The July 2014 Christadelphian Magazine was recently handed to us, and our attention drawn to the article entitled, “150 Years of The Christadelphian.”
On page 8 the brethren and sisters who later became part of the Berean Fellowship are described as a “sizeable defection.”
The Berean Fellowship is no longer “sizeable,” and that is certainly the case in the UK - but they take great exception to the term “defection” and to the article in your Magazine.
The dictionary describes the word “defection” as “the abandonment of duty, allegiance, principles etc.”
The idea contained or associated with this word also refers to “deserting one’s country, cause, allegiance etc, especially in order to join the opposing forces.”
The charge therefore made against the brethren and sisters in 1923 was that they had abandoned their principles and allegiance and joined forces with the enemy. This is a reasonable conclusion from the use of the word - and a serious charge.
Was it Defection?
How does the article confidently assert “defection”? The charge of defection must first be proved and the burden of proof was certainly not given in the article. Generalisations are not proof. It is true that an article in a magazine cannot provide the whole details of any issue that might arise. However, if a charge of “defection” is to be attributed to brethren and sisters then more than generalisations are required, otherwise current readers who know little or nothing of the things of the past will be given the impression that the brethren and sisters in 1923 were mere trouble makers. The article glosses over the matter as if those brethren and sisters were making a fuss over nothing.
While the article refers to the “Constabulary Issue” and the “Nature of Christ” no specific details are given.
It may be argued that the article was not intended to go into the “for and against” details. That point could be accepted, if the reference to “defection” had not been made. Here your writer has taken upon himself to be the case for defence, prosecution, judge and jury!
The question should really be asked by your thinking readers “Why did brethren and sisters choose to withdraw fellowship and become a minority group?” If the brethren and sisters of 1923 are castigated as defectors (and they are not around to answer for themselves), then the reasons that they chose to act in the way they did should in all fairness be placed before your readers.
Thankfully, the evidence is still available for those who love the Truth and desire to find out why things happened as they did; why brethren and sisters chose to separate.
The Constabulary Issue
Your article was right to say that there were issues surrounding the question of Military Service as a result of the 1914-18 War, and right again when it referred to a dissatisfied minority regarding the fellowshipping of Special Constables.
However, your article was wrong in not explaining the issues which gave rise to brethren and sisters (admittedly in a minority) refusing to accept the majority.
Full details of the events that took place leading to this division are given in the booklet “The Birmingham Trouble,” but in brief the issues were as follows.
Two Birmingham brethren (as you are no doubt aware) joined the Special Constables and justified themselves in so doing. The following extract from one of the brethren’s speeches indicates the seriousness of their position:
“The policeman on the contrary, finds that his work is entirely good. He is engaged in restraining evil in order that freedom may live and act. In a word, his use of force is judicial, and I submit that we are to discriminate between judicial force and personal violence….judicial force on the other hand is a definitely appointed means for the suppression of evil and is virtuous because of its divine sanction – it is moral and beneficent in result.”
Those who stood aside from these unscriptural views did so, not to set up a rival meeting, but to bring pressure upon the Arranging brethren to reconsider their support of brethren Davis and Pearce (the two brethren in question).
The Arranging brethren refused to consider the matters raised by the minority and actually withdrew their fellowship from them!
Yet Bro C C Walker had said:
“In all the thirty years of my experience, I have never heard the Commandments of Christ called in question in that manner before.”
A Bro F G Ford at the same time said:
“If the views of brethren Pearce and Davis were followed, I could foresee the city being policed by brethren.”
The views of these brethren did not change, despite much correspondence and discussion.
Which side “abandoned duty and principle” (and this must be duty and principle to Christ)? Whose “allegiance” remained steadfast? Who were the “defectors”?
The Nature (and Sacrifice) of Christ
Your article goes on to say that brethren and sisters in North America were “determined to dissociate themselves from the views on the nature of Christ propounded by Bro A D Strickler.” This is also stated as if this was just a whim and an unreasonable position for brethren and sisters of Christ to take. Was it?
Before we comment on this, you state that Bro Roberts and Bro Walker did not repudiate the views of A D Strickler.
It is true that Bro Walker did not. However, Bro Roberts died in 1898 and would not have been able to make his judgement on the matter when the issue finally came to a head after much debate. The division came over 20 years after Bro Roberts fell asleep in Christ.
Your readers who know nothing of this issue would be left with the impression that not even Bro Roberts stood against this!
But Bro Roberts contended earnestly against Edward Turney in 1872 who propounded similar views (known as Renunciationism). These views were diametrically opposed to the original teaching of Christadelphians on the Nature and Sacrifice of Christ. This led to a division in the brotherhood, which was a grief of mind to Bro Roberts; but he did not hesitate to defend the Faith on this issue. He would certainly had stood by those opposing Strickler when the same fundamental doctrine was being attacked.
But to come to the point regarding Strickler’ teaching.
The first sign of apostasy was indicated in his own admission that he was departing from the interpretation of Bro Thomas and Bro Roberts on the Nature and Sacrifice of Christ. In referring to them he said:
“It pains me to in any way differ from them. As a whole, I consider the writings of Dr. Thomas and Brother Roberts incomparable, and I believe none have a higher appreciation of their work for the truth than myself. I do not care to justify myself, but I can prove that Bro Roberts differed from Dr Thomas on some very important truths. I have been forced to my present views by what I honestly believe to be the meaning of the apostolic writings. The interpretation of those writings in some important passages is not in harmony with the intent of the divine writer. The vitality of man’s responsibility to God for his sins is undermined and destroyed by those interpretations. The foundations for the doctrine of atonement for original sin is laid in them, and J J Andrews in his views only carried out the logical conclusion.”
