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"Follow John Wesley, Glorious John Wesley"
The Theological Context of William Booth's Ecclesiology
By Andrew S. Miller III

With a note pad in his hands and a series of questions ready to be asked, the distinguished theologian and founding editor of The Methodist Times, Reverend Hugh Price Hughes, skips a list of inquiries and jumps to the question that he wanted to ask most.  His subject was the fifty-six-year old religious and ecclesiological misfit General William Booth. Here was Booth, a man who had left the formality of the Methodist New Connexion, a group started by the rebel rousing Alexander Kilham (1762-1798) in 1797,[1] being asked about his young and thriving Salvation Army. It was 1885, and the success of the Army was evident as it now included 1,749 corps, and 4,129 officers[2] in nearly every country within the British Commonwealth. Booth indicates the ironic nature of the question posed by Hugh Price Hughes in The Methodist Times, as he asked, “Have you any special advice for us Methodists?” To which Booth succinctly responds, “Follow John Wesley, glorious John Wesley.”[3] These words underscore the way that William Booth thought about his religious context, and what he felt was handed to him as a theological inheritance from the Wesleyan tradition.[4]

In trying to understand William Booth and his Salvation Army, does it matter if we see him in a Wesleyan theological context?  Most of Booth’s biographers suggest that there was nothing that Booth abhorred more than theology.[5] Did he even have an ecclesiology?  Can interpreters and inheritor’s of Booth’s Army find a context for his mission? It is important to let Booth speak for himself about his theological milieu. One of his most noted self-disclosures came as he described his fondness for John Wesley and Methodism:

 I worshiped everything that bore the name of Methodist. To me there was one God, and John Wesley was his prophet. I had devoured the story of his life. No human compositions seemed to me to be comparable to his writings, and to the hymns of his brother Charles, and all that was wanted in my estimation, for the salvation of the world was the faithful carrying into practice of the letter and the spirit of his instructions.[6]

The greatest good for Booth’s theology and practice is seen within this statement as he described the goal of his life as “the salvation of the world.” How would this happen? The Salvation of the world could happen if people would place “the letter and the spirit of his [John Wesley’s] instructions into practice.” The movement within this statement, beyond the hyperbolic beginning, is toward a pragmatic ecclesiology that values evangelism, mission and soteriology more than officially articulated ecclesiological statements. The very name of Booth’s movement, the[7] Salvation Army, suggests that it’s squarely focused on the task of salvation. William Booth inherited a functional ecclesiology from John Wesley that sparked the theological praxis of the Salvation Army.

 

Developing an Army and an Ecclesiology  

In 1865 William Booth found his destiny while preaching in London’s East End and formed The East London Christian Revival Society.[8] Later known as the Christian Mission, this group was motivated to preach the gospel to the poor of London’s East End, a segment of the population that was generally neglected by the Church in the Victorian era. Much like the beginning of the Methodist movement, as John Wesley had no desire to form a sectarian group, neither did William Booth with his Christian Mission. His main focus was to steer new converts to other churches as stated in the following:

 My first idea was simply to get people saved, and send them to the churches. This proved at the outset impracticable. 1st. They [the converts] would not go when sent. 2nd. They were not wanted. And 3rd. We wanted some of them at least ourselves, to help us in the business of saving others. We were thus driven to providing for the converts ourselves.[9]

 Unlike Wesley, who throughout his life was officially connected to the Church of England, Booth clearly made a distinction that his ties were never to another denomination; instead his connection was to his theological and spiritual inheritance. That inheritance is suggested in this paper to be a pragmatic Wesleyan ecclesiology.  Booth’s Christian Mission moved forward in seeking to save the lost of London’s East End.  During the first thirteen years the Christian Mission grew to include 75 preaching stations and 120 evangelists throughout Britain.

 In 1878 the Christian Mission changed its name to the Salvation Army. This change of identity is the first clear indication of a personal shift in William Booth’s theology, which adjusted from personal redemptive categories to institutional redemptive categories.[10] Booth felt so strongly about this institutional focus that at his sixtieth birthday party, he claimed that his movement was firmly in the orthodox tradition:

The Church of England boasts of being 2,000 years old. They say they are in Apostolic Succession. So are we. I am. I look at this sapling here that has just sprung into being—not twenty-five years old with its eight thousand salaried officers, its multitude of Soldiers in every land its colours waving in thirty-six different countries and colonies….As I say sometimes, we are a sort of Hallelujah Jews! We are the descendants not only of the ten tribes, but of the twelve Apostles.[11]  

This new theology is made clear in a popular (and often quoted) article by William Booth entitled “Our New Name—The Salvationist” in The Salvationist[12] from January 1, 1879:

