In the previous chapters we have investigated several of the leading propositions of those known as "Two Seed Primitive Baptists." We have cited extensively from the above book by Primitive Baptist leader Elder (Dr.) John M. Watson who lived in the Nashville, Tennessee area in the early to mid nineteenth century. When I was a young Primitive Baptist preacher I visited with the churches in that area, many of which were once pastored by Watson. He was an opponent of Two Seedism and the first part of the above book addressed the heresies of the Two Seeders. On page 190 we have the title "A REFUTATION OF THE MANICHEO PARKERITE HERESY THE IMPERFECTION OF ALL CREATED THINGS THE SOURCE OF EVIL." (See here) He refers to Two Seedism as "the Parkerite heresy" (pg. 191).
Throughout the nineteenth century the newly formed "Primitive Baptist" or "Old School" Baptist church had a large segment who believed in some or all of the leading tenets of that heretical system. In our writings thus far (all now being published together in a blog titled "Two Seed Baptists") I have cited from such leading "Primitive Baptist" elders as Sylvester Hassell, Hosea Preslar, William Conrad, Lemuel Potter, etc., who agreed with Elder Watson concerning how deep was the Two Seed Parkerite infection within the newly formed Hardshell Baptist confederacy. Wrote Watson:
"...our course will be to discuss such things as are producing distress and divorcement among us; for it is both well known and painfully felt by the Baptists of this Association, and the Old Order generally, that many hurtful and untenable notions, unsustained by the word of God, with nothing for their support, but mere Parkerite perversions, have been, for a long time, gaining strength and consideration among us, against which we now protest plainly, yet charitably." (pg. 191-192)
Writing in "The Gospel Messenger" of 1894 (as cited by me in another posting - See here) Sylvester Hassell testified:
"...the heathenish perversions of Scriptural truth set forth by Eld. Daniel Parker, of Tennessee, about 1835, in his pamphlet called "My Views on the Two Seeds," have corrupted Primitive Baptist doctrine more, and rent off more members and churches from our fellowship, than any and all other causes combined...May it please the God of Israel soon to dispossess all their minds of the blighting Satanic delusions with which their churches have been cursed for nearly sixty years."
In that same article he also said:
"It would be impossible to tell how many changes and forms, each one inconsistent with itself, with the others, and with the Scriptures, Two-Seedism has assumed during that period...this heathen corruption of the gospel that has, for sixty years, poisoned, hardened, chilled, confused, and divided the Church of God?"
Throughout this series I have on several occasions had reason to say that there were differences of opinion among Two Seeders. For instance, some believed the Devil was uncreated, while others rejected the idea of an eternal Devil. Some denied that the non-elect had souls, while others rejected that idea. Some denied the resurrection of the bodies, while other Two Seeders believed it. This is what Hassell meant when he spoke of the "many changes and forms" of "Two-Seedism." The one idea that they all held to most firmly however was the belief that the elect, or "seed" of the Lord, always existed in Christ, even from eternity, in the doctrine of the eternal vital union of Christ and the elect.
Watson lists some of the leading errors of the Two Seeders when he wrote the following agenda for his rebuttal against them, giving his views in opposition to them:
"As we have to shape our address according to the subjects of controversy among us, we will proceed according to the following order: to show,
1. That the imperfection of all created things is the source or origin of evil, and not an eternal principle of evil, or an eternal Devil.
2. Prove that all the human family, elect and non-elect, fell in Adam, in opposition to the Parkerite notion, that only the elect, or Church, fell in him! and give an exposition of the two texts of Scripture which they quote in confirmation of that error.
3. Set forth the Scriptural account of the different kinds of Union between Christ and His people, contradistinct to the Parkerite view of the subject.
4. Offer an exposition of the revealed doctrine of the change and resurrection of our natural or mortal bodies, in opposition to the fallacy of the non-resurrectionists.
5. Conclusion. We will now consider our first proposition-that the imperfection of all created things is the source or origin of evil, and not an eternal principle of evil, or an eternal Devil!" (pg. 192-193)
Wrote Watson about the various tenets of Two Seedism:
"Let us, then, make out a synopsis of the Parkerite creed:
1. They believe there is an uncreated, self-existent and eternal God, infinite in Wisdom, Power and Holiness.
2. They believe there is an uncreated self-existent, eternal Evil Spirit, or Devil, intelligent, wicked, cunning and antagonistic to God.
