The Battle for Hearts and Minds

It is always helpful to clarify truth by distinguishing it from error, that is, to better define what truth is, it is useful to determine what it is not. "Hereby know we the spirit of truth, and the spirit of error" (1 John 4.6b). This has been done in credal statements, catechisms and other works by the Church since its earliest days. The genre of literature which specifically focuses on this apologetic task is known as heresiography. Early examples of this include Irenaeus of Lyons, Against Heresies; Hippolytus of Rome, Refutation of All Heresies; and Tertullian, The Prescription Against Heretics.

Puritan heresiography too reflects an interest in upholding the truth and combating error. The 1640s, in particular, was a time of competing claims to truth, and while the Westminster Assembly succeeded in vindicating truth more eloquently than anyone, the battle for hearts and minds continued and many took up the challenge to refute error. Notable examples from the Puritan era include Thomas Edwards, whose Gangraena was published in three parts, the first and second of which was titled, The first and second part of Gangraena: or A catalogue and discovery of many of the errors, heresies, blasphemies and pernicious practices of the sectaries of this time, vented and acted in England these four last years (1646); Robert Baillie, A dissuasive from the errours of the time vvherein the tenets of the principall sects, especially of the independents, are drawn together in one map, for the most part in the words of their own authours, and their maine principles are examined by the touch-stone of the Holy Scriptures (1646); Ephraim Pagit (his father was a Puritan and he was a royalist sympathetic with Presbyterianism), Heresiography; or a description of the Hereticks and Sectaries of these latter times (1645); and Johannes Hoornbeek, Summa Controversiarum Religionis; Cum Infidelibus, Hæreticis, Schismaticis: Id Est, Gentilibus, Judæis, Muhammedanis; Papistis, Anabaptistis, Enthusiastis et Libertinis, Socinianis; Remonstrantibus, Lutheranis, Brouvnistis, Græcis (1653) [see here].

Catechisms also provided a launching pad for catalogues and refutations of particular errors such as David Dickson's Truth's Victory Over Error (this is the first sympathetic commentary on the Westminster Confession of Faith prepared from lectures given c. 1650 and first published in 1684; the first published commentary on the WCF was published in 1651 by an opponent of the Assembly, William Parker, although often misattributed to Henry Parker) which includes An alphabetical List of the proper and patronymic Names of the Authors of the old and late Heretics, confuted in the foregoing Treatise (a most useful reference, although among modern editions it is to be noted that the 2002 Presbyterian Armoury Publications edition includes page references, while the 2007 Banner of Truth edition does not); and a Compendium of the Principal Errors of Those that are Outside the Reformed Church was added to Abraham Hellenbroek's A Specimen of Divine Truths (one of the features constituting the expanded "big Hellenbroek" edition of his Catechism, although the Compendium was not authored by him).

In 1647, the London ministers of Sion College issued A Testimony to the Truth of Jesus Christ, and to Our Solemn League and Covenant, as Also Against the Errours, Heresies and Blasphemies of these times, and the Toleration of them. Wherein is inserted A Catalogue of divers of the said Errours &c. This Testimony was a powerful witness against the spiritual tumult of the 1640s, yet the 1650s required that this witness be expanded and clarified for the common man. Puritan Presbyterian William Lyford took up the challenge with a work that would be later be titled The Instructed Christian, or The Plain Man's Senses Exercised to Discern Both Good and Evil being a discovery of the errors, heresies, and blasphemies of these times (1655), and the toleration of them, as they are collected and testified against by the ministers of London, in their testimony to the truth of Jesus Christ. This book was reprinted by Soli Deo Publications, and I commend it to the reader as both a worthy exposition of the 1647 London Testimony, and a helpful guide to many of the errors of our own day as well.