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Writing Congregational Histories

A REVIEW OF VAN BONNEAU'S
TRACT,"TEACHING THE WORD"
BY DENNIS KELLOGG

The tract by Brother Van Bonneau was written in 1942. When it was first published, I read it. But being an anti-class advocate myself, I did as most of the anti-class brethren do, just took it for granted that the tract was a "bell-ringer" that could not help being the truth on the teaching question. Brother Bonneau's education, natural ability, and experiences as a debater, caused me to feel that he had scored a real mark in this effort to condemn class teaching "affirmatively and negatively," to use his own words. If I can show that he missed this MARK for which he strove, the subject should be forever settled as far as he is concerned, since he has dealt with it from the positive and negative sides. Since I have changed my mind on this subject and now believe class teaching to be in harmony with the Bible, I will now review this tract to see what is really in it, and apply the "ACID" test that its author suggested. Page 1. Brother Bonneau says, "Let a popular method of teaching sweep the schools of the country and a great clamor goes up for it as the only savior for the church. It seems to matter little how unscriptural a practice may be, in time, brethren become tolerant of it, if it attracts sufficient attention." Several things need saying about this excerpt. First, notice he calls our classes "a popular METHOD of teaching." If they are a method, they are not an institution, separate from the church, remember that. Second, classes are condemned on the grounds that they are "a popular method." So are the Day Meetings that churches have in the summer time. So is the invitation song, a popular thing in every anti-class church. Did you ever see them offer the Lord's invitation without using this "POPULAR" invitation song that the denominations use? Where is the scripture in the New Testament that proves that invitation songs were sung? It is popular, so our anti-class brethren have it.

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The radio has attracted attention. Every home has one. The sectarians preach and teach over it, so do our anti-class brethren. It is popular, and it is MODERN. Neither Christ nor the Apostles ever used one, and there is not a passage in the whole New Testament which tells us to use the radio, but it is the "SAVIOR" of the anti-class church, so they use it. The printing press is a POPULAR thing. It is a savior for the anti-class church. It prints their "CHURCH MESSENGER" and "GOSPEL TIDINGS." It also printed the little tract for Brother Bonneau! They must use the press, for others do, and they know that even if it wasn't used by Christ and his Apostles that they must use it now. for it is attracting attention ! Will they say that new means and methods of doing things in a modern world CHANGE the wisdom of HOW to do WHAT God tells them to do? New means of travel supersede walking, riding a donkey, or sailing on a ship, the only known means of travel in Bible days. Radio, Bible classes, literature (as Brother Bonneau's), religious periodicals, telephone and other ways are used now; others, perhaps, will be developed, to offer new opportunities for teaching. When the NEW devices (Brother Bonneau assumes that classes are new; I deny it) are used to assist us in doing what God has said, we are not adding to the word of God, for when a command is given us and the details are not stated, the details and arrangements that we can use to the best advantage to do the command are included in the command. Let airplanes, fast trains, autos, radios, presses, individual containers, baptistries, and every other means we can use to do what God has commanded be used; let them attract attention if needs be; we are certainly within our rights under the law of wisdom and good judgment, when we use them. All this fuss about being popular and attracting attention is merely a smoke screen to scare our anti-class brethren. They are easily scared. Like the one talent man, they are afraid. It was noted that Brother Bonneau calls our classes a "method," and further on in his tract he calls them "class methods of teaching," "class assemblies," and "class system." He calls us "the opposition."

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He can't make up his mind whether we have a "method" or an "institution," and of course he is not able to show his brethren which. He argues it both ways, like the school professor on the shape of the earth, he knows BOTH theories. In the last paragraph, on page 1, the brother assumes that we have an institution, saying "the opposition has tried to put the Sunday School on a par with private teaching in the home." He says further that he steps to the board, in debate, and makes two circles with "house to house" over one, and "publicly" over the other, then challenges the "opposition" to place class teaching in either circle. "This is where they squirm." Let us ask Brother Bonneau in which one of these circles he will put his church papers, radio preaching, Kerrville Bible School, and watch him squirm! On page 2, he asserts that Paul used only two methods, public and house to house, neither of which resemble the Sunday School! He states further that no body can deny that class teaching represents "some kind" of an assembly of the church. Yes, Brother Bonneau, the same kind of assembly that you have when your churches have singing school, a thing you can not find specific scripture for in the New Testament. I challenge you for the passage! Now let him squirm! Yes, the same kind of assembly you had at Houston, where you had a"church COURT." In that assembly, your women were put on the witness stand and testified before the group which included both of the anti-class churches there. These women would testify for some fifteen minutes, they took their places on the stand alternately with men. This "COURT" lasted around two hours each night for over a WEEK. This meeting was CALLED by the church, presided over by three preachers. Songs were sung and prayers were offered each night and the whole group was invited back. If this was a violation of 1 Cor. 14, you need to make your acknowledgments. If it was not, then you are allowing a meeting that is much more public and more formal than our classes. Now don't go away and say that these women were confessing their sin, as you would make us believe in the Brownfield debate (page 162).

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These women were not just confessing their faults, and you know it. They were testifying against a brother there. Surely you have not forgotten this so soon. Next, Brother Bonneau says, "We all believe that women can teach in the home as 'INDIVIDUALS,' but many of us oppose their teaching in church assemblies." He gives 1 Cor. 14:33 and argues that this governs "ALL ASSEMBLIES" of the saints. Question: Does it govern that court assembly and the singing school assembly? Would it apply to a weed cutting assembly that assembled to clean the church premises? Now as to the woman teaching as an INDIVIDUAL, I maintain that the ONLY TEACHING she can do is as an individual. Certainly she couldn't teach in the person of somebody else! You talk like the sectarian, when he says "Take Jesus as your PERSONAL savior." If Jesus is our savior, he is our PERSONAL savior. He can't be any other kind to us. Of course, the woman as an individual might get out of her place and do something she ought not, but regardless of what she does, she does it as an INDIVIDUAL! His next argument is, that if we deny our classes are the assembly of the church, then he can move "foot washing" into them and also have instrumental music! If he says his church court is not the assembly of the church, can he have his foot washing and instrumental? music in it? If his singing school, convened and called to order by the church, is not the assembly, can he have foot washing and use instrumental music in it? I mean the kind of singing school as is called by such churches as the one at Kerrville. Now who is it that is squirming? Brother Bonneau claims to have asked an opponent once, since he could use instrumental music in the home, and practice foot washing in the home, how could he keep instrumental music out of the classes? The opponent is supposed to have answered, "By making assemblies of the church of them." If Brother Bonneau had asked me that, I would have answered, "By placing the classes on a par with your Houston church court, and Kerrville Singing School assemblies, where both were convened and called to order by the church."

