Calvinism's Roman Catholic Origin: Part 1

Somebody says, “The pre-tribulation rapture was invented by Jesuits,” and suddenly it sounds like you’re supposed to stop asking questions. We do the opposite. We take that accusation seriously enough to test it, laying out what the claim actually means for Bible prophecy, the Great Tribulation, Daniel’s 70th week, and the idea of a future personal Antichrist.

From there, we introduce what we call the “supreme irony”: the stronger Roman Catholic connection may not be where the rumor points. We walk back through church history to Aurelius Augustine (354 to 430 AD), presented as a major source for both amillennialism and key Calvinistic categories, and we explain how an allegorical method of prophetic interpretation reshapes texts like Revelation 20, Daniel 9:24–27, and even broader prophetic expectations about a literal thousand-year reign of Jesus Christ.

We also read and reference quotations from Reformed and Presbyterian sources to show how often Augustine is credited as foundational, then ask the listener to consider what that means when people claim dispensationalism is the “Roman” invention. Along the way, we begin with the comfort of Annie Flint’s “One Day At A Time” and the promise of Christ’s presence with believers, because doctrine is not just an argument, it is meant to strengthen faith and steady the heart.

If you care about Reformed theology, Calvinism, dispensationalism, end times prophecy, or simply learning how to verify big claims, listen through and weigh the evidence. Subscribe, share the program with a friend, and leave a review so more people can find careful Bible teaching.

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Transcript

Welcome And Why Scripture Matters

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Welcome to the Preaching of the Cross Radio Podcast, featuring the radio ministry of Pastor James W. Knox of the Bible Baptist Church of Deland, Florida. Our prayer is that these half-hour Bible study programs will bring the lost to a saving knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ and enable the saved to grow in the grace and knowledge of the Savior. Now here's your host, Pastor James W. Knox.

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We're very happy to have you on board today, and hope and pray that God will cause your hearts to rejoice in the truths that we will set forth on the program today. Not truths because I have made them up or invented them, not truths because we have decided by a vote of our organizational structured hierarchy and our board of governors and so on and so forth, but truth because the word of God is truth. Jesus said to his father in John 17, 17, Sanctify them through the truth, thy word is truth. And we certainly believe with all of our hearts that the word of God is true. And since we've got the absolute truth of God Himself, why give you our opinion or our ideas? Why not just give you the truth from the Bible? And so that's what we try and do. We try and spend the entire uh half an hour which we have on this radio station each and every time to preach and teach the pure and perfect word of God in a way that is uh challenging, a way that is uh helpful, and in a way that is instructive to each and every listener, and we hope and pray that you'll find uh today's broadcast to be uh to be very much the

One Day At A Time Poem

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same. Here's a little poem I'd like to read to you before we start in with the Bible teaching today. This is by Annie Flint, and it's called One Day at a Time. One day at a time with its failures and fears, with its hurts and mistakes, with its weakness and tears, with its portion of pain and its burden of care, one day at a time we must meet and must bear. One day at a time to be patient and strong, to be calm under trial and sweet under wrong. Then its toiling shall pass, and its sorrow shall cease, it shall darken and die, and the night shall bring peace. One day at a time, but the day is so long, and the heart is not brave, and the soul is not strong. O thou pitiful Christ, be thou near all the way, give courage and patience and strength for the day. Swift cometh his answer, so clear, so sweet, yea I will be with thee, thy troubles to meet. I will not forget thee nor fail thee nor grieve, I will not forsake thee, I never will thee. Not yesterday's load we are called on to bear, nor the morrow's uncertain and shadowy care. Why should we look forward or back with dismay? Our needs as our mercies are but for the day. One day at a time, and the day is his day. He hath numbered its hours, though they haste or delay. His grace is sufficient, we walk not alone, as the day so the strength that he giveth his own. That's a blessed truth, it sure and certainly is. What a joy to know we're not walking through this life all by ourselves, but that Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of God, has promised to go with us to the end. He said to those that believe on his name, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee. Lo, I am with thee always, even unto the end of the world. And uh we certainly can rejoice in that great and blessed

