Regular Baptists are "a moderately Calvinistic Baptist sect that is found chiefly in the southern U.S., represents the original English Baptists before the division into Particular and General Baptists, and observes closed communion and foot washing", according to Merriam Webster. This definition describes Old Regular Baptists, not those who formed as a result of the Fundamentalist-Modernist controversy. The most prominent Regular Baptist group is the General Association of Regular Baptist Churches. While the term Regular Baptist was originally a reference to the Particular Baptists, it came to be used more loosely as a synonym for orthodox. The Baptist Bulletin of the GARBC defines them simply as groups who believe "orthodox, Baptist doctrine" and "affirm the rule or measure of the Scripture." As compared to General Baptists or Free Baptists, Regular Baptists were strict in their beliefs, and therefore also called Strict or Hard-shell Baptists. To be a Regular Baptist church in the GARBC is to hold to distinctive baptistic ecclesiology and interpret the Bible literally. History United States The term Regular Baptists developed in America from English immigrants who had been influenced by the Particular and General Baptists churches that were established in England. According to Stuart Ivison and Fred Rosser: "By 1638 there were also congregations of ‘Particular’ Baptists, who held that the Atonement was of particular application, i.e., for the sake of the elect only." The General, also known as Free Baptists, however, believed that all people could reap the benefits of atonement. This meant, particularly for the western pioneers, that individuals that were baptized were allowed to become church members and take communion. The number of Regular Baptists began to increase over the number of General or Free Baptists after the 1707 formation of the Philadelphia Baptist Association (PBA), which in 1742 developed a Confession of Faith. The influence and mission program of the Philadelphia Baptists shifted many of the Free Baptists to Regular Baptists. John Asplund traveled the United States and created the first comprehensive list of Baptist denominations in the United States in 1790 entitled Annual Register of the Baptist Denomination in America. He found that the greatest number of Baptist churches at that time were Regular Baptist churches. In the 1800s, the term Regular Baptist came to describe the Free Baptists. This was a surprising change as the term regular initially described the opposing position to the Free Baptists (i.e., particular atonement). This happened