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And I feel sure that everyone would have seen that the question was answered. Next he says, "There is no difference over METHODS of teaching as individuals (remember my treatment of this word individual?) in the homes. The question hangs on 'the right' of the church to use classes and women teachers in any of its assemblies." Why, Brother Bonneau, just use the authority that you used at Houston in the court, and the singing school at Kerrville, for God is no respecter of persons, if you can have women speaking in those assemblies, we can have women in class meetings! The right that he claims for using a plurality of drinking vessels, is the issue between him and his one container brethren. Will he step up and meet this issue with those brethren? Since he wants us to show a right to have classes. His next heading is, "Individual and church work." He tells us, "It is easy to differentiate between church assemblies, and ordinary gatherings of people as individuals." If it is easy as he says it is, don't you sup pose we brethren who have classes know what kind of meetings we have? He says further, "No doubt about it, when the church calls a group together, that group constitutes a church assembly." Apologize, Brother Bonneau, for those called at Houston and Kerrville! If the church grounds need the weeds cut and an assembly is called to do this work, women must keep silent, for it is a CHURCH ASSEMBLY, and the same is true when the church calls a dinner assembly in the church house or on the lawn, during the meeting. The sisters may bring the food, set the tables and serve the food, but they must keep SILENCE for this is a CALLED CONVENED ASSEMBLY as per this foolish reasoning, that Brother Bonneau is so sure about. He has made himself a straw man and imagines that he has the real McCOY! Enlarging this topic, he says, "There are many things we may practice as individuals in the homes that would be sinful in church assemblies. Physical meals are scriptural, if we eat them as individuals (how else would you eat?) but they are sinful in church assemblies (1 Cor. 11.:34)."

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That is enough to make one squirm! I have shown that the group who met for church, were dismissed with prayer, then called in an assembly around the physical table by the church, for a physical meal and prayers were offered in thanks giving for this physical meal. If this doesn't contradict Brother Bonneau's position on church assemblies, there is no meaning in language. If a person should come in on such an assembly around this physical meal in the church building, having seen everyone who was around the table at the church assembly for the morning worship, how could you explain to him that you were not in a church assembly, as per your definition, Brother Bonneau? The same people, same place, same "caller" and let's see you try to explain that your dinner assembly is not in violation of 1 Cor. 11:34. Now he wants to know why a piano can't be used in the class, if it is on a par with home. He reasons that. we oppose instruments in our classes for the same reason we would in church, but he is wrong again. He teaches school. Why would he oppose a piano in his literary classes if these classes he teaches are not church? He would oppose the instrument in his class for the same reason that we would oppose it in a Bible class. The purpose of both classes is to teach-not to play. Our refusing the instrument does not make our classes "church" any more than it makes his classes church by his refusing the instrument. Another straw man knocked down. On page 4, the brother says, ". . . Regulations under the law are not necessarily applicable today, they should not be regarded as definite proof by either side." After saying this, he gives six pages to making arguments based on Jewish assemblies under the law. If they don't prove anything, why does he waste his time with them? Why does he not find arguments that do count? He criticizes his opponent in the Brownfield debate (page 47) for offering scripture that he says does not prove the position they are holding. Hear him: "If a man cites a passage of scripture to prove a position, then that passage of scripture MUST FAVOR the position."

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Did he condemn himself in using six pages of space In his tract, admitting that the arguments he was making were "not necessarily applicable today"? Since he says they are not necessarily applicable today, I think I will use the part of wisdom and not notice them too closely. I mention one and pass on. An argument is made on Neh. 8 to show that the group taught was in one undivided assembly. I should like here to point out that we have assemblies like that every time we have church. I also want to ask him a question, which is an "IDEAL TWIN" to one the anti class brethren ask us when we argue that Titus 2 can be carried out in classes. They ask, "Is that the only way it can be carried out?" I ask Brother Bonneau, "Is one undivided assembly, with only one male speaker speaking at a time, the ONLY WAY TEACHING CAN BE DONE IN A GROUP?" We could ask them, since they use man-made baptistries, "Do you think that a baptistry is the ONLY way you can baptize? Don't you know people were baptized in rivers in Bible days?" On page 10, he says, "Drowning men grab at straws." I answer, yes, and men who hit at a straw man, instead of a man they see, beat the air. A man who will write six pages that he admits does not prove the argument, does not mind beating the air. Blind to the subject, he hits and strikes at, what he believes to be a real argument, and the anti-class brethren rejoice, and say look what a terrific blow! If they would do all arguments offered against the use of classes as I have done, they would see that the air had been beaten into a multitude of holes. The arguments Brother Bonneau makes on page 11 are these: "There is no controversy over the RIGHT of women to teach as 'individuals' (that word again) in the home. Would it be all right for a woman to have what he calls the Sunday School in her home, provided it was not called or convened by the church in any way? In the other argument he says, "The church assembly does not divide into classes," and he gives Acts 11:25-26 for proof. Look out. This teaches too much for your position, and what proves too much proves nothing.

