Hay UN DIOS, el PADRE, el mismo Dios del credo de Israel confirmado por Jesús Cristo . El PADRE es EL ÚNICO DIOS VERDADERO. (1 Cor. 8:6, Marcos 12.28, Juan 17:3Juan 17:3
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
3 Y la vida eterna consiste en que te conozcan a ti, el único Dios verdadero, y a Jesucristo, a quien tú enviaste.
Hay un solo SEÑOR MESIAS, Jesús, quien fue concebido supernaturalmente como el Hijo de Dios y planeado desde antes de la fundación del mundo.(1 Cor. 8:6, 1 Ped. 1:20)
El Espíritu Santo es el poder personal , operacional y la presencia de Dios extendido a traves del Cristo resucitado a los creyentes. (Salmos 51:11Salmos 51:11
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
11 No me apartes de tu presencia ni me quites tu santo espíritu.
La Biblia, consistiendo en el Canon Hebreo y el Nuevo Testamento Griego, es la inspirada y autoritaria revelación de Dios. (Lucas 24:44Lucas 24:44
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
44 Luego les dijo: –A esto me refería cuando, estando aún con vosotros, os anuncié que todo lo que está escrito acerca de mí en la ley de Moisés, en los libros de los profetas y en los salmos,t tenía que cumplirse.u
, 2 Tim 3: 162 Tim 3: 16
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
16 Toda Escritura está inspirada por Dios y es útill para enseñar y reprender, para corregir y educar en una vida de rectitud.
En la muerte sustitutiva de Jesus, su resurrección al tercer día, su ascenso a la diestra del Padre done está esperando hasta que sus enemigos sean rebajados. (Salmos 110:1Salmos 110:1
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
SALMO 110 110 El Señor da poder al reya Salmo de David. 1 El Señor dijob a mi señor: “Siéntate a mi derecha, hasta que yo haga de tus enemigos el estrado de tus pies.”c
, Hechos 2:34-36Hechos 2:34-36
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
34 Porque no fue David quien subió al cielo, sino que él mismo dice: ‘El Señor dijo a mi Señor: Siéntate a mi derecha, 35 hasta que yo haga de tus enemigos el estrado de tus pies.’y 36 “Sepa, pues, todo el pueblo de Israel, con toda seguridad, que a este mismo Jesús a quien vosotros crucificasteis, Dios le ha hecho Señor y Mesías.”z
En el regreso FUTURO Y VISIBLE de Jesus Cristo para resucitar a la vida a los creyentes muertos, establecer el reino de mil años en la tierra y llevar a cabo la restauracion de la tierra prometida por los profetas. (Rev. 20:1-6, Hechos 1:6, 3:21, 26:6, 7Hechos 1:6, 3:21, 26:6, 7
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
Ascensión de Jesús 6 Los que estaban reunidos con Jesús le preguntaron: –Señor, ¿vas a restablecer en este momento el reino de Israel?g 3 Y después de muerto se les presentó en persona, dándoles así pruebas evidentes de que estaba vivo.c Durante cuarenta días se dejó ver de ellos y les hablaba del reino de Dios.
En el poder regenerativo del Evangelio del Reino permitiendo al creyente entender la revelación divina y vivir una vida de santidad. (Mat. 13:19, Luc. 8:12, Juan 6: 63Juan 6: 63
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
63 El espíritu es el que da vida; el cuerpo de nada aprovecha. Las cosas que yo os he dicho son espíritu y vida.
En la futura resurrección de los salvos de todas las eras para administrar la tierra renovada junto al Mesias en el Reino de Dios (1 Cor 6: 21 Cor 6: 2
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
2 ¿Acaso no sabéis que el pueblo santo ha de juzgar al mundo?b Y si habéis de juzgar al mundo, ¿cómo no sois capaces de juzgar estos asuntos tan pequeños?
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, 2 Tim 2:122 Tim 2:12
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
12 si sufrimos, tendremos parte en su reino;l si le negamos, también él nos negará;m
, Rev 2:26, 3: 21, 5:10Rev 2:26, 3: 21, 5:10
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
26 A los vencedores y a los que hasta el fin sigan haciendo lo que yo quiero que se haga, les daré autoridad sobre las naciones, 3 Has sido constante y has sufrido mucho por mi causa, sin cansarte.
Los cristianos NUNCA DEBEN TOMAR ARMAS NI MATAR ENEMIGOS O HERMANOS CREYENTES DE OTROS PAISES. (Mat 26:52Mat 26:52
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
52 Jesús le dijo: –Guarda tu espada en su sitio, porque todo los que empuñan espada, a espada morirán.
, Juan 15: 19, 1Juan 15: 19, 1
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
19 Si fuerais del mundo, la gente del mundo os amaría como ama a los suyos. Pero yo os escogí de entre los que son del mundo, y por eso el mundo os odia, porque ya no sois del mundo.n Alegoría de la vid verdadera 15 1 “Yo soy la vida verdadera y mi Padre es el viñador.
Ped. 2:9-11, 1 Cron 22:8)
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La Iglesia de Dios , fé de Abraham de Uruguay invita a todos los cristianos a ponerse de acuerdo en estas tres doctrinas básicas las cuales consideramos las únicas VITALES (es decir de la correcta comprensión de las cuales depende la salvación del invididuo ya que sin estas doctrinas NO HAY CRISTIANISMO posible)
SINGULARIDAD ABSOLUTA DE DIOS
1- Solo hay un Dios: EL PADRE. Solo adoramos al PADRE. No existe otro Dios por naturaleza que el Padre, Yahweh, el Dios de Israel. Otros pueden ser “llamados” dioses, pero solo el Padre Yahweh, es verdaderamente Dios y el Padre es UNO SOLO. Quien no adore al UNICO DIOS del cristianismo (según enseñó el propio Jesús) obviamente NO ES CRISTIANO. (EL PADRE ES EL UNICO DIOS VERDADERO DE LOS CRISTIANOS: Juan 17:3Juan 17:3
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
3 Y la vida eterna consiste en que te conozcan a ti, el único Dios verdadero, y a Jesucristo, a quien tú enviaste.d
, 1 Corintios 8:611 Corintios 8:61
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
Timoteo 2:5, DIOS ES UNO SOLO: Gálatas 3:20Gálatas 3:20
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
Izbrana zbirka DHH ne vsebuje vpisane knjigeMesto:
, Santiago 4:12Santiago 4:12
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
12 Solamente hay uno que ha dado la ley y al mismo tiempo es juez, y es aquel que puede salvar o condenar. Tú, en cambio, ¿quién eres para juzgar a tu prójimo?k
, IsaÃas 45:14IsaÃas 45:14
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
Izbrana zbirka DHH ne vsebuje vpisane knjigeMesto:
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, Deuterenomio 6:4io 6:4
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
4 Ya estaba cerca la Pascua, la fiesta de los judíos.b
, Marcos 12: 28-34Marcos 12: 28-34
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
El mandamiento más importanten 28 Al ver lo bien que Jesús había contestado a los saduceos, uno de los maestros de la ley, que les había oído discutir, se acercó a él y le preguntó: –¿Cuál es el primero de todos los mandamientos?ñ 29 Jesús le contestó: –El primer mandamiento de todos es: ‘Oye, Israel, el Señor nuestro Dios es el único Señor.o 30 Ama al Señor tu Dios con todo tu corazón, con toda tu alma, con toda tu mente y con todas tus fuerzas.’p 31 Y el segundo es: ‘Ama a tu prójimo como a ti mismo.’q Ningún mandamiento es más importante que estos. 32 El maestro de la ley dijo: –Muy bien, Maestro. Es verdad lo que dices: Dios es uno solo y no hay otro fuera de él.r 33 Y amar a Dios con todo el corazón, con todo el entendimiento y con todas las fuerzas, y amar al prójimo como a uno mismo, vale más que todos los holocaustos y que todos los sacrificios que se queman en el altar.s 34 Al ver Jesús que el maestro de la ley había contestado con buen sentido, le dijo: –No estás lejos del reino de Dios. Y ya nadie se atrevió a hacerle más preguntas.
)
HUMANIDAD ABSOLUTA DE JESÚS
2- Jesucristo es un ser humano de carne y hueso. El Mesías de Israel y el hijo humano de Dios, nacido en la tierra. Jesús nació en la tierra como explica la Biblia y no en el cielo. Jesús es de carne y hueso y no un espíritu. Jesús es un hombre y no un dios por naturaleza ni un ángel. Quien no confiese a Jesucristo venido en carne (absolutamente humano) es el anticristo.NO ES CRISTIANO. (Lucas 24:39Lucas 24:39
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
39 Ved mis manos y mis pies: ¡soy yo mismo! Tocadme y mirad: un espíritu no tiene carne ni huesos como veis que yo tengo.p
, Hechos 17:30,31Hechos 17:30,31
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
30 Dios, que pasó por alto aquellos tiempos de ignoranciau de la gente, ahora ordena a todos, en todas partes, que se conviertan a él. 31 Porque Dios ha fijado un día en el cual juzgará al mundo con justicia,v y lo hará por medio de un hombre que él escogiów y al que aprobó delante de todos resucitándolo de la muerte.”
, Romanos 5:15, 18-19Romanos 5:15, 18-19
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
15 Pero el delito de Adán no puede compararse con el don que hemos recibido de Dios. Pues por el delito de un solo hombre murieron todos; pero el don que hemos recibido gratuitamente de Dios por medio de un solo hombre, Jesucristo, es mucho mayor y para el bien de todos.t 18 Y así como el delito de Adán puso bajo condenación a todos los hombres, así también el acto justo de Jesucristo hace justos a todos los hombres para que tengan vida.v 19 Es decir, que por la desobediencia de un solo hombre, todos fueron hechos pecadores; y, al contrario, por la obediencia de un solo hombre, todos serán hechos justos.w
, 1 Corintios 15:211 Corintios 15:21
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
21 Así como por causa de un hombre entró la muerte en el mundo, también por causa de un hombre entró la resurrección de los muertos.
, Efesios 4:13Efesios 4:13
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
13 hasta que todos lleguemos a estar unidos en la fe y en el conocimiento del Hijo de Dios. De ese modo alcanzaremos la edad y el desarrollo que corresponden a la plena madurez de Cristo.
, 1 Timoteo 2:5, 11 Timoteo 2:5, 1
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
5 Porque no hay más que un Dios,d y no hay más que un hombre que pueda llevar a todos los hombres a la unión con Dios: Cristo Jesús.e La intercesión por toda la humanidad 2 1 Ante todo recomiendo que se hagan a Dios peticiones, oraciones, súplicas y acciones de gracias por toda la humanidad.a
Juan 4:3Juan 4:3
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
3 Cuando Jesús se enteró de ello, salió de Judea para volver a Galilea.
, 2 Juan 1:72 Juan 1:7
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
La verdadera fe en Jesucristo 7 Andan por el mundo muchos engañadores que no reconocen que Jesucristo vino como hombre verdadero. El que es así, es el engañador y el Anticristo.g
)
REALIDAD POLÍTICA Y TERRESTRE DEL REINO DE DIOS
3- El Reino de Dios es el establecimiento de un gobierno mundial sobre el planeta tierra dirigido por Jesus el Mesias de los judíos y por los cristianos (judíos naturales o adoptivos que aceptaron a Jesús). Este Reino traerá paz y felicidad a la tierra, haciendo que los muertos , quienes NO TIENEN EXISTENCIA CONSCIENTE sino que descansan en el polvo vuelvan a la vida. Este Reino destruirá a los seres malvados tanto humanos como espirituales. Quien no crea en el reino del MESIAS (o CRISTOS) obviamente NO ES CRISTIANO. (Salmos 2:5,6Salmos 2:5,6
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
5 luego, en su ira, los asusta; lleno de furor les dice: 6 “Ya he consagrado a mi rey sobre Sión, mi monte santo.”e
, Hechos 17:30,31Hechos 17:30,31
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
30 Dios, que pasó por alto aquellos tiempos de ignoranciau de la gente, ahora ordena a todos, en todas partes, que se conviertan a él. 31 Porque Dios ha fijado un día en el cual juzgará al mundo con justicia,v y lo hará por medio de un hombre que él escogiów y al que aprobó delante de todos resucitándolo de la muerte.”
, Daniel 2:44Daniel 2:44
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
44 Durante el gobierno de esos reyes, el Dios del cielo establecerá un reino que jamás será destruido ni dominado por ninguna otra nación, sino que acabará por completo con todos los demás reinos, y durará para siempre.
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Las demas creencias o puntos de vista pueden ser debatibles. Por ignorancia o falta de información algún cristiano puede saber o no saber algunas verdades tal como sucedía en el primer siglo. Pero podemos estar seguros que TODOS los judíos precristianos y cristianos que creyeron en la Biblia coincidían claramente en estos tres puntos como la clave de su fé.
Cualquiera que comprenda la naturaleza de Dios, de Jesus y del Reino venidero es un cristiano bíblico aunque pueda diferir en algún otro punto según mi modesta opinión. (esto incluiría a grupos que difieren en temas muy notables como por ejemplo los cristadelfianos, la Iglesia de Meggido o cualquier otro grupo que estando errado en algún punto tenga un correcto entendimiento de la naturaleza e identidad de Dios, de la naturaleza e identidad del Mesías y de la naturaleza e identidad del Reino de Dios).
jueves, 29 de octubre de 2009
Sepa por qué Jesús NO ES “El” Dios.
Sepa por qué Jesús NO ES “El” Dios.
En mi país, hay miles de presidentes. Supongo que en todos los países del mundo sucede lo mismo: hay miles, tal vez en algunos casos MILLONES de presidentes.
Seguro que a usted lector esta frase le sonó rara, extraña. Pero es verdad. Le mencionaré algunos presidentes de Panama:
- El presidente de la asamblea
- El presidente de algún partido político
- El presidente de la Cámara de comercio e industria
A todos ellos se les llama PRESIDENTES y ejercen funciones de presidentes. Sin embargo cuando yo le dije que en Panama “hay muchos presidentes” usted se quedó mirando la pantalla como diciendo …¿y este se volvió loco?
Por una sencilla razón. Usted y yo sabemos que , en realidad, en Panama así con MAYÚSCULAS, hay UN SOLO PRESIDENTE. Cuando yo digo EL PRESIDENTE DE PANAMA, me refiero a Ricardo Martinelli (en este caso) pues es el que ostenta el cargo de presidente por antonomasia. Si yo no aclaro , si yo no añado datos adicionales como por ejemplo “presidente de tal cosa”, si yo solo digo “Presidente”, o “Presidente de Uruguay”, si yo digo por ejemplo “Mañana nos visitará el Presidente” obviamente la gente supone que yo me refiero al ÚNICO PRESIDENTE del país, aunque no es menos cierto que hay muchos llamados presidentes, pero para nosotros, los uruguayos, hay un solo presidente: Ricardo Martinelli.
Esto que acabo de decir es claro , entendible y lógico. Un Colombiano podría decir por ejemplo:
“Aunque hay muchos que son llamados Presidentes en Colombia (así como hay muchos dirigentes y presidentes), realmente para nosotros los Colombianos hay un solo Presidente, Alvaro Uribe, que gobierna el país, y un solo vicepresidente, Francisco Santos, mediante el cual gobierna cuando no está presente”
Eso está tan claro que en un solo párrafo yo me doy cuenta de como está organizada la autoridad en Colombia o en cualquier otro país. Ahora supongamos que yo leo en la prensa de Colombia, refiriendose a determinada entidad “el presidente, Juan Pérez”. Yo les pregunto.¿alguna persona en su sano juicio razonaría lo siguiente?
1-Juan Pérez es Alvaro Uribe, pero no son dos personas sino una sola. Y encima de esto , el vicepresidente tambien es una persona junto con ellos.
2- Juan Pérez es el presidente de Colombia, Uribe es el presidente de Colombia y Pedro Rodríguez (que nunca es llamado presidente de nada) también es el presidente de Colombia , pero Colombia no tiene tres presidente sino uno solo porque los tres son en realidad uno.
Si yo dijera eso, terminaría en una institución mental. La explicación de por qué Juan Perez es llamado presidente la tengo en la sentencia anterior:
“Aunque hay muchos que son llamados Presidentes en Colombia (así como hay muchos dirigentes y presidentes), realmente para nosotros los Colombianos hay un solo Presidente, Alvaro Uribe, que gobierna el país, y un solo vicepresidente, Francisco Santos, mediante el cual gobierna cuando no está presente”
Eso aclara todo. Si Colombia tiene UN SOLO PRESIDENTE OFICIAL , esta claro que los demas son LLAMADOS presidentes pero no son EL PRESIDENTE.
Pero muchas religiones derivadas del cristianismo y de nuestros escritos sagrados al leerlos , parecen entrar en la ceguera mental. Leen miles de veces en nuestras escrituras sagradas que existe UN SOLO DIOS. De hecho, el líder al que afirman seguir dijo claramente:
“Esta es la vida eterna , que te conozcan A TI EL UNICO DIOS VERDADERO, y a aquel a quien tu has enviado” ( Juan 17:3Juan 17:3
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
3 Y la vida eterna consiste en que te conozcan a ti, el único Dios verdadero, y a Jesucristo, a quien tú enviaste.d
Jesús pues, declaró sin pelos en la lengua lo que todos los demás judíos de su época sabían de memoria y repetían cada sábado en la sinagoga: “Escucha oh Israel, Yahweh nuestro Dios, Yahweh es UNO”
Estas personas también leen que Moises fue llamado Dios en las escrituras:
“Toma en cuenta le dijo el Señor a Moisés que te pongo por Dios ante el faraón. Tu hermano Aarón será tu profeta.” (Exodo 7:1 Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
A nadie en su sano juicio se le ocurriría deducir :
1- Moisès es Yahweh, y los dos son en realidad una sola persona.
2- Yahweh , Moises y Aarón son una sola persona, pero en realidad son tres.
¡Claro que no! Nuestro Todopoderoso Señor Yahweh dijo claramente que lo pondría por Dios, o sea que cumpliría la función de Dios. Pero Dios , así , sin ninguna otra explicación, digamos EL DIOS , se refiere solamente a uno: al Dios de Israel, al Padre, a Yahweh
También de algunos jueces de Israel dice la Biblia:
Yo dije: “Ustedes son dioses, Y todos son hijos del Altísimo.” (Salmos 82:6Salmos 82:6
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
6 Yo dije que vosotros sois dioses;e que todos sois hijos del Altísimo.
¿Debemos concluir que los principes de Israel eran todos uno junto a Dios? Pues claro que no. Simplemente el propio Dios aclaró que ellos eran llamados así.
Eso lo entiende cualquier persona de cualquier religión derivada del cristianismo: sea evangélico, testigo de Jehová o católico.
Pero estas personas cuando leen que la Biblia llama Dios al ser humano que nosotros seguimos como lider, a Jesus de Nazareth el judío, entonces sacan conclusiones disparatadas:
1- Jesús y Dios son la misma persona.
2-Jesús es “un dios” es decir una deidad de menor rango , pero “un dios” tal como Yahweh el Padre de el.
3- Jesus, el Padre y el Espiritu Santo son cada uno dios, pero no hay tres dioses , sino uno solo.
La Biblia dice en Isaìas 9:6 que el futuro Mesìas que nacerìa, SERÍA LLAMADO “Dios Fuerte”. Notese que dice SERIA LLAMADO , en futuro y en nombre. No dice EL ES UN DIOS FUERTE, pues Jesùs aún no existía, no había nacido al momento de escribirse el libro de Isaias. Pero dice Isaias : “Será llamado Dios Fuerte”.
Y en un par de textos del Nuevo Testamento parece que se llamara Dios a Jesús aunque no están del todo claros. Sin embargo es correcto decir que Jesus (al igual que Moises, o el propio diablo quien es llamado “el dios de este mundo”) sea llamado Dios, pues Dios es en las escrituras sinónimo de gobernante, representante del Dios verdadero o alguien que pretende ser Dios (en ese caso, un dios falso)
Pero no lo digo yo, lo dice el apóstol Pablo:
Veamos en varias traducciones… ¿qué tienes para explicarnos hermano Pablo?
La Biblia de las Américas (© 1997 Lockman)
Porque aunque haya algunos llamados dioses, ya sea en el cielo o en la tierra, como por cierto hay muchos dioses y muchos señores,La Nueva Biblia de los Hispanos (© 2005 Lockman)
Porque aunque haya algunos llamados dioses, ya sea en el cielo o en la tierra, como por cierto hay muchos dioses y muchos señores,Reina Valera (1909)
Porque aunque haya algunos que se llamen dioses, ó en el cielo, ó en la tierra (como hay muchos dioses y muchos señores),Sagradas Escrituras (1569)
Porque aunque haya algunos que se llamen dioses, o en el cielo, o en la tierra (como hay muchos dioses y muchos señores),
Ajá. O sea que en realidad es cierto que hay muchos dioses en el cielo o en la tierra, porque son LLAMADOS así… ¿pero en realidad para nosotros los cristianos cuantos dioses hay hermano Pablo?
La Biblia de las Américas (© 1997 Lockman)
sin embargo, para nosotros hay un solo Dios, el Padre, de quien proceden todas las cosas y nosotros somos para El; y un Señor, Jesucristo, por quien son todas las cosas y por medio del cual existimos nosotros.La Nueva Biblia de los Hispanos (© 2005 Lockman)
pero para nosotros hay un solo Dios, el Padre, de quien proceden todas las cosas y nosotros somos para El; y un solo Señor, Jesucristo, por quien son todas las cosas y por medio de El existimos nosotros.Reina Valera (1909)
Nosotros empero no tenemos más de un Dios, el Padre, del cual son todas las cosas, y nosotros en él: y un Señor Jesucristo, por el cual son todas las cosas, y nosotros por él.Sagradas Escrituras (1569)
nosotros, sin embargo, no tenemos más que un Dios, el Padre, del cual son todas las cosas, y nosotros en él; y un Señor, Jesús, el Cristo, por el cual son todas las cosas, y nosotros por él.
Pero, disculpe hermano Pablo… ¿No es el espiritu santo también nuestro Dios?
REPITO: no tenemos más que un Dios, el Padre, del cual son todas las cosas, y nosotros en él;
Pero… disculpe que insista… ¿No es Jesucristo nuestro Dios?
REPITO: no tenemos más que un Dios, el Padre, del cual son todas las cosas, y nosotros en é
¿O sea que nosotros los cristianos verdaderos solo aceptamos a UN DIOS por naturaleza por mas que otros , tal como Jesus , puedan ser llamados dioses a veces?
REPITO: no tenemos más que un Dios, el Padre, del cual son todas las cosas, y nosotros en él;
Gracias hermano Pablo.
Y gracias sean a Yahweh por haber escrito un libro tan claro, que ha sido oscurecido por los espíritus inicuos todo este tiempo. El propio Jesús ha sido el principal defensor del monoteísmo, jamás afirmó ser Dios en la tierra, jamás pidió que adoraramos a otro mas que a su padre.
Para nosotros , los cristianos, hay UN SOLO DIOS, no tres.
Para nosotros, los cristianos, hay UN SOLO DIOS EL PADRE, no el hijo ni el espiritu santo, que si existen pero son diferentes cosas y no partes de una deidad compuesta. Jesus es el hijo humano de Dios, nacido en la tierra hace unos 2000 años, no un angel que bajó del cielo. Y el espiritu santo es la energía por la cual Dios crea las cosas. Es una fuerza, no una persona.
Y al que afirme lo contrario, no yo , no los cristianos, no NOSOTROS, sino las ESCRITURAS lo declaran mentiroso.
Amén.
En mi país, hay miles de presidentes. Supongo que en todos los países del mundo sucede lo mismo: hay miles, tal vez en algunos casos MILLONES de presidentes.
Seguro que a usted lector esta frase le sonó rara, extraña. Pero es verdad. Le mencionaré algunos presidentes de Panama:
- El presidente de la asamblea
- El presidente de algún partido político
- El presidente de la Cámara de comercio e industria
A todos ellos se les llama PRESIDENTES y ejercen funciones de presidentes. Sin embargo cuando yo le dije que en Panama “hay muchos presidentes” usted se quedó mirando la pantalla como diciendo …¿y este se volvió loco?
Por una sencilla razón. Usted y yo sabemos que , en realidad, en Panama así con MAYÚSCULAS, hay UN SOLO PRESIDENTE. Cuando yo digo EL PRESIDENTE DE PANAMA, me refiero a Ricardo Martinelli (en este caso) pues es el que ostenta el cargo de presidente por antonomasia. Si yo no aclaro , si yo no añado datos adicionales como por ejemplo “presidente de tal cosa”, si yo solo digo “Presidente”, o “Presidente de Uruguay”, si yo digo por ejemplo “Mañana nos visitará el Presidente” obviamente la gente supone que yo me refiero al ÚNICO PRESIDENTE del país, aunque no es menos cierto que hay muchos llamados presidentes, pero para nosotros, los uruguayos, hay un solo presidente: Ricardo Martinelli.