We are a salvation people—this is our specialty…Our work is salvation. We believe in salvation and we have salvation….We aim at salvation. We want this and nothing short of this and we want this right off. My brethren, my comrades, soul saving is our avocation, the great purpose and business of our lives. Let us seek first the Kingdom of God, let us be Salvationist indeed.[13]  

The alteration is most obviously seen in the pragmatic shift to transform the structure of the Christian Mission to the military structure of the newly formed Salvation Army. When the military metaphor was adopted, every area of Booth’s movement was affected: preaching stations became corps, evangelists became corps officers, members became soldiers, and its leader became the General. An autocratic form of leadership emerged, and like a conquering Army, the fingers of the Salvation Army were stretched around the world. Historical theologian Roger J. Green explains that at this time Booth’s theology began to move from individual categories to institutional categories. Indeed, William Booth saw his Salvation Army as institutionally sanctified to bring about the Kingdom of God on earth.[14] His Salvation Army was, in his mind, the vehicle that would facilitate the coming millennium. Within eight years of the 1878 name change, the Salvation Army exploded to include 1,749 corps, and 4,129 officers.[15] Indicative of this time is Booth’s commissioning of a corporate missional and ecclesial task: “Go to them all. The whole fourteen hundred millions. Don’t despair. It can be done. It SHALL BE DONE. God has sent The Salvation Army on the task. If every saint on earth would do his duty, it could be done effectually in the next ten years. If the Salvation Army will be true to God, it will be done during the next fifty” [emphasis Booth’s].[16]  

It was in this time that Booth made one clear critique of John Wesley and Methodism. His experience with New Connexion Methodism was, to him, indicative of the unprepared nature of Methodism.  Jason E. Vickers has suggested in his book Wesley: A Guide for the Perplexed, that Wesley was a representative Anglican of his day. It seems that William Booth’s interpretation of Wesley too quickly forced Wesley into a bifurcation of a “reactionary and proto modernist”[17]  contrasted with being a stabilizing figure within the Anglican Communion—as if Wesley could not make up his mind. Booth saw these polarities of reform and stabilization as a weakness within Methodism, so when speaking about the growth of the Army and his focus of the movement’s position he explains, “What will it [the Army] grow to? Who can guess? I cannot. Never, I hope, into a sect. We have taken and shall continue to take every precaution against this. Warned by the failure of John Wesley in maintaining his unsectarian position, we are trying to avoid what we think were his mistakes.”[18] While understanding this side of Wesley is “perplexing” it might have been in the best interest of Wesley’s movement, which in his time was never severed from Anglicanism. With the name change to the Salvation Army, William Booth detached himself from committees and structure, thus enabling him to be the autocratic head of the movement.  

Battle images were rigorously employed as the Salvation Army sought to identify along the lines of an Army.  The Salvation Army was, as one author has said, a group of “soldiers without swords,”[19] whose mission had a singular focus of winning the world for Christ. Did the military metaphor create its own reality as a result of the way that its adherents adopted its mission? Booth and his Army saw themselves in a fight with a supreme purpose. Within the realm of historical theology it is easy to conclude that the Salvation Army’s militarism developed an ecclesiology that rearticulated what God’s people were to be about in this world. The metaphor of an Army “marching through the land” created new ways to express the mission of God. William Booth could challenge his troupes the same way a military general would. Thus he developed a task-oriented ecclesiology, with the task being the Salvation of the world. In his 1880 speech to the Wesleyan Methodist conference he explained, “I cannot help but feel that I am mixed up with a very important movement, and a movement that is worthy of the consideration of all Christian men who are concerned about the salvation of the world.”[20]

 

The Polarities of Wesley’s Ecclesiology

 Wesleyan communities developed as movements within the Church of England, which has caused these communities to have a systemic evangelical disposition that naturally questions whether it is a movement or separate a church. Methodist theologian Ted A. Campbell explains how Wesley clearly allowed mission to “trump” traditional Anglican ecclesiology when in 1784 he ordained two Methodist lay preachers to serve as elders and Thomas Coke to serve as superintendent of the Methodist movement in the United States.[21] This action created a flurry of activity that ignited and confirmed the suspicion that Wesley was more focused on mission than remaining at peace with the ecclesiastical structures of his time. Campbell diagnoses, “Methodists as having a bipolar ecclesiology, oscillating between an inherited Anglican concept of the church and a rather different understanding of the Methodist community as a ‘religious society’ or revival movement organized for missional purposes.”[22]  Furthering this view is Wesley scholar Kenneth J. Collins who highlights these distinctions polarities of Wesley’s articulated ecclesiology in that he followed the Reformed line of seeing the church as an institution marked by the proper preaching of the word of God and where the sacraments are dually administered. Collins suggests, “On the other hand, Wesley defined the church not simply in terms of institution and objective elements, but also in terms of flesh and blood people, members of the body of Christ who as a peculiar people are holy precisely because their Savior is holy.”[23] It is possible that these polarities might give shape to the theological and ecclesiological context of William Booth’s Salvation Army.  