A Booklet Sparks A New Study

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truth. Now, I was sent in the mail. You can't believe all the things we get in the mail, uh, hundreds of letters every week, and and all kinds of little booklets and little pamphlets, and someone sending this to read, someone sending that to try and straighten us out, someone sending uh something else to try and help us and encourage us, and uh just all kinds of things come in the mail. And I was sent a little booklet published in uh by Chester, England, I believe that's pronunciation, and it's a little booklet written by a man named Paul Bailey. I don't know how he got my name, don't know how he got my address. Of course, these broadcasts are heard all over the world, and these uh tape recordings uh go into places that you just you just couldn't believe or imagine. But uh this little booklet deals with a a subject that someone should have dealt with long ago, and it is done so well that I I'm just gonna place all my weight upon this man's research and study, and we're going to use his uh his framework to present to you a most interesting study indeed. This uh this study is called the Supreme Irony. The supreme irony. And the subheading is an exposure of the Roman Catholic roots of a millennial Calvinism. Now, to some of our listeners, that sounds most interesting, and the remainder uh you you may have no idea at all what what that's all about. So

The Jesuit Origin Claim Explained

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let me explain to you when discussing future events with those who call themselves Christians who are members of the Reformed churches. Now, you don't hear much about the Reformed Church in the southern United States, it's primarily a Midwestern thing and a northern uh northern thing. Uh it's a European uh matter. You would recognize, if I said Presbyterian, you would recognize that before you would recognize Reformed. Some of you would would recognize hard shell or primitive Baptist before you would recognize Reformed. But those in Reformed Persuasion charge that the pre-tribulation view of prophecy, that is, that the Lord Jesus Christ will come in the air to catch away all save-born-again believers before the time of Great Tribulation. Those in Reform Persuasion claim that this idea was invented by the Jesuit priests of the Roman Catholic Church. Now, the Jesuits, as you know, are the Society of Jesus founded by Ignatius Loyola in 1534. Due to the increasing popularity of this conspiracy theory and the regularity with which it is set forth, there's a need to examine history and find out whether or not this is true. Now here's the idea. The idea is that the time of Jacob's trouble is not Jacob's trouble. It's the church's trouble. The idea is that Daniel's 70th week, the seventieth week of prophecy regarding Daniel's people, the Jews, are not for Daniel's people the Jews, but for the church. The idea is that the church that is not appointed unto wrath will go through wrath. The idea being that the time of tribulation from which the New Testament believers promise deliverance is a time from which the New Testament believer will not be delivered. And the the men who denounce the pre-tribulation rapture teaching say that it was made up or invented by Jesuit priests of the Roman Catholic Church. Now in researching this subject, many Reformed writers, both ancient and modern, have been have been uh searched. Uh their writings have been searched. The classic works of uh Calvin and Augustine were were investigated, as well as several books written against dispensationalism by various ex-dispensationalists. If you recall when we went through the series, we we brought you an entire series of broadcasts. If I don't if I'm not mistaken, it was sixteen programs in all. And we we covered many of these works and dealt with many of these writings. But we we want to know what they say, we want to get the matter straight from the horse's mouth, if you will, and so we didn't overlook these matters. The prophetic works by reformed authors were were looked at, especially their exposition of Ezekiel 40 to 48, which we've covered on these broadcasts, Daniel chapter 9, verses 24 to 27, and we we've taken a good careful look to find out uh just why these people have come to the conclusions they've come to and determine whether or not uh this idea of a rapture prior to the Great Tribulation really is a Roman Catholic invention. So let's take a look, and and as I say, we're going to lean very heavily on the work of Paul Bailey, and we thank God for his research. Thank God for the time that he spent on this matter. It's been alleged by some Amillennial, that is, those who don't believe in a literal thousand-year reign of the Lord Jesus Christ on earth. It has been alleged by some Amillennial Calvinistic writers. When we say Calvinistic, we mean those who hold to the theory of the five points of John Calvin and believe that God forces some people to go to hell who don't want to, and God forces some people to go to heaven who don't want to, but he really doesn't force anybody to do it because nobody wants to do anything unless God forces them to want to. That's an oversimplification of the Calvinistic view, which the Calvinists don't like, but which perfectly suits the bill. But some Amelino Calvinistic writers claim that dispensational teachings such as the pre-tribulation rapture of the church and the future manifestation of a literal person who is an antichrist or the Antichrist are false doctrines made up by Jesuit priests. This was supposedly done to divert everyone's attention away from thinking that the Pope is the Antichrist. Now, what these men did, these men said that these Calvinists and reformers who are still hanging around in the Protestant Reformation instead of going on and getting the additional light that God's given to his church, these men have said that number one, we believe the Pope is the Antichrist, which of course is not taught anywhere in Scripture. Number two, since those who hold to a premillennial view of the return of the Lord Jesus Christ and a pre-tribulation rapture of the Church believe in a personal Antichrist who will be a false Christ who will set up a false uh throne and a false kingdom at Jerusalem, that those who believe such a thing are turning men away from the belief that the Pope is the Antichrist, and then their logic follows that, or to them it's logical, it follows that this being true, a Jesuit must have thought this up so that people wouldn't think the Pope was the Antichrist. Now, what any of that has to do with teaching the Bible, what any of that has to do with what the scriptures say is beyond me. These writers have accused men like J. N. Darby, who lived from 1800 to 1882, and C. I Schofield, who lived from 1843 to 1921, of swallowing this Jesuit bait and of infiltrating the church with these modern dispensational heresies. These writers contend that all great men of the past believe that the papacy fulfills the scriptures concerning the Antichrist, which of course all great men of the past don't believe that, never did believe that. And they contend that we are already in both the tribulation and the millennium, which broadly speaking is the historic millennial reform position. Now, how you can be in both the tribulation and the millennium is beyond me. Anybody that knows their Bible and studies their Bible just scratches their heads when they read statements like this, but that's exactly what these men teach and believe. This Romanistic Jesuit conspiracy, uh it is charged, uh, presents us with what must rank as one of the most ironic accusations in all of church history. Because the facts show the opposite, and we'll give you the facts, the opposite to be true. It is actually a millennial Calvinism, which has Roman Catholic origins, not dispensationalism. And that won't be hard to prove if we do our homework instead of just repeating what somebody told us.

