In the first installment in this series, I tried to sketch a theological framework within which to consider one of the first Reformed responses to the new Particular Baptist movement. Next, we need to meet the players involved in the 1642 debate at Southwark, which Daniel Featley’s The Dippers Dipt narrates.

In this installment, we focus on the major Baptist figure present at the debate, William Kiffin (1616–1701).¹ In the following installment, I will introduce you to Daniel Featley and to the text of the work.

Kiffin is worthy of attention, first because he was a central figure in the debate between Featley and the Baptists, but also because he was, as a nineteenth-century Baptist historian wrote, “FATHER OF THE PARTICULAR BAPTISTS.² He played a “significant role” in the drafting of the London Confession of Faith (1644) and was the second signatory to the Second London Baptist Confession (1677) in 1689.³ By the late 1640s and early 1650s, Kiffin emerged as a spokesman for the “fledging Baptist movement.⁴ A nineteenth-century historian called Kiffin an “extraordinary” person in the Particular Baptist tradition.⁵ One anonymous writer called him the “ordained Mufti of all heretics and sectaries.⁶

Kiffin was born in England (though his surname is Welsh).⁷ His parents died of the plague in 1625, and in 1629 he was apprenticed to a glover.⁸ This was a hard life for a thirteen-year-old boy, but Parliament would not pass child labor laws for another two centuries.⁹ Two years later he ran away from his master. While he was free, he found himself in St Antholin’s Church.¹⁰ There, he heard a sermon by Thomas Foxley, which the Lord used to convict him that he should not have run away, and so he returned to his master.¹¹ As a young man he heard some notable preachers in London, for example, Louis du Moulin (1606–80), the son of the famous French Reformed theologian Pierre du Moulin (1568–1658).¹² It was the Arminian preacher/theologian John Goodwin (c. 1594–1665) whose preaching Kiffin credited as the instrument through which he came to faith.¹³ That same year (1631) he was meeting regularly in a conventicle (a small-group) for prayer and Bible study. As an orphan without a wealthy sponsor, theological education was impossible, but according to historians, Kiffin became “skilled” and “knowledgeable” in the Scriptures.¹⁴

Because of his Arminianism and perceived sympathies with aspects of Romanism, the appointment of William Laud (1573–1645) as Archbishop of Canterbury created something of a crisis for a number of people in the Church of England, and Kiffin was among those. By 1638 he separated from the Church of England for the “congregational way.¹⁵ The pastor of the congregation where he settled, Samuel Eaton (c.1596–1665), was in prison for his non-conformity, and young Kiffin was invited to preach.¹⁶ By 1642 he left the Congregationalists and joined the fledgling but apparently fast-growing Baptist movement.¹⁷ As mentioned, he was a framer of and signatory to the London Confession of 1644. Throughout the rest of the decade and into the early years of the next, he “emerged as a spokesman” for the movement.¹⁸ He also became an active writer opposing the radical Fifth Monarchy movement and John Bunyan’s practice of receiving at communion those who had only an infant baptism.¹⁹

Kiffin had what today we might call a remarkable tent-making ministry. The apprentice glover grew up to become a successful leather merchant. He not only became a member of the “Worshipful Company of Leathersellers,” the ancient guild, but eventually, in 1671, Master of the Leathersellers guild.²⁰

He was so successful in business that he had leisure not only to conduct an ecclesiastical ministry, but also to be elected to Parliament and “sit” (English) or serve (American) as the member for Middlesex for two years (1656–58).²¹ He became an active supporter of the Parliamentary cause in the English Civil War, donating horses and funds and even being made a “captain” and “Lieutenant Colonel” in the London Militia.²² He would use his wealth, connections, and influence to help win the release of some General Baptists (as distinct from the Particular Baptists, Kiffin’s wing of the movement), who had been arrested for participating in conventicles.²³

His political activity earned him the wrath of his political opponents, and his house was raided in 1659 by General Monck, who had assumed control of the army after Oliver Cromwell’s death. Within the following three years he would endure being arrested, detained briefly, and then released three times.²⁴ He was arrested again in 1684 after the Rye House Plot of 1683, fomented by “various London radicals” to assassinate Charles II.²⁵ His son-in-law was wrongly accused of participating in the plot and narrowly escaped death.²⁶ In 1672 the Declaration of Indulgence granted those who dissented from the Church of England freedom to preach and worship, and Kiffin obtained a license to preach.²⁷

