Quotations from the writings of Ellen G. White with the phrase . . .
H E r e t i c s ( 3 RELATED PHRASES ) |
The word 'Heretics' appears 62 times in the published writings of EGW See page on Original site Related phrase: Heretic ( ) ( below )
| Notwithstanding Christ’s warning, men have sought to uproot the tares. To punish those who were supposed to be evildoers, the church has had recourse to the civil power. Those who differed from the established doctrines have been imprisoned, put to torture and to death, at the instigation of men who claimed to be acting under the sanction of Christ. But it is the spirit of Satan, not the Spirit of Christ, that inspires such acts. This is Satan’s own method of bringing the world under his dominion. God has been misrepresented through the church by this way of dealing with those supposed to be heretics. { COL 74.1}
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| Then came the third scene of abuse and mockery, worse even than that received from the ignorant rabble. In the very presence of the priests and rulers, and with their sanction, this took place. Every feeling of sympathy or humanity had gone out of their hearts. If their arguments were weak, and failed to silence His voice, they had other weapons, such as in all ages have been used to silence heretics, — suffering, and violence, and death. { DA 714.5}
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| Amid the gloom that settled upon the earth during the long period of papal supremacy, the light of truth could not be wholly extinguished. In every age there were witnesses for God—men who cherished faith in Christ as the only mediator between God and man, who held the Bible as the only rule of life, and who hallowed the true Sabbath. How much the world owes to these men, posterity will never know. They were branded as heretics, their motives impugned, their characters maligned, their writings suppressed, misrepresented, or mutilated. Yet they stood firm, and from age to age maintained their faith in its purity, as a sacred heritage for the generations to come. { GC 61.1} |
| This bull called upon all members of the church to join the crusade against the heretics. As an incentive to engage in this cruel work, it “absolved from all ecclesiastical pains and penalties, general and particular; it released all who joined the crusade from any oaths they might have taken; it legitimatized their title to any property they might have illegally acquired; and promised remission of all their sins to such as should kill any heretic. It annulled all contracts made in favor of Vaudois, ordered their domestics to abandon them, forbade all persons to give them any aid whatever, and empowered all persons to take possession of their property.”—Wylie, b. 16, ch. 1. This document clearly reveals the master spirit behind the scenes. It is the roar of the dragon, and not the voice of Christ, that is heard therein. { GC 77.2} Read entire Chapter 4
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| The papacy is just what prophecy declared that she would be, the apostasy of the latter times. 2 Thessalonians 2:3, 4. It is a part of her policy to assume the character which will best accomplish her purpose; but beneath the variable appearance of the chameleon she conceals the invariable venom of the serpent. “Faith ought not to be kept with heretics, nor persons suspected of heresy” (Lenfant, volume 1, page 516), she declares. Shall this power, whose record for a thousand years is written in the blood of the saints, be now acknowledged as a part of the church of Christ? { GC 571.2}
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| Amid the gloom that settled upon the earth during the long period of papal supremacy, the light of truth could not be wholly extinguished. In every age there were witnesses for God—men who cherished faith in Christ as the only mediator between God and man, who held the Bible as the only rule of life, and who hallowed the true Sabbath. How much the world owes to these men, posterity will never know. They were branded as heretics, their motives impugned, their characters maligned, their writings suppressed, misrepresented, or mutilated. Yet they stood firm, and from age to age maintained their faith in its purity, as a sacred heritage for the generations to come. { SR 335.1}
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| The great error of the Romish Church is found in the fact that the Bible is interpreted in the light of the opinions of the “fathers.” Their opinions are regarded as infallible, and the dignitaries of the church assume that it is their prerogative to make others believe as they do, and to use force to compel the conscience. Those who do not agree with them are pronounced heretics. But the word of God is not thus to be interpreted. It is to stand on its own eternal merits, to be read as the word of God, to be obeyed as the voice of God, which declares His will to the people. The will and voice of finite man are not to be interpreted as the voice of God. { FE 308.1 }
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| The great error of the Romish church is found in the fact that the Bible is interpreted in the light of the opinions of the “fathers.” These opinions are regarded as infallible, and the dignitaries of the church assume that it is their prerogative to make others believe as they do. Those who do not agree with them are pronounced heretics. But the word of God is not thus to be interpreted. It is to stand on its own eternal merits, to be read as the word of God, which declares his will to the people. { AUGleaner June 9, 1909, par. 4 }
