Religious Traditions

The Baptist Church

The Baptist church is a Christian sect, a Protestant denomination largely concentrated in the United States, although it spans adherents from around the globe. ("Baptists," the Columbia Encyclopedia, 2000, the History Channel Website) Within the Baptist tradition spans many of the beliefs of the ancient Jewish tradition the religion that authored the Hebrew Bible. The teachings of the Hebrew Bible inspired the Christian Bible, as well as the founding of both Catholic Churches. Of course, Christianity's history contains many schisms -- Roman Catholicism split from Eastern Catholicism, and later Martin Luther denied Papal authority altogether.

The Baptists split off from the multitude of Protestant traditions founded by Martin Luther. Baptists see themselves as holding to the truest principles embodied in the teachings of Jesus, Paul, and the Apostles, as well as the larger Judeo-Christian values of these two monotheistic traditions of Christianity and Judaism. The Baptists are an old Protestant sect, tracing their origins to the Dutch John Smith, a Mennonite who practiced self-immersion, baptizing himself before his congregation. Their existence predates that of the founding of the United States, even though most Baptists are concentrated in the United States. Baptists have existed since 1644. The name "Baptist" refers to what often strikes non-Baptists as an unusual feature of the sect, namely that Baptists "maintain that baptism should be administered to none but believers and that full immersion "is the only mode of administering baptism" truly authorized in the Christian Testament. The doctrine and practices of the Baptists thus broke with the Catholic forms of Christianity as well as with the Protestant Lutheran Church, but Baptists see this practice as a return to the true practices of Christ, and embodying the sect's definition of religion as a willed, conscious chosen method of rebirth for the believer. ("Baptists," the Columbia Encyclopedia, 2000, the History Channel Website)

Works Cited

Baptists." The Columbia Encyclopedia. 2000. The History Channel Website. http://www.thehistorychannel.co.uk/site/search/search.php?searchtext=1905&enc=6328?[24 Mar 2005]