The Supreme Irony And Augustine

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Now, in starting our investigation, we've got to go all the way back to a fellow named Aurelius Augustine. You've probably heard of the infamous Saint Augustine. He lived from 354 to 430 AD. And since he was the formulator and the fountainhead of both A millennialism and Calvinism, we've got to go back and search out what he said. I know the Calvinists believe that John Calvin came up with his doctrines of election and foreordination, predestination, and election from studying the Bible, but that's not true. He learned them from studying the writings of the Roman Catholic fathers because he himself, of course, was a Roman Catholic scholar. Now, the fact that Calvin got his ideas from Augustine can easily be proved by the writings of all Amillen Calvinists themselves. For example, with regard to Amillennialism, listen to this uh quotation from W.J. Greer in his book, The Momentous Event, published by the Banner of Truth Trust, which is a Calvinist publishing house, on page number 27. I quote, Augustine, who was one of the greatest men of the Christian Church of all time, at first adopted pre-Millinarianism, but gave it up as carnal. Augustine, says A.J. Case, laid the ghost of premillennialism so effectively that for centuries the subject was practically ignored. Now, if if the listener has spent his time in a church that does not teach the Bible, he or she will be confused as to what we're talking about. We say premillennialism. The millennium, Mili, 1000, the millennium is the 1,000-year reign of Jesus Christ on this earth. It is spoken of half a dozen times in the 20th chapter of the book of Revelation in such clarity that no one could mistake it, except someone who is interpreting the Bible instead of believing the Bible. Now, Augustine began by believing that Jesus Christ would return to earth and set up a thousand-year reign because that's what the Bible said. But he forsook that view, gave it up as carnal. How in the world, believing that only Jesus Christ can bring about the kingdom, rejecting that view and saying that man is going to bring about the kingdom by his religious deeds and labors and activities in the name of the Lord, how how a man can say that premillennialism is carnal and amillennialism is spiritual again causes one to scratch the head. But uh from the writing of W. J. Greer, The Matter of Truth Trust, we have a Calvinist telling us that Augustine was indeed an amillennialist. Oswald Alice, writing in Prophecy and the Church, in a book published by the Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Company, obviously a Calvinist outfit, in 1947, says on page six, quote, when Burkhoff, for example, describes A millennialism as the historic faith of the Christian Church, he is referring to the Augustinian view in general. William Cox, another A millennialist, he wrote in Biblical Studies in Final Things, Presbyterian Reform Publishing Company, 1966, page 177, quote, Augustine re-studied the millennialism problem. It's not a problem to anybody that believes the Bible, it's only a problem to those that don't like what the Bible says. Anyway, the quote goes on to say, Augustine restudied the millennialism problem and broke with the prevailing teachings. So you know what the prevailing teachings were between 354 and 430 AD? That according to the Scriptures, Jesus Christ was coming back to this earth to set up by himself, without the aid of man, without the aid of any church or any organization, a 1000-year kingdom on this earth. Cox goes on to say, quote, his Augustine's interpretation dealt such a blow to the premillennial teaching that it was all but unheard of again until the Protestant Reformation. No, what he means is that the Roman Catholic Church so persecuted the true believers that none of their writings or teachings were allowed to take hold and become prominent in the so-called world of thought and learning. But if you study any good work on church history, you'll find that there were pre-millennial pre-tribulational believers all over the earth being persecuted by the church which Augustine was helping to set up. Now, although Augustine actually leaned towards post-millennialism, the main point to recognize is that he held to and indeed systematized the mystical or allegorical method of prophetic interpretation, which had grown out of the Alexandrian Egypt School of Theology