He stated on another occasion:
“For years there has been a difficulty in harmonizing the Scriptures with the theory of the atonement held by us as Christadelphians”
A D Strickler proceeded to argue in a series of articles that no sin-offering was required by God for sin in any other sense than that of transgression, and that in consequence Jesus Christ did not come under the redemptive scope of his own offering. In short, Strickler returned to the orthodox view of the death of Christ and what it achieved.
One further quote will suffice to illustrate Strickler’s reasoning when treating of 2 Cor.5:21:
“Here was the man Christ Jesus, who knew no sin, made sin; it must be the same kind of sin in both statements; that is, sin as transgression of law. For John says, ‘Sin is the transgression of the law. How was Christ made sin? Just in the way the apostle says he was, viz., ‘Being made a curse for us; for it is written, cursed is everyone that hangeth on a tree’ (Gal.3:13). The law could not curse with death unless the law had been transgressed; Christ was brought under this by divine arrangement providentially carried out. Where is the justification to teach that the way in which Christ was made sin, was by being made ‘sinful flesh’ in view of the above facts?”
Here, Strickler prefers to make the Lord Jesus Christ a transgressor of the Mosaic Law, rather than accept that the word “sin” is used in two ways in the Scriptures (as expounded by Bro Thomas and Bro Roberts); viz., (1) the transgression of law, and (2) the physical principle of the animal nature which is the cause of all its diseases, death, and resolution into dust.
Much more could be produced to indicate the departure from this vital Saving Truth, and more information is given in the booklet “Bible Teaching Concerning Sin and Sacrifice.”
Again we ask the questions “Which side “abandoned duty and principle” (to Christ)?” “Whose “allegiance” remained steadfast?” “Who were the “defectors”?
The “determination to dissociate” from such teachings was obviously nothing else but faithfulness to the Word of God.
The Real Casualty of 1923
As your article indicates (though with some inaccuracies) error was not new to the Christadelphian community. There had been Renunciationism, Partial Inspiration, and Non-Pre-baptismal Responsibility (to name the most well-known issues that arose).
In all these controversies, the brethren and sisters in the main held fast to the sound doctrines of the Scriptures. Under the faithful leadership of Bro Roberts the vast majority of the brotherhood supported the withdrawal from fellowship those holding apostate views.
However, in 1923, there was no sound leadership and a new error arose! C.C. Walker who held the Editorship of The Christadelphian stated:
“Bro Strickler was “crotchety” but fundamentally sound.”
As indicated briefly above, Strickler was no sound on a fundamental principle of Truth.
The Birmingham ecclesia recognised that fact, but stated:
“Until the Buffalo brother (Strickler) comes to our doors we will take no action. We will continue to fellowship visitors from Buffalo and all other ecclesias which support him in fellowship”
Up until this point, the Scriptural teaching of the Doctrine of Fellowship and Withdrawal had been accepted and practiced. Now a new teaching began to emerge which could only be described as “at-the-door fellowship.” This was a fundamental shift from the always held position on Scriptural Fellowship.
Bro Roberts wrote:
“It is the duty of the friends of the Truth to uphold it as a basis of union among themselves, by refusing to receive either those who deny any part of it, or those who would receive those so denying”
This sound teaching which protected the Truth from error was gradually lost, and today there are numerous variations of the teaching on “Fellowship” which amount to the same thing – a failure to uphold the Truth coupled with a refusal to withdraw from errorists.
Has Time changed these principles?
It is impossible for time to change fundamental principles; but human nature can change; the lapse of time can minimise the importance of an issue. Subsequent generations can begin to think previous positions may have been extreme. How nice to be in Fellowship with a greater number of brethren and sisters! Such is the reasoning of the flesh and a mind that does not keep the sound principles of the Truth uppermost in the conscience.
There can be prevailing desires to have friendship and association with other groups – to such an extent that Truth is compromised.
Such were the results of the labours of John Carter in uniting the Bereans with Central in America in 1953, and a uniting with Suffolk Street in 1957. This was not repairing divisions as you article affirms, but compromising the Truth.
To be fair, the re-union of the Bereans with Central was a Berean desire to go back to Central – not a Central movement to correct a wrong position. Central did not admit any error or give any indication that the wrong views had changed, or would no longer be accepted.
The result of the Jersey City Conference in 1953 in the United States (without going into details) was a compromise for the majority of the Berean Fellowship. The fellowship was decimated. Whole ecclesias were reduced to small numbers, and those who had made a valiant stand in 1923 were betrayed by those who desired association with a group who had never corrected their errors.
If the Foundations be destroyed, what can the righteous do?
The Berean Fellowship was now a shadow of its former self. It was greatly reduced in numbers, and spread out over vast distances. The Berean Fellowship was no longer a “sizeable defection.” Those who had returned to the position that had previously been regarded as unsound, were the real defectors.
Those who went back to Central were to find that the continued ground of compromise was to be met with the arrival of the Suffolk Street group. The flood gates of apostasy were now pushed right open, with the acceptance back into fellowship of beliefs that were considered important enough to refuse by Bro Roberts, and the faithful of his day – the logical conclusion of forsaking the Doctrine of Fellowship in 1923.
A defection?
Not in our opinion!
The Berean Fellowship is admittedly few - but committed to the Scriptural principles of the Basis of Fellowship that was established by Brother Thomas and Brother Roberts - Principles that were vigorously upheld by the “sizeable defection” in 1923.
We intend in God’s grace to continue in that warfare of Faith, keeping separate from Central and the legion of errors that are fellowshipped there - while welcoming all lovers of the Truth who are prepared to courageously cast in their lot with us in the defence of the One Faith.
On behalf of the Hengoed Berean Christadelphians
Phillip Hughes
