44 Facts About Richard Baxter

Richard Baxter was an English Nonconformist church leader and theologian from Rowton, Shropshire, who has been described as "the chief of English Protestant Schoolmen".

Richard Baxter made his reputation in the late 1630s by his ministry at Kidderminster in Worcestershire, when he began a long and prolific career as theological writer.

Richard Baxter became one of the most influential leaders of the Nonconformist movement, spending time in prison.

Richard Baxter's views remain controversial within the Calvinist tradition of Predestination because he taught that Christians are placed under a type of faith-law.

Richard Baxter was helped by John Owen, master of the free school at Wroxeter, where he studied from about 1629 to 1632, and made fair progress in Latin.

Richard Baxter was reluctantly persuaded to go to court, and he went to London under the patronage of Sir Henry Herbert, Master of the Revels, with the intention of doing so, but soon returned home, resolved to study divinity.

Richard Baxter was confirmed in the decision by the death of his mother.

Richard Baxter commenced his ministry after being ordained by John Thornborough, Bishop of Worcester and was transferred to Bridgnorth, in Shropshire.

Richard Baxter remained at Bridgnorth for nearly two years, during which time he took a special interest in the controversy relating to Nonconformity and the Church of England.

Richard Baxter soon became alienated from the Church on several matters; and after the requirement of the "et cetera oath", he rejected episcopacy in its English form.

Richard Baxter was invited to deliver a sermon before the people, and was unanimously elected as the minister of St Mary and All Saints' Church, Kidderminster.

Richard Baxter's ministry continued, with many interruptions, for about 19 years; and during that time he accomplished many reforms in Kidderminster and the neighbourhood.

Richard Baxter formed the ministers in the country around him into an association, uniting them irrespective of their differences as Presbyterians, Episcopalians and Independents.

The Reformed Pastor was a book which Richard Baxter published in relation to the general ministerial efforts he promoted.

Richard Baxter returned to Worcestershire late in 1642 only to be driven out again, and moved to Coventry, another Parliamentarian stronghold.

Richard Baxter officiated each Sunday as chaplain to the garrison, preaching a sermon each to the soldiery, and the townspeople and strangers.

Richard Baxter's connexion with the Parliamentary army was a very characteristic one.

Richard Baxter joined it that he might, if possible, contract the growth of sectaries in that field, and maintain the cause of constitutional government in opposition to republican tendencies of the time.

Richard Baxter regretted that he had not previously accepted Oliver Cromwell's offer to become chaplain to the Ironsides.

Cromwell avoided him; but Richard Baxter, having to preach before him after he had assumed the Protectorship, chose for his subject the old topic of the divisions of the church, and in subsequent interviews argued with him about liberty of conscience, and even defended the monarchy he had subverted.

In 1647, Richard Baxter was staying at the home of Lady Rouse, wife of Sir Thomas Rouse, 1st Baronet, of Rous Lench, Worcestershire.

The Savoy Conference resulted in Richard Baxter's Reformed Liturgy, though it was cast aside without consideration.

Richard Baxter continued to advocate for a comprehensive "national church", off and on, until his death.

Richard Baxter was made a Royal chaplain, and offered the Bishopric of Hereford, but could not accept the offer without conforming.

From 1662 until the indulgence of 1687, Richard Baxter's life was constantly disturbed by persecution of one kind or another.

Richard Baxter retired to Acton in Middlesex, for the purpose of quiet study, but was placed in prison for keeping a conventicle.

Richard Baxter procured a habeas corpus in the court of common pleas.

Richard Baxter was taken up for preaching in London after the licences granted in 1672 were recalled by the King.

Richard Baxter had been committed to the King's Bench Prison on the charge of libelling the Church in his Paraphrase on the New Testament, and was tried before Jeffreys on this accusation.

Richard Baxter was sentenced to pay 500 marks, to lie in prison till the money was paid, and to be bound to his good behaviour for seven years.

Richard Baxter was now approaching 70 years old, and remained in prison for 18 months, until the government, hoping to win his influence, remitted the fine and released him.

Richard Baxter's health had grown even worse, yet this was the period of his greatest activity as a writer.

Richard Baxter wrote 168 or so separate works, including major treatises such as the Christian Directory, the Methodus Theologiae Christianae, and the Catholic Theology.

Richard Baxter died in London and his funeral was attended by churchmen as well as dissenters.

Richard Baxter rejected the idea of a limited atonement in favour of a universal atonement, which drew him into a long debate with Calvinist theologian John Owen.

Richard Baxter insisted that the Calvinists of his day ran the danger of ignoring the conditions that came with God's new covenant.

Justification, Richard Baxter insisted, required at least some degree of faith as the human response to the love of God.

Richard Baxter's theology made Baxter very unpopular among his contemporaries and even into the next century caused a split among the Dissenters.

AG Matthews, in an article "The Works of Richard Baxter: an Annotated List" lists 141 books written by Baxter.

Geoffrey Nuttall, in his biography of Richard Baxter, published in 1965, reproduces this list, noting that one of the listed works, Fasciculus literarum, was, in fact, written by John Hinckley.

In 1674, Richard Baxter cast in a new form the substance of Arthur Dent's book The Plain Man's Pathway to Heaven under the title, The Poor Man's Family Book.

In 1679 Richard Baxter made one of the very few known allusions to Sir Thomas Browne's discourse The Garden of Cyrus, critically declaring to newly ordained priests, You shall have more.

The Richard Baxter Monument is a Grade II listed structure in Kidderminster.

Son of Richard Baxter and Beatrice nee Adney born here in Rowton AD 1615.