3. They say that the soul of Christ is uncreated and eternal.
4. They fancy that the souls of the Children of God, or the Elect, are uncreated and eternal, and were always in actual union with God.
5. They contend that all the souls of the Children of God were infused into Adam, and pass, by a procreation of human bodies, into the persons of the elect.
6. They assert that the reprobates have no souls, and that their bodies are a multiplication of the woman's conception for the reception of a connate Satanic seed, uncreated and eternal, instead of souls, with which Satan was eternally united.
7. They affirm that, at death, the soul returns to God, and the seed of Satan to him.
8. They deny the resurrection of the bodies of the just and unjust." (pg. 229)
In response to these errors Watson wrote:
"The third article confounds Christ's soul and his divinity, and involves the untenable notion that Christ suffered in his divinity when he made his soul an offering for sin, and when his soul was exceeding sorrowful unto death. If the soul of Christ be uncreated, unoriginated and eternal, it is nothing less than divinity itself."
This is what we have already stated relative to this idea of being "eternal children" of God. It makes little gods of them all. The bible teaches, however, that men are created when conceived and born, this being the time when they came into actual existence. When they believe in Christ and turn to him they are created anew, becoming "new creatures in Christ." (See II Cor. 5: 17; Eph. 2: 10) But, if being saved is simply defined as becoming possessed of the soul or spirit of an eternal child of God, how is that a new creation? Two Seedism, as we will see in chapters dealing with its views on "regeneration" or "rebirth," has all kinds of problems explaining how an eternal spirit can experience regeneration. This led them to embrace what was called the no change view of regeneration, or "hollow log" regeneration.
Wrote Watson:
"Their fourth proposition that human souls are uncreated and eternal-blends them, in such a manner, with the divinity of God, that it is impossible to distinguish between them. Then, strange to tell, after they have been infused into Adam, they fall in him, become dead in trespasses and sins, roll sin under the tongue as a sweet morsel, and drink in iniquity as the ox doth water. Divine souls, uncreated souls, souls blended with the divinity of God, become thus defiled, by Satan and sin, until comparable to a cage of unclean birds! What absurdities! Human souls are certainly not of the high order ascribed to them by Parkerites, but a part of God's creation, and were capable of transgressing the Law of God, and taking the ruinous course of sin which we have just seen. In what way we are personally endowed with souls has not been revealed, and as no physiological researches have ever solved the problem we shall not attempt it." (pg. 230)
Yes, Two Seedism is an absurdity. What purpose did God have in creating human beings and placing within some human bodies his eternal children, children who from eternity were divine, holy, and perfect? Especially if there is no resurrection of their bodies? God is then seen as planting his children into bodies knowing that it would make them unholy! This makes regeneration a case where eternal holy spirits are made degenerate! Many Two Seeders affirmed that the eternal spirits of God's children experienced no change in regeneration, and no change to the body either. The only change that they acknowledged is that this implanting created a conflict between the flesh and the implanted spirit.
Wrote Watson:
"Nor is this all; it goes forth with a hard spirit here; has, of course, no sympathy or concern for the children of the devil: hints that prayer is useless in our pulpits, or elsewhere; dries up the sincere milk of the word; poisons the strong meats of the gospel; and confusion, contentions, disunion and chilling winds of doctrine follow in its serpentine wake! This is Parkerism, when stript of its Pagan patches, of its semi-christian garments, and made to stand forth in all its naked ugliness!" (pg. 233)
Today's Hardshell "Primitive" Baptists still retain remnants of Two Seed ideology, as I have stated in previous chapters and writings on Two Seedism. I have shown how it was Two Seedism that first proposed that the word of God or the gospel was no means in regeneration and today's Hardshells still hold to this idea. They also hold to a view of regeneration that has little or no change, for they tell us that people in heathen lands are regenerated even though they know nothing of Christ, or if they do, reject him and yet are born of God. They also retain remnants of Two Seedism in that they have that "hard spirit" that Watson mentions, wherein there is "no sympathy or concern for the children of the Devil," and that think "prayer" for sinners "is useless." I have written several articles about this characteristic of Hardshell Baptists through the years. You never hear them pray for the lost. As I pointed out about the origin of Satan, there are remnants of Two Seed views on that subject also, for they are skittish on it, not willing to say that Satan or angels fell from heaven.