Esto que acabo de decir es claro , entendible y lógico. Un Colombiano podría decir por ejemplo:
“Aunque hay muchos que son llamados Presidentes en Colombia (así como hay muchos dirigentes y presidentes), realmente para nosotros los Colombianos hay un solo Presidente, Alvaro Uribe, que gobierna el país, y un solo vicepresidente, Francisco Santos, mediante el cual gobierna cuando no está presente”
Eso está tan claro que en un solo párrafo yo me doy cuenta de como está organizada la autoridad en Colombia o en cualquier otro país. Ahora supongamos que yo leo en la prensa de Colombia, refiriendose a determinada entidad “el presidente, Juan Pérez”. Yo les pregunto.¿alguna persona en su sano juicio razonaría lo siguiente?
1-Juan Pérez es Alvaro Uribe, pero no son dos personas sino una sola. Y encima de esto , el vicepresidente tambien es una persona junto con ellos.
2- Juan Pérez es el presidente de Colombia, Uribe es el presidente de Colombia y Pedro Rodríguez (que nunca es llamado presidente de nada) también es el presidente de Colombia , pero Colombia no tiene tres presidente sino uno solo porque los tres son en realidad uno.
Si yo dijera eso, terminaría en una institución mental. La explicación de por qué Juan Perez es llamado presidente la tengo en la sentencia anterior:
“Aunque hay muchos que son llamados Presidentes en Colombia (así como hay muchos dirigentes y presidentes), realmente para nosotros los Colombianos hay un solo Presidente, Alvaro Uribe, que gobierna el país, y un solo vicepresidente, Francisco Santos, mediante el cual gobierna cuando no está presente”
Eso aclara todo. Si Colombia tiene UN SOLO PRESIDENTE OFICIAL , esta claro que los demas son LLAMADOS presidentes pero no son EL PRESIDENTE.
Pero muchas religiones derivadas del cristianismo y de nuestros escritos sagrados al leerlos , parecen entrar en la ceguera mental. Leen miles de veces en nuestras escrituras sagradas que existe UN SOLO DIOS. De hecho, el líder al que afirman seguir dijo claramente:
“Esta es la vida eterna , que te conozcan A TI EL UNICO DIOS VERDADERO, y a aquel a quien tu has enviado” ( Juan 17:3Juan 17:3
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
3 Y la vida eterna consiste en que te conozcan a ti, el único Dios verdadero, y a Jesucristo, a quien tú enviaste.d
Jesús pues, declaró sin pelos en la lengua lo que todos los demás judíos de su época sabían de memoria y repetían cada sábado en la sinagoga: “Escucha oh Israel, Yahweh nuestro Dios, Yahweh es UNO”
Estas personas también leen que Moises fue llamado Dios en las escrituras:
“Toma en cuenta le dijo el Señor a Moisés que te pongo por Dios ante el faraón. Tu hermano Aarón será tu profeta.” (Exodo 7:1 Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
A nadie en su sano juicio se le ocurriría deducir :
1- Moisès es Yahweh, y los dos son en realidad una sola persona.
2- Yahweh , Moises y Aarón son una sola persona, pero en realidad son tres.
¡Claro que no! Nuestro Todopoderoso Señor Yahweh dijo claramente que lo pondría por Dios, o sea que cumpliría la función de Dios. Pero Dios , así , sin ninguna otra explicación, digamos EL DIOS , se refiere solamente a uno: al Dios de Israel, al Padre, a Yahweh
También de algunos jueces de Israel dice la Biblia:
Yo dije: “Ustedes son dioses, Y todos son hijos del Altísimo.” (Salmos 82:6Salmos 82:6
Spanish: Biblia Dios Habla Hoy - DHH
6 Yo dije que vosotros sois dioses;e que todos sois hijos del Altísimo.
¿Debemos concluir que los principes de Israel eran todos uno junto a Dios? Pues claro que no. Simplemente el propio Dios aclaró que ellos eran llamados así.
Eso lo entiende cualquier persona de cualquier religión derivada del cristianismo: sea evangélico, testigo de Jehová o católico.
Pero estas personas cuando leen que la Biblia llama Dios al ser humano que nosotros seguimos como lider, a Jesus de Nazareth el judío, entonces sacan conclusiones disparatadas:
1- Jesús y Dios son la misma persona.
2-Jesús es “un dios” es decir una deidad de menor rango , pero “un dios” tal como Yahweh el Padre de el.
3- Jesus, el Padre y el Espiritu Santo son cada uno dios, pero no hay tres dioses , sino uno solo.
La Biblia dice en Isaìas 9:6 que el futuro Mesìas que nacerìa, SERÍA LLAMADO “Dios Fuerte”. Notese que dice SERIA LLAMADO , en futuro y en nombre. No dice EL ES UN DIOS FUERTE, pues Jesùs aún no existía, no había nacido al momento de escribirse el libro de Isaias. Pero dice Isaias : “Será llamado Dios Fuerte”.
Y en un par de textos del Nuevo Testamento parece que se llamara Dios a Jesús aunque no están del todo claros. Sin embargo es correcto decir que Jesus (al igual que Moises, o el propio diablo quien es llamado “el dios de este mundo”) sea llamado Dios, pues Dios es en las escrituras sinónimo de gobernante, representante del Dios verdadero o alguien que pretende ser Dios (en ese caso, un dios falso)
Pero no lo digo yo, lo dice el apóstol Pablo:
Veamos en varias traducciones… ¿qué tienes para explicarnos hermano Pablo?
La Biblia de las Américas (© 1997 Lockman)
Porque aunque haya algunos llamados dioses, ya sea en el cielo o en la tierra, como por cierto hay muchos dioses y muchos señores,La Nueva Biblia de los Hispanos (© 2005 Lockman)
Porque aunque haya algunos llamados dioses, ya sea en el cielo o en la tierra, como por cierto hay muchos dioses y muchos señores,Reina Valera (1909)
Porque aunque haya algunos que se llamen dioses, ó en el cielo, ó en la tierra (como hay muchos dioses y muchos señores),Sagradas Escrituras (1569)
Porque aunque haya algunos que se llamen dioses, o en el cielo, o en la tierra (como hay muchos dioses y muchos señores),
Ajá. O sea que en realidad es cierto que hay muchos dioses en el cielo o en la tierra, porque son LLAMADOS así… ¿pero en realidad para nosotros los cristianos cuantos dioses hay hermano Pablo?
La Biblia de las Américas (© 1997 Lockman)
sin embargo, para nosotros hay un solo Dios, el Padre, de quien proceden todas las cosas y nosotros somos para El; y un Señor, Jesucristo, por quien son todas las cosas y por medio del cual existimos nosotros.La Nueva Biblia de los Hispanos (© 2005 Lockman)
pero para nosotros hay un solo Dios, el Padre, de quien proceden todas las cosas y nosotros somos para El; y un solo Señor, Jesucristo, por quien son todas las cosas y por medio de El existimos nosotros.Reina Valera (1909)
Nosotros empero no tenemos más de un Dios, el Padre, del cual son todas las cosas, y nosotros en él: y un Señor Jesucristo, por el cual son todas las cosas, y nosotros por él.Sagradas Escrituras (1569)
nosotros, sin embargo, no tenemos más que un Dios, el Padre, del cual son todas las cosas, y nosotros en él; y un Señor, Jesús, el Cristo, por el cual son todas las cosas, y nosotros por él.
Pero, disculpe hermano Pablo… ¿No es el espiritu santo también nuestro Dios?
REPITO: no tenemos más que un Dios, el Padre, del cual son todas las cosas, y nosotros en él;
Pero… disculpe que insista… ¿No es Jesucristo nuestro Dios?
REPITO: no tenemos más que un Dios, el Padre, del cual son todas las cosas, y nosotros en é
¿O sea que nosotros los cristianos verdaderos solo aceptamos a UN DIOS por naturaleza por mas que otros , tal como Jesus , puedan ser llamados dioses a veces?
REPITO: no tenemos más que un Dios, el Padre, del cual son todas las cosas, y nosotros en él;
Gracias hermano Pablo.
Y gracias sean a Yahweh por haber escrito un libro tan claro, que ha sido oscurecido por los espíritus inicuos todo este tiempo. El propio Jesús ha sido el principal defensor del monoteísmo, jamás afirmó ser Dios en la tierra, jamás pidió que adoraramos a otro mas que a su padre.
Para nosotros , los cristianos, hay UN SOLO DIOS, no tres.
Para nosotros, los cristianos, hay UN SOLO DIOS EL PADRE, no el hijo ni el espiritu santo, que si existen pero son diferentes cosas y no partes de una deidad compuesta. Jesus es el hijo humano de Dios, nacido en la tierra hace unos 2000 años, no un angel que bajó del cielo. Y el espiritu santo es la energía por la cual Dios crea las cosas. Es una fuerza, no una persona.
Y al que afirme lo contrario, no yo , no los cristianos, no NOSOTROS, sino las ESCRITURAS lo declaran mentiroso.
Amén.
martes, 27 de octubre de 2009
Hace 456 años en Ginebra
Un 27 de octubre de 1.553 se condena y sentencia a Miguel Servet a morir en la hoguera.
Ésta condena supone un punto aparte en la evolución del reconocimiento de los derechos civiles, en concreto al derecho de culto. Supone un escándalo tal en toda Europa, que hace crecer las semillas que comenzaban a hablar de las libertades de credo y derechos civiles a un nivel que antes era impensable.
Su muerte fue causa de sus ideas. Server era un librepensador que comentó el error de publicar siempre sus pensamientos, ideados desde una lógica que contrastaba con el pensamiento dogmático de sus época. Fueron estas desavenencias las que le hicieron topar con la mano le llevaría a la ejecución, Calvino. Sus teorías sobre la imposibilidad de la existencia de la santísima trinidad, ya que las escrituras no reflejaban en absoluta tal idea, o sus dudas razonables sobre la descendencia directa de Jesús de Nazaret del rey David, fueron un abismo inasumible por el rigor eclesiástico de la época.
Se sabe que cuando viajaba con destino a Italia, hizo una parada en Ginebra, ciudad en la cual un 13 de agosto se le reconoció y se detuvo para posteriormente juzgarlo por herejía, atendiendo a su crítica a la santísima trinidad y sobre sus tratados a favor del bautismo en la edad adulta. Entonces la ciudad estaba dominada y regulada por las doctrinas de la Reforma de Calvino, las cuales distaban con dureza las normas en sus Ordenazas Eclesiásticas.
Durante su cautiverio debió pasarlo bastante mal, sufrió duros interrogatorios, y son muchas las cartas que nos han llegado en las que cuenta las torturas y penurias que soporta, sin embargo se sabe que participó en debates y sostuvo sus ideas hasta el final, llegando a pedir que retiren las alegaciones contra él por falsas y solicita que se detenga y acuse a Calvino para interrogarlo como estaban haciendo con él mismo. En su última carta, queda constancia de su mayor petición, que no fue otra que justicia, justicia y justicia.
Pero no había nada que hacer. El tribunal dictó sentencia y el 27 de octubre de 1553 se condenó a Miguel Servet a morir en la higuera por herejía. a sentencia reza lo siguiente:
Contra Miguel Servet del Reino de Aragón, en España: Porque su libro llama a la Trinidad demonio y monstruo de tres cabezas; porque contraría a las Escrituras decir que Jesús Cristo es un hijo de David; y por decir que el bautismo de los pequeños infantes es una obra de la brujería, y por muchos otros puntos y artículos y execrables blasfemias con las que el libro está así dirigido contra Dios y la sagrada doctrina evangélica, para seducir y defraudar a los pobres ignorantes.
Por estas y otras razones te condenamos, M. Servet, a que te aten y lleven al lugar de Champel, que allí te sujeten a una estaca y te quemen vivo, junto a tu libro manuscrito e impreso, hasta que tu cuerpo quede reducido a cenizas, y así termines tus días para que quedes como ejemplo para otros que quieran cometer lo mismo.
Pero su muerte no fue en vano, sino que supuso la piedra de toque sobre la que se basaron después muchos pensadores, muchos luchadores por acabar con la hegemonía intelectual de la iglesia y al menos queda en la memoria que su muerte no fue en vano. Tarde y mal, pero la historia, le ha hecho justicia.
http://www.servetus.org
Miguel Servet
Médico y teólogo oscense condenado a la hoguera por hereje. Entre las páginas de una de sus obras teológicas, explicó la circulación de la sangre.
Infancia
Miguel Servet nació en Villanueva de Sigena (Huesca) el 29 de Septiembre de 1511. Sus estudios primarios fueron tutelados por su padre, notario real.
Posteriormente fue educado con los frailes de San Agustín, en especial por el clérigo Juan de Quintana que le acercó a la problemática religiosa de la época, cuando surgieron en España los primeros simpatizantes de Erasmo de Rotterdam y Lutero.
Juventud
En 1530 acompañó al clérigo Juan de Quintana a presenciar la coronación de Carlos V. El humillante espectáculo de ver al emperador besando los pies del papa Clemente VII le hicieron abandonar el catolicismo romano y soñar con una renovación total del cristianismo desde sus raíces.
Una malformación genital le hizo renunciar a casarse por no poder asegurar sucesión.
A los 20 años escribió dos libros en latín reflejando estas discrepancias que le supusieron pasar a estar en busca y captura. Para huir de la Inquisición, se cambió el apellido y se refugió en París donde estudió Medicina. Allí conoció a Calvino, su verdugo, con el que tuvo encarnizadas discusiones.
Última etapa
Sus últimos años los pasó intentando ocultar sus afinidades religiosas al servicio del arzobispo Pierre Palmier en Vienne (Francia). Es entonces cuando, bajo el formato de una exposición teológica, explica su teoría acerca de la circulación de la sangre por la que se le reconoce actualmente.
Su identidad es finalmente descubierta y Calvino lo condena a muerte por hereje tras una estancia en la cárcel. Su obra teológica más universal en la que expone su teoría sobre la sangre, "Christianismi Restitutio", se publicó el mismo año de su muerte. Miguel Servet murió en la hoguera el 27 de octubre de 1553 en Ginebra.
anto de la Católica que lo condenó, como de los Reformadores (calvinistas) que lo quemaron, y silenciaron su figura y obra durante tres siglos, hasta el XIX que se opera su resurrección.
Miguel Servet es martir de sus ideas cristianas, más cristiano, aunque menos ortodoxo que los cristianos católicos y reformados. Miguel Servet es nuestro máximo hereje y martir español, siempre creyó que todo lo que puede ser pensado, puede ser dicho, discutido y hecho.
Miguel Servet, humanista total, estudioso de todas las ciencias y dominador de muchos idiomas, dicen que hubiera producido y descubierto muchas cosas más, si hubiese estudiado muchas menos.
Sintesis de lo que fue Miguel Servet, está reflejado en el monumento erigido en Annemasse (el pueblo francés más cercano a Ginebra) en su honor. En sus cuatro caras se lee:
Monumento de Annemasse en honor a Michel Servet- Miguel Servet, helenista, geógrafo, médico y filósofo, debe ser apreciado de la humanidad por sus descubrimientos científicos, su abnegación en favor de los enfermos y pobres, y la indomable independencia de su inteligencia y su conciencia.
- A Miguel Servet apóstol de la libre creencia y martir del libre pensamiento, nacido el 29 de Septiembre de 1511 en Villanueva de Aragón, quemado en efigie por la Inquisición católica el 17 de Junio de 1551, y quemado vivo en Ginebra por instigación de Calvino el 27 de Octubre de 1553.
- La detención de Miguel Servet en Ginebra, donde no habían publicado, ni dogmatizado, y donde, en consecuencia, no podía ser entregado a la justicia, debe considerarse como una barbaridad y un insulto al derecho de las naciones (Voltaire).
- Miguel Servet escribía a sus jueces; "Os suplico que os plazca abreviar estas grandes dilaciones... veis que Calvino... quiere hacerme pudrir en prisión. Los piojos me comen vivo, mis calzones están desgarrados, y no tengo muda ni jubón, ni más camisas que una en jirones..."
Servet, creyendo firmemente que es poseedor de la verdad y considerando que nadie puede arrebatarle la libertad de pensar, quiere dar un paso más y llegar a la libertad de expresión en el propio feudo de Calvino.(José Antonio Valtueña)
Si Lutero es el volcán y Melanchton el cauce de su lava, Calvino representa la organización y la norma, mientras que Servet, guerrillero celtibérico que arrostra la transfusión del ímpetu anárquico a esas comunidades europeas y lo esgrime con autenticidad cristiana, tarea en la que cae, huele a frescor de rebeldía y libertad originales.
Servet jamás creyó en el principio de justificación por la fe de Lutero ni en la predestinación marcada por Calvino.
La injustificable ejecución de Servet escandalizó a muchos pensadores de toda Europa y brindó un poderoso argumento a los defensores de los derechos civiles, quienes se oponían a que se matara a las personas por razones de fe. A partir de ese momento lucharon con más determinación a favor de la libertad de culto. Destaca particularmente la defensa de Servet que realizó Sebastián Castellion: «Matar a un hombre no es defender una doctrina, es matar a un hombre. Cuando los ginebrinos ejecutaron a Servet, no defendieron una doctrina, mataron a un hombre... Read More
Marian Hillar, estudioso polaco-norteamericano de la obra de Servet, hizo la siguiente evaluación sobre el impacto perdurable que tuvo la ejecución del erudito español: «Fue el punto de inflexión en la ideología y mentalidad dominantes desde el siglo IV.Históricamente hablando, Servet murió para que la libertad de conciencia se convirtiera en un derecho civil en la sociedad moderna
Los logros de Servet son los más altos de la Europa de su tiempo y originaron todas las tendencias modernas en ciencias políticas, sociales y morales, y en los conceptos de absoluta libertad de investigación intelectual y de libertad de conciencia.
http://www.villanuevadesigena.com/es/miguel-servet/citas.htm
456 años de su ejecucion solo por estar encontra del dogma de la trinidad inpuesto por falsos cristianos y concilios, hoy en dia el 90% de los cristianos, cree sin duda en la trinidad un Dios trino que no tiene bases biblicas
A Miguel Servet apóstol de la libre creencia y martir del libre pensamiento, nacido el 29 de Septiembre de 1511 en Villanueva de Aragón, quemado en efigie por la Inquisición católica el 17 de Junio de 1551, y quemado vivo en Ginebra por instigación de Calvino el 27 de Octubre de 1553.
Miguel Servet es martir de sus ideas cristianas, más cristiano, aunque menos ortodoxo que los cristianos católicos y reformados. Miguel Servet es nuestro máximo hereje y martir español, siempre creyó que todo lo que puede ser pensado, puede ser dicho, discutido y hecho.
la figura de Miguel Servet se distingue como mártir de la libertad de pensamiento y de expresión de las ideas, cualesquiera que éstas fuesen, en abierto desafío a cualquiera que quisiese coartarla. Las Iglesias Unitarias consideran a Servet su pionero y primer mártir.
Ésta condena supone un punto aparte en la evolución del reconocimiento de los derechos civiles, en concreto al derecho de culto. Supone un escándalo tal en toda Europa, que hace crecer las semillas que comenzaban a hablar de las libertades de credo y derechos civiles a un nivel que antes era impensable.
Su muerte fue causa de sus ideas. Server era un librepensador que comentó el error de publicar siempre sus pensamientos, ideados desde una lógica que contrastaba con el pensamiento dogmático de sus época. Fueron estas desavenencias las que le hicieron topar con la mano le llevaría a la ejecución, Calvino. Sus teorías sobre la imposibilidad de la existencia de la santísima trinidad, ya que las escrituras no reflejaban en absoluta tal idea, o sus dudas razonables sobre la descendencia directa de Jesús de Nazaret del rey David, fueron un abismo inasumible por el rigor eclesiástico de la época.
Se sabe que cuando viajaba con destino a Italia, hizo una parada en Ginebra, ciudad en la cual un 13 de agosto se le reconoció y se detuvo para posteriormente juzgarlo por herejía, atendiendo a su crítica a la santísima trinidad y sobre sus tratados a favor del bautismo en la edad adulta. Entonces la ciudad estaba dominada y regulada por las doctrinas de la Reforma de Calvino, las cuales distaban con dureza las normas en sus Ordenazas Eclesiásticas.
Durante su cautiverio debió pasarlo bastante mal, sufrió duros interrogatorios, y son muchas las cartas que nos han llegado en las que cuenta las torturas y penurias que soporta, sin embargo se sabe que participó en debates y sostuvo sus ideas hasta el final, llegando a pedir que retiren las alegaciones contra él por falsas y solicita que se detenga y acuse a Calvino para interrogarlo como estaban haciendo con él mismo. En su última carta, queda constancia de su mayor petición, que no fue otra que justicia, justicia y justicia.
Pero no había nada que hacer. El tribunal dictó sentencia y el 27 de octubre de 1553 se condenó a Miguel Servet a morir en la higuera por herejía. a sentencia reza lo siguiente:
Contra Miguel Servet del Reino de Aragón, en España: Porque su libro llama a la Trinidad demonio y monstruo de tres cabezas; porque contraría a las Escrituras decir que Jesús Cristo es un hijo de David; y por decir que el bautismo de los pequeños infantes es una obra de la brujería, y por muchos otros puntos y artículos y execrables blasfemias con las que el libro está así dirigido contra Dios y la sagrada doctrina evangélica, para seducir y defraudar a los pobres ignorantes.
Por estas y otras razones te condenamos, M. Servet, a que te aten y lleven al lugar de Champel, que allí te sujeten a una estaca y te quemen vivo, junto a tu libro manuscrito e impreso, hasta que tu cuerpo quede reducido a cenizas, y así termines tus días para que quedes como ejemplo para otros que quieran cometer lo mismo.
Pero su muerte no fue en vano, sino que supuso la piedra de toque sobre la que se basaron después muchos pensadores, muchos luchadores por acabar con la hegemonía intelectual de la iglesia y al menos queda en la memoria que su muerte no fue en vano. Tarde y mal, pero la historia, le ha hecho justicia.
http://www.servetus.org
Miguel Servet
Médico y teólogo oscense condenado a la hoguera por hereje. Entre las páginas de una de sus obras teológicas, explicó la circulación de la sangre.
Infancia
Miguel Servet nació en Villanueva de Sigena (Huesca) el 29 de Septiembre de 1511. Sus estudios primarios fueron tutelados por su padre, notario real.
Posteriormente fue educado con los frailes de San Agustín, en especial por el clérigo Juan de Quintana que le acercó a la problemática religiosa de la época, cuando surgieron en España los primeros simpatizantes de Erasmo de Rotterdam y Lutero.
Juventud
En 1530 acompañó al clérigo Juan de Quintana a presenciar la coronación de Carlos V. El humillante espectáculo de ver al emperador besando los pies del papa Clemente VII le hicieron abandonar el catolicismo romano y soñar con una renovación total del cristianismo desde sus raíces.
Una malformación genital le hizo renunciar a casarse por no poder asegurar sucesión.
A los 20 años escribió dos libros en latín reflejando estas discrepancias que le supusieron pasar a estar en busca y captura. Para huir de la Inquisición, se cambió el apellido y se refugió en París donde estudió Medicina. Allí conoció a Calvino, su verdugo, con el que tuvo encarnizadas discusiones.
Última etapa
Sus últimos años los pasó intentando ocultar sus afinidades religiosas al servicio del arzobispo Pierre Palmier en Vienne (Francia). Es entonces cuando, bajo el formato de una exposición teológica, explica su teoría acerca de la circulación de la sangre por la que se le reconoce actualmente.
Su identidad es finalmente descubierta y Calvino lo condena a muerte por hereje tras una estancia en la cárcel. Su obra teológica más universal en la que expone su teoría sobre la sangre, "Christianismi Restitutio", se publicó el mismo año de su muerte. Miguel Servet murió en la hoguera el 27 de octubre de 1553 en Ginebra.
anto de la Católica que lo condenó, como de los Reformadores (calvinistas) que lo quemaron, y silenciaron su figura y obra durante tres siglos, hasta el XIX que se opera su resurrección.
Miguel Servet es martir de sus ideas cristianas, más cristiano, aunque menos ortodoxo que los cristianos católicos y reformados. Miguel Servet es nuestro máximo hereje y martir español, siempre creyó que todo lo que puede ser pensado, puede ser dicho, discutido y hecho.
Miguel Servet, humanista total, estudioso de todas las ciencias y dominador de muchos idiomas, dicen que hubiera producido y descubierto muchas cosas más, si hubiese estudiado muchas menos.