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Two preachers assembled themselves with the church a whole year. Some length for an assembly! If you were not trying to show an assembly, why did you use it? It won't fit an assembly for it is an impossibility to convene for 365 days and nights. Away goes another straw man! The preachers did the teaching not the church. 2. Brother Bonneau, by his opposition to classes, is as the sectarian is by his salvation. The sect thinks every page in the Bible has the plan of salvation writ ten in detail, and Brother Bonneau can find his opposition to classes in just about every passage he finds on teaching. He even assumes that this year-long assembly didn't divide into classes. If such stretching of scriptures does his position any good, I would certainly be afraid of the position. Just read Acts 11:25-26, and see if he has a shadow of proof. Listen to this: "And the Apostles and elders came together for to consider the matter" (Acts 15:6). He gives this as an example of the church coming together without classes. This was not a regular church meeting, but a business meeting. The first coming together here was like our classes, private (Gal. 2:2). Besides, it is in "THE CHURCH" that silence applies. So his straw man bites the dust! The next scriptures given are Acts 15:25, "It seemed good unto us being assembled with 'ONE ACCORD'." And, Acts 15:30, "So when they were dismissed they came to Antioch . . . etc." Brother Bonneau adds, "These verses need no comment to show how early churches were taught in their assemblies." Let us see what these verses actually teach. He assumes that the phrase "ONE ACCORD" meant one group. Webster's dictionary defines accord as "agreement" and "harmony of mind," and the scriptures command Christians to be of the same mind (1 Cor. 1:10). But one mind, or one accord, does not mean that Christians are to be always in one assembly. Brother Bonneau gave it to prove one undivided assembly. There are anti-class preachers who are in ONE ACCORD but live several hundred miles apart, and who seldom see each other. Their "agreement" and "harmony of mind" do not necessitate their even being in the same town, much less under the same roof or in the same room. So this is another straw man.

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It appears that Verse 30 was given by him to show that because "they were dismissed, "that they had been in one group. To say they were dismissed, does not mean dismissed from one group, for our Bible classes are always dismissed; the school where he teaches dismisses every day, and those school classes were certainly not in one room. The term "gathered the multitude together" can have many different shades of meaning. At a special event the multitude of citizens gathered together in the town of Podunk. Does this mean that everybody was in the same store? "Together" is used in different ways. It has different meanings. Let us note that a man and his wife live "together," but they are not always at the same place at the same time. Two men may be together in business, and live a thousand miles apart. Even brethren may meet in the same building together, but be divided in mind, and not be "together," even though in the same church service. Especially would this be true of myself and Brother Bonneau. It may be that these verses needed "MORE" comment than he thought for. I thought they needed what comment I gave them. On page 13, Brother Bonneau says, "There is only one passage that says that the disciples came together to break bread. They (meaning us) understand this to mean it would be wrong to divide into classes to break bread." No, brother, we understand this scripture to show the "WHEN," the day, and not the manner of how to assemble. Other scriptures give the how. This one the day. You will remember that Jerusalem was a large place. They didn't have church buildings as we do today, that is why we read in so many places the term "the church that is in thy house," or theirs. So this point he intended to make is gone. The brother knows that we merely arrange classes to be taught by one teacher to each group, like the teaching by those groups in Acts 5:42. We hear him again (last paragraph on page 13), "I realize that these passages DO NOT PROVE that WE SHOULD NOT HAVE the classes." He used three precious pages of his tract in giving these scriptures and his comments and now admits they DO NOT prove that we should not have classes!

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Then, may I ask why you used them, Brother Bonneau? Don't forget that you are on record for saying that when scripture is given to prove a position, the scripture must FAVOR that position. By "favor" you surely meant prove. If those three pages in this tract do not prove his position, why did he not give something that was an "IDEAL TWIN" to his position? He wants to quibble. If his reasoning is understood by me, he does not know what church is. He won't define it, and slaps at us when we do so. He doesn't know whether church is a "together assembly" or a "divided assembly." When we have "church," our assembly is in the same room. When we have classes, they are in different rooms. Now as per him, the church MUST be in ONE room. If so, then our classes are not the church assembly! He wants to call these groups the church assembly anyhow, so he can bind his church assembly rule on them! On page 14, he says, "One thing is certain. The Bible was not written by Sunday School people." By this term he means those who have classes. There is a sting in the expression "Sunday School," and that is why he uses it. There is a sting in the epithets Campbellite and narrow-mindedness, and that is why the sectarian uses them. He called our classes a method, a system, etc., in this tract; but he loves to sting us with "Sunday School," else he would not have used it forty-eight times in this tract. Only eleven pages of the forty do not have it, and he made up for these eleven. He used it five times on page fourteen. Reason? It appeals to the prejudice of his brethren. But the sting in a name we don't profess to wear, whether "Sunday School Brethren" or "Campbellites" does us no harm, nor the "namer" any spiritual good, though it may satisfy his ego. It would be much better to sting us with applicable scripture. Men will be men, and men love to torture, even by calling others names. It seems to me that if anti-class people had written the Bible, it would read differently. It would say, "Stay away from Bible classes." Will the brother look at Acts 5:42?

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Does not "daily" mean every day? And does not "every house" include more groups than the ONE assembly that he contends for? Does not Acts 5:42 FAVOR our class arrangements? It does. Those meetings and ours look alike to me. Our anti-class brethren cut out such passages as this. They force their law on such meetings, by applying 1 Cor. 14:34 to every meeting. They would have given the Jerusalem church a black eye for having meetings all over town! Brother Bonneau makes mention of "Paul's ways," (1 Cor. 4:17) and says these are plural, that one way Paul taught was by a plurality of speakers who preached consecutively, (Acts 11:26, 15:12-21), and another way was by his doing ALL the preaching alone (Acts 20:7). Now, Brother Bonneau has forgotten just what Paul did, since the anti-class people did not write the Bible. We will now hear from the Apostle Paul, "I have taught you publicly, and from house to house," (Acts 20:20). "Help those women who labored with me in the gospel" (Phil. 4 3). We know that these women didn't violate 1 Cor. 14, and yet in this WAY OF PAUL, women could help! They did, and were commended by him for so doing. Acts 5:42 gives a picture of house to house teaching. On page 15, Brother Bonneau says, "We continue . . . this brings us to 1 Cor. 14." From reading his tract I thought that he was to 1 Cor. 14 already. He used it three times on page 2, and twice on page 3. They cry 1 Cor. 14 so much, binding it on all meetings (except those that they want to get by with) that they do not know when they do get to it. They use it for any argument that they can't meet on the teaching question. One of their debaters will ask an opponent, "What about the 144,000 of Revelation 7?" This is used to baffle the opponent although it has no bearing on the issue. In the same way, they cry, "What about 1 Cor. 14?" And now I ask, "What about it?" Did those women at Philippi (Phil. 4:3) violate it? If not, then 1 Cor. 14:34 does not apply to all teaching. It does apply to conditions described in that context. He states further that the prophesy of 1 Cor. 14:31 means for the speakers (teachers) to do so one by one.