He outlived his son William (d. 1669), his daughter Priscilla (d. 1679), his wife Hanna (d. 1682), and two of his grandsons, who were put to death for participating in the failed Monmouth Rebellion (1685),²⁸ in which James Scott, Duke of Monmouth (1649–85) and illegitimate son of Charles II, sought to take the throne in place of James II.²⁹

His last years were as turbulent as the rest of his life. He remarried, but his new wife “ran afoul” of the congregation. In 1698 she was charged by the congregation of defrauding Kiffin of ￡200 and making a false accusation against him.³⁰

Kiffin was as industrious ecclesiastically as he was in business and politics. Between 1644–60 he worked to gather and organize congregations into Baptist associations. He became a sort of superintendent of the new movement.³¹ His longest written work was his response to John Bunyan’s practice of admitting to communion those who had not been re-baptized or baptized as a believer.³²

Notes

1. Kiffin’s name is spelled differently by modern scholars. Michael A. G. Haykin and Samuel D. Renihan spell it as Kiffen, but Tom Nettles spells it Kiffin. A survey of his publications, in seventeenth-century editions, shows that his surname was spelled both Kiffin (e.g., A Briefe Remonstrance . . . [London, 1645]) and Kiffen (e.g., A Letter Sent to the Right Honorable . . . [London, 1659]). Since Early English Books use Kiffin, that is the spelling I use here. See Samuel David Renihan, “‘From Shadow to Substance.’ The Federal Theology of the English Particular Baptists (1642–1704),” PhD diss., (Amsterdam: Free University, 2017), 90; Michael A. G. Haykin, “William Kiffen,” in Michael A. G. Haykin and Terry Wolever ed., The British Particular Baptists, vol. 1, A Series of Biographical Essays on Notable Figures, rev. ed. (Springfield, MO: Particular Baptist Press, 2019); Tom Nettles, The Baptists: Key People Involved in Forming Baptist Identity, vol. 1, Beginnings in Britain (Ross-Shire, UK: Christian Focus, 2005), 129–45.
2. Joseph Ivimey, A History of the English Baptists…4 vol. (London, 1811–30), 2.296 as quoted in Nettles, The Baptists, 1.129. Capitalization original.
3. Haykin, “William Kiffen,” 155, 164 (hereafter, Haykin).
4. Haykin, 156. As an outsider to the Baptist movement, it is interesting to note that, in his essay, Haykin writes of Calvinistic Baptists and Baptists (and once of General Baptists, which implies the existence of a Particular Baptist movement) but does not use the expression “Particular Baptist.” Nettles, however, writes freely of Particular Baptists. Neither, in their essays, uses the expression “Reformed Baptist.” Haykin does, however, strongly align the Particular Baptist movement with the Reformed when he writes that the Baptists “emerged in the seventeenth century from the womb of English Puritanism” (Haykin, 151), and that the First London Confession (1644) “demonstrated the solidarity of the Calvinistic Baptists with the Reformed community throughout Europe” (Haykin,155). These are interesting claims. What is the evidence that the Reformed churches of Europe—all of whom confessed a sharply different understanding of the history of redemption, the nature of the church, the nature of the covenant of grace, and the administration of holy baptism, and condemned the very view of baptism advocated by the Baptist “community” (to use Haykin’s word) in the strongest possible terms—saw the Particular Baptist movement as Reformed? The evidence would seem to be to the contrary. Featley’s response was typical of the Reformed response when he denounced the Particular Baptists as “Catabaptists.” This is not the language of a warm embrace by the Reformed of the Particular Baptists. Further, it is long past time to think critically of the expression “Calvinistic Baptist.” This is an oxymoron and an oversimplification of Calvin’s and Calvinist theology, piety, and practice, boiling it down simply to soteriology. Kiffin and the Particular Baptists were predestinarian and Protestant in their soteriology, orthodox in their doctrines of God, Man, and Christ, but their reading of redemptive history, and their doctrines of the church and sacraments were not Calvinistic. Did the Particular Baptists take up the Extra Calvinisticum? If so, how did they square that with their reading of redemptive history and their denial of the continuity of the covenant of grace? How can we call Baptists “Calvinistic” when Kiffin et al., were at pains, as both Haykin and Nettles demonstrate, to read John Bunyan out of the Particular Baptist movement for accepting to the Lord’s Table those who had been baptized as infants only. How can one be “Calvinistic” but refuse to admit Calvin to the table? Or how can one be “Calvinistic” and be unable to commune in St Pierre during Calvin’s ministry? The same sorts of questions and challenges apply to Nettles (The Baptists, 1.143), who says the Second London Confession (1677/1689) is “very similar, but not identical in all points, to the Westminster Confession of Faith.” On the differences see this series: R. Scott Clark, “1689 Versus The Westminster Confession: A Comparison And Contrast.”