Sintesis de lo que fue Miguel Servet, está reflejado en el monumento erigido en Annemasse (el pueblo francés más cercano a Ginebra) en su honor. En sus cuatro caras se lee:
Monumento de Annemasse en honor a Michel Servet- Miguel Servet, helenista, geógrafo, médico y filósofo, debe ser apreciado de la humanidad por sus descubrimientos científicos, su abnegación en favor de los enfermos y pobres, y la indomable independencia de su inteligencia y su conciencia.
- A Miguel Servet apóstol de la libre creencia y martir del libre pensamiento, nacido el 29 de Septiembre de 1511 en Villanueva de Aragón, quemado en efigie por la Inquisición católica el 17 de Junio de 1551, y quemado vivo en Ginebra por instigación de Calvino el 27 de Octubre de 1553.
- La detención de Miguel Servet en Ginebra, donde no habían publicado, ni dogmatizado, y donde, en consecuencia, no podía ser entregado a la justicia, debe considerarse como una barbaridad y un insulto al derecho de las naciones (Voltaire).
- Miguel Servet escribía a sus jueces; "Os suplico que os plazca abreviar estas grandes dilaciones... veis que Calvino... quiere hacerme pudrir en prisión. Los piojos me comen vivo, mis calzones están desgarrados, y no tengo muda ni jubón, ni más camisas que una en jirones..."
Servet, creyendo firmemente que es poseedor de la verdad y considerando que nadie puede arrebatarle la libertad de pensar, quiere dar un paso más y llegar a la libertad de expresión en el propio feudo de Calvino.(José Antonio Valtueña)
Si Lutero es el volcán y Melanchton el cauce de su lava, Calvino representa la organización y la norma, mientras que Servet, guerrillero celtibérico que arrostra la transfusión del ímpetu anárquico a esas comunidades europeas y lo esgrime con autenticidad cristiana, tarea en la que cae, huele a frescor de rebeldía y libertad originales.
Servet jamás creyó en el principio de justificación por la fe de Lutero ni en la predestinación marcada por Calvino.
La injustificable ejecución de Servet escandalizó a muchos pensadores de toda Europa y brindó un poderoso argumento a los defensores de los derechos civiles, quienes se oponían a que se matara a las personas por razones de fe. A partir de ese momento lucharon con más determinación a favor de la libertad de culto. Destaca particularmente la defensa de Servet que realizó Sebastián Castellion: «Matar a un hombre no es defender una doctrina, es matar a un hombre. Cuando los ginebrinos ejecutaron a Servet, no defendieron una doctrina, mataron a un hombre... Read More
Marian Hillar, estudioso polaco-norteamericano de la obra de Servet, hizo la siguiente evaluación sobre el impacto perdurable que tuvo la ejecución del erudito español: «Fue el punto de inflexión en la ideología y mentalidad dominantes desde el siglo IV.Históricamente hablando, Servet murió para que la libertad de conciencia se convirtiera en un derecho civil en la sociedad moderna
Los logros de Servet son los más altos de la Europa de su tiempo y originaron todas las tendencias modernas en ciencias políticas, sociales y morales, y en los conceptos de absoluta libertad de investigación intelectual y de libertad de conciencia.
http://www.villanuevadesigena.com/es/miguel-servet/citas.htm
456 años de su ejecucion solo por estar encontra del dogma de la trinidad inpuesto por falsos cristianos y concilios, hoy en dia el 90% de los cristianos, cree sin duda en la trinidad un Dios trino que no tiene bases biblicas
A Miguel Servet apóstol de la libre creencia y martir del libre pensamiento, nacido el 29 de Septiembre de 1511 en Villanueva de Aragón, quemado en efigie por la Inquisición católica el 17 de Junio de 1551, y quemado vivo en Ginebra por instigación de Calvino el 27 de Octubre de 1553.
Miguel Servet es martir de sus ideas cristianas, más cristiano, aunque menos ortodoxo que los cristianos católicos y reformados. Miguel Servet es nuestro máximo hereje y martir español, siempre creyó que todo lo que puede ser pensado, puede ser dicho, discutido y hecho.
la figura de Miguel Servet se distingue como mártir de la libertad de pensamiento y de expresión de las ideas, cualesquiera que éstas fuesen, en abierto desafío a cualquiera que quisiese coartarla. Las Iglesias Unitarias consideran a Servet su pionero y primer mártir.
456 de la ejecucion de Miguel Servet
Un dia como hoy pero hace 456 años, fue quemado vivo Miguel Servert el
padre del unitarismo moderno.Los tres pilares en que descansa la fe
unitaria son la racionalidad, la libertad de pensamiento y la tolerancia
la figura de Miguel Servet se distingue como mártir de la libertad de pensamiento y de expresión de las ideas, cualesquiera que éstas fuesen, en abierto desafío a cualquiera que quisiese coartarla. Las Iglesias Unitarias consideran a Servet su pionero y primer mártir.
Si Lutero es el volcán y Melanchton el cauce de su lava, Calvino representa la organización y la norma, mientras que Servet, guerrillero celtibérico que arrostra la transfusión del ímpetu anárquico a esas comunidades europeas y lo esgrime con autenticidad cristiana, tarea en la que cae, huele a frescor de rebeldía y libertad originales.
Servet jamás creyó en el principio de justificación por la fe de Lutero ni en la predestinación marcada por Calvino.... Read More
La injustificable ejecución de Servet escandalizó a muchos pensadores de toda Europa y brindó un poderoso argumento a los defensores de los derechos civiles, quienes se oponían a que se matara a las personas por razones de fe. A partir de ese momento lucharon con más determinación a favor de la libertad de culto. Destaca particularmente la defensa de Servet que realizó Sebastián Castellion: «Matar a un hombre no es defender una doctrina, es matar a un hombre. Cuando los ginebrinos ejecutaron a Servet, no defendieron una doctrina, mataron a un hombre... Más información
Marian Hillar, estudioso polaco-norteamericano de la obra de Servet, hizo la siguiente evaluación sobre el impacto perdurable que tuvo la ejecución del erudito español: «Fue el punto de inflexión en la ideología y mentalidad dominantes desde el siglo IV.Históricamente hablando, Servet murió para que la libertad de conciencia se convirtiera en un derecho civil en la sociedad moderna
Los logros de Servet son los más altos de la Europa de su tiempo y originaron todas las tendencias modernas en ciencias políticas, sociales y morales, y en los conceptos de absoluta libertad de investigación intelectual y de libertad de conciencia.
456 años de su ejecucion solo por estar encontra del dogma de la trinidad inpuesto por falsos cristianos y concilios, hoy en dia el 90% de los cristianos, cree sin duda en la trinidad un Dios trino que no tiene bases biblicas
frases de Server
No debe imponerse como verdades conceptos sobre los que existen dudas
Si me hallas en error en un sólo punto, no debes por eso condenarme en todos .
Ni con estos, ni con aquellos estoy conforme ni disiento en todo. Todos tienen parte de verdad y parte de error, y cada cual descubre el error en otro sin ver el suyo.... Read More
La fe enciende la lámpara que solo el aceite del amor hace arder
El hombre es libre, y recibe de los astros, solo inclinaciones y tendencias. La preordenación, predestinación, elección, son inventos de Simón Mago
Lo divino ha bajado hasta lo humano, para que el humano pueda ascender hasta lo divino
¡Oh, Cristo, Hijo de Dios eterno, salva mi anima! ¡El hacha! ¡El hacha!; la hoguera no! - (Servet, frente a la pira)
Por entre las brumas de la memoria, cada vez más tambaleante, me llega a ratos la luz de mi pueblo, Villanueva. Percibo la luminosidad especial de un cielo plano y límpido en los veranos y el olor a mieses, que llenaron mis sentidos para siempre, y que atesoro en el origen de mis recuerdos, desde que jugaba con otros niños por las calles y campos del sitio donde abrí por primera vez los ojos - Miguel Servet (Historia de un fugitivo, Lainez)
No estamos obligados a juzgar según la Ley, aunque la ley nos muestra bien el pecado.
Serveto responde que no llama Triteitas a los que creen en la Trinidad, pues él mismo cree, sino a los que la presentan como no es...(En su proceso).
Leed la Biblia una y mil veces; si no le tenéis gusto es que habéis perdido la llave del conocimiento
Miguel Servet
http://barujnazareno.blogspot.com/2009/09/miguel-servet.html
Servet argumento que el dogma de la Trinidad carece de base bíblica, ya que no se halla en las Escrituras, sino que es fruto posterior de elucubraciones de «filósofos». Basándose en abundantes citas de la Biblia, Servet concluye que Jesús es hombre, hijo de Dios, y en definitiva no Dios mismo. Es hombre en tanto que nacido de mujer, por más que su nacimiento fuese milagroso. A su vez, Jesús es hijo de Dios en tanto que su nacimiento es el fruto de la fecundación por el Logos divino de la Virgen María.
citas de Servet
padre del unitarismo moderno.Los tres pilares en que descansa la fe
unitaria son la racionalidad, la libertad de pensamiento y la tolerancia
la figura de Miguel Servet se distingue como mártir de la libertad de pensamiento y de expresión de las ideas, cualesquiera que éstas fuesen, en abierto desafío a cualquiera que quisiese coartarla. Las Iglesias Unitarias consideran a Servet su pionero y primer mártir.
Si Lutero es el volcán y Melanchton el cauce de su lava, Calvino representa la organización y la norma, mientras que Servet, guerrillero celtibérico que arrostra la transfusión del ímpetu anárquico a esas comunidades europeas y lo esgrime con autenticidad cristiana, tarea en la que cae, huele a frescor de rebeldía y libertad originales.
Servet jamás creyó en el principio de justificación por la fe de Lutero ni en la predestinación marcada por Calvino.... Read More
La injustificable ejecución de Servet escandalizó a muchos pensadores de toda Europa y brindó un poderoso argumento a los defensores de los derechos civiles, quienes se oponían a que se matara a las personas por razones de fe. A partir de ese momento lucharon con más determinación a favor de la libertad de culto. Destaca particularmente la defensa de Servet que realizó Sebastián Castellion: «Matar a un hombre no es defender una doctrina, es matar a un hombre. Cuando los ginebrinos ejecutaron a Servet, no defendieron una doctrina, mataron a un hombre... Más información
Marian Hillar, estudioso polaco-norteamericano de la obra de Servet, hizo la siguiente evaluación sobre el impacto perdurable que tuvo la ejecución del erudito español: «Fue el punto de inflexión en la ideología y mentalidad dominantes desde el siglo IV.Históricamente hablando, Servet murió para que la libertad de conciencia se convirtiera en un derecho civil en la sociedad moderna
Los logros de Servet son los más altos de la Europa de su tiempo y originaron todas las tendencias modernas en ciencias políticas, sociales y morales, y en los conceptos de absoluta libertad de investigación intelectual y de libertad de conciencia.
456 años de su ejecucion solo por estar encontra del dogma de la trinidad inpuesto por falsos cristianos y concilios, hoy en dia el 90% de los cristianos, cree sin duda en la trinidad un Dios trino que no tiene bases biblicas
frases de Server
No debe imponerse como verdades conceptos sobre los que existen dudas
Si me hallas en error en un sólo punto, no debes por eso condenarme en todos .
Ni con estos, ni con aquellos estoy conforme ni disiento en todo. Todos tienen parte de verdad y parte de error, y cada cual descubre el error en otro sin ver el suyo.... Read More
La fe enciende la lámpara que solo el aceite del amor hace arder
El hombre es libre, y recibe de los astros, solo inclinaciones y tendencias. La preordenación, predestinación, elección, son inventos de Simón Mago
Lo divino ha bajado hasta lo humano, para que el humano pueda ascender hasta lo divino
¡Oh, Cristo, Hijo de Dios eterno, salva mi anima! ¡El hacha! ¡El hacha!; la hoguera no! - (Servet, frente a la pira)
Por entre las brumas de la memoria, cada vez más tambaleante, me llega a ratos la luz de mi pueblo, Villanueva. Percibo la luminosidad especial de un cielo plano y límpido en los veranos y el olor a mieses, que llenaron mis sentidos para siempre, y que atesoro en el origen de mis recuerdos, desde que jugaba con otros niños por las calles y campos del sitio donde abrí por primera vez los ojos - Miguel Servet (Historia de un fugitivo, Lainez)
No estamos obligados a juzgar según la Ley, aunque la ley nos muestra bien el pecado.
Serveto responde que no llama Triteitas a los que creen en la Trinidad, pues él mismo cree, sino a los que la presentan como no es...(En su proceso).
Leed la Biblia una y mil veces; si no le tenéis gusto es que habéis perdido la llave del conocimiento
Miguel Servet
http://barujnazareno.blogspot.com/2009/09/miguel-servet.html
Servet argumento que el dogma de la Trinidad carece de base bíblica, ya que no se halla en las Escrituras, sino que es fruto posterior de elucubraciones de «filósofos». Basándose en abundantes citas de la Biblia, Servet concluye que Jesús es hombre, hijo de Dios, y en definitiva no Dios mismo. Es hombre en tanto que nacido de mujer, por más que su nacimiento fuese milagroso. A su vez, Jesús es hijo de Dios en tanto que su nacimiento es el fruto de la fecundación por el Logos divino de la Virgen María.
citas de Servet
El Unitarismo
El Unitarismo es una corriente de pensamiento teológico de origen cristiano que afirma la unidad de Dios. En sentido genérico se han etiquetado así a diversas corrientes que rechazan el dogma de la Trinidad, tales como el adopcionismo, el arrianismo, el servetismo, el socinianismo y otras.
Los tres pilares en que descansa la fe unitaria (o unitariasta) son la racionalidad, la libertad de pensamiento y la tolerancia.
El primero de esto tres pilares, la racionalidad, nos enseña que la verdad revelada no puede contradecir a la ciencia probada. Es decir, la fe y la razón no sólo no son contradictorias sino que son complementarias. Por ejemplo, la noción de que Dios es uno y trino a la vez repugna a la razón y a la lógica, por lo que debe ser rechazado. O sea, que para los Unitarios todo lo que no sea contrastado por vía de la lógica o de la ciencia no puede ser objeto de la fe.
El segundo de los pilares básicos es la libertad absoluta de pensamiento. El ser humano termina descubriendo la verdad y razón de su existencia. En ese punto o la acepta o la rechaza y dado que el libre albedrío es un don de Dios, el derecho a aceptar o rechazar debe ser aceptado sin condenación. Por eso los unitarios no condenamos a nadie, ni juzgamos a nadie. Abogamos por una libertad absoluta de pensamiento. Que cada persona pueda leer la Biblia (o cualquiera de los llamados “libros sagrados”) sin la ayuda de ningún teólogo o clérigo y sacar sus propias conclusiones. A diferencia de las religiones organizadas, el Unitarismo no le teme a la verdad.
Consecuencia directa de la libertad absoluta de pensamiento, que profesan los Unitaristas, es que el Unitarismo como religión carece de artículos de fe en el sentido de principios irrefutables, que no admiten contradicción. Para los Unitarios, la palabra dogma tiene el mismo significado que en griego antiguo, es decir pensamiento o creencia. En este sentido el dogma o pensamiento compartido por todos los unitarios es la creencia en un solo y único Dios, creador de todo cuanto existe, existió y existirá.
El tercer rasgo distintivo es la tolerancia en materia de religión y una actitud firme y constante en apoyo de la libertad de conciencia, fundamento de todas las libertades, que exige respetar las opiniones de los otros y rechazar la violencia como solución de todos los problemas tanto personales como internacionales. Según Miguel Servet, nadie tiene derecho a coartar la conciencia intelectual, moral o religiosa de nadie, igual que nadie, ni persona ni institución, es árbitro supremo de la verdad. […] La verdad no se impone con la espada, ni con la excomunión: se abre camino por sí misma, con su propia luz, apoyada en la palabra. En otras palabras, el Unitarismo está inseparablemente ligado a la libertad de conciencia y de fe. No hay mayor absurdo y sinsentido que forzar la conciencia y el espíritu mediante la fuerza externa, cuando sólo el Creador tiene la autoridad sobre ellos.
La religión Unitaria es simple: Dios es uno y único. La existencia de Dios para los Unitarios no es un artículo de fe incuestionable sino que es el resultado o convencimiento racional personal al que se puede llegar de muchas maneras y por diversos caminos. Uno de ellos es el que explica Aristóteles en su Metafísica en la que, al abogar por la existencia de un Ser divino, lo describe como “Primer Motor”, responsable de la unidad y significación de la naturaleza. Este “Primer Motor”, dice Aristóteles, es lo primero que existió, o dicho de otra manera, lo que existía cuando nada había sido creado aún. Aristóteles añade que Dios, en su calidad de ser perfecto, es por consiguiente el ejemplo al que aspiran todos los seres del mundo, ya que desean participar de la perfección. Si se mira hacia el universo y su orden, se obtiene la convicción de que hay un Dios, que ha creado, mantiene y gestiona todo lo que existe.
Nadie tiene la exclusividad de Dios, dado que si Dios es uno y único es evidente que ha de ser el mismo para todos, sea cual sea la religión que se profese. Consecuencia directa de la unicidad de Dios es que ya se hable de Dios, de Yahvé, o de Alá, nos referimos a la misma noción de deidad.
Para los Unitarios Cristianos la base del Unitarismo es la doctrina recogida en los Evangelios, es decir, las normas de Unitarismo se basan en las enseñanzas de Jesús, la principal de las cuales es el amor a Dios y a los seres humanos tal como se recoge en el Evangelio de Marcos (12:28-33):
"Acercándose uno de los escribas, que los había oído disputar, y sabía que les había respondido bien, le preguntó: ¿Cuál es el primer mandamiento de todos? Jesús le respondió: El primer mandamiento de todos es: Oye, Israel; el Señor nuestro Dios, el Señor uno es. Y amarás al Señor tu Dios con todo tu corazón, y con toda tu alma, y con toda tu mente y con todas tus fuerzas. Este es el principal mandamiento. Y el segundo es semejante: Amarás a tu prójimo como a ti mismo. No hay otro mandamiento mayor que éstos. Entonces el escriba le dijo: Bien, Maestro, verdad has dicho, que uno es Dios, y no hay otro fuera de él; y el amarle con todo el corazón, con todo el entendimiento, con toda el alma, y con todas las fuerzas, y amar al prójimo como a uno mismo, es más que todos los holocaustos y sacrificios. Jesús entonces, viendo que había respondido sabiamente, le dijo: No estás lejos del reino de Dios. Y ya ninguno osaba preguntarle”.
Los tres pilares en que descansa la fe unitaria (o unitariasta) son la racionalidad, la libertad de pensamiento y la tolerancia.
El primero de esto tres pilares, la racionalidad, nos enseña que la verdad revelada no puede contradecir a la ciencia probada. Es decir, la fe y la razón no sólo no son contradictorias sino que son complementarias. Por ejemplo, la noción de que Dios es uno y trino a la vez repugna a la razón y a la lógica, por lo que debe ser rechazado. O sea, que para los Unitarios todo lo que no sea contrastado por vía de la lógica o de la ciencia no puede ser objeto de la fe.
El segundo de los pilares básicos es la libertad absoluta de pensamiento. El ser humano termina descubriendo la verdad y razón de su existencia. En ese punto o la acepta o la rechaza y dado que el libre albedrío es un don de Dios, el derecho a aceptar o rechazar debe ser aceptado sin condenación. Por eso los unitarios no condenamos a nadie, ni juzgamos a nadie. Abogamos por una libertad absoluta de pensamiento. Que cada persona pueda leer la Biblia (o cualquiera de los llamados “libros sagrados”) sin la ayuda de ningún teólogo o clérigo y sacar sus propias conclusiones. A diferencia de las religiones organizadas, el Unitarismo no le teme a la verdad.
Consecuencia directa de la libertad absoluta de pensamiento, que profesan los Unitaristas, es que el Unitarismo como religión carece de artículos de fe en el sentido de principios irrefutables, que no admiten contradicción. Para los Unitarios, la palabra dogma tiene el mismo significado que en griego antiguo, es decir pensamiento o creencia. En este sentido el dogma o pensamiento compartido por todos los unitarios es la creencia en un solo y único Dios, creador de todo cuanto existe, existió y existirá.
El tercer rasgo distintivo es la tolerancia en materia de religión y una actitud firme y constante en apoyo de la libertad de conciencia, fundamento de todas las libertades, que exige respetar las opiniones de los otros y rechazar la violencia como solución de todos los problemas tanto personales como internacionales. Según Miguel Servet, nadie tiene derecho a coartar la conciencia intelectual, moral o religiosa de nadie, igual que nadie, ni persona ni institución, es árbitro supremo de la verdad. […] La verdad no se impone con la espada, ni con la excomunión: se abre camino por sí misma, con su propia luz, apoyada en la palabra. En otras palabras, el Unitarismo está inseparablemente ligado a la libertad de conciencia y de fe. No hay mayor absurdo y sinsentido que forzar la conciencia y el espíritu mediante la fuerza externa, cuando sólo el Creador tiene la autoridad sobre ellos.
La religión Unitaria es simple: Dios es uno y único. La existencia de Dios para los Unitarios no es un artículo de fe incuestionable sino que es el resultado o convencimiento racional personal al que se puede llegar de muchas maneras y por diversos caminos. Uno de ellos es el que explica Aristóteles en su Metafísica en la que, al abogar por la existencia de un Ser divino, lo describe como “Primer Motor”, responsable de la unidad y significación de la naturaleza. Este “Primer Motor”, dice Aristóteles, es lo primero que existió, o dicho de otra manera, lo que existía cuando nada había sido creado aún. Aristóteles añade que Dios, en su calidad de ser perfecto, es por consiguiente el ejemplo al que aspiran todos los seres del mundo, ya que desean participar de la perfección. Si se mira hacia el universo y su orden, se obtiene la convicción de que hay un Dios, que ha creado, mantiene y gestiona todo lo que existe.
Nadie tiene la exclusividad de Dios, dado que si Dios es uno y único es evidente que ha de ser el mismo para todos, sea cual sea la religión que se profese. Consecuencia directa de la unicidad de Dios es que ya se hable de Dios, de Yahvé, o de Alá, nos referimos a la misma noción de deidad.
Para los Unitarios Cristianos la base del Unitarismo es la doctrina recogida en los Evangelios, es decir, las normas de Unitarismo se basan en las enseñanzas de Jesús, la principal de las cuales es el amor a Dios y a los seres humanos tal como se recoge en el Evangelio de Marcos (12:28-33):
"Acercándose uno de los escribas, que los había oído disputar, y sabía que les había respondido bien, le preguntó: ¿Cuál es el primer mandamiento de todos? Jesús le respondió: El primer mandamiento de todos es: Oye, Israel; el Señor nuestro Dios, el Señor uno es. Y amarás al Señor tu Dios con todo tu corazón, y con toda tu alma, y con toda tu mente y con todas tus fuerzas. Este es el principal mandamiento. Y el segundo es semejante: Amarás a tu prójimo como a ti mismo. No hay otro mandamiento mayor que éstos. Entonces el escriba le dijo: Bien, Maestro, verdad has dicho, que uno es Dios, y no hay otro fuera de él; y el amarle con todo el corazón, con todo el entendimiento, con toda el alma, y con todas las fuerzas, y amar al prójimo como a uno mismo, es más que todos los holocaustos y sacrificios. Jesús entonces, viendo que había respondido sabiamente, le dijo: No estás lejos del reino de Dios. Y ya ninguno osaba preguntarle”.
Catecismo de la Iglesia Cristiana Unitaria.
Esta es la primera, parte, en esta pagina esta el catecismo unitario, en 1737 apareció el primer catecismo unitario.El Catecismo de la Iglesia Cristiana Unitaria de España ha sido redactado tomando como modelo la edición de 1991 del de la Iglesia Unitaria de Hungría
Catecismo de la Iglesia Cristiana Unitaria.
1) ¿Qué es la religión?
Genéricamente podemos definir la religión como el conjunto de creencias sobre la divinidad, así como las prácticas para darle culto y las normas morales de conducta impuestas a sus seguidores.
Los Cristianos Unitarios (o Unitaristas) entendemos la religión como expresión del amor hacia Dios y hacia nuestro prójimo (todos los prójimos) y como una forma de vida basada en el ejempo de Jesucristo y en sus predicaciones.
Marcos 12,28-31: 28 Acercóse uno de los escribas que les había oído y, viendo que les había respondido muy bien, le preguntó: «¿Cuál es el primero de todos los mandamientos?» Jesús le contestó: «El primero es: Escucha, Israel: El Señor, nuestro Dios, es el único Señor; y amarás al Señor, tu Dios, con todo tu corazón, con toda tu alma, con toda tu mente y con todas tus fuerzas. El segundo es: Amarás a tu prójimo como a ti mismo. No existe otro mandamiento mayor que éstos.».