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Yes, and I say that the word prophesy always includes teaching, regardless of what else it may include Paul gave instructions to women to prophesy (to preach) when dressed for the occasion (1 Cor. 11:5). Philip had four virgin daughters who prophesied (which means that they taught, for if they foretold, they taught, and if they prophesied in a secondary sense, still they taught) . And our women teach, but they do not violate 1 Cor. 14 any more than these Christian women did. Phoebe, a servant of a church, was commended for her work, and that by the writer of 1 Cor. 14. She would not be fellowshipped by the anti-class brethren of to day if she were among them. They would say, "Sister Phoebe, 1 Cor. 14 forbids your services in all groups where teaching is done, even though it be groups of women and children." This Paul did not do, and he knew what the command meant, since he wrote it. The word "church" (1 Cor. 14:33-5) means assembly when they want to bind it on our classes, but it means "congregation" when they want to bind it on all the different congregations. The brother adds, "Of course some may insist that classes are not church assemblies, but we shall handle that more definitely later." If he CAN handle it, why not do it now? Why put it off after coming to it face to face? If he puts it off, maybe his brethren will forget that he backed away from it, and refused to handle it. This statement of his shows that he knows that we recognize 1 Cor. 14 as binding on assemblies when they function as a church in an assembly as of that context. Our difference is not over whether we believe the passage or not, but over his making it a law for all groups. He cannot tell the difference in the church of Christ and the international Sunday School, for he accuses that we have that organization (which we do not), and then tries to bind a command to the church to that organization. King of blunders! Nor can he tell (when he does not want to) the difference between a Bible class and THE ASSEMBLY. If 1 Cor. 14:34 was given to regulate THE ASSEMBLY, it does not apply

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to Bible classes, which Bonneau says did not at that time exist. Even Brother Bonneau does not apply all of 1 Cor. 14. On page 18 he says, "The particular directions concerning the wives of the prophets DO NOT APPLY TODAY, but the general law concerning other women is applicable now." So you see that not all of 1 Cor. 14 applies among anti-class churches, and he has to "fix it." He "fixes" it so he can govern the local church with it, or THE ASSEMBLY; the church as a separate institution. 1 Cor. 14 works wonders for him. It exceeds Alva Johnson's 144,000 of Rev. 7. We wonder what he means by "general law?" Is it one that includes details, or particulars, that are not stated in it? Yes, Brother Bonneau, we have our Bible classes under your "general law," the command to teach. Now the brother tells us that many profess to see no difference in teaching in church assemblies and in teaching as individuals in the home. Here he misrepresents us again. We claim to see no difference in teaching a class (a thing he calls a church assembly) in the church building, and in teaching that same group in our home. He told us on page 3 of his tract that it is easy to differentiate between the church assembly and ordinary gatherings of people as individuals. We agree and so we "differentiate," that classes are ordinary gatherings of people that want to be taught, and people who recognize that they haven't met in the capacity of the church in a class room, any more than they would be the church had they met in a home. Yes, it is VERY ORDINARY to see gatherings of people meet in classes where we are represented in the community. We know that we are not having "church." Visitors coming for church wait until classes are over, at the ,appointed time when we have arranged to have "church." Then we have "church" and apply 1 Cor. 14. On Luke 2:3£, Brother Bonneau says, "Anna did not speak of Him before a church assembly, as the church was not fully established at that time, but as she served God with fastings and prayers in the temple, she spoke as an individual in private . . . she no doubt 'spake of Him' . . . as she individually contacted them in private."

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The temple was a public place of worship and if Anna could speak as an individual in private in this public place, our argument that such a procedure can be done is established! Yes, and that by an outstanding anti-class representative. In this he justifies our sisters when they teach privately in a public meeting house. Now, he has handed us a passage and showed us how to use it (Lk. 2:38) that without a doubt FAVORS women teachers. Our women can do as Anna did, arrange to meet with people and SPEAK TO THEM OF HIM. In trying to "fix" Anna's case, he has indeed "fixed" his objections to women teachers. He admits that this instruction was not before a church assembly. He shows that a woman may teach people "on purpose" and that she may plan to teach and carry out her plans as Anna did. If a woman teaches one or a dozen, she does no more than Anna did. Can anyone see why our anti-class brethren will not allow us to allow our sisters to teach in the same capacity as did Anna? Instead of allowing it, they with draw from us for it! Brother Bonneau cites Acquila and Priscilla's teaching of Apollos and asks, "Did the church call this meeting, and place a plurality of classes about them?" Let me answer that they had just had preaching and. that they took the man aside from the preaching service to give him special instruction. We contend that our classes are aside from the preaching services, and that they give special instruction to the certain classes who attend! As to the plurality of classes, I would say that in one class is right, which all anti-class brethren will usually admit, that it certainly is not wrong for two or more teachers to do "right" at the same time. There fore, a plurality of classes can be taught at the same time for the same purpose as the one class. They did this in Jerusalem (Acts 5:42). Brother Bonneau seems to think that a woman would be justified in "individually" conducting a class and not being chargeable to elders or to God. Just so she ran her own boat, so to speak. To teach, however, she must do "outlaw" teaching , teaching out from under the direction of the elders and her husband-out from under all instructions.

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Really, I don't see how he can oppose a plurality of classes being taught by women at the same time, if those who were doing the teaching were to decide in their own minds to contact a group as did Anna. Of course, Anna went where she KNEW that she could contact people who wanted to be taught. When he cites Phillip's four daughters, he says the correct answer to the question, "Where did they prophesy?" is that they prophesied as individuals AWAY from the church assembly. (That is where we have our classes.) But who said that this is the "correct" answer? Brother Bonneau did. How did it come to be correct? It agrees with his position. If it needed to be reversed to fit another argument, he could give us "another correct answer" as he does on the term "church" in 1 Cor. 14:33. He gives a two way interpretation on passages when in a tight. It is a fact that these girls prophesied before a meeting, or group larger than their family and that it was known to the extent that Luke tells about it Acts 21:8-9). These girls were not talking to themselves. They were not before The Assembly of the church, for they would have been violating 1 Cor. 14 there. They had to speak in a meeting that 1 Cor. 14 did not condemn, and it is that kind of meeting exactly, where our women speak. We do not use this example to demonstrate all the details of class teaching, but to show that our women can teach in the same way that these did. When our anti-class brethren tell us that women can't .teach, we tell them Luke said these "DID." The next argument that our brother makes is on Acts 16:13, where Lydia and a group of women had met (a woman's meeting, D.K.) for prayer. He "sees" no classes proved by this meeting. We wouldn't expect him to do so, unless he admits that more than one may do right at the same time. Let us notice what took place in this meeting. First, Paul did not condemn this meeting, as our anti-class preachers would have done. Second, Paul taught this women's class and he knew all about the restrictions placed upon women, for he it

