The Travel Letters of Alexander Campbell . . .

THE WATERSHED OF CAMPBELL’S LIFE

Out last installment concluded with Mr. Campbell’s return to Bethany after a six months journey into the South, the most extended of all his trips except the one that took him abroad in 1847. This essay has to do with his travel letters and attending activities from 1840 to 1845. Now in his mid 50’s, he is no longer a young man, and the movement he led has now begun to solidify and has worked its way into all of the states of the union and several foreign countries, with some 300,000 adults in its ranks.

In these years Alexander gave an increasing amount of time and thought to education. Not only was he lecturing to educational societies and teachers’ institutes across the land, but he began to forge an educational philosophy that resulted in the founding of his own college on his own farm land. Bethany College opened its door to its charter class of 100 students in 1840.

The founding of the college might be seen as a kind of watershed in the life. of Campbell. Up until that time he was looked upon as a reformer, an editor, and as the founder of a new frontier religion. And in all these respects he was seen mostly as an antagonist. He was one of the most controversial names in the religious press of that day. We have seen that in those earlier years meetinghouses were closed to him. and his visits were boycotted. Like Ishmael of old, it appeared that his hand was against every man and every man’s hand was against him.

Several factors were responsible for the changes that are apparent on the other side of the watershed. The union of the Stone and Campbell movements in 1831, which gave the cause the propulsion that it needed, is an important one. The influx into the movement of so many responsible citizens and the consequent gains in terms of wealth and leadership are other factors, for these made possible the erection of appropriate buildings, the publication of numerous journals, and the rise of many educational enterprises.

From this point on Alexander Campbell is welcomed in those places that once rejected him. He is now seen more as an educator and as a churchman than as a militant editor and aggressive leader of an avant garde movement. He can now speak in his own building in most places, or he is an invited guest in most all churches. His cultural base is broader, for he is now in the company of governors and presidents, and he now addresses the Congress of the United States and intellectual institutes of various descriptions as well as those little chapels in the woods and big city churches. He had gained such a place for himself in the life of the United States that on the eve of his trip to Europe the famous Henry Clay sent a letter of introduction that read in part: “Dr. Campbell is among the most eminent citizens of the United States, distinguished for his great learning and ability, for his successful devotion to the education of youth, for his piety and as the head and founder of one of the most important and respectable religious communities in the United States.” Mr. Clay also referred to Mr. Campbell’s role in Virginia’s constitutional convention where he was associated with ex-Presidents Monroe and Madison and ex-Chief Justice John Marshall.

And of course Alexander himself was growing taller and broader amidst all this. It is a psychological fact of life that when one has more apples in his own orchard than he can tend he is less interested in swiping apples from the adjoining gardens. He can now give more time to consolidating his own forces, to cooperative enterprises, to conducting a college, and to more far ranging subjects in his writing and speaking. And along the way he even found ways to appease the Baptists who had for so long rejected him, exploring ways to reunite with them.

In referring to the founding of Bethany College as the watershed of this change, it is not meant that the college caused the changes. It is rather that the college was the effect of the change. As the leader of a growing religious community in a growing nation, Campbell realized the importance of education as the means of accomplishing his cherished goal of reformation. He soon saw the dire need for an educated ministry if the churches he had helped create were to survive and have an impact upon the Christian world.

Nor do we suggest by the watershed metaphor that there were two Alexander Campbells, the latter being radically different from the first. His view of things, like his purposes, remained basically the same. His changes were like those of any growing man, especially in reference to attitudes and methods.

The anti-institutional elements of the Restoration tradition have contended that Bethany College was the big mistake in Campbell’s life, that it only served to weaken and secularize the spiritual nature of his work, and that it was a contradiction to his efforts to free the church of institutional and sectarian control. It would have been better, it is said, had he gone on giving his life only to the churches making them what they ought to be.

A case can be made for this viewpoint, for from that point of the watershed he is burdened more by the college than by the churches, and he is more an educator in the arts and sciences than a minister of the Word. And it is increasingly the case that education and Bethany College are his themes rather than the ancient order of things. Too, money was never an issue in his travels, for he always paid his own expenses. But with the burden of the college on his back he becomes a solicitor for funds. And it was the college that kept him at home much more of the time when Selina couldn’t!

It is not likely that Bethany College was as important to the end in view as Campbell thought, for there were other colleges, more conveniently located, both before and after Bethany, that could have served the educational need of the movement, especially with his support, which they did not have because of Bethany. Had he given all his efforts to his publications, which went right into the homes and hearts of rank and file disciples across the land, and to visiting among the churches in ministering the Word, he might have strengthened the movement to such a degree that it would never have divided into numerous feuding sects as it since has. It might have remained a unity movement that by now would have gone far in uniting the Christian world. Too, if Campbell had left the college business in the hands of other able educators, which there were plenty of, and lent his influence to all such enterprises, there would now be no one college that could lay greater claim to the Campbell tradition. Amidst the tragedy of division Bethany College, and with it Alexander Campbell, are largely identified with only one wing of discipledom, which happens to be the more liberal wing, and this has contributed to a neglect of the Campbell tradition in the more conservative circles, and this at a very costly price. It might have been different had he remained only “a man for the churches.”

But this is largely speculation, and we have no interest in minimizing the importance of Bethany College in the life of Campbell or its significance through the years to the life of the church and the nation. We would not argue, however, that Bethany College was Alexander Campbell’s most important contribution to the world. It would be on our list, but not in first or second place.

In 1842 Alexander again travels to Kentucky and Ohio, and this was the time of the movement’s greatest progress. The disciples numbered 40,000 in Kentucky alone. In his visit to Lexington, where the disciples were erecting the largest building in the state, he learned that 1,000 persons had been immersed in that area within a period of two months.

This rapid growth demanded some organizational cooperation beyond the local congregation, and thus emerged a problem that has always been a lively issue within the movement, often involving divisions, and that is the question of how and to what extent are the churches to cooperate. While Alexander concluded that a congregation is to have no regular officers but bishops and deacons, with one elder serving as president, the congregations of a given area must form some cooperative structure in order to serve their region. Regions in turn should have some arrangement, made up of representatives of all the churches.

Necessity pushed the movement to more organization, and by 1849 the American Missionary Society was organized with Mr. Campbell as its first president. He thought a society was also needed for the publication and circulation of the Bible, but he was satisfied for this to be done through the existing American and Foreign Bible Society, of which he served as a life director. He urged the churches to give liberal support to the society. — Ed.