Juan 4,21: El mandamiento que tenemos de él es la siguiente: los que aman a Dios deben amar a sus hermanos y hermanas también;
Mateo 7,21: No todos los que me dicen: Señor, Señor, entrará en el reino de Dios, pero sólo el que hace la voluntad de mi Padre en el cielo.
2) ¿Cómo sabemos que Dios existe?
Si se mira hacia el universo y su orden, o a nosotros mismos y nuestros talentos, se obtiene la convicción de que hay un Dios, que ha creado, mantiene y gestiona todo lo que existe.
El filósofo griego Aristóteles definió a Dios como el primer motor, es decir lo primero que existió, lo que existía cuando nada había sido creado aún. Por ello decimos que Dios es eteno, que siempre ha existido y existirá.
Nadie tiene la exclusividad de Dios, dado que si Dios es uno y único es evidente que ha de ser el mismo para todos, sea cual sea la religión que se profese.
3) ¿En qué consiste el amor hacia Dios?
El amor hacia Dios consiste en el respeto a sus leyes y en nuestro esfuerzo para cumplirlas.
4) ¿Cuál es el propósito de la religión?
El propósito de la religión es perfeccionar nuestras almas a través del amor a Dios y al prójimo, ennoblecer nuestros sentimientos y fomentar el servicio al prójimo.
5) ¿Tiene necesidad la Humanidad de la religión?
El propósito de la religión muestra claramente que la Humanidad necesita la religión; la historia de la Humanidad demuestra, con pruebas evidentes, que nunca ha habido un pueblo sin religión.
6) ¿Cómo se ha desarrollado la religión?
La religión se ha desarrollado debido a lainfluencia de líderes ilustrados, racionales, morales y religiosos que nos han llevado a una clara convicción religiosa, que se corresponde con la razón.
Usualmente a esos líderes les llamamos profetas, apóstoles o fundadores de la religión.
En el curso de la historia, esos mensajeros de Dios fueron Zoroastro para los persas, Confucio para los chinos, Buda para los hindues, Moisés y los profetas para los Judios y Mahoma para los árabes.
7) ¿Quién fue el mayor profeta de Dios?
Para nosotros los Cristianos, el mayor profeta de Dios es Jesús, el fundador de la religión cristiana. Él nos enseñó tanto el conocimiento y el amor de Dios.
Nadie puede poner cualquier otro fundamento que el que se ha establecido; que es Jesucristo. (1 Corintios 3,11)
8) ¿Cómo sabemos acerca de las enseñanzas de los profetas y de Jesús?
Sabemos que las enseñanzas de los profetas y de Jesús por la Biblia, a la que también llamamos la Sagradas Escrituras.
9) ¿Qué es la Biblia?
La Biblia es un conjunto de libros que incluye 66 obras de la antigüedad, de autores y con contenido diferente.
10) ¿Cuántas partes tiene la Biblia?
La Biblia tiene dos partes principales: El Antiguo Pacto o Antiguo Testamento y el Nuevo Pacto o Nuevo Testamento. El Antiguo Testamento contiene 39 libros, el Nuevo Testamento 27 libros.
11) ¿Quién escribió los libros del Antiguo Testamento?
Los libros del Antiguo Testamento fueron escritos antes del nacimiento de Jesús por parte de los maestros y profetas del pueblo judío en los idiomas hebreo y arameo.
12) ¿Cuál es el orden de los libros en el Antiguo Testamento?
El orden de los libros del Antiguo Testamento es:
Los Cinco Libros de Moisés, Josué, Jueces, Ruth, I y II Samuel, I y II Reyes, I y II Crónicas, Esra, Nehemías, Esther, Job, Salmos, Proverbios, eclesiásticos, Cantar de los Cantares, Isaías, Jeremías, Lamentaciones de Jeremías, Ezequiel, Daniel, Oseas, Joel, Amós, Abdías, Jonás, Miqueas, Nahum, Habacuc, Sofonías, Hageo, Zacarías, Malaquías.
13) ¿Qué contiene el Antiguo Testamento?
El Antiguo Testamento contiene las normas morales y religiosas del pueblo judío y de las enseñanzas de los profetas.
14) ¿Cuál es la enseñanza fundamental del Antiguo Testamento?
La enseñanza fundamental del Antiguo Testamento son los Diez Mandamientos de Moisés, que pueden resumirse como sigue: Dios es Uno y sólo a Dios adorarás; no fabricar ni adorar ídolos, no tomar el nombre de Dios en vano; guardar las fiestas; honrar a tus padres; no matar; no cometer adulterio; no robar; no mentir; no envidiar.
Véase, la totalidad del texto de los Diez Mandamientos:
Éxodo 20,1-17:
20:1 Y habló Dios todas estas palabras, diciendo:
20:2 Yo soy Jehová tu Dios, que te saqué de la tierra de Egipto, de casa de servidumbre.
20:3 No tendrás dioses ajenos delante de mí.
20:4 No te harás imagen, ni ninguna semejanza de lo que esté arriba en el cielo, ni abajo en la tierra, ni en las aguas debajo de la tierra.
20:5 No te inclinarás a ellas, ni las honrarás; porque yo soy Jehová tu Dios, fuerte, celoso, que visito la maldad de los padres sobre los hijos hasta la tercera y cuarta generación de los que me aborrecen,
20:6 y hago misericordia a millares, a los que me aman y guardan mis mandamientos.
20:7 No tomarás el nombre de Jehová tu Dios en vano; porque no dará por inocente Jehová al que tomare su nombre en vano.
20:8 Acuérdate del día de reposo para santificarlo.
20:9 Seis días trabajarás, y harás toda tu obra;
20:10 mas el séptimo día es reposo para Jehová tu Dios; no hagas en él obra alguna, ni tú, ni tu hijo, ni tu hija, ni tu siervo, ni tu criada, ni tu bestia, ni tu extranjero que está dentro de tus puertas.
20:11 Porque en seis días hizo Jehová los cielos y la tierra, el mar, y todas las cosas que en ellos hay, y reposó en el séptimo día; por tanto, Jehová bendijo el día de reposo y lo santificó.
20:12 Honra a tu padre y a tu madre, para que tus días se alarguen en la tierra que Jehová tu Dios te da.
20:13 No matarás.
20:14 No cometerás adulterio.
20:15 No hurtarás.
20:16 No hablarás contra tu prójimo falso testimonio.
20:17 No codiciarás la casa de tu prójimo, no codiciarás la mujer de tu prójimo, ni su siervo, ni su criada, ni su buey, ni su asno, ni cosa alguna de tu prójimo.
15) ¿Quién escribió los libros del Nuevo Testamento?
Los libros del Nuevo Testamento fueron escritos después de la muerte de Jesús en griego y en arameo por los evangelistas y apóstoles.
16) ¿Cual es el orden de los libros del Nuevo Testamento?
El orden de los libros del Nuevo Testamento: El Evangelio según Mateo, Marcos, Lucas y Juan, Los Hechos de los Apóstoles, las cartas de Pablo: Romanos, I y II Corintios, Gálatas, Efesios, Filipenses, Colosenses, I y II Tesalonicenses , I y II Timoteo, Tito, Filemón, y Hebreos, las cartas de Santiago, Pedro I y II, I, II y III Juan, la carta de Judas y el libro de Revelaciones.
17) ¿Qué es lo que contiene el Nuevo Testamento?
La primera parte del Nuevo Testamento: el Evangelio según Marcos, Mateo, Lucas y Juan contiene la historia de la vida y las enseñanzas de Jesús, y la otra parte nos muestra el trabajo y las enseñanzas de los Apóstoles. Debido a su contenido, al Nuevo Testamento se le llama también Evangelio, que significa "mensaje alegre".
18) ¿Por qué es necesario conocer la Biblia?
Es necesario conocer la Biblia porque las enseñanzas que se incluyen en ella son la base de la religión cristiana y para la vida cristiana. Por esta razón tenemos que leer y estudiar la Biblia con amor y usando la razón.
Pero él respondió, porque escrito está: No sólo de pan vivirá, sino de toda palabra que sale de la boca de Dios. (Mateo 4,4)
Por lo que fue escrito en tiempos pasados fue escrito para nuestra instrucción, para que por la constancia y por el fomento de la Escritura nosotros podamos tener esperanza. (Roma 5,4)
19) ¿Cómo se llaman a aquellos cuya religión se basa en las enseñanzas de Jesús?
Aquellos, cuya religión se basa en la enseñanza de Jesús somos llamados cristianos. Ser "cristiano" significa que pertenece o es seguidor de Jesús.
Así fue que durante un año entero se reunieron con la iglesia y enseñó un gran número de personas y que fue en Antioquía que los discípulos fueron llamados en primer lugar " cristianos". (Hechos 11,26)
20) ¿Están unidos los cristianos?
La Cristiandad no está unida. En el curso de la historia, la religión cristiana se ha dividido en diferentes denominaciones. Pero los cristianos que viven en la tierra están unidos por la enseñanza de Jesús sobre la unidad fraterna. El número de cristianos es de aproximadamente un mil doscientos millones.
Porque así como el cuerpo es uno y tiene muchos miembros y todos los miembros del cuerpo, aunque muchos, son un solo cuerpo, así es con Cristo. Uno en el Espíritu fuimos todos bautizados en un cuerpo - Judíos o griegos, esclavos o libres - y todos se nos dio a beber de un mismo Espíritu. (1Corintios 12,12-13)
21) ¿Por qué el Cristianismo se divide en distintas denominaciones?
Entre los cristianos de la antigüedad y más tarde en la época de la Reforma, surgieron diferentes ideas acerca de la personalidad y la enseñanza de Jesús. Esto dio lugar a distintas denominaciones las cuales se han formado a partir de los seguidores de estos diferentes conceptos religiosos.
22) ¿Cuál es nuestra religión?
Nuestra religión se denomina Cristiana Unitaria (o Unitarista) para indicar que creemos en un solo y único Dios (a diferencia de politeistas y trinitarios) y que seguimos las enseñanzas de Jesucristo. Por ello somos Unitarios/as o Unitaristas.
23 ¿Se puede ser Cristiano sin ser Unitarista o Unitarista sin ser Cristiano?
Si. Hay Cristianos que son trinitarios (por ejemplo Ortodoxos y Católicos) y hay Unitaristas que no son Cristianos (por ejemplo Judíos y Mahometanos).
Incluso hay Cristianos que siendo Unitaristas (en sentido estricto) están adscritos a denominaciones no unitaristas (tales como los Testigos de Jehová y los Cristadelfianos)
24) ¿Quién es considerado el padre del moderno Unitarismo?
El médico y teólogo español Miguel Servet (o Serveto) es considerado el padre del moderno Unitarismo.
Servet nació en Villanueva de Sigena (Huesca) en 1511 y murió quemado en la hoguera en Ginebra (Suiza) en 1553.
Además del español, hablaba el francés, el italiano, el latín, el griego y el hebreo. Estudió Medicina, Teología y Derecho.
En 1531 publicó De Trinitatis Erroribus (De los errores de la Trinidad) obra que causó gran revuelo y en la que argumenta que el dogma de la Trinidad carece de base bíblica ya que no se haya en las Escrituras sino que fue concebido por elucubraciones filosóficas posteriores. El año siguiente publicó Dialogorum de Trinitate (Diálogos sobre la Trinidad), acompañado de una obra suplementaria, De Iustitia Regni Christi (Sobre la Justicia del Reino de Dios). Otro opúsculo de esta misma época, aunque de datación imprecisa, es Declarationis Iesus Christi Filii Dei (Declaración de Jesucristo Hijo de Dios), también conocido como "Manuscrito de Stuttgart".
Como médico y científico destacó por ser el que primero describió la circulación de la sangre.
Debido a sus divergencias con Calvino fue detenido en Ginebra y condenado a muerte lo que tuvo lugar el 27 de octubre de 1553. Independientemente de la importancia de sus descubrimientos fisiológicos o de su labor como polemista religioso, la figura de Miguel Servet se distingue como mártir de la libertad de pensamiento y de expresión de las ideas, cualesquiera que éstas fuesen, en abierto desafío a cualquiera que quisiese coartarla.
Las Iglesis Unitarias consideran a Servet su pionero y primer mártir.
25) ¿Cuáles son los antecedentes del Unitarismo?
Los orígenes del Unitarismo cabe encontrarlos en los primeros siglos del Cristianismo en los que la religión predicada por Jesus y difundida por los apóstoles, se basaba en la creencia en un solo Dios.
En el siglo III, surgió con gran fuerza en el mundo cristiano la idea de la Trinidad, que fue rechazada por figuras tales como Arrio, como contraria a las enseñanzas originales de Jesús. La imposición del Credo católico y del dogma trinitario en los Concilios de Nicea (325) y Constantinopla (381) supuso la condena como herejías de las ideas unitarias (de las que el arrianismo fue su principal exponente) y la persecución de sus seguidores.
En España, el Arrianismo sobrevivió más de dos siglos como religión oficial hasta la conversión del rey visigodo Recaredo al Catolicismo en 587.
26 ¿Qué otros maestros son considerados sucesores de Servet y padres del Unitarismo?
La vida, obra y sacrificio de Miguel Servet sirvieron de guía a muchos.
Sebastian Castellio reprochó duramente a Calvino su intolerancia y su fanatismo y proclamó la libertad de conciencia en asuntos de fe, un principio que luego ha sido fundamental en la tradición Unitaria y Universalista.
Entretanto el húngaro Ferecz David predicaba el Cristianismo Unitario en Transilvania (país situado en lo que hoy es Rumanía).
Por su parte, el italiano Fausto Socino (Sozzini) publicó una obra en la que tomaba a Cristo como modelo humano de vida y rechazaba el dogma de su naturaleza divina (Socinianismo). Socino, perseguido también por sus creencias, encontró refugio en Polonia, donde se unió a otros reformadores liberales y antitrinitarios de aquel país, en el grupo denominado Hermanos Polacos (después aniquilado por la Contrarreforma Católica).
27) ¿A quién se considera fundador de la Iglesia Unitaria o Unitarista?
Ferecz David está considerado como el fundador de la Iglesia Unitaria o Unitarista en Transilvania en 1560 de donde se extendió rápidamente por Hungría y Rumanía. El rey Segismundo de Transilvania aceptó el Unitarismo y dictó el primer Edicto de Tolerancia religiosa en la historia moderna de Europa en 1568. Tras la muerte del rey Segismundo llegó la Contrarreforma a Transilvania. Ferenc Dávid fue condenado a cadena perpetua y murió en prisión en 1579, sin que se conozcan las causas de su muerte ni el lugar donde fue enterrado su cadáver, pero la Iglesia Unitaria que él fundó ha logrado sobrevivir con grandes dificultades hasta nuestros días.
28) ¿Qué pasó después de la muerte de Francisco David?
Tras la muerte de de Ferenc David siguió un período muy difícil en la historia de nuestra iglesia. En primer lugar, la intolerancia religiosa y más tarde, la represión política oprimió de nuestra iglesia. En lugar de construir, nuestros antepasados se vieron obligados a reunir todas sus fuerzas para la autodefensa. En esta dura lucha muchas de nuestras iglesias y congregaciones se han perdido, así como cerca de las tres cuartas partes de nuestros creyentes. Sólo la Divina Providencia, la ley de libertad religiosa y la heroica persistencia de una porción de nuestros creyentes ha resguardado nuestra iglesia de la total desaparición.
29) ¿Qué desarrollo tuvo el Unitarismo en otros países?
En Inglaterra hubo unitarios aislados hacia 1600, el más notable de los cuales fue John Biddle, aunque el Unitarismo se desarrolló como movimiento formal alrededor de 1700, en parte dentro de la Iglesia de Inglaterra, pero principalmente en círculos disidentes. En Estados Unidos el liberalismo religioso que vino ser conocido como Unitarismo surgió dentro de las iglesias congregacionales en Massachusetts como reacción contra el Gran Despertar (1740-43). La elección (1805) de Henry Ware como profesor de la Cátedra Hollis de Teología en la Universidad Harvard desencadenó una controversia, a resultas de la cual los liberales pasaron a ser una denominación separada. El sermón de William Ellery Channing (1819) intitulado "Cristianismo Unitario" fue una influyente declaración de sus creencias.
En 1838, en su discurso en la Facultad de Teología, Ralph Waldo Emerson declaró que la verdad religiosa debe basarse en la conciencia interna, no en pruebas históricas externas. Los unitarios más conservadores se opusieron a Emerson y sus seguidores, conocidos como trascendentalistas, temiendo que tal subjetivismo destruyera la posición cristiana de ser una religión divinamente revelada. Desde la controversia sobre el Trascendentalismo, algunos dentro de la denominación siempre han estimado importante mantener continuidad con la tradición cristiana, en tanto que otros han encontrado que el cristianismo es intelectualmente limitado y emocionalmente restrictivo.
30) ¿´Qué personajes españoles fueron influidos por el Unitarismo?
Dicen que el reformador español Casiodoro Reina, traductor de la Biblia, lloró al contemplar el lugar de Ginebra donde fue martirizado Miguel Servet, y que desde entonces fue considerado sospechoso de ser afín al Unitarismo. En cualquier caso, desde la muerte de Servet, el aparato represor de la Inquisición y el Estado impidieron cualquier brote unitarista en España durante muchos años. Algunos sólo pudieron conocerlo en otros países, como el escritor y erudito español José María Blanco White, que perteneció a la iglesia unitaria de Liverpool en los últimos años de su vida, durante su exilio en Inglaterra. Otra gran figura que se sintió identificada con el Unitarismo fue el político y educador Gumersindo de Azcárate, krausista y uno de los promotores de la Institución Libre de Enseñanza . Tanto Azcárate como Francisco Giner de los Rios fueron admiradores de las obras de los líderes intelectuales del Unitarismo norteamericano, Willian E. Channing y Theodore Parker y transmitieron esta admiración a muchos de sus alumnos, entre ellos Miguel de Unamuno.
Catecismo de la Iglesia Cristiana Unitaria.
1) ¿Qué es la religión?
Genéricamente podemos definir la religión como el conjunto de creencias sobre la divinidad, así como las prácticas para darle culto y las normas morales de conducta impuestas a sus seguidores.
Los Cristianos Unitarios (o Unitaristas) entendemos la religión como expresión del amor hacia Dios y hacia nuestro prójimo (todos los prójimos) y como una forma de vida basada en el ejempo de Jesucristo y en sus predicaciones.
Marcos 12,28-31: 28 Acercóse uno de los escribas que les había oído y, viendo que les había respondido muy bien, le preguntó: «¿Cuál es el primero de todos los mandamientos?» Jesús le contestó: «El primero es: Escucha, Israel: El Señor, nuestro Dios, es el único Señor; y amarás al Señor, tu Dios, con todo tu corazón, con toda tu alma, con toda tu mente y con todas tus fuerzas. El segundo es: Amarás a tu prójimo como a ti mismo. No existe otro mandamiento mayor que éstos.».
Juan 4,21: El mandamiento que tenemos de él es la siguiente: los que aman a Dios deben amar a sus hermanos y hermanas también;
Mateo 7,21: No todos los que me dicen: Señor, Señor, entrará en el reino de Dios, pero sólo el que hace la voluntad de mi Padre en el cielo.
2) ¿Cómo sabemos que Dios existe?
Si se mira hacia el universo y su orden, o a nosotros mismos y nuestros talentos, se obtiene la convicción de que hay un Dios, que ha creado, mantiene y gestiona todo lo que existe.
El filósofo griego Aristóteles definió a Dios como el primer motor, es decir lo primero que existió, lo que existía cuando nada había sido creado aún. Por ello decimos que Dios es eteno, que siempre ha existido y existirá.
Nadie tiene la exclusividad de Dios, dado que si Dios es uno y único es evidente que ha de ser el mismo para todos, sea cual sea la religión que se profese.
3) ¿En qué consiste el amor hacia Dios?
El amor hacia Dios consiste en el respeto a sus leyes y en nuestro esfuerzo para cumplirlas.
4) ¿Cuál es el propósito de la religión?
El propósito de la religión es perfeccionar nuestras almas a través del amor a Dios y al prójimo, ennoblecer nuestros sentimientos y fomentar el servicio al prójimo.
5) ¿Tiene necesidad la Humanidad de la religión?
El propósito de la religión muestra claramente que la Humanidad necesita la religión; la historia de la Humanidad demuestra, con pruebas evidentes, que nunca ha habido un pueblo sin religión.
6) ¿Cómo se ha desarrollado la religión?
La religión se ha desarrollado debido a lainfluencia de líderes ilustrados, racionales, morales y religiosos que nos han llevado a una clara convicción religiosa, que se corresponde con la razón.
Usualmente a esos líderes les llamamos profetas, apóstoles o fundadores de la religión.
En el curso de la historia, esos mensajeros de Dios fueron Zoroastro para los persas, Confucio para los chinos, Buda para los hindues, Moisés y los profetas para los Judios y Mahoma para los árabes.
7) ¿Quién fue el mayor profeta de Dios?
Para nosotros los Cristianos, el mayor profeta de Dios es Jesús, el fundador de la religión cristiana. Él nos enseñó tanto el conocimiento y el amor de Dios.
Nadie puede poner cualquier otro fundamento que el que se ha establecido; que es Jesucristo. (1 Corintios 3,11)
8) ¿Cómo sabemos acerca de las enseñanzas de los profetas y de Jesús?
Sabemos que las enseñanzas de los profetas y de Jesús por la Biblia, a la que también llamamos la Sagradas Escrituras.
9) ¿Qué es la Biblia?
La Biblia es un conjunto de libros que incluye 66 obras de la antigüedad, de autores y con contenido diferente.
10) ¿Cuántas partes tiene la Biblia?
La Biblia tiene dos partes principales: El Antiguo Pacto o Antiguo Testamento y el Nuevo Pacto o Nuevo Testamento. El Antiguo Testamento contiene 39 libros, el Nuevo Testamento 27 libros.
11) ¿Quién escribió los libros del Antiguo Testamento?
Los libros del Antiguo Testamento fueron escritos antes del nacimiento de Jesús por parte de los maestros y profetas del pueblo judío en los idiomas hebreo y arameo.
12) ¿Cuál es el orden de los libros en el Antiguo Testamento?
El orden de los libros del Antiguo Testamento es:
Los Cinco Libros de Moisés, Josué, Jueces, Ruth, I y II Samuel, I y II Reyes, I y II Crónicas, Esra, Nehemías, Esther, Job, Salmos, Proverbios, eclesiásticos, Cantar de los Cantares, Isaías, Jeremías, Lamentaciones de Jeremías, Ezequiel, Daniel, Oseas, Joel, Amós, Abdías, Jonás, Miqueas, Nahum, Habacuc, Sofonías, Hageo, Zacarías, Malaquías.
13) ¿Qué contiene el Antiguo Testamento?
El Antiguo Testamento contiene las normas morales y religiosas del pueblo judío y de las enseñanzas de los profetas.
14) ¿Cuál es la enseñanza fundamental del Antiguo Testamento?
La enseñanza fundamental del Antiguo Testamento son los Diez Mandamientos de Moisés, que pueden resumirse como sigue: Dios es Uno y sólo a Dios adorarás; no fabricar ni adorar ídolos, no tomar el nombre de Dios en vano; guardar las fiestas; honrar a tus padres; no matar; no cometer adulterio; no robar; no mentir; no envidiar.
Véase, la totalidad del texto de los Diez Mandamientos:
Éxodo 20,1-17:
20:1 Y habló Dios todas estas palabras, diciendo:
20:2 Yo soy Jehová tu Dios, que te saqué de la tierra de Egipto, de casa de servidumbre.
20:3 No tendrás dioses ajenos delante de mí.
20:4 No te harás imagen, ni ninguna semejanza de lo que esté arriba en el cielo, ni abajo en la tierra, ni en las aguas debajo de la tierra.
20:5 No te inclinarás a ellas, ni las honrarás; porque yo soy Jehová tu Dios, fuerte, celoso, que visito la maldad de los padres sobre los hijos hasta la tercera y cuarta generación de los que me aborrecen,
20:6 y hago misericordia a millares, a los que me aman y guardan mis mandamientos.
20:7 No tomarás el nombre de Jehová tu Dios en vano; porque no dará por inocente Jehová al que tomare su nombre en vano.
20:8 Acuérdate del día de reposo para santificarlo.
20:9 Seis días trabajarás, y harás toda tu obra;
20:10 mas el séptimo día es reposo para Jehová tu Dios; no hagas en él obra alguna, ni tú, ni tu hijo, ni tu hija, ni tu siervo, ni tu criada, ni tu bestia, ni tu extranjero que está dentro de tus puertas.
20:11 Porque en seis días hizo Jehová los cielos y la tierra, el mar, y todas las cosas que en ellos hay, y reposó en el séptimo día; por tanto, Jehová bendijo el día de reposo y lo santificó.