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was who gave them, and nowhere does he mention the restrictions for the church assembly as binding on a meeting like this. Third, women may meet on purpose, in a group, at a specified place, at a specific time, not to quilt, but to worship (pray). He says, "How may we distinguish between individual work and the work that is done in church assemblies? To my mind, the distinction is very easy. When a local congregation calls a group together, that group constitutes a church assembly." Now let us see if this distinction is right. Suppose that a local congregation calls a group together to clean the church premises. Is this called assembly governed by 1 Cor. 14? Sup pose a local congregation calls a group together as did the churches at Houston, where they had church court, where their women spoke sometimes before the whole assembly for as much as fifteen minutes, does 1 Cor. 14 apply? Suppose after the preaching services some Sun day morning, the elders of a local congregation call an assembly around the benches in the church building where a feast is spread. It is called by the church, it is an assembly, and 1 Cor. 14 would most surely apply according to one of Brother Bonneau's definitions. Since these three supposed cases which have happened, and still happen, are not under the specific regulations of l Cor. 14, we must admit that Brother Bonneau's distinguished interpretation of a church assembly is false. The brother reasons that a sister is within her "rights" when she teaches a group, where the church has not convened it, nor called a plurality of classes. Would he accept the idea of a woman running over the elders and her husband by teaching in her "rights"? If she is in her rights, why would it be any of their business? What I would like to know is, HOW FAR APART these plurality of classes would have to be to make them acceptable to him? The brethren who published this tract for Brother Bonneau will not agree with him on this score, although they indorsed it. Since Brother Bonneau thinks you anti-class sisters are with in your rights in teaching under these restrictions, we class brethren would like to see you sisters doing it.

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God will expect something from your life spent here on this earth. The next three pages of his tract are given, trying to show that the classes are public and not private. This sounds bad for a man's position, when he will give these three pages of argument, after saying that he is not so interested in whether or not the classes are public or private. How many pages would he have given in argument provided he was interested in whether the classes were public or private? Could he be beating the air? Brother Bonneau thinks anyone "audacious" to call a meeting private when the public is invited to attend it. We all realize that there are degrees of privacy. A home is a private place, but the bath room is the most private room in the house. Children in a community may be invited to a birthday party for a three-year-old if all others not in this age group are excluded, the party is a private affair. I have known of a school teacher leasing the public skating rink for the eighth grade, and having a private party in a public place. A hospital invites the public, all ages, to come use its facilities, but a patient in a room with a closed door is in private. The very idea of a door suggests privacy. Our classes are behind doors. When a group is taken aside, apart in a room, or to one side of the throng as was Jesus' group in Luke 9:10, that group is private. Our classes taken apart, certainly "FAVOR" privacy. Here comes Brother Bonneau back with his piano again! He is the most music-minded fellow I ever read after. His argument is that our classes are "church" or else we would allow an instrument in them. You will remember that he has used this argument several times before, and each time I answer that we meet in the rooms to teach and not to play. It seems to me, if he had a foot to stand on, he would be writing on "TEACHING THE WORD" instead of going around like a ferris wheel on the music question. His subject was "TEACHING THE WORD," but the reader would get the impression that the way to teach the word is to oppose the ways we class brethren

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teach it, and to offer instrumental music in the teaching program. Has he told us how to teach? Has he been in the affirmative? Is not the whole theme of the anti class subject of teaching in the negative? They try to survive not on their own merits of teaching, but what they term our demerits. They use a piano to throw up a smoke screen. They don't aim to prove anything with it, but it tends to help them not notice our arguments on the teaching question Listen to this, in trying to answer our argument, "If a woman may teach in her home, she may teach under a tree between her home and the church house, and if she can teach under the shade tree, she may teach in the church house," he didn't say she couldn't, but he dragged up the piano and started a "musical program" in connection. Why don't they tell us "WHERE" woman may teach? They only tell us where she may not teach! Is the teaching program of the New Testament only negative as he makes it appear? His subject, teaching the word, would be a good place to give some attention to where she may teach. On page 26, the brother contends that a woman may play a piano in the class room. Did you ever hear this argument before? He made it on page 25, and several other pages, and makes it again. If nothing else will do him, and he will accept classes provided we "fix" up a room for him with a piano in it, I believe we can stop division. If he wants his feet washed we would do that for him in the same spirit that we would allow him to play on his favorite instrument, the PIANO. He knows that he is only beating the air, for our classes do not play, nor wash feet for the same reason his classes, in the literary school where he teaches, do not. His literary classes are not "church" but not be cause they would refuse to play in them. If nothing else will do him but have a piano in a school, why does he not put one in his singing school? This kind of School he accepts, though he cannot find a detailed Scripture for any such in the New Testament. The Piano would be more suited to a singing class than to Bible class, don't you think? If his singing school is the "church" as per his argument, then, according

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to him, nothing can keep it out! If the singing school is the church, he had best get busy and silence the women in it. We come to a very interesting thing on page 26. He says "IF" I were going to change my position, etc. The reader will remember that the brother makes the term "IF" in 1 Cor. 14:23 mean "MUST" and since he has been so bold on the definition of "IF", it follows that he "MUST" change! To him, "if" means must in 1 Cor. 14: 23, but here he may give "IF" a second definition. He can do so as easily as he gives "church" two definitions in 1 Cor. 14:33. With Brother Bonneau, all things are possible as to interpreting words. Now he says, "If they (women) should start regular teaching purely from an individual standpoint in the church building, it would not be long before the church would want to organize a Sunday School out of the practice." May we ask him some questions? Suppose the women go on and teach regularly (within her rights as you say she may on page 21) and the church does not "ORGANIZE" any institution, would you then encourage your brethren to fellowship us? Remember, you have not proved us to have a super-organization separate from the church, you only ASSUME that we do. Suppose you show us HOW "a woman may teach within her rights as an individual in church building regularly" and when you do, I will guarantee that you will not preach for the anti-class brethren when they hear about it. Suppose further that you encourage this "right" of women teachers and stop division? You infer that it is possible for a teaching arrangement to be carried on in the church house and it not be a "super organization" separate from the church. Now if all our anti-class brethren will only look at this, we can get somewhere. Why not encourage all of them to ALLOW this kind of regular teaching, and get them to practice it, and we will be of the same mind and judgment, and together we can fight against any organization of which you are afraid. We don't have the institution which you mention, and since we are within "OUR RIGHTS" to teach in

