HENRY

See also:

• HENRY AINSWORTH (1571–1622)
• AINSWORTH, ROBERT (166o-1743)
• AINSWORTH, WILLIAM HARRISON (1805-1882)

AINSWORTH (1571–1622)  , English Nonconformist divine and scholar, was born of yeoman stock in 1J70/1 at Swanton Morley, Norfolk . He was for four years from December 1587 a scholar of Caius College, Cambridge, and, after associating with the Puritan party in the Church, eventually joined the Separatists . Driven abroad about the year 1593, he found a home in " a blind lane at Amsterdam." He acted as " porter " to a scholarly bookseller in that city, who, on discovering his skill in the Hebrew language, made him known to his country-men . When part of the London church, of which Francis Johnson (then in prison) was pastor, reassembled in Amsterdam, Ainsworth was chosen as their doctor or teacher . In 1596 he took the lead in drawing up a confession of their faith, which he reissued in Latin in i 598 and dedicated to the various universities of Europe (including St Andrews, Scotland) . Johnson joined his flock in 1597, and in 1,6o4 he and Ainsworth composed An Apology or Defence of such true Christians as are commonly but unjustly called Brownists . The task of organizing the church was not easy and dissension was rife . Of Ainsworth it may be said that, though often embroiled in controversy, he never put himself forward; yet he was the most steadfast and cultured champion of the principles represented by the early Congregationalists . Amid all the strife of controversy, he steadily pursued his rabbinical studies . The combination was so unique that many, like the encyclopaedists L . Moreri and J . H .

Zedler, have made two

Henry Ainsworths—one Dr Henry Ainsworth, a learned biblical commentator; the other H . Ainsworth, an arch-heretic and " the ringleader of the Separatists at Amster-dam." Some confusion has also been occasioned through his not unfriendly controversy with one John Ainsworth, who abjured the Anglican for the Roman church . In 16o8 Ainsworth answered Richard Bernard's The Separatist Schisme . But his ablest and most arduous minor work in controversy was his reply to John Smyth (commonly called " the Se-Baptist "), entitled a Defence of Holy Scripture, Worship and Ministry used in the Christian Churches separated from Antichrist, against the Challenges, Cavils and Contradictions of Mr Smyth (1609) . In 1610 he was forced reluctantly to withdraw, with a large part of their church, from F . Johnson and those who adhered to him . For some time a difference of principle, as to the church's right to revise its officers' decisions, had been growing between them, Ainsworth taking the more Congregational view . (See CONGREGATIONALISM.) But in spirit he remained a man of peace . His memory abides through his rabbinical learning . The ripe fruit of many years' labour appeared in his Annotations—on Genesis (1616) ; Exodus (1617); Leviticus (1618) ; Numbers (1619) ; Deuteronomy (1619) ; Psalms (including a metrical version, 1612); Song of Solomon (1623) . These were collected in folio in 1627, and again in 1639, and later in various forms . From the outset the Annotations took a commanding place, especially among continental scholars, and he established for English nonconformity a tradition of culture and scholarship .

There is no

probability about the narrative given by Neal in his History of the Puritans (ii . 47) that he was poisoned by certain Jews . He died in 1622, or early in 1623, for in that year was published his Seasonable Discourse, or a Censure upon a Dialogue of the Anabaptists, in which the editor speaks of him as a departed worthy .