20:12 Honra a tu padre y a tu madre, para que tus días se alarguen en la tierra que Jehová tu Dios te da.
20:13 No matarás.
20:14 No cometerás adulterio.
20:15 No hurtarás.
20:16 No hablarás contra tu prójimo falso testimonio.
20:17 No codiciarás la casa de tu prójimo, no codiciarás la mujer de tu prójimo, ni su siervo, ni su criada, ni su buey, ni su asno, ni cosa alguna de tu prójimo.
15) ¿Quién escribió los libros del Nuevo Testamento?
Los libros del Nuevo Testamento fueron escritos después de la muerte de Jesús en griego y en arameo por los evangelistas y apóstoles.
16) ¿Cual es el orden de los libros del Nuevo Testamento?
El orden de los libros del Nuevo Testamento: El Evangelio según Mateo, Marcos, Lucas y Juan, Los Hechos de los Apóstoles, las cartas de Pablo: Romanos, I y II Corintios, Gálatas, Efesios, Filipenses, Colosenses, I y II Tesalonicenses , I y II Timoteo, Tito, Filemón, y Hebreos, las cartas de Santiago, Pedro I y II, I, II y III Juan, la carta de Judas y el libro de Revelaciones.
17) ¿Qué es lo que contiene el Nuevo Testamento?
La primera parte del Nuevo Testamento: el Evangelio según Marcos, Mateo, Lucas y Juan contiene la historia de la vida y las enseñanzas de Jesús, y la otra parte nos muestra el trabajo y las enseñanzas de los Apóstoles. Debido a su contenido, al Nuevo Testamento se le llama también Evangelio, que significa "mensaje alegre".
18) ¿Por qué es necesario conocer la Biblia?
Es necesario conocer la Biblia porque las enseñanzas que se incluyen en ella son la base de la religión cristiana y para la vida cristiana. Por esta razón tenemos que leer y estudiar la Biblia con amor y usando la razón.
Pero él respondió, porque escrito está: No sólo de pan vivirá, sino de toda palabra que sale de la boca de Dios. (Mateo 4,4)
Por lo que fue escrito en tiempos pasados fue escrito para nuestra instrucción, para que por la constancia y por el fomento de la Escritura nosotros podamos tener esperanza. (Roma 5,4)
19) ¿Cómo se llaman a aquellos cuya religión se basa en las enseñanzas de Jesús?
Aquellos, cuya religión se basa en la enseñanza de Jesús somos llamados cristianos. Ser "cristiano" significa que pertenece o es seguidor de Jesús.
Así fue que durante un año entero se reunieron con la iglesia y enseñó un gran número de personas y que fue en Antioquía que los discípulos fueron llamados en primer lugar " cristianos". (Hechos 11,26)
20) ¿Están unidos los cristianos?
La Cristiandad no está unida. En el curso de la historia, la religión cristiana se ha dividido en diferentes denominaciones. Pero los cristianos que viven en la tierra están unidos por la enseñanza de Jesús sobre la unidad fraterna. El número de cristianos es de aproximadamente un mil doscientos millones.
Porque así como el cuerpo es uno y tiene muchos miembros y todos los miembros del cuerpo, aunque muchos, son un solo cuerpo, así es con Cristo. Uno en el Espíritu fuimos todos bautizados en un cuerpo - Judíos o griegos, esclavos o libres - y todos se nos dio a beber de un mismo Espíritu. (1Corintios 12,12-13)
21) ¿Por qué el Cristianismo se divide en distintas denominaciones?
Entre los cristianos de la antigüedad y más tarde en la época de la Reforma, surgieron diferentes ideas acerca de la personalidad y la enseñanza de Jesús. Esto dio lugar a distintas denominaciones las cuales se han formado a partir de los seguidores de estos diferentes conceptos religiosos.
22) ¿Cuál es nuestra religión?
Nuestra religión se denomina Cristiana Unitaria (o Unitarista) para indicar que creemos en un solo y único Dios (a diferencia de politeistas y trinitarios) y que seguimos las enseñanzas de Jesucristo. Por ello somos Unitarios/as o Unitaristas.
23 ¿Se puede ser Cristiano sin ser Unitarista o Unitarista sin ser Cristiano?
Si. Hay Cristianos que son trinitarios (por ejemplo Ortodoxos y Católicos) y hay Unitaristas que no son Cristianos (por ejemplo Judíos y Mahometanos).
Incluso hay Cristianos que siendo Unitaristas (en sentido estricto) están adscritos a denominaciones no unitaristas (tales como los Testigos de Jehová y los Cristadelfianos)
24) ¿Quién es considerado el padre del moderno Unitarismo?
El médico y teólogo español Miguel Servet (o Serveto) es considerado el padre del moderno Unitarismo.
Servet nació en Villanueva de Sigena (Huesca) en 1511 y murió quemado en la hoguera en Ginebra (Suiza) en 1553.
Además del español, hablaba el francés, el italiano, el latín, el griego y el hebreo. Estudió Medicina, Teología y Derecho.
En 1531 publicó De Trinitatis Erroribus (De los errores de la Trinidad) obra que causó gran revuelo y en la que argumenta que el dogma de la Trinidad carece de base bíblica ya que no se haya en las Escrituras sino que fue concebido por elucubraciones filosóficas posteriores. El año siguiente publicó Dialogorum de Trinitate (Diálogos sobre la Trinidad), acompañado de una obra suplementaria, De Iustitia Regni Christi (Sobre la Justicia del Reino de Dios). Otro opúsculo de esta misma época, aunque de datación imprecisa, es Declarationis Iesus Christi Filii Dei (Declaración de Jesucristo Hijo de Dios), también conocido como "Manuscrito de Stuttgart".
Como médico y científico destacó por ser el que primero describió la circulación de la sangre.
Debido a sus divergencias con Calvino fue detenido en Ginebra y condenado a muerte lo que tuvo lugar el 27 de octubre de 1553. Independientemente de la importancia de sus descubrimientos fisiológicos o de su labor como polemista religioso, la figura de Miguel Servet se distingue como mártir de la libertad de pensamiento y de expresión de las ideas, cualesquiera que éstas fuesen, en abierto desafío a cualquiera que quisiese coartarla.
Las Iglesis Unitarias consideran a Servet su pionero y primer mártir.
25) ¿Cuáles son los antecedentes del Unitarismo?
Los orígenes del Unitarismo cabe encontrarlos en los primeros siglos del Cristianismo en los que la religión predicada por Jesus y difundida por los apóstoles, se basaba en la creencia en un solo Dios.
En el siglo III, surgió con gran fuerza en el mundo cristiano la idea de la Trinidad, que fue rechazada por figuras tales como Arrio, como contraria a las enseñanzas originales de Jesús. La imposición del Credo católico y del dogma trinitario en los Concilios de Nicea (325) y Constantinopla (381) supuso la condena como herejías de las ideas unitarias (de las que el arrianismo fue su principal exponente) y la persecución de sus seguidores.
En España, el Arrianismo sobrevivió más de dos siglos como religión oficial hasta la conversión del rey visigodo Recaredo al Catolicismo en 587.
26 ¿Qué otros maestros son considerados sucesores de Servet y padres del Unitarismo?
La vida, obra y sacrificio de Miguel Servet sirvieron de guía a muchos.
Sebastian Castellio reprochó duramente a Calvino su intolerancia y su fanatismo y proclamó la libertad de conciencia en asuntos de fe, un principio que luego ha sido fundamental en la tradición Unitaria y Universalista.
Entretanto el húngaro Ferecz David predicaba el Cristianismo Unitario en Transilvania (país situado en lo que hoy es Rumanía).
Por su parte, el italiano Fausto Socino (Sozzini) publicó una obra en la que tomaba a Cristo como modelo humano de vida y rechazaba el dogma de su naturaleza divina (Socinianismo). Socino, perseguido también por sus creencias, encontró refugio en Polonia, donde se unió a otros reformadores liberales y antitrinitarios de aquel país, en el grupo denominado Hermanos Polacos (después aniquilado por la Contrarreforma Católica).
27) ¿A quién se considera fundador de la Iglesia Unitaria o Unitarista?
Ferecz David está considerado como el fundador de la Iglesia Unitaria o Unitarista en Transilvania en 1560 de donde se extendió rápidamente por Hungría y Rumanía. El rey Segismundo de Transilvania aceptó el Unitarismo y dictó el primer Edicto de Tolerancia religiosa en la historia moderna de Europa en 1568. Tras la muerte del rey Segismundo llegó la Contrarreforma a Transilvania. Ferenc Dávid fue condenado a cadena perpetua y murió en prisión en 1579, sin que se conozcan las causas de su muerte ni el lugar donde fue enterrado su cadáver, pero la Iglesia Unitaria que él fundó ha logrado sobrevivir con grandes dificultades hasta nuestros días.
28) ¿Qué pasó después de la muerte de Francisco David?
Tras la muerte de de Ferenc David siguió un período muy difícil en la historia de nuestra iglesia. En primer lugar, la intolerancia religiosa y más tarde, la represión política oprimió de nuestra iglesia. En lugar de construir, nuestros antepasados se vieron obligados a reunir todas sus fuerzas para la autodefensa. En esta dura lucha muchas de nuestras iglesias y congregaciones se han perdido, así como cerca de las tres cuartas partes de nuestros creyentes. Sólo la Divina Providencia, la ley de libertad religiosa y la heroica persistencia de una porción de nuestros creyentes ha resguardado nuestra iglesia de la total desaparición.
29) ¿Qué desarrollo tuvo el Unitarismo en otros países?
En Inglaterra hubo unitarios aislados hacia 1600, el más notable de los cuales fue John Biddle, aunque el Unitarismo se desarrolló como movimiento formal alrededor de 1700, en parte dentro de la Iglesia de Inglaterra, pero principalmente en círculos disidentes. En Estados Unidos el liberalismo religioso que vino ser conocido como Unitarismo surgió dentro de las iglesias congregacionales en Massachusetts como reacción contra el Gran Despertar (1740-43). La elección (1805) de Henry Ware como profesor de la Cátedra Hollis de Teología en la Universidad Harvard desencadenó una controversia, a resultas de la cual los liberales pasaron a ser una denominación separada. El sermón de William Ellery Channing (1819) intitulado "Cristianismo Unitario" fue una influyente declaración de sus creencias.
En 1838, en su discurso en la Facultad de Teología, Ralph Waldo Emerson declaró que la verdad religiosa debe basarse en la conciencia interna, no en pruebas históricas externas. Los unitarios más conservadores se opusieron a Emerson y sus seguidores, conocidos como trascendentalistas, temiendo que tal subjetivismo destruyera la posición cristiana de ser una religión divinamente revelada. Desde la controversia sobre el Trascendentalismo, algunos dentro de la denominación siempre han estimado importante mantener continuidad con la tradición cristiana, en tanto que otros han encontrado que el cristianismo es intelectualmente limitado y emocionalmente restrictivo.
30) ¿´Qué personajes españoles fueron influidos por el Unitarismo?
Dicen que el reformador español Casiodoro Reina, traductor de la Biblia, lloró al contemplar el lugar de Ginebra donde fue martirizado Miguel Servet, y que desde entonces fue considerado sospechoso de ser afín al Unitarismo. En cualquier caso, desde la muerte de Servet, el aparato represor de la Inquisición y el Estado impidieron cualquier brote unitarista en España durante muchos años. Algunos sólo pudieron conocerlo en otros países, como el escritor y erudito español José María Blanco White, que perteneció a la iglesia unitaria de Liverpool en los últimos años de su vida, durante su exilio en Inglaterra. Otra gran figura que se sintió identificada con el Unitarismo fue el político y educador Gumersindo de Azcárate, krausista y uno de los promotores de la Institución Libre de Enseñanza . Tanto Azcárate como Francisco Giner de los Rios fueron admiradores de las obras de los líderes intelectuales del Unitarismo norteamericano, Willian E. Channing y Theodore Parker y transmitieron esta admiración a muchos de sus alumnos, entre ellos Miguel de Unamuno.
Unitarian Christianity
By William Ellery Channing
Delivered at the Ordination of Rev. Jared Sparks in The First Independent Church of Baltimore on May 5, 1819.
1 Thes. v. 21: "Prove all things; hold fast that which is good."
The peculiar circumstances of this occasion not only justify, but seem to demand a departure from the course generally followed by preachers at the introduction of a brother into the sacred office. It is usual to speak of the nature, design, duties, and advantages of the Christian ministry; and on these topics I should now be happy to insist, did I not remember that a minister is to be given this day to a religious society, whose peculiarities of opinion have drawn upon them much remark, and may I not add, much reproach. Many good minds, many sincere Christians, I am aware, are apprehensive that the solemnities of this day are to give a degree of influence to principles which they deem false and injurious. The fears and anxieties of such men I respect; and, believing that they are grounded in part on mistake, I have thought it my duty to lay before you, as clearly as I can, some of the distinguishing opinions of that class of Christians in our country, who are known to sympathize with this religious society. I must ask your patience, for such a subject is not to be despatched in a narrow compass. I must also ask you to remember, that it is impossible to exhibit, in a single discourse, our views of every doctrine of Revelation, much less the differences of opinion which are known to subsist among ourselves. I shall confine myself to topics, on which our sentiments have been misrepresented, or which distinguish us most widely from others. May I not hope to be heard with candor? God deliver us all from prejudice and unkindness, and fill us with the love of truth and virtue.
There are two natural divisions under which my thoughts will be arranged. I shall endeavour to unfold, 1st, The principles which we adopt in interpreting the Scriptures. And 2dly, Some of the doctrines, which the Scriptures, so interpreted, seem to us clearly to express.
I. We regard the Scriptures as the records of God's successive revelations to mankind, and particularly of the last and most perfect revelation of his will by Jesus Christ. Whatever doctrines seem to us to be clearly taught in the Scriptures; we receive without reserve or exception. We do not, however, attach equal importance to all the books in this collection. Our religion, we believe, lies chiefly in the New Testament. The dispensation of Moses, compared with that of Jesus, we consider as adapted to the childhood of the human race, a preparation for a nobler system, and chiefly useful now as serving to confirm and illustrate the Christian Scriptures. Jesus Christ is the only master of Christians, and whatever he taught, either during his personal ministry, or by his inspired Apostles, we regard as of divine authority, and profess to make the rule of our lives.
This authority, which we give to the Scriptures, is a reason, we conceive, for studying them with peculiar care, and for inquiring anxiously into the principles of interpretation, by which their true meaning may be ascertained. The principles adopted by the class of Christians in whose name I speak, need to be explained, because they are often misunderstood. We are particularly accused of making an unwarrantable use of reason in the interpretation of Scripture. We are said to exalt reason above revelation, to prefer our own wisdom to God's. Loose and undefined charges of this kind are circulated so freely, that we think it due to ourselves, and to the cause of truth, to express our views with some particularity.
Our leading principle in interpreting Scripture is this, that the Bible is a book written for men, in the language of men, and that its meaning is to be sought in the same manner as that of other books. We believe that God, when he speaks to the human race, conforms, if we may so say, to the established rules of speaking and writing. How else would the Scriptures avail us more, than if communicated in an unknown tongue?
Now all books, and all conversation, require in the reader or hearer the constant exercise of reason; or their true import is only to be obtained by continual comparison and inference. Human language, you well know, admits various interpretations; and every word and every sentence must be modified and explained according to the subject which is discussed, according to the purposes, feelings, circumstances, and principles of the writer, and according to the genius and idioms of the language which he uses. These are acknowledged principles in the interpretation of human writings; and a man, whose words we should explain without reference to these principles, would reproach us justly with a criminal want of candor, and an intention of obscuring or distorting his meaning.
Were the Bible written in a language and style of its own, did it consist of words, which admit but a single sense, and of sentences wholly detached from each other, there would be no place for the principles now laid down. We could not reason about it, as about other writings. But such a book would be of little worth; and perhaps, of all books, the Scriptures correspond least to this description. The Word of God hears the stamp of the same hand, which we see in his works. It has infinite connexions and dependences. Every proposition is linked with others, and is to be compared with others; that its full and precise import may he understood. Nothing stands alone. The New Testament is built on the Old. The Christian dispensation is a continuation of the Jewish, the completion of a vast scheme of providence, requiring great extent of view in the reader. Still more, the Bible treats of subjects on which we receive ideas from other sources besides itself; such subjects as the nature, passions, relations, and duties of man; and it expects us to restrain and modify its language by the known truths, which observation and experience furnish on these topics.
We profess not to know a book, which demands a more frequent exercise of reason than the Bible. In addition to the remarks now made on its infinite connexions, we may observe, that its style nowhere affects the precision of science, or the accuracy of definition. Its language is singularly glowing, bold, and figurative, demanding more frequent departures from the literal sense, than that of our own age and country, and consequently demanding more continual exercise of judgment. -- We find, too, that the different portions of this book, instead of being confined to general truths, refer perpetually to the times when they were written, to states of society, to modes of thinking, to controversies in the church, to feelings and usages which have passed away, and without the knowledge of which we are constantly in danger of extending to all times, and places, what was of temporary and local application. -- We find, too, that some of these books are strongly marked by the genius and character of their respective writers, that the Holy Spirit did not so guide the Apostles as to suspend the peculiarities of their minds, and that a knowledge of their feelings, and of the influences under which they were placed, is one of the preparations for understanding their writings. With these views of the Bible, we feel it our bounden duty to exercise our reason upon it perpetually, to compare, to infer, to look beyond the letter to the spirit, to seek in the nature of the subject, and the aim of the writer, his true meaning; and, in general, to make use of what is known, for explaining what is difficult, and for discovering new truths.
Need I descend to particulars, to prove that the Scriptures demand the exercise of reason? Take, for example, the style in which they generally speak of God, and observe how habitually they apply to him human passions and organs. Recollect the declarations of Christ, that he came not to send peace, but a sword; that unless we eat his flesh, and drink his blood, we have no life in us; that we must hate father and mother, and pluck out the right eye; and a vast number of passages equally bold and unlimited. Recollect the unqualified manner in which it is said of Christians, that they possess all things, know all things, and can do all things. Recollect the verbal contradiction between Paul and James, and the apparent clashing of some parts of Paul's writings with the general doctrines and end of Christianity. I might extend the enumeration indefinitely; and who does not see, that we must limit all these passages by the known attributes of God, of Jesus Christ, and of human nature, and by the circumstances under which they were written, so as to give the language a quite different import from what it would require, had it been applied to different beings, or used in different connexions.
Enough has been said to show, in what sense we make use of reason in interpreting Scripture. From a variety of possible interpretations, we select that which accords with the nature of the subject and the state of the writer, with the connexion of the passage, with the general strain of Scripture, with the known character and will of God, and with the obvious and acknowledged laws of nature. In other words, we believe that God never contradicts, in one part of scripture, what he teaches in another; and never contradicts, in revelation, what he teaches in his works and providence. And we therefore distrust every interpretation, which, after deliberate attention, seems repugnant to any established truth. We reason about the Bible precisely as civilians do about the constitution under which we live; who, you know, are accustomed to limit one provision of that venerable instrument by others, and to fix the precise import of its parts, by inquiring into its general spirit, into the intentions of its authors, and into the prevalent feelings, impressions, and circumstances of the time when it was framed. Without these principles of interpretation, we frankly acknowledge, that we cannot defend the divine authority of the Scriptures. Deny us this latitude, and we must abandon this book to its enemies.
We do not announce these principles as original, or peculiar to ourselves. All Christians occasionally adopt them, not excepting those who most vehemently decry them, when they happen to menace some favorite article of their creed. All Christians are compelled to use them in their controversies with infidels. All sects employ them in their warfare with one another. All willingly avail themselves of reason, when it can be pressed into the service of their own party, and only complain of it, when its weapons wound themselves. None reason more frequently than those from whom we differ. It is astonishing what a fabric they rear from a few slight hints about the fall of our first parents; and how ingeniously they extract, from detached passages, mysterious doctrines about the divine nature. We do not blame them for reasoning so abundantly, but for violating the fundamental rules of reasoning, for sacrificing the plain to the obscure, and the general strain of Scripture to a scanty number of insulated texts.
We object strongly to the contemptuous manner in which human reason is often spoken of by our adversaries, because it leads, we believe, to universal skepticism. If reason be so dreadfully darkened by the fall, that its most decisive judgments on religion are unworthy of trust, then Christianity, and even natural theology, must be abandoned; for the existence and veracity of God, and the divine original of Christianity, are conclusions of reason, and must stand or fall with it. If revelation be at war with this faculty, it subverts itself, for the great question of its truth is left by God to be decided at the bar of reason. It is worthy of remark, how nearly the bigot and the skeptic approach. Both would annihilate our confidence in our faculties, and both throw doubt and confusion over every truth. We honor revelation too highly to make it the antagonist of reason, or to believe that it calls us to renounce our highest powers.
We indeed grant, that the use of reason in religion is accompanied with danger. But we ask any honest man to look back on the history of the church, and say, whether the renunciation of it be not still more dangerous. Besides, it is a plain fact, that men reason as erroneously on all subjects, as on religion. Who does not know the wild and groundless theories, which have been framed in physical and political science? But who ever supposed, that we must cease to exercise reason on nature and society, because men have erred for ages in explaining them? We grant, that the passions continually, and sometimes fatally, disturb the rational faculty in its inquiries into revelation. The ambitious contrive to find doctrines in the Bible, which favor their love of dominion. The timid and dejected discover there a gloomy system, and the mystical and fanatical, a visionary theology. The vicious can find examples or assertions on which to build the hope of a late repentance, or of acceptance on easy terms. The falsely refined contrive to light on doctrines which have not been soiled by vulgar handling. But the passions do not distract the reason in religious, any more than in other inquiries, which excite strong and general interest; and this faculty, of consequence, is not to be renounced in religion, unless we are prepared to discard it universally. The true inference from the almost endless errors, which have darkened theology, is, not that we are to neglect and disparage our powers, but to exert them more patiently, circumspectly, uprightly. The worst errors, after all, having sprung up in that church, which proscribes reason, and demands from its members implicit faith. The most pernicious doctrines have been the growth of the darkest times, when the general credulity encouraged bad men and enthusiasts to broach their dreams and inventions, and to stifle the faint remonstrances of reasons, by the menaces of everlasting perdition. Say what we may, God has given us a rational nature, and will call us to account for it. We may let it sleep, but we do so at our peril. Revelation is addressed to us as rational beings. We may wish, in our to sloth, that God had given us a system, demand of comparing, limiting, and inferring. But such a system would be at variance with the whole character of our present existence; and it is the part of wisdom to take revelation as it is given to us, and to interpret it by the help of the faculties, which it everywhere supposes, and on which founded.
To the views now given, an objection is commonly urged from the character of God. We are told, that God being infinitely wiser than men, his discoveries will surpass human reason. In a revelation from such a teacher, we ought to expect propositions, which we cannot reconcile with one another, and which may seem to contradict established truths ; and it becomes us not to question or explain them away, but to believe, and adore, and to submit our weak and carnal reason to the Divine Word. To this objection, we have two short answers. We say, first, that it is impossible that a teacher of infinite wisdom should expose those, whom he would teach, to infinite error. But if once we admit, that propositions, which in their literal sense appear plainly repugnant to one another, or to any known truth, are still to be literally understood and received, what possible limit can we set to the belief of contradictions? What shelter have we from the wildest fanaticism, which can always quote passages, that, in their literal and obvious sense, give support to its extravagances? How can the Protestant escape from transubstantiation, a doctrine most clearly taught us, if the submission of reason, now contended for, be a duty? How can we even hold fast the truth of revelation, for if one apparent contradiction may be true, so may another, and the proposition, that Christianity is false, though involving inconsistency, may still be a verity?
We answer again, that, if God be infinitely wise, he cannot sport with the understandings of his creatures. A wise teacher discovers his wisdom in adapting himself to the capacities of his pupils, not in perplexing them with what is unintelligible, not in distressing them with apparent contradictions, not in filling them with a skeptical distrust of their own powers. An infinitely wise teacher, who knows the precise extent of our minds, and the best method of enlightening them, will surpass all other instructors in bringing down truth to our apprehension, and in showing its loveliness and harmony. We ought, indeed, to expect occasional obscurity in such a book as the Bible, which was written for past and future ages, as well as for the present. But God's wisdom is a pledge, that whatever is necessary for US, and necessary for salvation, is revealed too plainly to be mistaken, and too consistently to be questioned, by a sound and upright mind. It is not the mark of wisdom, to use an unintelligible phraseology, to communicate what is above our capacities, to confuse and unsettle the intellect by appearances of contradiction. We honor our Heavenly Teacher too much to ascribe to him such a revelation. A revelation is a gift of light. It cannot thicken our darkness, and multiply our perplexities.
II. Having thus stated the principles according to which we interpret Scripture, I now proceed to the second great head of this discourse, which is, to state some of the views which we derive from that sacred book, particularly those which distinguish us from other Christians.