For the purposes of this study it is helpful to highlight the way that Wesley’s ecclesiology grew within Wesleyan movements. This is the theological context in which Booth was shaped. Campbell uses three helpful examples to express this tension: the practical expression of a Love Feast compared to the Lord’s Supper by Wesleyan communities, officially endorsed systematic theologies which emphasized soteriological themes, and architecture within in the movement that was functional for missional purposes. It is interesting to discover with Campbell how ecclesiological language was generally couched in the church’s ecclesiology in its higher calling to evangelism, mission, and soteriology. Sacraments are not always highlighted in Wesleyan communities despite the high view that Wesley held, saying that the church exists where the sacraments of the Lord’s Supper and Baptism are “rightly” or “dualy” administrated.  This tension within Methodism created its own movement and tilled the ground for the nineteenth century movement where William Booth’s pragmatic ecclesiology would grow.

 

Booth’s as an Inheritor of the Wesley’s Polarities   

It is within this missional branch of Wesleyanism that William Booth and his Salvation Army find its theological home and inheritance. William Booth commented at the Wesleyan Conference of 1880 that “I am the child of Methodism; that I was converted and trained to love the soul-saving work in Methodism.”[24] These comments are revealing on a few levels. First it is important to see that William Booth sets his own context not simply in revivalism or the Reformation but within the Methodist expression of Protestantism. William Booth generally had no time for connecting himself to anything but the early church. It was common for the General to suggest that his movement was a direct descendent from the Biblical narrative itself. He felt this so much that he would often retroactively commission the apostles and biblical characters as Captains, Officers, and Generals.[25] Secondly, this statement and many others like it show that he was never ashamed to connect himself to the Wesleyan tradition. In an ecclesiological sense he particularized the way that he identified with his Wesleyan roots by saying he was a part of the “soul-saving work in Methodism.” It would be easy to assume that William Booth was tipping his hat toward the non-sacramental tradition of the Salvation Army. This argument would make sense, except for the fact that in 1880 The Salvation Army was still practicing the two sacraments of Baptism and the Lord’s Supper. What Booth’s comment shows us is that he is more committed to the evangelism, mission, and soteriology of Methodism. I suggest that Booth’s connection to this polarity in Wesleyan theology is a part of the theological foundation that would enable his Army to abandoned the sacraments in 1883.[26]  

If Booth felt he was connecting himself to the missional side of Wesley’s ecclesiology, it is not surprising to see that he felt his Army was specifically joined to the real intentions of Wesley, in William Booth’s estimation. In the same speech to the Wesleyan Conference, Booth explains, “I am sometimes disposed to think that this movement [The Salvation Army] is the continuation of the world of Mr. Wesley, for we have gone on, only a great deal further, on the same lines he travelled.”[27] In what way were they moving further? It likely was in the pragmatic manifestation of a missional ecclesiology rather than a substance focused ecclesiology that fits into the institutional categories of word and sacrament.  

When William Booth made the decision to cease practicing the sacraments he did so within an ecclesiological argument that understood the Salvation Army’s identity as focused on its evangelistic task:  

Now if the Sacraments are not conditions of Salvation; if there is a general division of opinion as to the proper mode of administering them, and if the introduction of them would create division of opinion and heart burning, and if we are not professing to be a church, nor aiming at being one, but simply a force for aggressive Salvation purposes, is it not wise for us to postpone any settlement of the question, to leave it over to some future day, when we shall have more light , and see more clearly our way before us?

Meanwhile, we do not prohibit our own people in any shape or form from taking the Sacraments. We say, ‘If this is a matter of your conscience, by all means break bread.’[28] 

There are several historical reasons that created the atmosphere for William Booth’s non-observant statement.  This paper is focused on the theological reasoning that accompanied Booth’s praxis, but a historical comment is helpful. Suffice to say that Victorian Anglicanism made an attempt to bring the Army under the umbrella of the Church of England. The Church of England was reluctant to welcome the Army’s revivalist tendencies and was uncomfortable providing an ecclesiastical home for this band known as The Salvation Army. Andrew Eason makes a brilliant case for the historical context of the Army’s move away from the “ecclesiastical supremacy” of the Church of England.[29] The major theological implications that can be conveyed through Booth’s speech might allow us to catch a glimpse of his ecclesiological priorities. First, he indicated that ceremonial sacraments are not “conditions” for salvation, clearly pointing to the reality that evangelism was more important than official ecclesiastical procedure. Though Wesley had a high view of the sacraments, one can see a similarity in his disregard of ecclesiastical processes with the ordinations of 1784. In a similar fashion Wesley allowed the mission and movement of God to transcend his ecclesiology. The source of this movement is likely due to Wesley and Booth’s understanding of “perceptible inspiration.” Wesley scholar and philosophical theologian, William J. Abraham, finds reason to assert that Wesley was able to demonstrate to himself and others that he had experienced the truth of the gospel in his Aldersgate experience. This paves the way for Abraham’s claim that Wesley’s theology should be understood soteriologically.[30] Wesley and Booth, though they would likely not agree on this issue, were committed to the way they could prove that God was at work in the world.[31]  Hence Booth can say that Sacraments can be postponed for his Army, in the light of the evangelical task before them.  