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this way, we don't feel we should be bound to a law of some brethren's fancy, speaking where God has not. We prefer to stay within our right, and let the opposers take "the blame" for a divided brotherhood. Brother Bonneau has admitted in principle what we have. And if the anti-class brethren will only open their eyes, they can see the thing that many of us have seen and are seeing all along. That is why we are leaving that anti-class faction that does very little teaching, and that opposes our doing the teaching that is so badly needed. We have a benighted world in sin and darkness, and we who have the gospel are holding it in unrighteousness, in not allowing our sisters to teach. More, they make trouble over the preacher teaching a class, even though he be a MAN! Hence we who have been anti-class advocates have failed, and failed miserably to preach and teach the message of life to those who are lost. On page 27, our brother wonders why we would oppose the communion in four class rooms, if we can teach classes in four rooms? This is an easy question. Communion is for the ASSEMBLY of the church. We class brethren say this and so does he. We would exclude the communion from the classes for the same reason he would exclude it from the singing school class, that is "called" and "convened" by the church, held in the church house, and paid for out of the church treasury. Brother Bonneau can call and convene a class to sing under the instruction of Col. 3:16, and I can call and convene a class to learn under the command of Mt. 28:19-20. Both "convening" are expedients, but he thinks his far outshines mine. These arrangements to carry out law come to us the same way. If one is wrong, both are wrong. As long as he allows a singing school under the command "SING" fairness demands that he allow us the privilege to have a Bible school under the command "TEACH." Now he comes saying that our plea is that the class system (he didn't call it Sunday School this time, he didn't want to sting, maybe) is the best method of teaching. He argues that if that were so, he would use it every time there was a gathering of the church. I believe Brother Bonneau mis-stated us. We say that on

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some occasions, and for particular needs, class teaching is better adapted. Jesus used the class system, Mt. 17:1 Mt. 20:17, Lk. 9:10, and who will say that it was not the best method on those occasions? Yet Jesus used other means besides the class system. He made no mistakes, and we make none by following his example in using the class system. When we show the examples of class teaching, and especially when we mention Tit. 2:3-5, some anti-class brother will ask, "Do you think that this class arrangement is the only way it can be carried out?" I should like to say that it is ONE WAY; and this is the way we carry it out. Let them tell us how they carry it out! They do not carry it out, as a people. If we believed that preaching was the ONLY way to teach, we would not have schools such as they have at Kerrville, and at Gunter. We would not have religious papers as the two that they publish. We would not use the radio as they do. They know we don't believe that classes are the only way to teach, any more than they believe pulpit preaching is the only way to do it. Do our anti-class brethren believe their religious papers are the only way to teach, because they see that the papers will fill a need in a certain sphere? The brethren may not, but the editors nearly do. They plead for the churches to place orders for "bundle lots." We all know that a religious paper is a human institution within itself, in which to do preaching and teaching. Through this device of men, unknown in Paul's day, a ONE MAN editor DICTATES WHAT SHALL or shall not be sent into each home on its pages. The editor, then, is an officer of a human organization, with self appointed power who teaches that the church ought to support such a paper, for it is HIS. Most editors go through the brotherhood and form a clan or click like-minded with him, and will cut out the remainder of the brotherhood. There is partiality among them. Certain preachers, regardless of how good they may be, are not used to write sermons. All that these preachers and leaders are to the editor, is a source of subs.

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Talk about institutionalism. Why oppose what you think might be one, and fellowship to the fullest one you know to be such? Papers have done no little harm in keeping the brethren divided, and such is true of the two published by our anti-class brethren today. Papers build up factions. Where the "bundle lot" goes, a faction of its own "kith and kin" arises. The more bundle lots sold, the more prominent the editor, and the larger his following. With all this papers can still be used to a good advantage when properly controlled and used, but they are not the ONLY way to teach and preach, regardless of their influence. On page 28, the brother hits at us because our classes which he calls Sunday school, draw large crowds. He says it is because we work twice as hard through these classes as we do through scriptural ways. Now I have the secret why all anti-class churches are not having large crowds. They don't work as hard for the church as he thinks we do in teaching people! I have known for a long time they were not growing. Inactivity will finally kill anything. They are drying out, because they are not working. It might be jealousy on their part that causes them to think that we are working twice as hard for the classes as we do for the church, when they see their little struggling groups "chewing the rag" with one another, while we are bravely marching on with the gospel at home and on foreign fields. The point is, if he is right, that crowds come by hard work, we have crowds at church, so we work more for the church than they do, he being our witness on getting crowds. Our anti-class brethren are having the poorest attendance of any group I know of, and according to this brother, it is because they are not working. People don't go to a dead service, where people are not allowed to do the work God said for them to do. While the anti-class churches go drifting along with the tide, they are losing, and losing fast. People see their bundle of inconsistencies and come worship and work with us for the Lord. There is still more room, and we have much to do. We could use all of them to help us with the Master's