1. In the first place, we believe in the doctrine of God's UNITY, or that there is one God, and one only. To this truth we give infinite importance, and we feel ourselves bound to take heed, lest any man spoil us of it by vain philosophy. The proposition, that there is one God, seems to us exceedingly plain. We understand by it, that there is one being, one mind, one person, one intelligent agent, and one only, to whom underived and infinite perfection and dominion belong. We conceive, that these words could have conveyed no other meaning to the simple and uncultivated people who were set apart to be the depositaries of this great truth, and who were utterly incapable of understanding those hair- breadth distinctions between being and person, which the sagacity of later ages has discovered. We find no intimation, that this language was to be taken in an unusual sense, or that God's unity was a quite different thing from the oneness of other intelligent beings.
We object to the doctrine of the Trinity, that, whilst acknowledging in words, it subverts in effect, the unity of God. According to this doctrine, there are three infinite and equal persons, possessing supreme divinity, called the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Each of these persons, as described by theologians, has his own particular consciousness, will, and perceptions. They love each other, converse with each other, and delight in each other's society. They perform different parts in man's redemption, each having his appropriate office, and neither doing the work of the other. The Son is mediator and not the Father. The Father sends the Son, and is not himself sent; nor is he conscious, like the Son, of taking flesh. Here, then, we have three intelligent agents, possessed of different consciousness, different wills, and different perceptions, performing different acts, and sustaining different relations; and if these things do not imply and constitute three minds or beings, we are utterly at a loss to know how three minds or beings are to be formed. It is difference of properties, and acts, and consciousness, which leads us to the belief of different intelligent beings, and, if this mark fails us, our whole knowledge fall; we have no proof, that all the agents and persons in the universe are not one and the same mind. When we attempt to conceive of three Gods, we can do nothing more than represent to ourselves three agents, distinguished from each other by similar marks and peculiarities to those which separate the persons of the Trinity; and when common Christians hear these persons spoken of as conversing with each other, loving each other, and performing different acts, how can they help regarding them as different beings, different minds?
We do, then, with all earnestness, though without reproaching our brethren, protest against the irrational and unscriptural doctrine of the Trinity. "To us," as to the Apostle and the primitive Christians, "there is one God, even the Father." With Jesus, we worship the Father, as the only living and true God. We are astonished, that any man can read the New Testament, and avoid the conviction, that the Father alone is God. We hear our Saviour continually appropriating this character to the Father. We find the Father continually distinguished from Jesus by this title. "God sent his Son." "God anointed Jesus." Now, how singular and inexplicable is this phraseology, which fills the New Testament, if this title belong equally to Jesus, and if a principal object of this book is to reveal him as God, as partaking equally with the Father in supreme divinity! We challenge our opponents to adduce one passage in the New Testament, where the word God means three persons, where it is not limited to one person, and where, unless turned from its usual sense by the connexion, it does not mean the Father. Can stronger proof be given, that the doctrine of three persons in the Godhead is not a fundamental doctrine of Christianity?
This doctrine, were it true, must, from its difficulty, singularity, and importance, have been laid down with great clearness, guarded with great care, and stated with all possible precision. But where does this statement appear? From the many passages which treat of God, we ask for one, one only, in which we are told, that he is a threefold being, or that he is three persons, or that he is Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. On the contrary, in the New Testament, where, at least, we might expect many express assertions of this nature, God is declared to be one, without the least attempt to prevent the acceptation of the words in their common sense; and he is always spoken of and addressed in the singular number, that is, in language which was universally understood to intend a single person, and to which no other idea could have been attached, without an express admonition. So entirely do the Scriptures abstain from stating the Trinity, that when our opponents would insert it into their creeds and doxologies, they are compelled to leave the Bible, and to invent forms of words altogether unsanctioned by Scriptural phraseology. That a doctrine so strange, so liable to misapprehension, so fundamental as this is said to be, and requiring such careful exposition, should be left so undefined and unprotected, to be made out by inference, and to be hunted through distant and detached parts of Scripture, this is a difficulty, which, we think, no ingenuity can explain.
We have another difficulty. Christianity, it must be remembered, was planted and grew up amidst sharp-sighted enemies, who overlooked no objectionable part of the system, and who must have fastened with great earnestness on a doctrine involving such apparent contradictions as the Trinity. We cannot conceive an opinion, against which the Jews, who prided themselves on an adherence to God's unity, would have raised an equal clamor. Now, how happens it, that in the apostolic writings, which relate so much to objections against Christianity, and to the controversies which grew out of this religion, not one word is said, implying that objections were brought against the Gospel from the doctrine of the Trinity, not one word is uttered in its defence and explanation, not a word to rescue it from reproach and mistake? This argument has almost the force of demonstration. We are persuaded, that had three divine persons been announced by the first preachers of Christianity, all equal, and all infinite, one of whom was the very Jesus who had lately died on a cross, this peculiarity of Christianity would have almost absorbed every other, and the great labor of the Apostles would have been to repel the continual assaults, which it would have awakened. But the fact is, that not a whisper of objection to Christianity, on that account, reaches our ears from the apostolic age. In the Epistles we see not a trace of controversy called forth by the Trinity.
We have further objections to this doctrine, drawn from its practical influence. We regard it as unfavorable to devotion, by dividing and distracting the mind in its communion with God. It is a great excellence of the doctrine of God's unity, that it offers to us ONE OBJECT of supreme homage, adoration, and love, One Infinite Father, one Being of beings, one original and fountain, to whom we may refer all good, in whom all our powers and affections may be concentrated, and whose lovely and venerable nature may pervade all our thoughts. True piety, when directed to an undivided Deity, has a chasteness, a singleness, most favorable to religious awe and love. Now, the Trinity sets before us three distinct objects of supreme adoration; three infinite persons, having equal claims on our hearts; three divine agents, performing different offices, and to be acknowledged and worshipped in different relations. And is it possible, we ask, that the weak and limited mind of man can attach itself to these with the same power and joy, as to One Infinite Father, the only First Cause, in whom all the blessings of nature and redemption meet as their centre and source? Must not devotion be distracted by the equal and rival claims of three equal persons, and must not the worship of the conscientious, consistent Christian, be disturbed by an apprehension, lest he withhold from one or another of these, his due proportion of homage?
We also think, that the doctrine of the Trinity injures devotion, not only by joining to the Father other objects of worship, but by taking from the Father the supreme affection, which is his due, and transferring it to the Son. This is a most important view. That Jesus Christ, if exalted into the infinite Divinity, should be more interesting than the Father, is precisely what might be expected from history, and from the principles of human nature. Men want an object of worship like themselves, and the great secret of idolatry lies in this propensity. A God, clothed in our form, and feeling our wants and sorrows, speaks to our weak nature more strongly, than a Father in heaven, a pure spirit, invisible and unapproachable, save by the reflecting and purified mind. -- We think, too, that the peculiar offices ascribed to Jesus by the popular theology, make him the most attractive person in the Godhead. The Father is the depositary of the justice, the vindicator of the rights, the avenger of the laws of the Divinity. On the other hand, the Son, the brightness of the divine mercy, stands between the incensed Deity and guilty humanity, exposes his meek head to the storms, and his compassionate breast to the sword of the divine justice, bears our whole load of punishment, and purchases with his blood every blessing which descends from heaven. Need we state the effect of these representations, especially on common minds, for whom Christianity was chiefly designed, and whom it seeks to bring to the Father as the loveliest being? We do believe, that the worship of a bleeding, suffering God, tends strongly to absorb the mind and to draw it from other objects, just as the human tenderness of the Virgin Mary has given her so conspicuous a place in the devotions of the Church of Rome. We believe, too, that this worship, though attractive, is not most fitted to spiritualize the mind, that it awakens human transport, rather than that deep veneration of the moral perfections of God, which is the essence of piety.
2. Having thus given our views of the unity of God, I proceed in the second place to observe, that we believe in the unity of Jesus Christ. We believe that Jesus is one mind, one soul, one being, as truly one as we are, and equally distinct from the one God. We complain of the doctrine of the Trinity, that, not satisfied with making God three beings, it makes; Jesus Christ two beings, and thus introduces infinite confusion into our conceptions of his character. This corruption of Christianity, alike repugnant to common sense and to the general strain of Scripture, is a remarkable proof of the power of a false philosophy in disfiguring the simple truth of Jesus.
According to this doctrine, Jesus Christ, instead of being one mind, one conscious intelligent principle, whom we can understand, consists of two souls, two minds; the one divine, the other human; the one weak, the other almighty; the one ignorant, the other omniscient. Now we maintain, that this is to make Christ two beings. To denominate him one person, one being, and yet to suppose him made up of two minds, infinitely different from each other, is to abuse and confound language, and to throw darkness over all our conceptions of intelligent natures. According to the common doctrine, each of these two minds in Christ has its own consciousness, its own will, its own perceptions. They have, in fact, no common properties. The divine mind feels none of the wants and sorrows of the human, and the human is infinitely removed from the perfection and happiness of the divine. Can you conceive of two beings in the universe more distinct? We have always thought that one person was constituted and distinguished by one consciousness. The doctrine, that one and the same person should have two consciousness, two wills, two souls, infinitely different from each other, this we think an enormous tax on human credulity.
We say, that if a doctrine, so strange, so difficult, so remote from all the previous conceptions of men, be indeed a part and an essential part of revelation, it must be taught with great distinctness, and we ask our brethren to point to some plain, direct passage, where Christ is said to be composed of two minds infinitely different, yet constituting one person. We find none. Other Christians, indeed, tell us, that this doctrine is necessary to the harmony of the Scriptures, that some texts ascribe to Jesus Christ human, and others divine properties, and that to reconcile these, we must suppose two minds, to which these properties may be referred. In other words, for the purpose of reconciling certain difficult passages, which a just criticism can in a great degree, if not wholly, explain, we must invent an hypothesis vastly more difficult, and involving gross absurdity. We are to find our way out of a labyrinth, by a clue which conducts us into mazes infinitely more inextricable.
Surely, if Jesus Christ felt that he consisted of two minds, and that this was a leading feature of his religion, his phraseology respecting himself would have been colored by this peculiarity. The universal language of men is framed upon the idea, that one person is one person, is one mind, and one soul; and when the multitude heard this language from the lips of Jesus, they must have taken it in its usual sense, and must have referred to a single soul all which he spoke, unless expressly instructed to interpret it differently. But where do we find this instruction? Where do you meet, in the New Testament, the phraseology which abounds in Trinitarian books, and which necessarily grows from the doctrine of two natures in Jesus? Where does this divine teacher say, "This I speak as God, and this as man; this is true only of my human mind, this only of my divine"? Where do we find in the Epistles a trace of this strange phraseology? Nowhere. It was not needed in that day. It was demanded by the errors of a later age.
We believe, then, that Christ is one mind, one being, and, I add, a being distinct from the one God. That Christ is not the one God, not the same being with the Father, is a necessary inference from our former head, in which we saw that the doctrine of three persons in God is a fiction. But on so important a subject, I would add a few remarks. We wish, that those from whom we differ, would weigh one striking fact. Jesus, in his preaching, continually spoke of God. The word was always in his mouth. We ask, does he, by this word, ever mean himself? We say, never. On the contrary, he most plainly distinguishes between God and himself, and so do his disciples. How this is to be reconciled with the idea, that the manifestation of Christ, as God, was a primary object of Christianity, our adversaries must determine.
If we examine the passages in which Jesus is distinguished from God, we shall see, that they not only speak of him as another being, but seem to labor to express his inferiority. He is continually spoken of as the Son of God, sent of God, receiving all his powers from God, working miracles because God was with him, judging justly because God taught him, having claims on our belief, because he was anointed and sealed by God, and as able of himself to do nothing. The New Testament is filled with this language. Now we ask, what impression this language was fitted and intended to make? Could any, who heard it, have imagined that Jesus was the very God to whom he was so industriously declared to be inferior; the very Being by whom he was sent, and from whom he professed to have received his message and power? Let it here be remembered, that the human birth, and bodily form, and humble circumstances, and mortal sufferings of Jesus, must all have prepared men to interpret, in the most unqualified manner, the language in which his inferiority to God was declared. Why, then, was this language used so continually, and without limitation, if Jesus were the Supreme Deity, and if this truth were an essential part of his religion? I repeat it, the human condition and sufferings of Christ tended strongly to exclude from men's minds the idea of his proper Godhead; and, of course, we should expect to find in the New Testament perpetual care and effort to counteract this tendency, to hold him forth as the same being with his Father, if this doctrine were, as is pretended, the soul and centre of his religion. We should expect to find the phraseology of Scripture cast into the mould of this doctrine, to hear familiarly of God the Son, of our Lord God Jesus, and to be told, that to us there is one God, even Jesus. But, instead of this, the inferiority of Christ pervades the New Testament. It is not only implied in the general phraseology, but repeatedly and decidedly expressed, and unaccompanied with any admonition to prevent its application to his whole nature. Could it, then, have been the great design of the sacred writers to exhibit Jesus as the Supreme God?
I am aware that these remarks will be met by two or three texts, in which Christ is called God, and by a class of passages, not very numerous, in which divine properties are said to be ascribed to him. To these we offer one plain answer. We say, that it is one of the most established and obvious principles of criticism, that language is to be explained according to the known properties of the subject to which it is applied. Every man knows, that the same words convey very different ideas, when used in relation to different beings. Thus, Solomon BUILT the temple in a different manner from the architect whom he employed; and God REPENTS differently from man. Now we maintain, that the known properties and circumstances of Christ, his birth, sufferings, and death, his constant habit of speaking of God as a distinct being from himself, his praying to God, his ascribing to God all his power and offices, these acknowledged properties of Christ, we say, oblige us to interpret the comparatively few passages which are thought to make him the Supreme God, in a manner consistent with his distinct and inferior nature. It is our duty to explain such texts by the rule which we apply to other texts, in which human beings are called gods, and are said to be partakers of the divine nature, to know and possess all things, and to be filled with all God's fulness. These latter passages we do not hesitate to modify, and restrain, and turn from the most obvious sense, because this sense is opposed to the known properties of the beings to whom they relate; and we maintain, that we adhere to the same principle, and use no greater latitude, in explaining, as we do, the passages which are thought to support the Godhead of Christ.
Trinitarians profess to derive some important advantages from their mode of viewing Christ. It furnishes them,they tell us, with an infinite atonement, for it shows them an infinite being suffering for their sins. The confidence with which this fallacy is repeated astonishes us. When pressed with the question, whether they really believe, that the infinite and unchangeable God suffered and died on the cross, they acknowledge that this is not true, but that Christ's human mind alone sustained the pains of death. How have we, then, an infinite sufferer? This language seems to us an imposition on common minds, and very derogatory to God's justice, as if this attribute could be satisfied by a sophism and a fiction.
We are also told, that Christ is a more interesting object, that his love and mercy are more felt, when he is viewed as the Supreme God, who left his glory to take humanity and to suffer for men. That Trinitarians are strongly moved by this representation, we do not mean to deny; but we think their emotions altogether founded on a misapprehension of their own doctrines. They talk of the second person of the Trinity's leaving his glory and his Father's bosom, to visit and save the world. But this second person, being the unchangeable and infinite God, was evidently incapable of parting with the least degree of his perfection and felicity. At the moment of his taking flesh, he was as intimately present with his Father as before, and equally with his Father filled heaven, and earth, and immensity. This Trinitarians acknowledge; and still they profess to be touched and overwhelmed by the amazing humiliation of this immutable being! But not only does their doctrine, when fully explained, reduce Christ's humiliation to a fiction, it almost wholly destroys the impressions with which his cross ought to be viewed. According to their doctrine, Christ was comparatively no sufferer at all. It is true, his human mind suffered; but this, they tell us, was an infinitely small part of Jesus, bearing no more proportion to his whole nature, than a single hair of our heads to the whole body, or than a drop to the ocean. The divine mind of Christ, that which was most properly himself, was infinitely happy, at the very moment of the suffering of his humanity. Whilst hanging on the cross, he was the happiest being in the universe, as happy as the infinite Father; so that his pains, compared with his felicity, were nothing. This Trinitarians do, and must, acknowledge. It follows necessarily from the immutableness of the divine nature, which they ascribe to Christ; so that their system, justly viewed, robs his death of interest, weakens our sympathy with his sufferings, and is, of all others, most unfavorable to a love of Christ, founded on a sense of his sacrifices for mankind. We esteem our own views to be vastly more affecting. It is our belief, that Christ's humiliation was real and entire, that the whole Saviour, and not a part of him, suffered, that his crucifixion was a scene of deep and unmixed agony. As we stand round his cross, our minds are not distracted, nor our sensibility weakened, by contemplating him as composed of incongruous and infinitely differing minds, and as having a balance of infinite felicity. We recognize in the dying Jesus but one mind. This, we think, renders his sufferings, and his patience and love in bearing them, incomparably more impressive and affecting than the system we oppose.
3. Having thus given our belief on two great points, namely, that there is one God, and that Jesus Christ is a being distinct from, and inferior to, God, I now proceed to another point, on which we lay still greater stress. We believe in the MORAL PERFECTION OF GOD. We consider no part of theology so important as that which treats of God's moral character; and we value our views of Christianity chiefly as they assert his amiable and venerable attributes.
It may be said, that, in regard to this subject, all Christians agree, that all ascribe to the Supreme Being infinite justice, goodness, and holiness. We reply, that it is very possible to speak of God magnificently, and to think of him meanly; to apply to his person high-sounding epithets, and to his government, principles which make him odious. The Heathens called Jupiter the greatest and the best; but his history was black with cruelty and lust. We cannot judge of men's real ideas of God by their general language, for in all ages they have hoped to soothe the Deity by adulation. We must inquire into their particular views of his purposes, of the principles of his administration, and of his disposition towards his creatures.
We conceive that Christians have generally leaned towards a very injurious view of the Supreme Being. They have too often felt, as if he were raised, by his greatness and sovereignty, above the principles of morality, above those eternal laws of equity and rectitude, to which all other beings are subjected. We believe, that in no being is the sense of right so strong, so omnipotent, as in God. We believe that his almighty power is entirely submitted to his perceptions of rectitude; and this is the ground of our piety. It is not because he is our Creator merely, but because he created us for good and holy purposes; it is not because his will is irresistible, but because his will is the perfection of virtue, that we pay him allegiance. We cannot bow before a being, however great and powerful, who governs tyrannically. We respect nothing but excellence, whether on earth or in heaven. We venerate not the loftiness of God's throne, but the equity and goodness in which it is established.
We believe that God is infinitely good, kind, benevolent, in the proper sense of these words; good in disposition, as well as in act; good, not to a few, but to all; good to every individual, as well as to the general system.
We believe, too, that God is just; but we never forget, that his justice is the justice of a good being, dwelling in the same mind, and acting in harmony, with perfect benevolence. By this attribute, we understand God's infinite regard to virtue or moral worth, expressed in a moral government; that is, in giving excellent and equitable laws, and in conferring such rewards, and inflicting such punishments, as are best fitted to secure their observance. God's justice has for its end the highest virtue of the creation, and it punishes for this end alone, and thus it coincides with benevolence; for virtue and happiness, though not the same, are inseparably conjoined.
God's justice thus viewed, appears to us to be in perfect harmony with his mercy. According to the prevalent systems of theology, these attributes are so discordant and jarring, that to reconcile them is the hardest task, and the most wonderful achievement, of infinite wisdom. To us they seem to be intimate friends, always at peace, breathing the same spirit, and seeking the same end. By God's mercy, we understand not a blind instinctive compassion, which forgives without reflection, and without regard to the interests of virtue. This, we acknowledge, would be incompatible with justice, and also with enlightened benevolence. God's mercy, as we understand it, desires strongly the happiness of the guilty, but only through their penitence. It has a regard to character as truly as his justice. It defers punishment, and suffers long, that the sinner may return to his duty, but leaves the impenitent and unyielding, to the fearful retribution threatened in God's Word.
To give our views of God in one word, we believe in his Parental character. We ascribe to him, not only the name, but the dispositions and principles of a father. We believe that he has a father's concern for his creatures, a father's desire for their improvement, a father's equity in proportioning his commands to their powers, a father's joy in their progress, a father's readiness to receive the penitent, and a father's justice for the incorrigible. We look upon this world as a place of education, in which he is training men by prosperity and adversity, by aids and obstructions, by conflicts of reason and passion, by motives to duty and temptations to sin, by a various discipline suited to free and moral beings, for union with himself, and for a sublime and ever-growing virtue in heaven.
Now, we object to the systems of religion, which prevail among us, that they are adverse, in a greater or less degree, to these purifying, comforting, and honorable views of God; that they take from us our Father in heaven, and substitute for him a being, whom we cannot love if we would, and whom we ought not to love if we could. We object, particularly on this ground, to that system, which arrogates to itself the name of Orthodoxy, and which is now industriously propagated through our country. This system indeed takes various shapes, but in all it casts dishonor on the Creator. According to its old and genuine form, it teaches, that God brings us into life wholly depraved, so that under the innocent features of our childhood is hidden a nature averse to all good and propense to all evil, a nature which exposes us to God's displeasure and wrath, even before we have acquired power to understand our duties, or to reflect upon our actions. According to a more modern exposition, it teaches, that we came from the hands of our Maker with such a constitution, and are placed under such influences and circumstances, as to render certain and infallible the total depravity of every human being, from the first moment of his moral agency; and it also teaches, that the offence of the child, who brings into life this ceaseless tendency to unmingled crime, exposes him to the sentence of everlasting damnation. Now, according to the plainest principles of morality, we maintain, that a natural constitution of the mind, unfailingly disposing it to evil and to evil alone, would absolve it from guilt; that to give existence under this condition would argue unspeakable cruelty; and that to punish the sin of this unhappily constituted child with endless ruin, would be a wrong unparalleled by the most merciless despotism.
This system also teaches, that God selects from this corrupt mass a number to be saved, and plucks them, by a special influence, from the common ruin; that the rest of mankind, though left without that special grace which their conversion requires, are commanded to repent, under penalty of aggravated woe; and that forgiveness is promised them, on terms which their very constitution infallibly disposes them to reject, and in rejecting which they awfully enhance the punishments of hell. These proffers of forgiveness and exhortations of amendment, to beings born under a blighting curse, fill our minds with a horror which we want words to express.
That this religious system does not produce all the effects on character, which might be anticipated, we most joyfully admit. It is often, very often, counteracted by nature, conscience, common sense, by the general strain of Scripture, by the mild example and precepts of Christ, and by the many positive declarations of God's universal kindness and perfect equity. But still we think that we see its unhappy influence. It tends to discourage the timid, to give excuses to the bad, to feed the vanity of the fanatical, and to offer shelter to the bad feelings of the malignant. By shocking, as it does, the fundamental principles of morality, and by exhibiting a severe and partial Deity, it tends strongly to pervert the moral faculty, to form a gloomy, forbidding, and servile religion, and to lead men to substitute censoriousness, bitterness, and persecution, for a tender and impartial charity. We think, too, that this system, which begins with degrading human nature, may be expected to end in pride; for pride grows out of a consciousness of high distinctions, however obtained, and no distinction is so great as that which is made between the elected and abandoned of God.
The false and dishonorable views of God, which have now been stated, we feel ourselves bound to resist unceasingly. Other errors we can pass over with comparative indifference. But we ask our opponents to leave to us a GOD, worthy of our love and trust, in whom our moral sentiments may delight, in whom our weaknesses and sorrows may find refuge. We cling to the Divine perfections. We meet them everywhere in creation, we read them in the Scriptures, we see a lovely image of them in Jesus Christ; and gratitude, love, and veneration call on us to assert them. Reproached, as we often are, by men, it is our consolation and happiness, that one of our chief offences is the zeal with which we vindicate the dishonored goodness and rectitude of God.
4. Having thus spoken of the unity of God; of the unity of Jesus, and his inferiority to God; and of the perfections of the Divine character; I now proceed to give our views of the mediation of Christ, and of the purposes of his mission. With regard to the great object which Jesus came to accomplish, there seems to be no possibility of mistake. We believe, that he was sent by the Father to effect a moral, or spiritual deliverance of mankind; that is, to rescue men from sin and its consequences, and to bring them to a state of everlasting purity and happiness. We believe, too, that he accomplishes this sublime purpose by a variety of methods; by his instructions respecting God's unity, parental character, and moral government, which are admirably fitted to reclaim the world from idolatry and impiety, to the knowledge, love, and obedience of the Creator; by his promises of pardon to the penitent, and of divine assistance to those who labor for progress in moral excellence; by the light which he has thrown on the path of duty; by his own spotless example, in which the loveliness and sublimity of virtue shine forth to warm and quicken, as well as guide us to perfection; by his threatenings against incorrigible guilt; by his glorious discoveries of immortality; by his sufferings and death; by that signal event, the resurrection, which powerfully bore witness to his divine mission, and brought down to men's senses a future life; by his continual intercession, which obtains for us spiritual aid and blessings; and by the power with which he is invested of raising the dead, judging the world, and conferring the everlasting rewards promised to the faithful.