5. Haykin, 151.
6. Haykin, 157. A mufti is a “Muslim legal expert empowered to give rulings on religious matters.” Oxford Dictionary of English, s.v. “Mufti.”
7. The narrative—the play-by-play, if you will—that follows is heavily dependent upon the chapters by Haykin and Nettles cited above. I am responsible for the color commentary, as it were.
8. A glover is a maker of leather gloves.
9. See Heather Michon, “The History of Child Labor in England: From the Industrial Revolution to Reforms and Changing Attitudes,” The Economic Historian, March 25, 2024.
10. St Antholin’s Budge Row dates to the twelfth century. It burned in the Great Fire in 1666 and was rebuilt by Sir Christopher Wren.
11. Haykin, 152.
12. On Pierre du Moulin, see Daniel Borvan, “Fighting for the Faith: Pierre du Moulin’s Polemic Quest,” DPhil thesis (Oxford: University of Oxford, 2020). On the Huguenots generally, see Daniel Borvan, On The Perseverance of the French Reformed Church (video); Borvan, Exiles on Main Street—Huguenots As A Christian Minority (video); Matthew Scott Harding, “A Voice Among the Restricted French Delegates of Dort: Pierre du Moulin on Providence and Predestination,” in Joel R. Beeke and Martin I. Klauber ed., The Synod of Dort: Historical, Theological, and Experiential Perspectives (Göttingen: V&R Publishing, 2020); Daniel Borvan, “Pierre du Moulin’s Use of Scripture and Tradition in the Arminian Controversy” in Beeke and Klauber, ed., The Synod of Dort.
13. Haykin, 153. Do not confuse the Arminian John Goodwin for the Reformed theologian Thomas Goodwin (1600–80).
14. Haykin, 153.
15. Haykin, 154.
16. Haykin, 154. For more on Samuel Eaton, see “Eaton, Samuel,” in Cyclopedia of Biblical, Theological, and Ecclesiastical Literature, ed. James Strong and John McClintock (NY: Harper and Brothers, 1880).
17. Haykin, 155–56.
18. Haykin, 156. Haykin, in this essay, only once, and then implicitly, distinguishes between kinds of Baptists. Often he writes of “the Baptists.” The implication seems to be that, in at least some respects, Kiffin’s leadership extended beyond the Particular Baptist wing of the movement.
19. Haykin, 157–58; 162; Nettles, The Baptists, 1.139–41.
20. Haykin, 160.
21. Haykin, 159.
22. Haykin, 159.
23. Haykin, 160. Baptists in America who are tempted by Christian Nationalism might do well to pay attention to the experience of Baptists in England and in the American colonies before they rush headlong toward trying to establish a theocracy.
24. Haykin, 159.
25. Haykin, 163. The Rye House Plot was so called because some “republicans” plotted to murder “Charles II and his brother James duke of York as they passed the Rye House near Hoddesdon in Hertfordshire on their return from Newmarket to London in March 1683. This was to be followed by risings in London and elsewhere.” Doreen J. Milne, “The Results of the Rye House Plot and Their Influence upon the Revolution of 1688: The Alexander Prize Essay,” Transactions of the Royal Historical Society 1 (1959): 91.
26. Haykin, 164.
27. Haykin, 161.
28. Haykin, 164.
29. See Mark Cartwright, “Monmouth Rebellion” World History Encyclopedia, September 6, 2022.
30. Haykin, 164.
31. Nettles, The Baptists, 1.133.
32. Nettles, The Baptists, 1.138.

©R. Scott Clark. All Rights Reserved.

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Post authored by:

• R. Scott Clark

  

  R.Scott Clark is the President of the Heidelberg Reformation Association, the author and editor of, and contributor to several books and the author of many articles. He has taught church history and historical theology since 1997 at Westminster Seminary California. He has also taught at Wheaton College, Reformed Theological Seminary, and Concordia University. He has hosted the Heidelblog since 2007.

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