The Conditionalist Faith of Our Fathers, vol. 2

II. Conditionalists Legatt and Wightman Burned at Stake Under James I

James I was just as despotic as Elizabeth had been. In Scotland, while he was still James VI, he was very zealous for Presbyterianism and severely critical of the king of England and episcopacy. But on becoming king of Great Britain, James reversed his views, championed episcopacy, and threatened to harry the Puritans and Separatists out of the land. ⁹ Sentence of excommunication was pronounced upon any who impugned the true apostolical character of the Church of England or any part of its outline of worship or ceremonies. Many fled to Leyden and Amsterdam, including Brownists (or Congregationalists) and Anabaptists. CFF2 134.1

In 1606 the latter group drew up a Confession of Faith in twenty-six articles, and a company of thirty later returned to London, meeting for worship in strictest secrecy. But the fires of persecution had again been lighted, and men were still being burned for “heresy.” Thus it was that Bartholomew Legatt (Legat, Legate), “unblamable” in life and “skilled in the Scripture,” suffered at the stake in Smithfield, and Edward Wightman (or Thomas Withman) was similarly put to a martyr’s death in Litchfield. ¹⁰ CFF2 134.2

Note the setting: In 1611, the very year of publication of the epochal Authorized or King James Version of the Scriptures, a work opposing the Conditionalist contentions was likewise issued. It was entitled The Soule is Immortal; or discourse defending the immortality of the soul; against Anabaptists [such as Legat and Wightman], atheists, etc., by John Jackson. The accusations were harsh, in accordance with the times. CFF2 134.3

Astonishing as it may seem today, Anabaptist-Arians BARTHOLOMEW LEGATT and EDWARD WIGHTMAN were burned at the stake at Smithfield and Litchfield, respectively, under mandate of King James I of Great Britain. The story is told in A True Relation of the Commissions and Warrants for the Condemnation and Burning of Bartholomew Legatt and Thomas Withman ... in the Year, 1611. Signed with K. James his own hand. ¹¹ The title page refers to the “most Blasphemous Heresies and false Opinions” of the accused, adding that the document is “Published by Authority.” CFF2 135.1

Next follows the salutation of “James [I] by grace of God, King of England, Scotland,” et cetera, and “Defender of the Faith,” to Thomas Lord Ellesmere, Chancellor of England. The recital tells how the bishop of London had proceeded in a “Cause of Heresie” against Legatt of London, accused of “divers wicked Errours, Heresies, and blasphemous Opinions,” thirteen in number. He was then publicly pronounced an “obstinate and incorrigible Heretick” and, under sentence of excommunication, was turned over to the sheriff of London for “the execution of justice.” CFF2 135.2

1. “ROTTON CONTAGIOUS MEMBER” IS “CUT OFF.”

In the warrant to the sheriff, written in the horrific language of the day, Legatt is “pronounced, decreed, and declared to be an obdurate, contumnacious, and incorrigible Heretick,” and described as a “rotton contagious Member to be cut off from the Church of Christ.” The “Holy [Anglican] Mother Church,” having “not further to doe” with this “blasphemous Heretick,” turned him over to “our secular Power to be punished with condign punishment,” to “root out and extirpate,” namely, to be “burned with fire.” The sheriffs are thereupon commanded to “commit publickly to the Fire,” in West-Smithfield, the said Legatt to “be really burned in the same Fire.” ¹² This was executed amid a vast “conflux of people.” CFF2 135.3

Picture 2: Legatt burned at the Stake
Anabaptist Bartholomew Legatt—Burned at the Stake at Smithfield in 1611, Under Mandate of James I, as an “Incorrigible Heretick”.
Page 136

In the bill of particulars Wightman was charged with “wholesale” heresy—that is, of cherishing the combined heresies of the archheretics Ebion, Cerinthus, Valentinus, Arius, Macedonius, Simon Magnus, Manes, and Photinus, together with the specific deviations of the Anabaptists, ¹³ which included soul sleep. His name was obviously so blackened as to make him appear hideous, and fit only for the fire. “No sane man could possibly hold all the multifarious” and conflicting opinions imputed to him, and Crosby points out that “many of the heresies they charged upon him are ... foolish and inconsistent.” ¹⁴ Indeed, Bishop Neile, one of the commissioners who condemned him, later wrote an apology for his death. CFF2 136.1

2. INCLUDED “HERESY” OF “SOUL SLEEP.”

Under the provision of rooting out such “wicked Heresies” as the “Anabaptists” hold, it is to be particularly noted that after the common charges against the Anabaptists are listed, Wightman is thrice charged specifically with holding to the “heresy” of “soul sleep” and of the saints’ not going immediately to heaven at death: CFF2 136.2

“11. That the Soul doth sleep in the sleep of the first death, as well as the body, and is mortall as touching the sleep of the first death, as the body is: And that the Soul of our Saviour Jesus Christ did sleep in that sleep of death as well as his body. 12. That the Souls of the elect Saints departed, are not [now] Members possessed of the triumphant Church in Heaven.” ¹⁵ CFF2 137.1

That, of course, is straight Conditionalism. As to other heresies, number thirteen was specifically against the baptizing of infants, and number sixteen “that Christianity is not wholly possessed and preached in the Church of England, but only in part.” Therefore, in the writ of execution, pursuant to the king’s “Regal Function and Office” and authorized under the “great Seal of England,” the warrant to the Lord Chancellor is cited and the commission to the sheriff of Litchfield is given, “according to exigence of the Ecclesiastical Canons, and of the Laws and Customs of this Our Kingdome of England.” Wightman, then, as an Anabaptist-Arian holding “cursed Opinions belched by the instinct of Satan,” is “Adjudged and Pronounced an Heretick, and therefore is a diseased Sheep out of the Flock of the Lord.” And “lest Our Subjects he do infect by his contagion,” he is decreed to be “cast out and cut off.” ¹⁶ CFF2 137.2

As with Legatt, Wightman—charged with every conceivable heresy, including denial of man’s inherent immortality—on April 11, 1611, was turned over to the secular power according to law by James I, “Defender of the Catholike Faith,” to be “burned with fire” in Litchfield, specifically— CFF2 137.3

“in some publike and open place below the City aforesaid, for the cause aforesaid, before the people, and the same Edward Wightman in the same fire cause really to be Burned in the detestation of said Crime and for manifest example of other Christians, that they may not fall into the same crime.” ¹⁷ CFF2 137.4

Such was the cruel fate of these Conditionalists. CFF2 137.5

3. LAST PUBLIC BURNING FOR “HERESY” BY PROTESTANT MONARCH

Such violent language and action by a Protestant king, in the significant year of our Lord 1611, may to us today seem terrible and unthinkable—and it is, for persecution is an outrage of Protestant principle. But it was the hangover of the custom of the times, brought over from centuries of Roman Catholic violence against “heretics,” and such “heresy” included Conditionalism. (Martyrdom pictured on page 136.) CFF2 138.1

The Protestant Wightman, let it not be forgotten, died under the charge, among other “heresies,” of believing and teaching “that the Soul doth sleep in the sleep of the first death, as well as the body, and is mortal as touching the sleep of the first death” (Art. 11). For this aggregation of heresies listed he was deemed worthy of martyrdom, and the decree was duly executed. But this, it should be added, is said to be the last public burning for “heresy” authorized and executed by a Protestant monarch of England. CFF2 138.2