Second, it was important for Booth not to get involved in the arguments that were being made by other churches who took stances on the sacraments. It is in this sense that Booth can say, “if we are not professing to be a church, nor aiming at being one [then we don’t have to be concerned about the proper administration of the sacraments]…” If being a church means taking an opinion that could hurt the battle for the salvation of the world, then William Booth could easily say that his Army was not a church in that fashion. Instead of being a church in the institutional sense, his Army was “a force for aggressive Salvation purposes.” Mission was the priority of William Booth’s ecclesiology. A very abrupt articulation of this ecclesiological understanding came from one of Booth’s inner circle leaders, George Scott Railton, who seemingly resented the hoops of confirmation that the Church of England was asking the Army to jump through to observe the sacraments. He chides, “The church law, they say will not allow them to receive us to the communion table, unless we get confirmed. Very well, we won’t waste a minute in discussing that with anybody; but instead of trying to get ourselves confirmed we’ll try to get confirmed drunkards saved.”[32] This soteriologically focused ecclesiology should not be a surprise since this group was and is still called today the Salvation Army.

 

A Lack of an Ecclesiology?  

In a now famous address at the Oxford Institute of Methodist Studies, in 1962, acclaimed John Wesley scholar and theologian delivered an address, “Do Methodists have a Doctrine of the Church?”  Ted Campbell summarizes Outler’s conclusion, “His answer was, essentially, no—Methodist have a strong sense of the mission of the church, but not really a ‘doctrine of the church’  beyond what Methodists inherited from Anglicanism.”[33] A parallel statement came describing William Booth by the “Albert Outler of Salvation Army Studies,” Roger J. Green. In his article “Facing History: Our Way Ahead for a Salvationist Theology,” Green concludes that the contemporary Salvation Army has inherited a “weak ecclesiology.”[34] He asserts that Booth’s ecclesiology was weak for two reasons: his postmillennialism and the distancing of the Army from the institutional church after the failed merger with the Church of England. A definition is needed for the term “weak.” It appears that Green is suggesting that “weak” is a lack of strength.[35]  

Green’s argument that the contemporary Army has inherited a weak ecclesiology seems to have two points of contention. His first argument is that postmillennialism does not create a lasting ecclesiology because it supposedly did not plan for the future.[36] His second argument is centered on the fact that Booth was ecclesiastically inconsistent in his definitions of the Army’s raison d’etre (i.e. “reason for existence”). Green’s second claim demands a distinction between ecclesiastical structures and ecclesiology. William Booth was inconsistent when speaking ecclesiastically. Ecclesiological and ecclesiastical are, however, different terms. Booth’s unpredictable ecclesiastic language refers more to the organization of the movement, whereas, suggesting that Booth possessed a “weak ecclesiology” is proposing that he had an incomplete doctrine of the church. The same could be said regarding Outler’s discussion of Methodism. Green’s final point of argument is that Booth’s ecclesiology is weak because it de-emphasized ecclesiastical structures. In fact Booth was proposing an alternative structure, inherited from his Wesleyan ecclesiology, which was far more effective than the ecclesiastical structures of his day.  

William Booth was continually defining the early Army, his letters and sermons giving regular emphasis (sometimes overemphasis) to what it meant to be a Salvationist. This provided an ecclesial self-understanding for the young Army. An implicit ecclesiology that lacks classical formulation does not necessarily dictate a “weak” ecclesiology. Booth’s writings are saturated with ecclesiological statements concerning the mission and aims of the Salvation Army. What is implicit is direct theological definition about ecclesiology. His inconsistent ecclesiastical jargon does not negate the content and missional purpose of those statements. Sociologically this creates difficulties in identifying the Salvation Army as a “church” or “sect” along the lines of the typology of Ernst Troeltsch and others. Sociological difficulties do not however necessitate theological deficiency.[37] At the forefront of Roger Green’s argument about Booth’s “weak” ecclesiology is his desire to see the Army move toward church-like categories. Green notes, “I have long been convinced that the only way to approach a correct historical analysis that leads to a truthful institutional self-understanding is to impose the sect/church distinctions developed in the discipline of sociology upon ourselves.”[38]   He then encourages Salvationist to accept the “historical fact” that the Army has moved from being a sect to a church and should hence evaluate what sectarian distinctives should be maintained.[39]  Missionally and soteriologically directed movements are not governed by sociology; they are motivated by God’s word, which challenges them to be an active body “preaching the Gospel of Jesus Christ and meeting human needs in his name without discrimination.”[40] When mission directs the church, it forms an alternative ecclesiology that is often more in tune with Scripture than the sociologically classified “church” or “denomination.”  

