves the year-day principle, thus: PFF3 53.3
“If the fourty-two moneths of the Beasts reign, and the two hundred and threescore dayes of the prophesie of the Witnesses of Jesus in Sackcloth be expired: yet I fear the three dayes and a halfe of the greatest slaughter of the Witnesses is not over.” 111 PFF3 53.4
Then he declares that God will subdue all His enemies, particularly the two mighty opposers, “the Turkish and Popish Empires,” and reiterates the “42 moneths of the reign of this mighty and dreadfull Beast”—with the slaughter of the witnesses “not long before his own eternall dounfall.” 112 PFF3 53.5
12. CATHOLIC CHRISTENDOM Is PROPHESIED BEAST
Throughout Williams’ Christenings Make Not Christians runs the same strain of Catholic Christendom as the Beast, and the people worshiping the Beast 113 -The Roman power being “transferred from the Roman Emperour to the Roman Popes and the Popish kingdomes, branches of that Roman-Root.” 114 PFF3 53.6
Further on he remarks: PFF3 54.1
“For the Catholicks conversion, although I believe I may safely hope that God hath his in Rome, in Spaine, yet if Antichrist be their false head (as most true it is) the body, faith, baptisme, hope (opposite to the true, Ephes. 4.) are all false also.” 115 PFF3 54.2
13. SLAUGHTER OF WITNESSES NEARLY ACCOMPLISHED
In The Hireling Ministry None of Christs, Williams contends that “the greatest soul oppression in this nation” comes through national churches and their “Hireling Ministrie” and subservient universities, and declares, “It is the absolute duty of the civil state to set free the souls of all men from that so long oppressing yoake of such ministries,” and all persons should be permitted to “make free choice of what worship ... they please.” Then follows a characteristic statement: PFF3 54.3
“Ever since the beast Antichrist rose, the Lord hath stirred up the ministrie of Prophesie, who must continue their witness, and prophesie until their witness be finished, and slaughters probably neer approching accomplished.” 116 PFF3 54.4
14. FULLNESS OF GENTILES FOLLOWS PAPAL FALL
Castigating Protestant attempts to plead apostolic succession by running “into the Tents of Antichrist,” 117 and for the aping of popish titles, ceremonies, and holy Gowns, cassocks, caps, scarfs, rings, and boots, 118 Williams declares the “fullnesse of the Gentiles is not yet come, and probably shall not, untill the downefall of the Papacy.” 119 PFF3 54.5
15. PROPHESYING OF WITNESSES PARALLELS BEAST’S REIGN
The witness against the “falshoods of Antichrist” must continue among the saints, he declares, adding: PFF3 54.6
“The Ministry of Service of Prophets, and Witnesses, mourning and Prophecying in Sack-cloath, God hath immediately stirred up and continued all along the reigne of the Beast, and Antichrist of Rome. PFF3 54.7
“This Witnesse is (probably) neer finished, and the bloudy storme of the slaughter of the Witnesses, is yet to be expected and prepared for.” 120 PFF3 54.8
Such are the earliest American expositors of prophecy. Utterly opposite in church polity, they were nevertheless impressively united in the main prophetic outline—with Rome the fourth prophetic empire, the Papacy as the subsequent Antichrist, the year-day principle, and the second advent as the sublime climax of all. PFF3 55.1
At the close of the prophetic expositors of the seventeenth century, a summary will be given, bringing together and crystallizing the otherwise scattered evidence on the basic features of interpretation covered in this survey. Only as the cumulative force of the aggregate witness is brought together does the full significance of the individual testimony appear. The same plan of summarization will be followed at the close of the eighteenth-century witness. PFF3 55.2