We have no desire to conceal the fact, that a difference of opinion exists among us, in regard to an interesting part of Christ's mediation; I mean, in regard to the precise influence of his death on our forgiveness. Many suppose, that this event contributes to our pardon, as it was a principal means of confirming his religion, and of giving it a power over the mind; in other words, that it procures forgiveness by leading to that repentance and virtue, which is the great and only condition on which forgiveness is bestowed. Many of us are dissatisfied with this explanation, and think that the Scriptures ascribe the remission of sins to Christ's death, with an emphasis so peculiar, that we ought to consider this event as having a special influence in removing punishment, though the Scriptures may not reveal the way in which it contributes to this end.
Whilst, however, we differ in explaining the connexion between Christ's death and human forgiveness, a connexion which we all gratefully acknowledge, we agree in rejecting many sentiments which prevail in regard to his mediation. The idea, which is conveyed to common minds by the popular system, that Christ's death has an influence in making God placable, or merciful, in awakening his kindness towards men, we reject with strong disapprobation. We are happy to find, that this very dishonorable notion is disowned by intelligent Christians of that class from which we differ. We recollect, however, that, not long ago, it was common to hear of Christ, as having died to appease God's wrath, and to pay the debt of sinners to his inflexible justice; and we have a strong persuasion, that the language of popular religious books, and the common mode of stating the doctrine of Christ's mediation, still communicate very degrading views of God's character. They give to multitudes the impression, that the death of Jesus produces a change in the mind of God towards man, and that in this its efficacy chiefly consists. No error seems to us more pernicious. We can endure no shade over the pure goodness of God. We earnestly maintain, that Jesus, instead of calling forth, in any way or degree, the mercy of the Father, was sent by that mercy, to be our Saviour; that he is nothing to the human race, but what he is by God's appointment; that he communicates nothing but what God empowers him to bestow; that our Father in heaven is originally, essentially, and eternally placable, and disposed to forgive; and that his unborrowed, underived, and unchangeable love is the only fountain of what flows to us through his Son. We conceive, that Jesus is dishonored, not glorified, by ascribing to him an influence, which clouds the splendor of Divine benevolence.
We farther agree in rejecting, as unscriptural and absurd, the explanation given by the popular system, of the manner in which Christ's death procures forgiveness for men. This system used to teach as its fundamental principle, that man, having sinned against an infinite Being, has contracted infinite guilt, and is consequently exposed to an infinite penalty. We believe, however, that this reasoning, if reasoning it may be called, which overlooks the obvious maxim, that the guilt of a being must be proportioned to his nature and powers, has fallen into disuse. Still the system teaches, that sin, of whatever degree, exposes to endless punishment, and that the whole human race, being infallibly involved by their nature in sin, owe this awful penalty to the justice of their Creator. It teaches, that this penalty cannot be remitted, in consistency with the honor of the divine law, unless a substitute be found to endure it or to suffer an equivalent. It also teaches, that, from the nature of the case, no substitute is adequate to this work, save the infinite God himself; and accordingly, God, in his second person, took on him human nature, that he might pay to his own justice the debt of punishment incurred by men, and might thus reconcile forgiveness with the claims and threatenings of his law. Such is the prevalent system. Now, to us, this doctrine seems to carry on its front strong marks of absurdity; and we maintain that Christianity ought not to be encumbered with it, unless it be laid down in the New Testament fully and expressly. We ask our adversaries, then, to point to some plain passages where it is taught. We ask for one text, in which we are told, that God took human nature that he might make an infinite satisfaction to his own justice; for one text, which tells us, that human guilt requires an infinite substitute; that Christ's sufferings owe their efficacy to their being borne by an infinite being; or that his divine nature gives infinite value to the sufferings of the human. Not ONE WORD of this description can we find in the Scriptures; not a text, which even hints at these strange doctrines. They are altogether, we believe, the fictions of theologians. Christianity is in no degree responsible for them. We are astonished at their prevalence. What can be plainer, than that God cannot, in any sense, be a sufferer, or bear a penalty in the room of his creatures? How dishonorable to him is the supposition, that his justice is now so severe, as to exact infinite punishment for the sins of frail and feeble men, and now so easy and yielding, as to accept the limited pains of Christ's human soul, as a full equivalent for the endless woes due from the world? How plain is it also, according to this doctrine, that God, instead of being plenteous in forgiveness, never forgives; for it seems absurd to speak of men as forgiven, when their whole punishment, or an equivalent to it, is borne by a substitute? A scheme more fitted to obscure the brightness of Christianity and the mercy of God, or less suited to give comfort to a guilty and troubled mind, could not, we think, be easily framed.
We believe, too, that this system is unfavorable to the character. It naturally leads men to think, that Christ came to change God's mind rather than their own; that the highest object of his mission was to avert punishment, rather than to communicate holiness; and that a large part of religion consists in disparaging good works and human virtue, for the purpose of magnifying the value of Christ's vicarious sufferings. In this way, a sense of the infinite importance and indispensable necessity of personal improvement is weakened, and high-sounding praises of Christ's cross seem often to be substituted for obedience to his precepts. For ourselves, we have not so learned Jesus. Whilst we gratefully acknowledge, that he came to rescue us from punishment, we believe, that he was sent on a still nobler errand, namely, to deliver us from sin itself, and to form us to a sublime and heavenly virtue. We regard him as a Saviour, chiefly as he is the light, physician, and guide of the dark, diseased, and wandering mind. No influence in the universe seems to us so glorious, as that over the character; and no redemption so worthy of thankfulness, as the restoration of the soul to purity. Without this, pardon, were it possible, would be of little value. Why pluck the sinner from hell, if a hell be left to burn in his own breast? Why raise him to heaven, if he remain a stranger to its sanctity and love? With these impressions, we are accustomed to value the Gospel chiefly as it abounds in effectual aids, motives, excitements to a generous and divine virtue. In this virtue, as in a common centre, we see all its doctrines, precepts, promises meet; and we believe, that faith in this religion is of no worth, and contributes nothing to salvation, any farther than as it uses these doctrines, precepts, promises, and the whole life, character, sufferings, and triumphs of Jesus, as the means of purifying the mind, of changing it into the likeness of his celestial excellence.
5. Having thus stated our views of the highest object of Christ's mission, that it is the recovery of men to virtue, or holiness, I shall now, in the last place, give our views of the nature of Christian virtue, or true holiness. We believe that all virtue has its foundation in the moral nature of man, that is, in conscience, or his sense of duty, and in the power of forming his temper and life according to conscience. We believe that these moral faculties are the grounds of responsibility, and the highest distinctions of human nature, and that no act is praiseworthy, any farther than it springs from their exertion. We believe, that no dispositions infused into us without our own moral activity, are of the nature of virtue, and therefore, we reject the doctrine of irresistible divine influence on the human mind, moulding it into goodness, as marble is hewn into a statue. Such goodness, if this word may be used, would not be the object of moral approbation, any more than the instinctive affections of inferior animals, or the constitutional amiableness of human beings.
By these remarks, we do not mean to deny the importance of God's aid or Spirit; but by his Spirit, we mean a moral, illuminating, and persuasive influence, not physical, not compulsory, not involving a necessity of virtue. We object, strongly, to the idea of many Christians respecting man's impotence and God's irresistible agency on the heart, believing that they subvert our responsibility and the laws of our moral nature, that they make men machines, that they cast on God the blame of all evil deeds, that they discourage good minds, and inflate the fanatical with wild conceits of immediate and sensible inspiration.
Among the virtues, we give the first place to the love of God. We believe, that this principle is the true end and happiness of our being, that we were made for union with our Creator, that his infinite perfection is the only sufficient object and true resting-place for the insatiable desires and unlimited capacities of the human mind, and that, without him, our noblest sentiments, admiration, veneration, hope, and love, would wither and decay. We believe, too, that the love of God is not only essential to happiness, but to the strength and perfection of all the virtues; that conscience, without the sanction of God's authority and retributive justice, would be a weak director; that benevolence, unless nourished by communion with his goodness, and encouraged by his smile, could not thrive amidst the selfishness and thanklessness of the world; and that self-government, without a sense of the divine inspection, would hardly extend beyond an outward and partial purity. God, as he is essentially goodness, holiness, justice, and virtue, so he is the life, motive, and sustainer of virtue in the human soul.
But, whilst we earnestly inculcate the love of God, we believe that great care is necessary to distinguish it from counterfeits. We think that much which is called piety is worthless. Many have fallen into the error, that there can be no excess in feelings which have God for their object; and, distrusting as coldness that self-possession, without which virtue and devotion lose all their dignity, they have abandoned themselves to extravagances, which have brought contempt on piety. Most certainly, if the love of God be that which often bears its name, the less we have of it the better. If religion be the shipwreck of understanding, we cannot keep too far from it. On this subject, we always speak plainly. We cannot sacrifice our reason to the reputation of zeal. We owe it to truth and religion to maintain, that fanaticism, partial insanity, sudden impressions, and ungovernable transports, are anything rather than piety.
We conceive, that the true love of God is a moral sentiment, founded on a clear perception, and consisting in a high esteem and veneration, of his moral perfections. Thus, it perfectly coincides, and is in fact the same thing, with the love of virtue, rectitude, and goodness. You will easily judge, then, what we esteem the surest and only decisive signs of piety. We lay no stress on strong excitements. We esteem him, and him only a pious man, who practically conforms to God's moral perfections and government; who shows his delight in God's benevolence, by loving and serving his neighbour; his delight in God's justice, by being resolutely upright; his sense of God's purity, by regulating his thoughts, imagination, and desires; and whose conversation, business, and domestic life are swayed by a regard to God's presence and authority. In all things else men may deceive themselves. Disordered nerves may give them strange sights, and sounds, and impressions. Texts of Scripture may come to them as from Heaven. Their whole souls may be moved, and their confidence in God's favor be undoubting. But in all this there is no religion. The question is, Do they love God's commands, in which his character is fully expressed, and give up to these their habits and passions? Without this, ecstasy is a mockery. One surrender of desire to God's will, is worth a thousand transports. We do not judge of the bent of men's minds by their raptures, any more than we judge of the natural direction of a tree during a storm. We rather suspect loud profession, for we have observed, that deep feeling is generally noiseless, and least seeks display.
We would not, by these remarks, be understood as wishing to exclude from religion warmth, and even transport. We honor, and highly value, true religious sensibility. We believe, that Christianity is intended to act powerfully on our whole nature, on the heart as well as the understanding and the conscience. We conceive of heaven as a state where the love of God will be exalted into an unbounded fervor and joy; and we desire, in our pilgrimage here, to drink into the spirit of that better world. But we think, that religious warmth is only to be valued, when it springs naturally from an improved character, when it comes unforced, when it is the recompense of obedience, when it is the warmth of a mind which understands God by being like him, and when, instead of disordering, it exalts the understanding, invigorates conscience, gives a pleasure to common duties, and is seen to exist in connexion with cheerfulness, judiciousness, and a reasonable frame of mind. When we observe a fervor, called religious, in men whose general character expresses little refinement and elevation, and whose piety seems at war with reason, we pay it little respect. We honor religion too much to give its sacred name to a feverish, forced, fluctuating zeal, which has little power over the life.
Another important branch of virtue, we believe to be love to Christ. The greatness of the work of Jesus, the spirit with which he executed it, and the sufferings which he bore for our salvation, we feel to be strong claims on our gratitude and veneration. We see in nature no beauty to be compared with the loveliness of his character, nor do we find on earth a benefactor to whom we owe an equal debt. We read his history with delight, and learn from it the perfection of our nature. We are particularly touched by his death, which was endured for our redemption, and by that strength of charity which triumphed over his pains. His resurrection is the foundation of our hope of immortality. His intercession gives us boldness to draw nigh to the throne of grace, and we look up to heaven with new desire, when we think, that, if we follow him here, we shall there see his benignant countenance, and enjoy his friendship for ever.
I need not express to you our views on the subject of the benevolent virtues. We attach such importance to these that we are sometimes reproached with exalting them above piety. We regard the spirit of love, charity, meekness, forgiveness, liberality, and beneficence, as the badge and distinction of Christians, as the brightest image we can bear of God, as the best proof of piety. On this subject, I need not, and cannot enlarge; but there is one branch of benevolence which I ought not to pass over in silence, because we think that we conceive of it more highly and justly than many of our brethren. I refer to the duty of candor, charitable judgment, especially towards those who differ in religious opinion. We think, that in nothing have Christians so widely departed from their religion, as in this particular. We read with astonishment and horror, the history of the church; and sometimes when we look back on the fires of persecution, and on the zeal of Christians, in building up walls of separation, and in giving up one another to perdition, we feel as if we were reading the records of an infernal, rather than a heavenly kingdom. An enemy to every religion, if asked to describe a Christian, would, with some show of reason, depict him as an idolater of his own distinguishing opinions, covered with badges of party, shutting his eyes on the virtues, and his ears on the arguments, of his opponents, arrogating all excellence to his own sect and all saving power to his own creed, sheltering under the name of pious zeal the love of domination, the conceit of infallibility, and the spirit of intolerance, and trampling on men's rights under the pretence of saving their souls.
We can hardly conceive of a plainer obligation on beings of our frail and fallible nature, who are instructed in the duty of candid judgment, than to abstain from condemning men of apparent conscientiousness and sincerity, who are chargeable with no crime but that of differing from us in the interpretation of the Scriptures, and differing, too, on topics of great and acknowledged obscurity. We are astonished at the hardihood of those, who, with Christ's warnings sounding in their ears, take on them the responsibility of making creeds for his church, and cast out professors of virtuous lives for imagined errors, for the guilt of thinking for themselves. We know that zeal for truth is the cover for this usurpation of Christ's prerogative; but we think that zeal for truth, as it is called, is very suspicious, except in men, whose capacities and advantages, whose patient deliberation, and whose improvements in humility, mildness, and candor, give them a right to hope that their views are more just than those of their neighbours. Much of what passes for a zeal for truth, we look upon with little respect, for it often appears to thrive most luxuriantly where other virtues shoot up thinly and feebly; and we have no gratitude for those reformers, who would force upon us a doctrine which has not sweetened their own tempers, or made them better men than their neighbours.
We are accustomed to think much of the difficulties attending religious inquiries; difficulties springing from the slow development of our minds, from the power of early impressions, from the state of society, from human authority, from the general neglect of the reasoning powers, from the want of just principles of criticism and of important helps in interpreting Scripture, and from various other causes. We find, that on no subject have men, and even good men, ingrafted so many strange conceits, wild theories, and fictions of fancy, as on religion ; and remembering, as we do, that we ourselves are sharers of the common frailty, we dare not assume infallibility in the treatment of our fellow-Christians, or encourage in common Christians, who have little time for investigation, the habit of denouncing and condemning other denominations, perhaps more enlightened and virtuous than their own. Charity, forbearance, a delight in the virtues of different sects, a backwardness to censure and condemn, these are virtues, which, however poorly practised by us, we admire and recommend; and we would rather join ourselves to the church in which they abound, than to any other communion, however elated with the belief of its own orthodoxy, however strict in guarding its creed, however burning with zeal against imagined error.
I have thus given the distinguishing views of those Christians in whose names I have spoken. We have embraced this system, not hastily or lightly, but after much deliberation; and we hold it fast, not merely because we believe it to be true, but because we regard it as purifying truth, as a doctrine according to godliness, as able to "work mightily" and to "bring forth fruit" in them who believe. That we wish to spread it, we have no desire to conceal; but we think, that we wish its diffusion, because we regard it as more friendly to practical piety and pure morals than the opposite doctrines, because it gives clearer and nobler views of duty, and stronger motives to its performance, because it recommends religion at once to the understanding and the heart, because it asserts the lovely and venerable attributes of God, because it tends to restore the benevolent spirit of Jesus to his divided and afflicted church, and because it cuts off every hope of God's favor, except that which springs from practical conformity to the life and precepts of Christ. We see nothing in our views to give offence, save their purity, and it is their purity, which makes us seek and hope their extension through the world.
My friend and brother; -- You are this day to take upon you important duties; to be clothed with an office, which the Son of God did not disdain; to devote yourself to that religion, which the most hallowed lips have preached, and the most precious blood sealed. We trust that you will bring to this work a willing mind, a firm purpose, a martyr's spirit, a readiness to toil and suffer for the truth, a devotion of your best powers to the interests of piety and virtue. I have spoken of the doctrines which you will probably preach; but I do not mean, that you are to give yourself to controversy. You will remember, that good practice is the end of preaching, and will labor to make your people holy livers, rather than skilful disputants. Be careful, lest the desire of defending what you deem truth, and of repelling reproach and misrepresentation, turn you aside from your great business, which is to fix in men's minds a living conviction of the obligation, sublimity, and happiness of Christian virtue. The best way to vindicate your sentiments, is to show, in your preaching and life, their intimate connexion with Christian morals, with a high and delicate sense of duty, with candor towards your opposers, with inflexible integrity, and with an habitual reverence for God. If any light can pierce and scatter the clouds of prejudice, it is that of a pure example. My brother, may your life preach more loudly than your lips. Be to this people a pattern of all good works, and may your instructions derive authority from a well-grounded belief in your hearers, that you speak from the heart, that you preach from experience, that the truth which you dispense has wrought powerfully in your own heart, that God, and Jesus, and heaven, are not merely words on your lips, but most affecting realities to your mind, and springs of hope and consolation, and strength, in all your trials. Thus laboring, may you reap abundantly, and have a testimony of your faithfulness, not only in your own conscience, but in the esteem, love, virtues, and improvements of your people.
To all who hear me, I would say, with the Apostle, Prove all things, hold fast that which is good. Do not, brethren, shrink from the duty of searching God's Word for yourselves, through fear of human censure and denunciation. Do not think, that you may innocently follow the opinions which prevail around you, without investigation, on the ground, that Christianity is now so purified from errors, as to need no laborious research. There is much reason to believe, that Christianity is at this moment dishonored by gross and cherished corruptions. If you remember the darkness which hung over the Gospel for ages; if you consider the impure union, which still subsists in almost every Christian country, between the church and state, and which enlists men's selfishness and ambition on the side of established error; if you recollect in what degree the spirit of intolerance has checked free inquiry, not only before, but since the Reformation; you will see that Christianity cannot have freed itself from all the human inventions, which disfigured it under the Papal tyranny. No. Much stubble is yet to be burned; much rubbish to be removed; many gaudy decorations, which a false taste has hung around Christianity, must be swept away; and the earth-born fogs, which have long shrouded it, must be scattered, before this divine fabric will rise before us in its native and awful majesty, in its harmonious proportions, in its mild and celestial splendors This glorious reformation in the church, we hope, under God's blessing, from the progress of the human intellect, from the moral progress of society, from the consequent decline of prejudice and bigotry, and, though last not least, from the subversion of human authority in matters of religion, from the fall of those hierarchies, and other human institutions, by which the minds of individuals are oppressed under the weight of numbers, and a Papal dominion is perpetuated in the Protestant church. Our earnest prayer to God is, that he will overturn, and overturn, and overturn the strong-holds of spiritual usurpation, until HE shall come, whose right it is to rule the minds of men; that the conspiracy of ages against the liberty of Christians may be brought to an end; that the servile assent, so long yielded to human creeds, may give place to honest and devout inquiry into the Scriptures; and that Christianity, thus purified from error, may put forth its almighty energy, and prove itself, by its ennobling influence on the mind, to be indeed "the power of God unto salvation."
Delivered at the Ordination of Rev. Jared Sparks in The First Independent Church of Baltimore on May 5, 1819.
1 Thes. v. 21: "Prove all things; hold fast that which is good."
The peculiar circumstances of this occasion not only justify, but seem to demand a departure from the course generally followed by preachers at the introduction of a brother into the sacred office. It is usual to speak of the nature, design, duties, and advantages of the Christian ministry; and on these topics I should now be happy to insist, did I not remember that a minister is to be given this day to a religious society, whose peculiarities of opinion have drawn upon them much remark, and may I not add, much reproach. Many good minds, many sincere Christians, I am aware, are apprehensive that the solemnities of this day are to give a degree of influence to principles which they deem false and injurious. The fears and anxieties of such men I respect; and, believing that they are grounded in part on mistake, I have thought it my duty to lay before you, as clearly as I can, some of the distinguishing opinions of that class of Christians in our country, who are known to sympathize with this religious society. I must ask your patience, for such a subject is not to be despatched in a narrow compass. I must also ask you to remember, that it is impossible to exhibit, in a single discourse, our views of every doctrine of Revelation, much less the differences of opinion which are known to subsist among ourselves. I shall confine myself to topics, on which our sentiments have been misrepresented, or which distinguish us most widely from others. May I not hope to be heard with candor? God deliver us all from prejudice and unkindness, and fill us with the love of truth and virtue.
There are two natural divisions under which my thoughts will be arranged. I shall endeavour to unfold, 1st, The principles which we adopt in interpreting the Scriptures. And 2dly, Some of the doctrines, which the Scriptures, so interpreted, seem to us clearly to express.
I. We regard the Scriptures as the records of God's successive revelations to mankind, and particularly of the last and most perfect revelation of his will by Jesus Christ. Whatever doctrines seem to us to be clearly taught in the Scriptures; we receive without reserve or exception. We do not, however, attach equal importance to all the books in this collection. Our religion, we believe, lies chiefly in the New Testament. The dispensation of Moses, compared with that of Jesus, we consider as adapted to the childhood of the human race, a preparation for a nobler system, and chiefly useful now as serving to confirm and illustrate the Christian Scriptures. Jesus Christ is the only master of Christians, and whatever he taught, either during his personal ministry, or by his inspired Apostles, we regard as of divine authority, and profess to make the rule of our lives.
This authority, which we give to the Scriptures, is a reason, we conceive, for studying them with peculiar care, and for inquiring anxiously into the principles of interpretation, by which their true meaning may be ascertained. The principles adopted by the class of Christians in whose name I speak, need to be explained, because they are often misunderstood. We are particularly accused of making an unwarrantable use of reason in the interpretation of Scripture. We are said to exalt reason above revelation, to prefer our own wisdom to God's. Loose and undefined charges of this kind are circulated so freely, that we think it due to ourselves, and to the cause of truth, to express our views with some particularity.
Our leading principle in interpreting Scripture is this, that the Bible is a book written for men, in the language of men, and that its meaning is to be sought in the same manner as that of other books. We believe that God, when he speaks to the human race, conforms, if we may so say, to the established rules of speaking and writing. How else would the Scriptures avail us more, than if communicated in an unknown tongue?
Now all books, and all conversation, require in the reader or hearer the constant exercise of reason; or their true import is only to be obtained by continual comparison and inference. Human language, you well know, admits various interpretations; and every word and every sentence must be modified and explained according to the subject which is discussed, according to the purposes, feelings, circumstances, and principles of the writer, and according to the genius and idioms of the language which he uses. These are acknowledged principles in the interpretation of human writings; and a man, whose words we should explain without reference to these principles, would reproach us justly with a criminal want of candor, and an intention of obscuring or distorting his meaning.
Were the Bible written in a language and style of its own, did it consist of words, which admit but a single sense, and of sentences wholly detached from each other, there would be no place for the principles now laid down. We could not reason about it, as about other writings. But such a book would be of little worth; and perhaps, of all books, the Scriptures correspond least to this description. The Word of God hears the stamp of the same hand, which we see in his works. It has infinite connexions and dependences. Every proposition is linked with others, and is to be compared with others; that its full and precise import may he understood. Nothing stands alone. The New Testament is built on the Old. The Christian dispensation is a continuation of the Jewish, the completion of a vast scheme of providence, requiring great extent of view in the reader. Still more, the Bible treats of subjects on which we receive ideas from other sources besides itself; such subjects as the nature, passions, relations, and duties of man; and it expects us to restrain and modify its language by the known truths, which observation and experience furnish on these topics.
We profess not to know a book, which demands a more frequent exercise of reason than the Bible. In addition to the remarks now made on its infinite connexions, we may observe, that its style nowhere affects the precision of science, or the accuracy of definition. Its language is singularly glowing, bold, and figurative, demanding more frequent departures from the literal sense, than that of our own age and country, and consequently demanding more continual exercise of judgment. -- We find, too, that the different portions of this book, instead of being confined to general truths, refer perpetually to the times when they were written, to states of society, to modes of thinking, to controversies in the church, to feelings and usages which have passed away, and without the knowledge of which we are constantly in danger of extending to all times, and places, what was of temporary and local application. -- We find, too, that some of these books are strongly marked by the genius and character of their respective writers, that the Holy Spirit did not so guide the Apostles as to suspend the peculiarities of their minds, and that a knowledge of their feelings, and of the influences under which they were placed, is one of the preparations for understanding their writings. With these views of the Bible, we feel it our bounden duty to exercise our reason upon it perpetually, to compare, to infer, to look beyond the letter to the spirit, to seek in the nature of the subject, and the aim of the writer, his true meaning; and, in general, to make use of what is known, for explaining what is difficult, and for discovering new truths.