When moving toward the future the Army must evaluate its heritage in order to progress with historically directed confidence. It seems that the ecclesiological heritage that William Booth fashioned for his Army is something that should be maintained. Why?  Because this ecclesiology keeps the Salvation Army focused on mission, this ecclesiology provides a place for the Army as an “evangelical branch of the universal Christian church.”[41]  

 

Conclusion 

If William Booth shaped his Salvation Army in any specific tradition, he did so in light of his ecclesiological legacy from the Wesleyan movement. More than 135 years after Booth began his movement in London’s East End, the Salvation Army is in a position to renew the way that it actualizes its own theological inheritance as a Wesleyan community and movement. As a Salvation Army officer, I am daily am oscillating between the polarities of Wesley’s ecclesiology. I am leader of missional movement, I am pastor of congregation, I am the CEO of non-profit agency, the leader of a disaster response team, while being a politician lobbying my local municipal leaders. It seems that William Booth’s pragmatic ecclesiology has maginified the extreme sectarian pole of Wesley’s ecclesiology. For instance, there was a lively discussion on Facebook, while I was writing this paper, concerning the Army’s ecclesiological identity.[42] A worship leader in the Army posted a comment about the need for wearing uniforms these days, which in my impression opened the proverbial “can of ecclesial worms,” leaving more than 200 comments in just twenty-four hours. One officer championed, “The Salvation is not a church….was never intended to be….we are an ARMY….a mission….fighting for lost souls….William Booth did not intend for us to become a church….”[43] What is apparent in this statement is a desire to stay focused on our task, but ecclesiological identification has broadened since William Booth’s day and the Salvation Army can easily keep its evangelical focus while seeing itself as an evangelical branch of the church. There is no reason to distinguish the Army’s theological praxis by moving away from seeing itself as a movement within an ecclesiological context.  

The way forward for the Army might be for it live in the tension of John Wesley’s ecclesiology. This would likely require some pragmatic movement to embrace the institutional realities the way Wesley did with the Church of England. Despite the comments above the Army does not have to live within an either/or mentality regarding its ecclesial identity, it can simultaneously be understood as a church that is a part of the Church Universal while also being a missionally focused movement. That Salvation Army has learned a great deal and provides a distinctive taste within the body of Christ, that taste can advance God’s kingdom more richly if the Army is willing embrace its ecclesiological inheritance. This embrace can be done explicitly or implicitly. The inheritor’s of Booth’s Army could find a holy balance in their ecclesiology, if they will hear and actualize their founder’s words to Hugh Prices Hughes to “Follow John Wesley, glorious John Wesley.”

 

 

 

 

 

SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY

 

 Abraham, William J. Aldersgate and Athens: John Wesley and the Foundations of Christian Belief. Waco: Baylor University Press, 2010. 

 Begbie, Harold. The Life of General William Booth, 2 vols. New York: Macmillan, 1920.

 Booth, William. Doctrines and Disciplines of The Salvation Army, 3rd ed. London: The Salvation Army, 1890.

 ________. The Founder’s Messages to Soldiers.  London: The Salvation Army Book Department, 1921.

 ________. The Founder Speaks Again. London: The Salvation Army Publishing and Supplies, 1960.

 ________.The General’s Letters, 1885. London: Salvationist Publishing and Supplies, 1885.

 ________. “The General’s Address at the Wesleyan Conference.” The War Cry. August 14, 1880, 1.

 ________.“The General’s Message On The Occasion of the 46th Anniversary.” The War Cry 32. July, 1911.

 ________. “The General’s New Year Address to Officers.” The War Cry. January 17, 1883. 1-2.

 ________. Go!” All the World. November, 1884.

 ________. How To Preach. 1893. New York: The Salvation Army Eastern Territory Literary Council, 1980.

 ________. “The Millennium; or, The Ultimate Triumph of Salvation Army Principles.” All The World 6. August 1890.

 ________. Salvation Soldiery. 1889. Oakville: The Salvation Army Triumph Press, 1980.

 ________.“What is The Salvation Army?” The Contemporary Review 41. August, 1882: 175-182

 Booth-Tucker, Fredrick. The Life of Catherine Booth, the Mother of The Salvation Army, 2 volumes. New York: Fleming H. Revel Company, 1892.

 Campbell, Ted A. Wesleyan Beliefs: Formal and Popular Expressions of the Core Beliefs of    Wesleyan Communities. Nashville: Abingdon, 2010.

 Collins, Kenneth J. The Theology of John Wesley: Holy Love and the Shape of Grace.Nashville: Abingdon, 2007.

