BRITISH ISRAELISM

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 72, Issue 290, 6 December 1929, Page 7

BRITISH ISRAELISM

Sir, —C.L.W. says: “The term ‘Protestant’ is of foreign origin.” If he will turn to a dictionary he will find the meaning of protestant to be “one who protests’’ It does net matter what the subject is about which he protests. People protested to such good purpose, more than 300 years ago, on the subject of being under a foreign power, either politically or religiously, that they came to be called “Protestants.” These Protestants claimed that the Scriptures alone contained the supreme authority in mat ters of faith. How entirely the ancient British church rejected human authority in matters of faith may be learnt from the saying of St. Columba of lona (A.D. 550): “Except what has been declared by the law, the prophets, the Evangelists and the Apostles, a profound silence ought to be observed by all others on the subject of the Trinity.” The 6th of the 39 Articles of the Church of England makes the same statement. There it is stated: “Holy Scripture containeth all things necessary to salvation, so that what ever is not read therein, nor can be proved thereby, is not to be reckoned of any man that it should be believea as an article of the Faith, or be thought requisite or necessary to salvation.’’ This shows the continuity oi doctrine for nearly 2000 years of the British Church, which was founded by the Apostles, and which church was itself the Christian continuity of the church which God founded in the wilderness. This brings us back to where we were before. God took Israel to be “a peculiar people unto Himself. ’ He formed the whole nation into a church. The church was the whole nation. This is so still, for the representatives of the whole nation irrespective of denomination recently voted for the acceptance or rejection of the revised Prayer Book. When later, foreign doctrine and usages were introduced into the Hebrew Church, God punished by sending Israel into captivity. The ancient Britons were Israelites, settled there before the captivity. As soon as Christ had redeemed Israel by His death, as foretold in Isa. 53rd., the news of their redemption was taken to Britain by some of the Apostles, and the first Christian Church was built at Glastonbury in Gloucestershire. “The ancient British Church/’ writes Blackstone, vol. 4, p. 105, ‘‘ by whomsoever planted, was a stranger to the Bishop of Rome, and all his authority. ’ ’ ‘ ‘The Britons told Augustine,” writes Bacon, in “Government of England,” “they would not be subject to him, nor let him pervert the ancient laws of their church. They maintained the liberty of their church 500 years after his time, and were the last of the churches of Europe to give up their power to Rome, and the first that took that power away.” That occurred in 1555, when they protested against the errors of Rome, and reformed themselves on to the original foundation of tne ancient British Church, founded by the Apostles. In Rom. 11., St. Paul reminds the Roman converts that they , were a wild graft, grafted into the good olive tree, and they were only partakers of the fatness, because of the root on to which they were grafted, but they were not to boast themselves above the natural branches, for God was able to break them off the tree. “Be not highminded, but fear.” C.L.W. says: ‘‘The League of Nations is unable to function properly until a United Christendom displaces the present foreign ecclesiastical control and environment.” I am under the impression that the League of Nations is a man-made concern, and quite indepen dent of God. The League of Nations which God chose for Himself (Gen. 22; Gen. 35; Gen. 48), to function in these latter days is the Anglo-Saxon Race.

ELIZABETH ASHTON. This correspondence is now closed. — Editor.