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| Never let him who is named as a child of God, meet another who differs with him in his religious faith with a spirit of ridicule. This was the spirit the persecutors of Protestants had when dealing with those whom they termed “heretics.” They could not show where dissenters were in error from “the law and the testimony,” and therefore they resorted to ridicule, and some of the faithful found it more difficult to bear a sneer, than to face their enemies in open conflict. Soldiers in the army of Jesus Christ have turned cowards before ridicule, and Satan has worked through cold, unconsecrated professors of his name, to intimidate those with the weapon of jest, who never would have been turned from their loyalty to God if the rack, the stake, the dungeon, and death alone had threatened them. { HM August 1, 1894, par. 5 }
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| The spirit that instigates accusation and condemnation in the church which results in uprooting those that are looked upon as evil-doers, has manifested itself in seeking to correct wrongs through the civil power. This is Satan’s own method for bringing the world under his dominion; but the Lord Jesus Christ has given us no such example for thus dealing with the erring. God has been misrepresented through the church by this very way of dealing with heretics; he has been represented as the one who empowered the church to do these wicked things. { RH January 10, 1893, par. 8 }
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It was the desire for liberty of conscience that inspired the Pilgrims to brave the perils of the long journey across the sea, to endure the hardships and dangers of the wilderness, and with God’s blessing to lay, on the shores of America, the foundation of a mighty nation. Yet honest and God-fearing as they were, the Pilgrims did not yet comprehend the great principle of religious liberty. The freedom which they sacrificed so much to secure for themselves, they were not equally ready to grant to others. “Very few, even of the foremost thinkers and moralists of the seventeenth century, had any just conception of that grand principle, the outgrowth of the New Testament, which acknowledges God as the sole judge of human faith.”—Ibid. 5:297. The doctrine that God has committed to the church the right to control the conscience, and to define and punish heresy, is one of the most deeply rooted of papal errors. While the Reformers rejected the creed of Rome, they were not entirely free from her spirit of intolerance. The dense darkness in which, through the long ages of her rule, popery had enveloped all Christendom, had not even yet been wholly dissipated. Said one of the leading ministers in the colony of Massachusetts Bay: “It was toleration that made the world antichristian; and the church never took harm by the punishment of heretics.”—Ibid., vol. 5, p. 335. The regulation was adopted by the colonists that only church members should have a voice in the civil government. A kind of state church was formed, all the people being required to contribute to the support of the clergy, and the magistrates being authorized to suppress heresy. Thus the secular power was in the hands of the church. It was not long before these measures led to the inevitable result—persecution. { GC 292.3}
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| The traffic in indulgences, subversive as it was of the very foundation principles of the gospel, could not fail to arouse determined opposition on the part of Luther. Though still a papist of the straightest sort, he was filled with horror at the blasphemous assumptions of Tetzel and his associates. Many of his own congregation had purchased certificates of pardon, and they soon began to come to Luther confessing their various sins, and expecting absolution, not because they were penitent and wished to reform, but on the ground of the indulgence. Luther refused them absolution, and warned them that unless they should repent, and reform their lives, they must perish in their sins. In great perplexity, they sought out Tetzel, and informed him that Luther, an Augustine monk, had treated his letters with contempt. The friar was filled with rage. He uttered the most terrible curses, caused fires to be lighted in the public square, and declared that he had orders from the pope to burn the heretics who should dare to oppose his most holy indulgences. { ST June 14, 1883, par. 6 }
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| The very same course was taken by the denominational churches when we embraced the first and second angels’ messages. And as the light was shining forth from the oracles of God upon the messages which were present truth for our time, Satan tried by every means in his power to close the door to shut out the light. We had to meet with prejudice and with ridicule and with sneers and with criticism of the very same character that we have had to meet here in this conference. The opposition seemed almost crushing in its influence. What if we had held our peace and been controlled by the ministers who thought we were heretics, disturbing the peace of churches? Nevertheless, we did move forward, and while many bent beneath the power of opposition and yielded their faith to preserve the unity with their brethren, and retained their place in the churches, many could not conscientiously do this. They held fast their faith. And what was the result? They were turned out of the churches. After the passing of the time, when sorrow and disappointment was weighing us down to the earth, the Lord let His light shine in upon us, giving us the light upon the third angel’s message so strikingly clear, which showed us our whereabouts in prophecy and placed our feet in a sure path. { 1888 830.2 }
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