 Eason, Andrew Mark, “The Salvation Army and the Sacraments in Victorian Britain: Retracing the Steps to Non-Observance,” Fides et Historia . June 22, 2009.

 _________. “The Salvation Army in Late-Victorian Britain: The Convergence of Church and Sect,” Word and Deed  5:2. May 2003: 29-50.

 Ervine, St. John. God’s Solider: General William Booth, 2 vols. New York: Macmillan, 1935.

 Green, Roger J. Catherine Booth: A Biography of the Cofounder of The Salvation Army. Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1996.

 ________. “Facing History: Our Way Ahead for a Salvationist Theology,” Word and Deed 1:2. May, 1999: 23-39.

________. The Life and Ministry of William Booth: Founder of The Salvation Army. Nashville: Abingdon, 2005.

________. War on Two Fronts: the Redemptive Theology of William Booth. Atlanta: The Salvation Army Supplies and Purchasing Department, 1989.

 Handbook of Doctrine. London: The Salvation Army International Headquarters, 1969.

 Hughes, Hugh Price. “An Interview with William Booth on The Salvation Army,” The Methodist Times. February, 1885. 81-82.

 The Merriam-Webster Concise School and Office Dictionary. Springfield, MA: Mirriam-Webster, Inc., 1991.

 Moyles, R. G.  A Bibliography of Salvation Army Literature in English 1865-1987. Lewiston, NY: E. Mellon Press, 1988.

 Murdoch, Norman H. Origins of The Salvation Army. Knoxville: The University of Tennessee Press, 1994.

 Needham, Philip D. Community in Mission: A Salvationist Ecclesiology. Atlanta: The Salvation Army, 1987. 

 Railton, George Scott. Twenty-One Years Salvation Army. London: The Salvation Army, 1886.

 Rhemick, John R.  A New People of God: A Study in Salvationism. Des Plaines, ILL: The Salvation Army, 1993.

 Rightmire, R. David.  Sacraments and the Salvation Army: Pneumatological Foundations. Metchen: The Scarecrow Press, 1990.

 Robertson, Roland. “The Salvation Army: the Persistence of Sectarianism,” Brian R. Wilson, ed. Patterns of Sectarianism. London: Heinemann Educational Books, 1967: 49-105.

 Salvation Story: Salvationist Handbook of Doctrine. London: The Salvation Army International Headquarters, 1998.

 The Salvation Army 2004 Year Book. London:  The Salvation Army International Headquarters, 2004

 Sandall, Robert. The History of The Salvation Army. 7 vols. London: The Salvation Army, 1947-1966. vols. 1-3 by Sandal, vols. 4-5 by Arch Wiggins, vol. 6 by Fredrick Coutts, vol. 7 by Henry Gariepy.

 Vickers, Jason E. Wesley: A Guide for the Perplexed. New York: T & T Clark, 2009.

 Walker, Pamela J. Pulling the Devil’s Kingdom Down: The Salvation Army in Victorian. Berkley, CA: University of California Press, 2001.

 Warrick, Susan E. and Charles Yrigoyen. ed. The Historical Dictionary of Methodism. 2nd Edition. Lanham: Scarecrow Press, 2005.

 



[1] See “Methodist New Connexion” The Historical Dictionary of Methodism, ed. Susan E. Warrick and Charles Yrigoyen, 2nd Edition (Lanham: Scarecrow Press, 2005), 207-208.

[2] Robert Sandal, The History of The Salvation Army. 7 vols. (London: The Salvation Army, 1947-1966. vols. 1-3 by Sandal, vols. 4-5 by Arch Wiggins, vol. 6 by Fredrick Coutts, vol. 7 by Henry Gariepy), 2:338.  

[3] Hugh Price Hughes, “An Interview with William Booth on The Salvation Army,” The Methodist Times (February, 1885), 81-82.

[4] It is interesting to note the nature and context of this interview. Hugh Price Hughes would in that same year lead a movement called the “Forward Movement” that targeted toward a similar population as Booth’s Army. See Ted A. Campbell, Wesleyan Beliefs: Formal and Popular Expressions of the Core Beliefs of Wesleyan Communities (Nashville: Abingdon, 2010), 235.  It is also interesting to note from an ecclesiological perspective that this same theologian and social commentator, Hugh Price Hughes, in an 1890 sermon places General William Booth in the same ecclesial and canonical context  as the Archbishop of Canterbury, Charles Spurgeon, Cardinal Manning, the Chairmen of the Congregational Union, and the President of the Methodist Conference. See Hughes “‘Robert Elsmere’ and Mr. Gladstone’s Criticism of the Book,” in Social Christianity: Sermons Delivered in St. James Hall, London (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1890), 99–100. Quoted in Campbell, Wesleyan Beliefs, 79.  Maybe Hughes’ followed Booth’s advice. 

