2 May 1690 A.D. A narrow escape for 300 Waldensians from 4000
French dragoons.
The story
is told by Dr. Rusten. Rusten, E. Michael and Rusten, Sharon. The One Year Christian History. Carol Stream, IL: Tyndale House
Publishers, 2003. Available at: http://www.amazon.com/The-Year-Christian-History-Books/dp/0842355073/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1393302630&sr=8-1&keywords=rusten+church+history
Backstory.
Peter
Waldo was a rich 12th century merchant from Lyons, France—the silk
business. He was moved by Mark 10.21 to give up his goods and preach.
Mark 10:21
1599
Geneva Bible (GNV)
21 And Jesus looked upon
him, and loved him, and said unto him, One thing is lacking
unto thee. Go and sell all that thou hast, and give to the poor, and
thou shalt have treasure in heaven, and come, follow me, and take up the cross.
He
did not intend to start a movement, but it happened. His followers went out 2 by 2. Sections of the Scriptures were translated
into the local dialect. Rome did not like the vernacular Scriptures nor
Scriptures in the hands and mouths of laymen.
That was their province of authority.
Various
engagements with the Papacy resulted in their flight from Languedoc in southern
France into the Italian Alps of Lombardy in northern Italy.
Seen by the Romanists as unorthodox, the Waldensians were
formally declared heretics by Pope
Lucius III, 1184 at the Synod
of Verona and by Pope
Innocent III at the Fourth Lateran Council in 1215. In 1211, more than 80
Waldensians were burned as heretics at Strasbourg, beginning several centuries of persecution
that nearly destroyed the movement.
Waldensians held a number of things as Bible readers. Some of these were:
1. The atoning death and justifying righteousness of Christ
2. The Godhead
3. The fall of man
4. The incarnation of the Son
5. They denied purgatory and said it was the “invention of the Antichrist.”
7. Temporal offices were not meant for ministers of the Gospel
8. Relics were simply rotten bones and pilgrimages served no end.
9. Relics and pilgrimmages impoverished people and enriched ecclesiastics.
11.
Some viewed Romanism as
the harlot of the Apocalpyse.
By the time of the Reformation, many became Calvinists. The Swiss and French Reformed churches sent William Farel and Anthony Saunier to attend the meeting of Chanforan. It convened on 12 October 1532. Farel invited them to join the Reformation and to leave secrecy. A French Reformed Confession of Faith was crafted and the Waldensians accepted it.
The French Bible translated by Pierre Robert Olivétan with Calvin’s help. It was published at Neuchâtel in 1535. The cost of its publication was defrayed by the churches in Waldensia who collected the sum of 1500 gold crowns for this purpose.
By
1689, with much water under the bridge, the French were assailed by Romanist
authorities. The French Huguenots fled
to the Italian Alps and joined them.
They
took a covenant called the Covenant of Sibaud:
“God by his grace, having brought us back happily to the
heritages of our fathers, to re-establish there the pure service of our holy
religion—in continuance and for the accomplishment of the great enterprise
which this great God of armies hath hitherto carried on in our favor—
“We, pastors, captains, and other officers, swear and
promise before the living God, and on the life of our souls, to keep union and
order among ourselves; and not to separate and disunite ourselves from one
another, while God shall preserve us in this life, if we should be reduced to
three or four in number…
“And we, soldiers, promise and swear this day before God to
be obedient to the orders of our officers, and to continue faithful to them,
even to the last drop of our blood…
“And in order that union, which is the soul of all our
affairs, may remain always unbroken among us, the officers swear fidelity to
the soldiers, and the soldiers to the officers;
“All together promising to our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ
to rescue, as far as it be possible to us, the dispersed remnant of our
brethren from the yoke which oppresses them, that along with them we may
establish and maintain in these valleys the kingdom of the gospel, even unto
death.
“In witness whereof, we swear to observe this present
engagement so long as we shall live.”
On
2 May 1690, the Waldensians were
entrenched in the mountains. Beneath
were 4000 French dragoons led by Marquis de Feuquiere. They attacked including an artillery barrage
during a snow storm. The Waldensians
scrambled higher. A thick fog set
in. The Waldensians escaped to live for
another day.
2
Mar 1690 A.D. See above, the escape of
the Waldensians. More on their
Confession
Note
the observation that the Church of England (before Laud, Arminians and the
Latitudinarians) was classified as a Reformed faith: the "Reformed
Churches" of France, Switzerland, Germany, England, Scotland, Geneva, and
Holland. Geneva too! Oh no! Whaaaa!!! I
want my Mommy and baby bottle!
http://heritagebooktalk.com/waldensian-confession-reformed-confessions/
states the following.