Allegorical Prophecy And Origen’s Influence

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in 190 AD. Now God called his people, the nation of Israel, out of Egypt. God taught us how Abraham got in trouble when he went down to Egypt. Later the children of Israel lost their homeland because they looked to Egypt for help. God called his only begotten Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, out of Egypt. Egypt is always a type of this world. And those Alexandrian manuscripts, which are the basis for the New International Version and the New American Standard Version, are just more of the same. Now, one of the greatest champions of this error, this mystical and allegorical interpretation of the Bible, instead of just believing what the Bible says, you spend all your time teaching people the Bible doesn't mean what it says, it means something else, and then making up something that you think it means. One of the greatest champions of this error was the Alexandrian Gnostic heretic by the name of Origen. He lived from 185 to 254. Today, Reformed and Roman Catholic theologians all follow the allegorical method of interpretation when dealing with prophecy. All the popes of Rome have been a millennialists. That is, there isn't one Reformed leader or one Roman Catholic leader who has ever believed in the premillennial coming of Jesus Christ to set up a thousand year rule and reign on earth over which He Himself is King of Kings and Lord of Lords. Not a one of them has ever believed that. They got that teaching from Augustine, and Augustine got that teaching from Origen, and neither of these men ever believed that the Bible meant what it said. Not only does

Reformed Quotes On Augustine And Calvin

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the Reformed camp readily admit that Augustine is the father of its prophetic views, it also points to him as the original founder and formulator of its Calvinistic views. Now please note carefully the following quotations and bear in mind that they are the words of amillennial and postmillennial Calvinists. They are not the words of dispensationalists. Lorraine Bittner, who many of you are probably familiar with, he's an excellent student, excellent scholar. He has written many masterful works. The problem is when the Bible crosses his theology, he crosses out the Bible and stays with his theology. But in his work, Reformed Doctrine of Predestination, or the Reformed Doctrine of Predestination, Presbyterian Reformed Publishing Company, 1932, he says, quote, Augustine had taught the essentials of the system, referring to five-point Calvinism, a thousand years before Calvin was born. That is, the man who wrote the textbook for the Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Company on the Reformed Doctrine of Predestination said that the doctrine came from Augustine, the virtual founder of the Roman Catholic Church, Benjamin Warfield, wrote a book entitled Calvin and Augustine, again for the Presbyterian Reform Publishing. Company. This book came out in 1956, and he said, Quote, the system of doctrine taught by Calvin is just the Augustinianism common to the whole body of reformers. Now you know what these men just said? Two men writing textbooks for Reformed and Presbyterian publishing houses, writing doctrinal manuals for Calvinists. They said our doctrine is nothing more than that of Augustine, recycled by John Calvin. Please note that Augustine did not merely believe the five commonly accepted points of Calvinism, but A. C. Customs insists they were actually, and I quote, formulated by uh formulated implicitly by Augustine. That's from a work, The Sovereignty of Grace, Presbyterian Reform Publishing Company, 1979, page 71. Now these aren't men that are anti-Calvinistic. These aren't men that are dispensationalists, these aren't men that are Bible believers. These are men setting forth the doctrines of the Calvinists, and they're all admitting that John Calvin was simply repeating the teachings of the Roman Catholic founders, or the founders of the Roman Catholic Church.