[5] See Harold Begbie, The Life of General William Booth, 2 vols. (New York: Macmillan, 1920). Begbie’s interpretation are likely misunderstood and characterized. For an alternative vision of William Booth and his theological perspective see Roger J. Green, The Life and Ministry of William Booth: Founder of The Salvation Army (Nashville: Abingdon, 2005).

[6] Quoted in Fredrick Booth-Tucker, The Life of Catherine Booth, the Mother of The Salvation Army, 2 volumes (New York: Fleming H. Revel Company, 1892) 1:74.  It is important to note that Booth is consciously and humorously paraphrasing the Muslim shahadah. Booth issued a similar statement on his sixtieth birthday which is recorded in St. John Ervine, God’s Soldier: General William Booth, 2 volumes (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1935) 2:735. 

[7] For stylistic reasons I do not capitalize the definite article.

[8] Also referred to as The East London Christian Revival Union or East London Christian Mission these names appeared interchangeably in the formative years of the movements. See Rightmire, 28-29n. and John R Rhemick, A New People of God: A Study in Salvationism (Des Plaines, ILL: The Salvation Army, 1993), 17.  

[9] William Booth, in George Scott Railton, Twenty-One Years Salvation Army (London: The Salvation Army, 1886), 22.

[10] That is to say that the Salvation Army was viewed by William Booth as institutionally sanctified to bring redemption to the world. Roger Green explains that these “institutional” categories were “sustained by his [Booth’s] belief that The Salvation Army was divinely ordained, and that it was a renewal in the nineteenth century and twentieth century of the Church of the New Testament, the early Church, the Reformation Church, and the Wesleyan revival.” War on Two Fronts: The Redemptive Theology of William Booth (Atlanta: The Salvation Army, 1989), 54-55.

[11] St. John Ervine, God’s Soldier: General William Booth, 2 volumes (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1935) 2:737.  Also in this speech William Booth defends his autocratic structures as having been invented and ordained by God, saying, “It was the government of Eden; it is the government of the Mosaic economy. Moses was the General, yet His people were free. I say it is the government of Heaven.” God’s Solider, 2:736. The point here is that William Booth saw the movement from the Christian Mission to the Salvation Army as accompanied by an institutional sanctification that reinforced his ecclesiological and theological foundation.

[12] It should be noted that this was written in connection with the change of name of the Army’s journal from The Christian Mission Magazine to The Salvationist.

[13] William Booth, “Our New Name—The Salvationist” found in The Founder Speaks Again: A Selection of the Writings of William Booth (London: The Salvation Army, 1960), 45-48. 

[14] See William Booth’s article “The Millennium, or, The Ultimate Triumph of Salvation Army Principles.” All The World 6. August 1890.” 341. In this article Booth paints a picture of the coming millennial kingdom that envisions London as the New Jerusalem.

[15] Robert Sandal, The History of The Salvation Army. 7 vols. (London: The Salvation Army, 1947-1966. vols. 1-3 by Sandal, vols. 4-5 by Arch Wiggins, vol. 6 by Fredrick Coutts, vol. 7 by Henry Gariepy), 2:338.  

[16] William Booth, “Go!” All the World (November, 1884) found in The General’s Letters, 1885 (London: International Headquarters, 1890), 7. This demonstrates an amazing parallel between Booth and Charles Finney, particularly Finney’s claim, in 1835, that if the church does its job the millennium could come in three years.

[17] For more on these polarities see Jason E. Vickers, Wesley: A Guide for the Perplexed (New York: T & T Clark, 2009), 40-49.

[18] William Booth, “What is The Salvation Army?” The Contemporary Review 41 (August 1882): 175-182, 181. It might be that comments like this are what drive some to insist that Booth  is not very concerned about his ecclesiological inheritance.

[19] Herbert Andrew Wisby, Soldiers without Swords (New York: Macmillan, 1955). 

[20] William Booth, “The General’s Address at the Wesleyan Conference,” The War Cry, (August 14, 1880), 1.

[21] Ted A. Campbell, Wesleyan Beliefs: Formal and Popular Expressions of the Core Beliefs of Wesleyan Communities (Nashville: Abingdon, 2010), 204.

[22] Ted A. Campbell, , Wesleyan Beliefs: Formal and Popular Expressions of the Core Beliefs of Wesleyan Communities (Nashville: Abingdon, 2010), 206.

[23] Kenneth J. Collins, The Theology of John Wesley: Holy Love and the Shape of Grace  (Nashville: Abingdon, 2007), 240.

[24] William Booth, “The General’s Address at the Wesleyan Conference,” The War Cry, (August 14, 2980), 1.

[25] For  as consistent example of this see Booth book, Salvation Soldiery: A Series of Addresses on the Requirements of Jesus Christ’s Service (London: The Salvation Army, 1889).