Waldensian Confession – Reformed Confessions
Taken from Reformed
Confessions of the 16th and 17th Centuries in English Translation: Volume 4,
1600–1693
Waldensian Confession (1603)
Historical Background
The following document, while not a formal confession of
faith, attests to the Reformed character of the Waldensian Church at the turn
of the seventeenth century. Here the Vaudois align themselves emphatically with
the Reformed churches of Europe.
The general context of the declaration is the ongoing
persecution of the Waldensians in the region of Saluzzo/Salusse/Saluces
(so-called Marquisate of Saluzzo), south of Turin, Italy. Emmanuel Philibert
(1528–1580) had regained the Duchy of Savoy-Piedmont from the French in 1559
and made Turin his capital in 1562. He was succeeded in 1580 by Charles
Emmanuel I (the Great [1580–1630]), who repeatedly attempted to conquer and
suppress Calvinism in his domain and beyond (twice he failed to attack and
conquer Geneva, in 1588 and in 1602). The Waldensians were classified along
with other banditti as outlaws and heretics. They responded with an appeal to
Charles Emmanuel at a conference in the spring of 1603. On April 9, he issued a
decree of general amnesty (a copy is reproduced in Morland, 466–71). The
Waldensians gained a few brief years of tranquility by this decree.
Our translation is based on the French text found in Leger,
Histoire générale des églises évangeliques des Vallées de Piémont (1669),
1:111–12, as compared with the English version in Samuel Morland, The History
of the Evangelical Churches of the Valleys of Piemont (1658), 41–43.
A Declaration of the Waldenses of the Valleys of
Meane, and of Maties and of the Marquisate of Saluzzo, presented in
the year 1603, to the Duke of savoy.
Whereas our predecessors from all time, and from father to
son, have been instructed in the doctrine and religion which we have always
openly professed from our childhood and in which we have instructed our
families, as we have learned from our fathers, and which (while the king [of
France] held the Marquisate of Saluzzo), we were permitted to profess without
any disturbance no less than our brothers in the Valleys of Lucerne, who, by a
treaty expressly made with their sovereign prince, have rejoiced with us in
securing its continuation: and because His Highness, incited instead by persons
of evil intentions than by his own will, has resolved to disturb us and to that
end has brought forth an edict against us: that all the world may know that it
is not for any crime which we have committed, either against the person of our
prince, or to rebel against the laws, or that we have been guilty of murders,
of thefts, etc.; that we have been tormented in that way, spoiled of our goods,
and the possessions of our houses, etc. We declare that we are certain and
persuaded that the doctrine and religion practiced by the Reformed Churches of
France, Switzerland, Germany, England, Scotland, Geneva, Denmark, Sweden,
Holland and other kingdoms, nations and dominions, of which we have before made
open profession under the obedience of our princes and principal sovereigns, is
the only doctrine and religion ordained of God, which alone is able to render
us acceptable to God and to lead us to salvation. We have resolved to hold it
at the peril of our lives, goods, and honor, and to continue in it up to the
last breath of our life. And if anyone believes that we are in error, we very
humbly beseech him that he show us our errors; we offer to renounce it without
delay and to follow whatever would be shown to be more excellent, desiring
nothing more than to render the obedience to God that we owe to Him, as poor
creatures, and by this means obtain from Him true and eternal happiness. But if
by violence, they wish to constrain us to abandon the way of salvation, to
follow the errors and false doctrines invented by men, we choose rather to
suffer the loss of our houses, goods, and lives, begging most humbly His
Highness, whom we recognize as our lawful Prince and Sovereign, that he not
permit us to be persecuted without cause, but rather that he allow us to
continue all the rest of our life, and our children and posterity after us, in
the same obedience which we have before inviolably rendered as his true and
faithful subjects.
Since we request nothing else of him except the rendering
whatever we ought according to the express commandment of God, we may also be
allowed to give to God the service which is due to Him and which is required of
us by His Word. And meanwhile in the midst of our calamities and banishment, we
pray the Reformed churches to recognize us as true members of theirs, always
ready to seal with our own blood, if God calls us to, the confession of faith
which has been published, which we hold in every way agreeing with the doctrine
of the holy apostles, wishing to live and die in it. And if for so doing we are
persecuted, we return thanks to God, who has granted us the honor of suffering
for Him, committing the outcome of our affairs and the justice of our cause
into the hands of the providence of God, who will deliver us when and by the
means which shall please Him. Most humbly praying that as He holds the hearts
of kings and princes in His hand, He will be pleased to bend the heart of His
Highness to have pity on us, who have never offended him, and have resolved not
ever to offend him, that he may acknowledge us, he may recognize us to be most
faithful subjects, than those who persuade him to persecute us severely, and
for ourselves, that He will be pleased to strengthen us amid these temptations
and give us constancy and patience to persevere in the profession of the truth
until the end of our life and that of our posterity after us. Amen.
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