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work, if they would give up their indolence, and the self-righteousness of the Pharisee, and quit binding laws where God has not. Our crowds are on the increase, not because we foster a super institution, but because we are preaching the gospel that God uses to make an increase of the body. To use any other substitute is to fail, or to neglect to preach it is to suffer defeat. How can they hear without a preacher? and how can he preach unless you brethren support him, and let him do it? You are afraid, like the one talent man. His fear didn't take the place of obedience. Your fear won't take the place of your obeying the command of the great commission. You just can't get scared enough for God to overlook your neglect. To neglect is to be held guilty in judgment (Heb. 2:2). Would to God Brother Bonneau were "TEACHING THE WORD" instead of opposing us who are doing it. I would that he were teaching ALL nations instead of teaching our anti-brethren to stay away from us who are at work. His teaching the word would have a better appeal if it were positive instead of prohibitive. On page 28, he says we argue that if people can spread their meals in the church house and eat there when Paul tells them to eat at home (1 Cor. 11:34), that in the same way women may obey the injunction, "If they would learn anything let them ask their husbands 'at home' " (1 Cor. 14:35). He says that they may ask and teach in and around the church building. He says further, "Both requirements, 'eat at home' and 'ask their husbands at home' have been obeyed on the church premises, provided in both cases the individuals had acted as agents of the home, and had not called a church assembly for such purposes." If this is correct, then all we have to do to make classes and women teachers acceptable, is to tell our sisters to ACT AS HOME AGENTS, and let them get the classes together as usual, only they would have to figure out how to get them together without CALLING THEM TOGETHER AS AN ASSEMBLY.

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We might do as our anti-class brethren do when they get the group to assemble around that physical meal, advertise a week ahead of time that "There is to be a church dinner next Sunday, come one, come all." This dinner-assembly is a called meeting that has been advertised by the church, and will be eaten in the church building where these brethren have GROUPED BENCHES "TOGETHER IN ONE PLACE." Those in authority call and convene this assembly. Ask anybody you please whose dinner it is, and they will say a church dinner. When they "loose" the "eat at home" and the "ask at home," (1 Cor. 11:34; 14:35) so their sisters can both eat and ask on the church premises, they have "loosed" the "ask at home," so our sisters can have a Bible class there. The difference is, our women speaking where his eat, is not according to his hobby, and he has to allow what he and his brethren want, and refuse to us the same privileges that they take. He says, "Make them both an individual affair and the argument is gone." Yes, we see. Who is in the "making" business? It is Brother Bonneau. He "makes" an individual affair of them to win the argument. For he says the argument is gone, presto! Where did he get his "making" recipe? He makes scriptures fit his notions, and why not "make" for others the liberty he takes? He won't allow it! We are not in the "making" business, the anti-class brethren do that! One thing is outstanding: he has admitted people can "MAKE" a church assembly or refrain from making one, even though a group is convened, called, and gathered around the table in ONE PLACE! His dinner assembly is the opposite of what a foreigner not accustomed to seeing common meals eaten in the church building, would think. Even so, classes are the opposite of what Brother Bonneau would make you think he sees in them. THE CHURCH DINNER IS AS MUCH A CHURCH AFFAIR AS THE CLASSES. The only possible way to have a church affair is for people as individuals to gather. Can a person commune with Christ without intending to? Can a man be baptized for the remission of sins without intending to?

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Can we have church and not intend to? See Jno. 4 23-24. God looks on the heart and he knows when we intend to have church and when we don't. A class can not be a church assembly without intention any more than a person can commune with Christ without in tending to. We must do things on purpose for them to count with God. The dinner at church is a church assembly only IF you intend for it to be so. So is the Bible class, and since we don't intend for it to be "church" any more than you intend for the church dinner to be "church," it is not church, and for the same reason. We now notice page 34. Brother Bonneau asks, "How does a woman teach over the man?" It seems that he would show that, since he is writing on the subject. It is easier to ask questions than to answer them, or is it? He admits a woman may teach as an individual, and that she is to be subject to the man everywhere. Therefore, she may "individually teach" and not usurp authority over the man when she does it as per his reasonings. Let us ask him back his own question, how may a woman usurp authority over the man? If men helped her in any particular, according to his logic, she would run her teaching into an organization. She must "outlaw" everybody. If a sister decided on her "own" to take advantage of her "rights" and went to the church building with out anybody's permission, she could teach as an "individual" and hence couldn't be usurping authority over anyone while within her rights. It may be that Brother Bonneau answers this question as he does the question of blasphemy against the Holy Ghost, by saying it can't be done today. Elders would not be allowed to interfere with the sister; to do so would immediately change her from an individual to a super organization. Elders couldn't stop her either, for they must not bother anybody who is within his rights! Will he answer his own question? Not as long as he holds to this foolish argument, for Bonneau would cut Bonneau asunder by meeting him self coming back from nowhere. We believe one way a woman may usurp authority over the man is by telling him where to head in, as some of the anti-class sisters do.

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On page 36, he says, "Wherever the passage applies, there the women must be in silence," We say a hearty Amen. He thinks it applies to our classes and we think it applies no more to our Bible school than it does to his singing school. We class folk are very much opposed t., a woman disregarding this restriction. We believe a woman may usurp authority over a man in the home, or on the street, as well as in church affairs, and that frequently they do so. In the last paragraph, page 36, he tells us of a class brother who declared that Bonneau's position on 1 Cor. 14:27-33 would force the existence of tongue speakers and prophets in the church today. Well, he did give the scripture that was to govern miracle gift meetings. We do not have prophesying now, but he interprets verse 31 to mean ';teach" one by one in the assembly, so he substitutes teach for prophesy. He is in the substituting business. Now watch him change his definition of prophesy. He can make it change immediately, for when I tell him women were to dress properly before prophesying in 1 Cor. 11:5, and that they "DID" prophesy according to Acts 21:8-9, he changes, presto! Prophesy now means something else. Why? Because he does not want it to mean teaching, for women could and did do that. He changes like the weather, and like the metamorphosis of the butterfly. In some seasons of argument, it is more convenient to take a certain form of reasoning but at other seasons of difficulty with his position, he blooms out with an other argument, not only different but opposite. On page 37, he says that a brother asked him if he regarded the law of Moses binding on us today since he had quoted from Deuteronomy and Nehemiah in the former part of this tract. His answer is, "I stated positively in that article that I did not regard these as binding today, but cited them to prove that the Jews knew how to teach . . . without dividing into classes." Brother Bonneau used only six pages of his tract arguing these scriptures he regards not binding today, to prove what? They can't be for nor against class

