What makes a Baptist?

A sign on the door that says “Baptist Church” often offers little guidance as to what one may find inside. Will there be speaking in tongues? Strict Calvinist theology? A prosperity gospel? A strong political message? A high liturgy? Variations in names—“First Baptist Church,” “Apostolic Baptist Church,” “Burmese Baptist Church” or “Full Gospel Baptist Church”—may offer clues, but even a denominational affiliation (Southern Baptist, National Baptist Convention) will leave open a very wide range of possibilities.

Baptist history has no obvious plot, not least because no Baptist church need claim any connection with another, past or present. Scholars who devote themselves to interpreting Baptist tradition must contend with a community that is not sure it has one. Baptists who want to explain their practices or beliefs are as likely to appeal to the early church or the book of Acts as to texts or founders from their past. In fact, Baptists have no agreement about whether their story should start with 17th-century English dissenters, 16th-century Anabaptists or the first-century church.

Undaunted, Robert Johnson and David Bebbington have undertaken introductory overviews of this fractious family. Johnson’s summary is a cross-section of the Baptist present, with historical background, while Bebbington’s is a thematic history, with interpretive glimpses of the present.