After the Secession of 1834, our Dutch forebears fought an eighty year battle for freedom to have Reformed schools. Faced with unacceptable public schools, strong beliefs about the meaning of baptism for education, concerns regarding vaccinations, and an intolerant and unjust government, Seceders often opted for homeschooling – or endured jail terms and fines. We want to appreciate their struggle for unity between church, home, and school.

Church, School, and State⤒🔗

The Dutch Secession of 1834 was the church’s return to the truth of the Word of God as confessed in the Three Forms of Unity, and to the freedom to worship Him accordingly. Under the church order of 1816, Dutch Reformed ministers were free to deny, for instance, that Jesus was the divine Son of God who died to pay for our sins. Rather, people like Dr. Hofstede DeGroot emphasized how loving and enlightened the man Jesus was: he would even die to show how disgusting sin was. And they gloried in humanistic principles which the Synod of Dort in 1618-1619 had rejected. Meanwhile, ministers were not free to oppose modernism, necessitating the Secession.

Modernist ideas took root in schools also. The 1806 School Act, a product of French revolutionary rule, determined that schools should now train in “all Social and Christian Virtues,” that denominations should each teach their own doctrines, and that teachers must be trained to promote (religious) tolerance. In the 1840s, Groen VanPrinsterer (a prominent Christian politician and historian) recognized that public schools could maintain a Christian character for some time. By then, however, even the presence of the Bible in a public school had become intolerable and forbidden, as the revolutionary ideals of Liberty, Equality, and Brotherhood increasingly determined its character. In 1834, a zealous school-inspector publicly reprimanded a teacher for having “offensive” Bibles in his classroom. In 1835, foreigners were sceptical that Dutch schools could teach “Social and Christian Virtues” without the Bible or a clearly Christian foundation, or be Christian without offending Jews. Around 1850, a teacher in Zaandam believed it was still acceptable to read the Bible with her class of only Protestant children. To save her job, she had to stop the practice. Tolerance only extended to modernists.

Hoksbergen, Kok, and Takken←⤒🔗

Elder Hoksbergen published a letter about the nature of “neutral” education in 1835. In it, he wrote:

Where there are only apostate state schools, the parents are forced by the spirit of the age ... to sacrifice their God-given children to that Molech; but may the Lord keep me and many of my countrymen from doing so... The doctrine of Christ has been banned from these schools, and they get drunk on the fables of antichrist ... and the spirit of lies, the old serpent, jinxes them into believing that the doctrine of Christ is too hard for children to understand. The schools are just as depraved as the churches, and should we stay out of (the churches), but send our children to (the schools)?

Elder Kok of Dwingelo commented on a new picture Bible for children, which ignored the fall into sin and redemption in Christ:

Parents ... can you ultimately expect that God will take your offspring into heaven, if you let them walk on the road to hell? ... But especially, you parents, who ... for Christ’s sake have left Babylon, who publicly profess Christ, and who have taken up His cross ... following the command that is holy, just and good – see to it that your children will not be taught any differently than what Paul wanted to know: Jesus Christ and Him crucified!

It was a matter of principle that our forebears could not accept state education if the state church (Babylon) had to be rejected. There had to be unity of home, church, and school.

Taking to heart what Hoksbergen, Kok, and other leaders had written, Grietje Takken taught some neighbourhood children in December, 1837. In January 1838, she was condemned to three days in jail and the costs of the court process.

Smilde’s Struggle←⤒🔗

Teacher Douwe Van der Werp of Houwerzijl was among those who worshipped with Rev. De Cock in nearby Ulrum when the Secession started – much to the chagrin of Mr. Pietersen, his principal. In the classroom, Douwe did not hide his Reformed faith, but taught on biblical grounds. Meanwhile, Dr. Hofstede De Groot, Ulrum’s former minister and now public school-inspector, anonymously published a brochure to promote his modernist views in the schools. The brochure attracted Douwe’s wrath, and, with a foreword of Rev. De Cock, he issued a scathing rebuttal of its “heresies, destructive to the soul” and its “recommendations of most honourable, scholarly, non-honourable and stupid attackers of the church and congregation of the Lord,” challenging the author to a public polemic. Hofstede De Groot didn’t like this, and threatened Pietersen with dismissal if he didn’t terminate Douwe. Pietersen complied.

Concerned parents in Smilde (some fifty kilometres to the south) now hired Douwe. He started on Monday, November 10, with twenty students in the hastily arranged classroom in a barn; on Tuesday, there were forty; and on Thursday, the mayor, the town clerk, and the policeman came for an investigation. On Friday, the mayor outlawed the school as a “rebellious act against the existing order,” as it was started without legal permission. On November 21, thirty-six people petitioned him to grant permission to have their own school on the following grounds:

1. When we brought our children to be baptized, we promised before God and the congregation, that we would teach them or have them taught in the true doctrine of salvation; and as we are convinced that in the schools of today the true doctrine is not impressed on the children, we cannot send them there without sinning against God; for God’s command tells us, “Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it” (Proverbs  22:6).

2. Of course it is inconceivable that we allow our children to grow up like savages who know nothing. To prepare children for their office is the calling of the parents, and only education that prepares them for the pure service of God is acceptable. For that service they also need to learn how to read, write, and cipher.

3. We can’t vaccinate our children without defiling our consciences before God, and we wish to obey God more than men ... give us therefore the necessary authorization, or show us the way to obtain that freedom (to have our own school); ... in order that we can have our children taught as God commands and as our consciences require, and that we may not violate our solemnly sworn oath before God and the congregation. (Since 1823, cowpox vaccination was mandatory for schoolchildren. KS)

Parents had to pay public school tuition for all children between ages five and twelve, regardless of attendance. This injustice particularly affected those whose consciences were bothered about the cowpox vaccination and the philosophy of the schools.

The parents in Smilde petitioned the mayor; they approached the somewhat sympathetic provincial governor; they even asked the king, but the last word (on May 26, 1835) was that they would not receive freedom to have their own school, or be exempt from paying tuition. On December 10, 1834, Douwe had been sentenced to a fine of Dfl. 50 (or one month in jail), and Dfl. 2.39 for court costs. Two-thirds of the fine must be donated to the public school of Smilde!

Struggle and Freedom←⤒🔗

Despite repercussions, several Reformed schools were established and subsequently vanished during this decade. Many were set up by consistories, as diaconal schools. Complying with the 1806 School Act, some of these would only teach doctrine, catechism, or Bible. In a clandestine fashion, others also taught different subjects. But even a suspicion of this (apart from utilizing often unqualified teachers) could lead to prosecution. In parliament, Groen Van Prinsterer spoke up for the injustices done to the Seceders and others. In 1840, he pleaded (unsuccessfully) that parents receive the freedom to teach their children according to their consciences, and not be forced to send them to unchristian state schools. In 1846 and later, the desire to have unity between home, church, and school motivated Rev. Van Raalte and many others to emigrate to North America. The Dutch constitution of 1848 officially gave freedom of education, in 1889 a new law stipulated some government support for Christian schools, and in 1920 all schools received equal funding.

Our forebears persevered to gain privileges unique in the world, and were blessed. Are we prepared to make the same sacrifices they did for the meaning of the covenant and baptism in Reformed education? Do we properly justify our ease with vaccinations? How are we a community that stands together on matters of bringing up the next generation of God’s people? And if the government offers funding, should we accept it? When does a blessing turn into a curse?