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teaching if not binding today. Why did he do it? Remember, he was the one who said the scriptures given to prove a position must "FAVOR" the position. (Brownfield debate, page 47.) Now here he comes along, using six pages of arguments on scriptures he admits himself do not favor his position, for "they are not binding now," to use his words. When they get in the binding business though, they don't mind binding any thing handy. Just so they can condemn the class brethren, which to them is the main thing. "Happy is the man that condemneth not himself in that thing which he alloweth." Brother Bonneau says, "Our class brethren usually charge that we make a law where God has made none. They insist that God does not require any particular method of teaching, but that we demand a specific method. I am perfectly willing to be placed on trial on the charge . . . if God has made no law on this question . . . we stand one hundred per cent to blame for the division of the issue." I challenge Brother Bonneau to give one scripture authorizing a method of teaching to the exclusion of any other. These brethren make a law when they bind the method of teaching the assembly of the church, on every kind of teaching we class brethren arrange. If this church assembly method of teaching is the only kind, then let them quit using the radio, religious papers, tracts, and Bible schools. If the church assembly method of teaching applies to every group taught in the church house, how can Brother Bonneau permit that sister her "rights" to teach in such capacity? Our anti-class brethren do us as they say the one-container brethren do them. They claim the one-cup brethren bind the container, what God has not bound by their use of the term "cup." When they refuse to be bound to this law, the one-cup brethren accuse them of transgressing the Bible! When our anti-class brethren bind their application of 1 Cor. 14 on every group arrangement that we have to teach, we revolt as they do, and for the same reason. GOD DOES NOT DEMAND ANY SPECIFIC METHOD OF

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TEACHING OUTSIDE THE ASSEMBLY OF THE CHURCH. Therefore, we may have church papers, radio preaching, church schools like theirs at Kerrville, and the one they had at Gunter. The Knight brothers also have their own "personal work," Bible readings, etc., and we may have Bible classes by the same authority. In the last paragraph on page 38, the brother tells of another who was "repeatedly demanding" that Brother Bonneau answer him yes or no whether or not he makes the class method a test of fellowship. He claims that he has explained his "position" to him, but the brother insists the question has not been answered, but "side stepped." Brother Bonneau states he reserves the right to answer all questions in the manner he thinks they should be handled. Now, doesn't it appear if classes were so out of harmony with the scriptures as he tries to make them appear, why can't he say yes, and give the scriptural answer? The reason he appears to side step answering this question asked him is that he knows that false charges have been heaped upon us, and that they go too far in disfellowshipping us. It would take Brother Bonneau but a quick second to answer the question of whether he fellowshipped a fornicator, a drunkard, a murderer. Everyone would know that his answer was not side stepped. Many of these good brethren would fellowship us class brethren "IF" the pressure were not too great from inside their faction. They are not allowed to carry out their convictions in this matter of fellowship, and remain with the anti-class group. The question of fellowship is continued on page 39 He says, "There is the work itself and there are individuals who believe in the Sunday School and support it. What should be our attitude toward fellowshipping them? Here is where we need to exercise extreme caution before rushing in where angels fear to tread. There are two classes of Sunday School brethren and our fellowship of them should depend entirely on how far the individual under consideration has gone with the question. I have no qualms whatever against fellowshipping a brother who believes in the Sunday

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School provided he has never pressed the question nor fostered the classes upon the church." Yes, he is afraid to RUSH in where angels FEAR to do so. This is why he does not answer yes or no. He has no "qualms" whatever against fellowshipping a brother who believes in classes, provided he does not "press" nor "foster" the classes upon the church. Tell me, would he fellowship a brother who believed in murdering, drunkenness, or fornication, as long as the brother did not "press" or "foster" them? Why won't he fellowship us if he believes his own statement here? We are not pressing him to have the classes, nor any church to foster the classes as we do, if they carry out the teaching program of the great commission some way, but we are asking him to allow us the privilege of doing what we believe (Rom. 14:23 and Jas. 4:17). It is natural for us if we believe in a thing, to sup port it; for faith is proved by works. If we believe in the church we will "press it" and "foster it" and "at tend." If angels would fear to disfellowship us class brethren, and I verily believe they would, I agree with Brother Bonneau that the anti-class brethren ought not to do so. If Brother Bonneau would teach ALL of the anti-class brethren that they not only could, but should fellowship everyone of us that they possibly can, division would stop. Let everyone of them fellowship only those who Brother Bonneau says they can, but are not, instead of disfellowshipping everyone of us, lock, stock and barrel. On page 40, the good brother concludes by appealing to us class brethren to "Please give up your classes and take a firm stand for the truth." I challenge the last one of the anti-class brethren to mention one Bible truth which we do not believe and teach- our difference is not over our rejecting any truth, but as mentioned before, over differences of interpretation of the words "church" and "teach," as their differing with the one cup brethren is not over their rejecting scripture, but over an interpretation of the term "CUP." Does he mean to imply that "truth" is the anti class interpretation? Shall we be governed by men?

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Must we take the interpretation of men who differ among themselves on such vital things as "can the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit be committed today?" Brother Bonneau answers the above question in the negative. He says that this cannot be committed today. His brethren disagree, but still fellowship him. The same cause that permits them to fellowship him, will permit them to fellowship us who differ on applications also. In concluding my review of this tract, I will say that I have tried to see all worthwhile arguments he made, and pay my respects to them. I have found his tract, "Teaching the Word," to be very much in the negative, even though he promised on page one that he would give positive reasons. He has not touched the subject under his caption, but he has hit at, and missed, us who use every known means of teaching possible, in their proper place. His booklet would have been more correctly titled, "Errors of the Classes and Class Brethren, As I View It." In teaching against our classes, he forgot to show affirmatively, authority for their school at Kerrville, the two church papers they publish, their use of the radio etc. He did not tell how their missionaries do mission work, at home or abroad. There is a reason for they have none at home to speak of, and have not sent one abroad in twenty years, according to their own admission. Their quibbling about classes and women's right to teach from the negative point of view has kept them in the objective case. They have thought of "teaching" from the negative point of view and now they are quibbling about a preacher's rights in preaching and teaching. They are afraid for women, AND MEN, to teach, because they are AFRAID. This fear keeps them from being a teaching people, and has caused them to make a faction of the body of Christ and keep it divided. If they will only practice toward us what they ask the one-cup brethren to practice toward them, we will be one in Jesus Christ, for which he so earnestly prayed.

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