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C.

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H. Spurgeon, although clearly premillennial, boldly stated. And this is quoted by Kent Kelly from his book Inside the Tulip Controversy, Calvary Press, 1986, page 22, quote, C. H. Spurgeon, quote, Calvin got his Calvinism from Augustine. Now you've only got to skim through Calvin's institutes to find that he quotes freely and favorably from Augustine on page after page. In fact, A. L. Baker, in his book, uh Birkauer's Doctrine of Election, Presbyterian Reform Publishing Company 1981, says, quote, There is hardly a doctrine of Calvin that does not bear the marks of Augustine's influence. In other words, when a man says I'm a Calvinist, that man is saying, I am a Roman Catholic. I just reject the Pope. You must remember, these reformers were trying to reform the Roman Catholic Church. They had little or no argument with the doctrines of Roman Catholicism. They just didn't like the authority and the influence of the Pope. John Calvin had no problem with the Roman Catholic doctrines because he continued to teach them, including baby sprinkling, amillennialism, and of course the five-point heretical doctrine of unconditional election and the so-called doctrines of grace, which have nothing at all to do with the grace of God. They have rather to do with Augustine's Egyptian philosophies that he picked up from origin, who never believed any Bible as far as he could throw the building I'm sitting in right now. Since well-informed omillennial Calvinists acknowledge that Augustine formulated their beliefs, it is not surprising to find that they hold him in high esteem. Calvin himself called Augustine a holy man. And are you ready for this? In Calvin's Calvinism, page 127, 145, 146, 149, Reform Free Publishing Association, and John Calvin's Institutes, page 963-966, available from Westminster Press, John Calvin called Augustine Holy Father. If I was a Calvinist, I wouldn't let anybody know it. I would say that I believed in the doctrines of grace, I would say that I believed in the sovereignty of God, I would be a Calvinist, but I certainly wouldn't tell anybody I was a Calvinist. Not a man that would violate Jesus Christ's commandment to call no man on earth your father, and not a man who would call Augustine Holy Father, when the only person in all the Word of God that was ever called Holy Father was God the Father seated in heaven. It's a strange thing, isn't it? Talbot and Crampton called Augustine one of the greatest theologians and philosophical, philosophical minds that God has ever seen fit to give to his church. That's Talbot and Crampton, Calvinism, Hyper Calvinism, and Armenianism, Stillwater's Revival Books, page 79. A.C. Constance asserts that Augustine stands as a major link between Paul and Calvin. That's quite a stretch, isn't it?

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Thank you so much for listening today to the preaching of the Cross Radio Broadcast.

Free CD Offer And Closing

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You've just heard the first in a series of six messages on the Roman Catholic origin of Calvinism. We will send you this entire series of six programs on one CD, absolutely free of charge. No cost, no solicitation, no follow-up letter. We want you to have a copy of this study, The Roman Catholic Origins of Calvinism. You may order it at our website, jameswnox.org. Just go to jameswnox.org. Give us your name and mailing address and the call letters of the station to which you listen, and we will get you a copy of the entire six-part study on the Roman Catholic origins of Calvinism. That is Jameswnox.org. Visit today, put in your order, leave us the call letters of this station. We will be encouraged to be able to encourage you. All right, the announcer be on in just a moment. We leave it up to the local station to tell you when the program will come your way again. And he'll be on in just a moment, or she will be on in just a moment to tell you when you can hear the Preaching of the Cross radio broadcast next on this fine station. Until then, I'm Brother James. May the Lord richly bless you, and good day.

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Thanks for tuning in today. Join us every weekday for another episode of the Preaching of the Cross Radio Podcast. For hundreds of hours of in-depth expository Bible teaching, please visit our YouTube channel, James W. Knox Sermons, our sermon audio page, Bible Baptist the Land, or our website, Bible BaptistTheland.com. Until next time and throughout eternity, may Jesus Christ be praised.