Watson gives the truth against the errors of Parkerism, writing thusly:
"The Lord loved them with an everlasting love when they did not actually exist, when they had only a representative existence in His foreknowledge, and when they are brought into existence in time, He draws them with loving kindness, through regeneration into actual union with Himself...This vital actual union, begins with quickening--the receiving of those spiritual blessings, with which the people of God were blessed, before the foundation of the world, when they had no actual existence, but which they receive in the day of the Lord's visitation, and through which a vital actual union is brought about, between God and the soul, and when all these spiritual blessings shall have been received, a vital, actual union will ensue likewise between God and our vile mortal bodies. Ro 8:11,30." (pg. 221 of "The Old Baptist Test")
Watson says, in agreement with scripture, that no one's soul existed prior to being born into the world. He wrote further:
"The remarks made in the introduction to the subject of eternal union between God and his people, apply with equal force to that of justification; which is eternal in the same sense that the union of Christ and His church is..." (pg. 221)
Thus Watson denied the Two Seed teaching of eternal justification. He also affirmed that actual union with Christ does not occur until one receives Christ in regeneration.
Watson wrote:
"Before dismissing the present subject, we will refer to another text greatly perverted by the Parkerite: "For as much then, as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, He also himself likewise took part in the same, etc. Heb 2:13. The Parkerite supposes that they were the children of God actually, before the creation of Adam, and that they partook of flesh and blood through Him, hence they say, Christ "also Himself likewise took part of the same" etc. And to indicate Parkerism more fully, we will state their counterpart to this, they say "the children of the devil, or seed of the devil were his children or seed actually, before the creation of Adam, even from everlasting, and that they partook of flesh and blood, through the multiplied conception of the woman! Hence their eternal union with Satan." (pg. 222-223)
We have already called attention to this text, along with James 1: 18, wherein Gilbert Beebe sought to teach the idea that the elect were begotten in eternity past when the Son of God was begotten. They come down from heaven and become flesh (incarnation) just as Jesus did. There is as much foundation for that belief as there is for the incarnation of Krishna, the eighth avatar, or incarnation, of the Hindu god Vishnu.
In 1875 in the Hardshell Baptist periodical "The Baptist Watchman," a weekly paper published out of Nashville, Tennessee just after the Civil War, we read of a letter written to that paper wherein there is still mention of the "eternal children" doctrine. That letter begins as follows:
"To the Editors of the Baptist Watchman"
"I am pained, also, to see some differences among some of the Primitive Baptist, on doctrinal points. Some (a minority or majority? - SG) holding what is called "eternal children doctrine," (associated with "Two Seedism" - SG) which I cannot see that the scriptures justify. I believe the church stood complete in the purpose of God in Christ from the beginning of time in the covenant between the Father and the Son, for he spoke of things that were not as though they were. Again, some (a minority or majority? - SG) say he works without means. I just as well say that Jesus did not open the eyes of the blind man without the clay and spittle, or that the fish was not used to carry Jonah to land, or a Jonah to preach to the Ninevites; or that God did not use Ezekiel and the wind in resurrecting the dry bones of the valley. To say that he does not use man to speak to man, and his purposes not carried out by it, is strange to me indeed. The Apostle said he was not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, because it is the power of God unto salvation (not the power after salvation) to every one that believe. If then it is the power of God, we ought not to limit it. The book says, "We preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord and ourselves your servants for Jesus sake." (Feb. 6, 1875 Issue) (See my posting "Means Still Taught In 1875" - See here)
This writer mentions two errors of the Two Seeders that were prevalent among the "Primitive Baptist Church" in 1875, the error of "eternal children" and the error that God does not use means in the salvation of souls.
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