[26] For more on this see R. David Rightmire, Sacraments and the Salvation Army: Pneumatological Foundations (Metchen: The Scarecrow Press, 1990). Rightmire’s thesis is that Booth’s  pneumatological emphasis inherited from the American Holiness movement was the theological basis for abandoning the sacraments, in that one’s wholly committed life empowered by the spirit was in itself a sacrament to God’s work.  Hence William Booth says in “The General’s New Year Address to Officers,” “Let us remember Him who died to for us continually. Let us remember His love every hour of our lives , and continually feed on Him—not on Sundays only, and then forget him all the week, but let us in faith eat his flesh and drink his blood continually…all to the Glory of God.” The War Cry (January 17, 1883), 2. Another explaination, which is more of a defense, comes in Philip Needham’s, Community in Mission: A Salvationist Ecclesiology (Atlanta: The Salvation Army Supplies, 1987). Needham’s discussion is intentionally inward focused toward the Army.  This focus is the book’s strength and simultaneously its weakness. Community in Mission is a supplemental response to the Army’s response to the Lima Document, Baptism, Eucharist and Ministry. His argument about the sacraments falls into the category of defense rather than explanation. He is defending the validity of The Salvation Army as a Christian church, and he does so by insisting that the real importance in the Christian experience is the spiritual change rather than a physical manifestation of it. The Salvation Army can not continue to defend its sacramental position from a spiritualist hermeneutic that tends toward a type of sacramental doceticism, which overemphasizes the spiritual over the physical. An explanation of the theological roots within the Wesleyan Holiness movement is the primary way of understanding the Salvation Army’s position theologically.

[27] William Booth, “The General’s Address at the Wesleyan Conference,” The War Cry, (August 14, 2980), 1.

[28] William Booth, “The General’s New Year Address to Officers,” The War Cry (January 17, 1883), 2.

[29] Andrew M. Eason, “The Salvation Army and the Sacraments in Victorian Britain: Retracing the Steps to Non-Observance,” Fides et Historia  (June 22, 2009).

[30] William J. Abraham, Aldersgate and Athens: John Wesley and the Foundations of Christian Belief (Waco: Baylor University Press, 2010).

[31] Abraham asserts that Wesley could have resorted to the divine power in human experience more as a claim to undergird epistemological certainty. The claim of a blind person to say “I was blind, but now I see” has power to reach many people as a rational claim. Hence the simplicity of the inward evidence, for Wesley, is more powerful than a complex argument.

[32] George Scott Railton, “Are We Going to Church ?” War Cry  (June 15, 1882), 1. Quoted in Andrew M. Eason, “The Salvation Army and the Sacraments in Victorian Britain: Retracing the Steps to Non-Observance,” Fides et Historia  (June 22, 2009),14.

[33] Ted A. Campbell, , Wesleyan Beliefs: Formal and Popular Expressions of the Core Beliefs of Wesleyan Communities (Nashville: Abingdon, 2010), 206.

[34] Roger J. Green, “Facing History: Our Way Ahead for a Salvationist Theology.” Word and Deed 1:2 (May, 1999): 23-39, 29. 

[35] There are various lexical definitions of “weak”: “1:lacking strength or vigor….2 not able to sustain or resist much weight, pressure, or strain….3 deficient in vigor of mind or character…4 not supported by truth or logic…5 not able to function properly.…6 lacking skill or proficiency…” The Merriam-Webster Concise School and Office Dictionary (Springfield, MA: Mirriam-Webster, Inc., 1991), 594. 

[36] It is not within the scope of this paper to discuss Booth eschatology. For more on this see my, “The Good Time Coming”: The Impact of William Booth’s Eschatological Vision, Unpublished MDiv thesis (Asbury Theological Seminary, 2005).

[37] See Roland Robertson’s helpful study of the Salvation Army using this typology in “The Salvation Army: the Persistence of Sectarianism,” in Brian R. Wilson, ed. Patterns of Sectarianism (London: Heinemann Educational Books, 1967), 49-105; Andrew Mark Eason, “The Salvation Army in Late-Victorian Britain: The Convergence of Church and Sect,” Word and Deed 5:2 (May 2003): 29-50.

[38] Green, “Facing History,” 29.

[39] The chief sectarian distinction Green opposes is postmillennialism. He maintains that the Army should retain wearing the uniform as a symbol of the sacramental life. See Green, “Facing History,” 30-31.  

[40]The Salvation Army 2004 Year Book (London:  The Salvation Army International Headquarters, 2004), iii.

[41] The Salvation Army 2004 Year Book (London:  The Salvation Army International Headquarters, 2004), iii.

[42] My professor will be glad to know that I was an objective observer to this discussion and not a participant.

[43] Conversation accessed from Phil Laegar’s profile page on Facebook on Thursday, December 1, 2010. Screen shots were taken of this conversation.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

   

 

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