Need I descend to particulars, to prove that the Scriptures demand the exercise of reason? Take, for example, the style in which they generally speak of God, and observe how habitually they apply to him human passions and organs. Recollect the declarations of Christ, that he came not to send peace, but a sword; that unless we eat his flesh, and drink his blood, we have no life in us; that we must hate father and mother, and pluck out the right eye; and a vast number of passages equally bold and unlimited. Recollect the unqualified manner in which it is said of Christians, that they possess all things, know all things, and can do all things. Recollect the verbal contradiction between Paul and James, and the apparent clashing of some parts of Paul's writings with the general doctrines and end of Christianity. I might extend the enumeration indefinitely; and who does not see, that we must limit all these passages by the known attributes of God, of Jesus Christ, and of human nature, and by the circumstances under which they were written, so as to give the language a quite different import from what it would require, had it been applied to different beings, or used in different connexions.
Enough has been said to show, in what sense we make use of reason in interpreting Scripture. From a variety of possible interpretations, we select that which accords with the nature of the subject and the state of the writer, with the connexion of the passage, with the general strain of Scripture, with the known character and will of God, and with the obvious and acknowledged laws of nature. In other words, we believe that God never contradicts, in one part of scripture, what he teaches in another; and never contradicts, in revelation, what he teaches in his works and providence. And we therefore distrust every interpretation, which, after deliberate attention, seems repugnant to any established truth. We reason about the Bible precisely as civilians do about the constitution under which we live; who, you know, are accustomed to limit one provision of that venerable instrument by others, and to fix the precise import of its parts, by inquiring into its general spirit, into the intentions of its authors, and into the prevalent feelings, impressions, and circumstances of the time when it was framed. Without these principles of interpretation, we frankly acknowledge, that we cannot defend the divine authority of the Scriptures. Deny us this latitude, and we must abandon this book to its enemies.
We do not announce these principles as original, or peculiar to ourselves. All Christians occasionally adopt them, not excepting those who most vehemently decry them, when they happen to menace some favorite article of their creed. All Christians are compelled to use them in their controversies with infidels. All sects employ them in their warfare with one another. All willingly avail themselves of reason, when it can be pressed into the service of their own party, and only complain of it, when its weapons wound themselves. None reason more frequently than those from whom we differ. It is astonishing what a fabric they rear from a few slight hints about the fall of our first parents; and how ingeniously they extract, from detached passages, mysterious doctrines about the divine nature. We do not blame them for reasoning so abundantly, but for violating the fundamental rules of reasoning, for sacrificing the plain to the obscure, and the general strain of Scripture to a scanty number of insulated texts.
We object strongly to the contemptuous manner in which human reason is often spoken of by our adversaries, because it leads, we believe, to universal skepticism. If reason be so dreadfully darkened by the fall, that its most decisive judgments on religion are unworthy of trust, then Christianity, and even natural theology, must be abandoned; for the existence and veracity of God, and the divine original of Christianity, are conclusions of reason, and must stand or fall with it. If revelation be at war with this faculty, it subverts itself, for the great question of its truth is left by God to be decided at the bar of reason. It is worthy of remark, how nearly the bigot and the skeptic approach. Both would annihilate our confidence in our faculties, and both throw doubt and confusion over every truth. We honor revelation too highly to make it the antagonist of reason, or to believe that it calls us to renounce our highest powers.
We indeed grant, that the use of reason in religion is accompanied with danger. But we ask any honest man to look back on the history of the church, and say, whether the renunciation of it be not still more dangerous. Besides, it is a plain fact, that men reason as erroneously on all subjects, as on religion. Who does not know the wild and groundless theories, which have been framed in physical and political science? But who ever supposed, that we must cease to exercise reason on nature and society, because men have erred for ages in explaining them? We grant, that the passions continually, and sometimes fatally, disturb the rational faculty in its inquiries into revelation. The ambitious contrive to find doctrines in the Bible, which favor their love of dominion. The timid and dejected discover there a gloomy system, and the mystical and fanatical, a visionary theology. The vicious can find examples or assertions on which to build the hope of a late repentance, or of acceptance on easy terms. The falsely refined contrive to light on doctrines which have not been soiled by vulgar handling. But the passions do not distract the reason in religious, any more than in other inquiries, which excite strong and general interest; and this faculty, of consequence, is not to be renounced in religion, unless we are prepared to discard it universally. The true inference from the almost endless errors, which have darkened theology, is, not that we are to neglect and disparage our powers, but to exert them more patiently, circumspectly, uprightly. The worst errors, after all, having sprung up in that church, which proscribes reason, and demands from its members implicit faith. The most pernicious doctrines have been the growth of the darkest times, when the general credulity encouraged bad men and enthusiasts to broach their dreams and inventions, and to stifle the faint remonstrances of reasons, by the menaces of everlasting perdition. Say what we may, God has given us a rational nature, and will call us to account for it. We may let it sleep, but we do so at our peril. Revelation is addressed to us as rational beings. We may wish, in our to sloth, that God had given us a system, demand of comparing, limiting, and inferring. But such a system would be at variance with the whole character of our present existence; and it is the part of wisdom to take revelation as it is given to us, and to interpret it by the help of the faculties, which it everywhere supposes, and on which founded.
To the views now given, an objection is commonly urged from the character of God. We are told, that God being infinitely wiser than men, his discoveries will surpass human reason. In a revelation from such a teacher, we ought to expect propositions, which we cannot reconcile with one another, and which may seem to contradict established truths ; and it becomes us not to question or explain them away, but to believe, and adore, and to submit our weak and carnal reason to the Divine Word. To this objection, we have two short answers. We say, first, that it is impossible that a teacher of infinite wisdom should expose those, whom he would teach, to infinite error. But if once we admit, that propositions, which in their literal sense appear plainly repugnant to one another, or to any known truth, are still to be literally understood and received, what possible limit can we set to the belief of contradictions? What shelter have we from the wildest fanaticism, which can always quote passages, that, in their literal and obvious sense, give support to its extravagances? How can the Protestant escape from transubstantiation, a doctrine most clearly taught us, if the submission of reason, now contended for, be a duty? How can we even hold fast the truth of revelation, for if one apparent contradiction may be true, so may another, and the proposition, that Christianity is false, though involving inconsistency, may still be a verity?
We answer again, that, if God be infinitely wise, he cannot sport with the understandings of his creatures. A wise teacher discovers his wisdom in adapting himself to the capacities of his pupils, not in perplexing them with what is unintelligible, not in distressing them with apparent contradictions, not in filling them with a skeptical distrust of their own powers. An infinitely wise teacher, who knows the precise extent of our minds, and the best method of enlightening them, will surpass all other instructors in bringing down truth to our apprehension, and in showing its loveliness and harmony. We ought, indeed, to expect occasional obscurity in such a book as the Bible, which was written for past and future ages, as well as for the present. But God's wisdom is a pledge, that whatever is necessary for US, and necessary for salvation, is revealed too plainly to be mistaken, and too consistently to be questioned, by a sound and upright mind. It is not the mark of wisdom, to use an unintelligible phraseology, to communicate what is above our capacities, to confuse and unsettle the intellect by appearances of contradiction. We honor our Heavenly Teacher too much to ascribe to him such a revelation. A revelation is a gift of light. It cannot thicken our darkness, and multiply our perplexities.
II. Having thus stated the principles according to which we interpret Scripture, I now proceed to the second great head of this discourse, which is, to state some of the views which we derive from that sacred book, particularly those which distinguish us from other Christians.
1. In the first place, we believe in the doctrine of God's UNITY, or that there is one God, and one only. To this truth we give infinite importance, and we feel ourselves bound to take heed, lest any man spoil us of it by vain philosophy. The proposition, that there is one God, seems to us exceedingly plain. We understand by it, that there is one being, one mind, one person, one intelligent agent, and one only, to whom underived and infinite perfection and dominion belong. We conceive, that these words could have conveyed no other meaning to the simple and uncultivated people who were set apart to be the depositaries of this great truth, and who were utterly incapable of understanding those hair- breadth distinctions between being and person, which the sagacity of later ages has discovered. We find no intimation, that this language was to be taken in an unusual sense, or that God's unity was a quite different thing from the oneness of other intelligent beings.
We object to the doctrine of the Trinity, that, whilst acknowledging in words, it subverts in effect, the unity of God. According to this doctrine, there are three infinite and equal persons, possessing supreme divinity, called the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Each of these persons, as described by theologians, has his own particular consciousness, will, and perceptions. They love each other, converse with each other, and delight in each other's society. They perform different parts in man's redemption, each having his appropriate office, and neither doing the work of the other. The Son is mediator and not the Father. The Father sends the Son, and is not himself sent; nor is he conscious, like the Son, of taking flesh. Here, then, we have three intelligent agents, possessed of different consciousness, different wills, and different perceptions, performing different acts, and sustaining different relations; and if these things do not imply and constitute three minds or beings, we are utterly at a loss to know how three minds or beings are to be formed. It is difference of properties, and acts, and consciousness, which leads us to the belief of different intelligent beings, and, if this mark fails us, our whole knowledge fall; we have no proof, that all the agents and persons in the universe are not one and the same mind. When we attempt to conceive of three Gods, we can do nothing more than represent to ourselves three agents, distinguished from each other by similar marks and peculiarities to those which separate the persons of the Trinity; and when common Christians hear these persons spoken of as conversing with each other, loving each other, and performing different acts, how can they help regarding them as different beings, different minds?
We do, then, with all earnestness, though without reproaching our brethren, protest against the irrational and unscriptural doctrine of the Trinity. "To us," as to the Apostle and the primitive Christians, "there is one God, even the Father." With Jesus, we worship the Father, as the only living and true God. We are astonished, that any man can read the New Testament, and avoid the conviction, that the Father alone is God. We hear our Saviour continually appropriating this character to the Father. We find the Father continually distinguished from Jesus by this title. "God sent his Son." "God anointed Jesus." Now, how singular and inexplicable is this phraseology, which fills the New Testament, if this title belong equally to Jesus, and if a principal object of this book is to reveal him as God, as partaking equally with the Father in supreme divinity! We challenge our opponents to adduce one passage in the New Testament, where the word God means three persons, where it is not limited to one person, and where, unless turned from its usual sense by the connexion, it does not mean the Father. Can stronger proof be given, that the doctrine of three persons in the Godhead is not a fundamental doctrine of Christianity?
This doctrine, were it true, must, from its difficulty, singularity, and importance, have been laid down with great clearness, guarded with great care, and stated with all possible precision. But where does this statement appear? From the many passages which treat of God, we ask for one, one only, in which we are told, that he is a threefold being, or that he is three persons, or that he is Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. On the contrary, in the New Testament, where, at least, we might expect many express assertions of this nature, God is declared to be one, without the least attempt to prevent the acceptation of the words in their common sense; and he is always spoken of and addressed in the singular number, that is, in language which was universally understood to intend a single person, and to which no other idea could have been attached, without an express admonition. So entirely do the Scriptures abstain from stating the Trinity, that when our opponents would insert it into their creeds and doxologies, they are compelled to leave the Bible, and to invent forms of words altogether unsanctioned by Scriptural phraseology. That a doctrine so strange, so liable to misapprehension, so fundamental as this is said to be, and requiring such careful exposition, should be left so undefined and unprotected, to be made out by inference, and to be hunted through distant and detached parts of Scripture, this is a difficulty, which, we think, no ingenuity can explain.
We have another difficulty. Christianity, it must be remembered, was planted and grew up amidst sharp-sighted enemies, who overlooked no objectionable part of the system, and who must have fastened with great earnestness on a doctrine involving such apparent contradictions as the Trinity. We cannot conceive an opinion, against which the Jews, who prided themselves on an adherence to God's unity, would have raised an equal clamor. Now, how happens it, that in the apostolic writings, which relate so much to objections against Christianity, and to the controversies which grew out of this religion, not one word is said, implying that objections were brought against the Gospel from the doctrine of the Trinity, not one word is uttered in its defence and explanation, not a word to rescue it from reproach and mistake? This argument has almost the force of demonstration. We are persuaded, that had three divine persons been announced by the first preachers of Christianity, all equal, and all infinite, one of whom was the very Jesus who had lately died on a cross, this peculiarity of Christianity would have almost absorbed every other, and the great labor of the Apostles would have been to repel the continual assaults, which it would have awakened. But the fact is, that not a whisper of objection to Christianity, on that account, reaches our ears from the apostolic age. In the Epistles we see not a trace of controversy called forth by the Trinity.
We have further objections to this doctrine, drawn from its practical influence. We regard it as unfavorable to devotion, by dividing and distracting the mind in its communion with God. It is a great excellence of the doctrine of God's unity, that it offers to us ONE OBJECT of supreme homage, adoration, and love, One Infinite Father, one Being of beings, one original and fountain, to whom we may refer all good, in whom all our powers and affections may be concentrated, and whose lovely and venerable nature may pervade all our thoughts. True piety, when directed to an undivided Deity, has a chasteness, a singleness, most favorable to religious awe and love. Now, the Trinity sets before us three distinct objects of supreme adoration; three infinite persons, having equal claims on our hearts; three divine agents, performing different offices, and to be acknowledged and worshipped in different relations. And is it possible, we ask, that the weak and limited mind of man can attach itself to these with the same power and joy, as to One Infinite Father, the only First Cause, in whom all the blessings of nature and redemption meet as their centre and source? Must not devotion be distracted by the equal and rival claims of three equal persons, and must not the worship of the conscientious, consistent Christian, be disturbed by an apprehension, lest he withhold from one or another of these, his due proportion of homage?
We also think, that the doctrine of the Trinity injures devotion, not only by joining to the Father other objects of worship, but by taking from the Father the supreme affection, which is his due, and transferring it to the Son. This is a most important view. That Jesus Christ, if exalted into the infinite Divinity, should be more interesting than the Father, is precisely what might be expected from history, and from the principles of human nature. Men want an object of worship like themselves, and the great secret of idolatry lies in this propensity. A God, clothed in our form, and feeling our wants and sorrows, speaks to our weak nature more strongly, than a Father in heaven, a pure spirit, invisible and unapproachable, save by the reflecting and purified mind. -- We think, too, that the peculiar offices ascribed to Jesus by the popular theology, make him the most attractive person in the Godhead. The Father is the depositary of the justice, the vindicator of the rights, the avenger of the laws of the Divinity. On the other hand, the Son, the brightness of the divine mercy, stands between the incensed Deity and guilty humanity, exposes his meek head to the storms, and his compassionate breast to the sword of the divine justice, bears our whole load of punishment, and purchases with his blood every blessing which descends from heaven. Need we state the effect of these representations, especially on common minds, for whom Christianity was chiefly designed, and whom it seeks to bring to the Father as the loveliest being? We do believe, that the worship of a bleeding, suffering God, tends strongly to absorb the mind and to draw it from other objects, just as the human tenderness of the Virgin Mary has given her so conspicuous a place in the devotions of the Church of Rome. We believe, too, that this worship, though attractive, is not most fitted to spiritualize the mind, that it awakens human transport, rather than that deep veneration of the moral perfections of God, which is the essence of piety.
2. Having thus given our views of the unity of God, I proceed in the second place to observe, that we believe in the unity of Jesus Christ. We believe that Jesus is one mind, one soul, one being, as truly one as we are, and equally distinct from the one God. We complain of the doctrine of the Trinity, that, not satisfied with making God three beings, it makes; Jesus Christ two beings, and thus introduces infinite confusion into our conceptions of his character. This corruption of Christianity, alike repugnant to common sense and to the general strain of Scripture, is a remarkable proof of the power of a false philosophy in disfiguring the simple truth of Jesus.
According to this doctrine, Jesus Christ, instead of being one mind, one conscious intelligent principle, whom we can understand, consists of two souls, two minds; the one divine, the other human; the one weak, the other almighty; the one ignorant, the other omniscient. Now we maintain, that this is to make Christ two beings. To denominate him one person, one being, and yet to suppose him made up of two minds, infinitely different from each other, is to abuse and confound language, and to throw darkness over all our conceptions of intelligent natures. According to the common doctrine, each of these two minds in Christ has its own consciousness, its own will, its own perceptions. They have, in fact, no common properties. The divine mind feels none of the wants and sorrows of the human, and the human is infinitely removed from the perfection and happiness of the divine. Can you conceive of two beings in the universe more distinct? We have always thought that one person was constituted and distinguished by one consciousness. The doctrine, that one and the same person should have two consciousness, two wills, two souls, infinitely different from each other, this we think an enormous tax on human credulity.
We say, that if a doctrine, so strange, so difficult, so remote from all the previous conceptions of men, be indeed a part and an essential part of revelation, it must be taught with great distinctness, and we ask our brethren to point to some plain, direct passage, where Christ is said to be composed of two minds infinitely different, yet constituting one person. We find none. Other Christians, indeed, tell us, that this doctrine is necessary to the harmony of the Scriptures, that some texts ascribe to Jesus Christ human, and others divine properties, and that to reconcile these, we must suppose two minds, to which these properties may be referred. In other words, for the purpose of reconciling certain difficult passages, which a just criticism can in a great degree, if not wholly, explain, we must invent an hypothesis vastly more difficult, and involving gross absurdity. We are to find our way out of a labyrinth, by a clue which conducts us into mazes infinitely more inextricable.
Surely, if Jesus Christ felt that he consisted of two minds, and that this was a leading feature of his religion, his phraseology respecting himself would have been colored by this peculiarity. The universal language of men is framed upon the idea, that one person is one person, is one mind, and one soul; and when the multitude heard this language from the lips of Jesus, they must have taken it in its usual sense, and must have referred to a single soul all which he spoke, unless expressly instructed to interpret it differently. But where do we find this instruction? Where do you meet, in the New Testament, the phraseology which abounds in Trinitarian books, and which necessarily grows from the doctrine of two natures in Jesus? Where does this divine teacher say, "This I speak as God, and this as man; this is true only of my human mind, this only of my divine"? Where do we find in the Epistles a trace of this strange phraseology? Nowhere. It was not needed in that day. It was demanded by the errors of a later age.
We believe, then, that Christ is one mind, one being, and, I add, a being distinct from the one God. That Christ is not the one God, not the same being with the Father, is a necessary inference from our former head, in which we saw that the doctrine of three persons in God is a fiction. But on so important a subject, I would add a few remarks. We wish, that those from whom we differ, would weigh one striking fact. Jesus, in his preaching, continually spoke of God. The word was always in his mouth. We ask, does he, by this word, ever mean himself? We say, never. On the contrary, he most plainly distinguishes between God and himself, and so do his disciples. How this is to be reconciled with the idea, that the manifestation of Christ, as God, was a primary object of Christianity, our adversaries must determine.
If we examine the passages in which Jesus is distinguished from God, we shall see, that they not only speak of him as another being, but seem to labor to express his inferiority. He is continually spoken of as the Son of God, sent of God, receiving all his powers from God, working miracles because God was with him, judging justly because God taught him, having claims on our belief, because he was anointed and sealed by God, and as able of himself to do nothing. The New Testament is filled with this language. Now we ask, what impression this language was fitted and intended to make? Could any, who heard it, have imagined that Jesus was the very God to whom he was so industriously declared to be inferior; the very Being by whom he was sent, and from whom he professed to have received his message and power? Let it here be remembered, that the human birth, and bodily form, and humble circumstances, and mortal sufferings of Jesus, must all have prepared men to interpret, in the most unqualified manner, the language in which his inferiority to God was declared. Why, then, was this language used so continually, and without limitation, if Jesus were the Supreme Deity, and if this truth were an essential part of his religion? I repeat it, the human condition and sufferings of Christ tended strongly to exclude from men's minds the idea of his proper Godhead; and, of course, we should expect to find in the New Testament perpetual care and effort to counteract this tendency, to hold him forth as the same being with his Father, if this doctrine were, as is pretended, the soul and centre of his religion. We should expect to find the phraseology of Scripture cast into the mould of this doctrine, to hear familiarly of God the Son, of our Lord God Jesus, and to be told, that to us there is one God, even Jesus. But, instead of this, the inferiority of Christ pervades the New Testament. It is not only implied in the general phraseology, but repeatedly and decidedly expressed, and unaccompanied with any admonition to prevent its application to his whole nature. Could it, then, have been the great design of the sacred writers to exhibit Jesus as the Supreme God?
I am aware that these remarks will be met by two or three texts, in which Christ is called God, and by a class of passages, not very numerous, in which divine properties are said to be ascribed to him. To these we offer one plain answer. We say, that it is one of the most established and obvious principles of criticism, that language is to be explained according to the known properties of the subject to which it is applied. Every man knows, that the same words convey very different ideas, when used in relation to different beings. Thus, Solomon BUILT the temple in a different manner from the architect whom he employed; and God REPENTS differently from man. Now we maintain, that the known properties and circumstances of Christ, his birth, sufferings, and death, his constant habit of speaking of God as a distinct being from himself, his praying to God, his ascribing to God all his power and offices, these acknowledged properties of Christ, we say, oblige us to interpret the comparatively few passages which are thought to make him the Supreme God, in a manner consistent with his distinct and inferior nature. It is our duty to explain such texts by the rule which we apply to other texts, in which human beings are called gods, and are said to be partakers of the divine nature, to know and possess all things, and to be filled with all God's fulness. These latter passages we do not hesitate to modify, and restrain, and turn from the most obvious sense, because this sense is opposed to the known properties of the beings to whom they relate; and we maintain, that we adhere to the same principle, and use no greater latitude, in explaining, as we do, the passages which are thought to support the Godhead of Christ.
Trinitarians profess to derive some important advantages from their mode of viewing Christ. It furnishes them,they tell us, with an infinite atonement, for it shows them an infinite being suffering for their sins. The confidence with which this fallacy is repeated astonishes us. When pressed with the question, whether they really believe, that the infinite and unchangeable God suffered and died on the cross, they acknowledge that this is not true, but that Christ's human mind alone sustained the pains of death. How have we, then, an infinite sufferer? This language seems to us an imposition on common minds, and very derogatory to God's justice, as if this attribute could be satisfied by a sophism and a fiction.
We are also told, that Christ is a more interesting object, that his love and mercy are more felt, when he is viewed as the Supreme God, who left his glory to take humanity and to suffer for men. That Trinitarians are strongly moved by this representation, we do not mean to deny; but we think their emotions altogether founded on a misapprehension of their own doctrines. They talk of the second person of the Trinity's leaving his glory and his Father's bosom, to visit and save the world. But this second person, being the unchangeable and infinite God, was evidently incapable of parting with the least degree of his perfection and felicity. At the moment of his taking flesh, he was as intimately present with his Father as before, and equally with his Father filled heaven, and earth, and immensity. This Trinitarians acknowledge; and still they profess to be touched and overwhelmed by the amazing humiliation of this immutable being! But not only does their doctrine, when fully explained, reduce Christ's humiliation to a fiction, it almost wholly destroys the impressions with which his cross ought to be viewed. According to their doctrine, Christ was comparatively no sufferer at all. It is true, his human mind suffered; but this, they tell us, was an infinitely small part of Jesus, bearing no more proportion to his whole nature, than a single hair of our heads to the whole body, or than a drop to the ocean. The divine mind of Christ, that which was most properly himself, was infinitely happy, at the very moment of the suffering of his humanity. Whilst hanging on the cross, he was the happiest being in the universe, as happy as the infinite Father; so that his pains, compared with his felicity, were nothing. This Trinitarians do, and must, acknowledge. It follows necessarily from the immutableness of the divine nature, which they ascribe to Christ; so that their system, justly viewed, robs his death of interest, weakens our sympathy with his sufferings, and is, of all others, most unfavorable to a love of Christ, founded on a sense of his sacrifices for mankind. We esteem our own views to be vastly more affecting. It is our belief, that Christ's humiliation was real and entire, that the whole Saviour, and not a part of him, suffered, that his crucifixion was a scene of deep and unmixed agony. As we stand round his cross, our minds are not distracted, nor our sensibility weakened, by contemplating him as composed of incongruous and infinitely differing minds, and as having a balance of infinite felicity. We recognize in the dying Jesus but one mind. This, we think, renders his sufferings, and his patience and love in bearing them, incomparably more impressive and affecting than the system we oppose.
3. Having thus given our belief on two great points, namely, that there is one God, and that Jesus Christ is a being distinct from, and inferior to, God, I now proceed to another point, on which we lay still greater stress. We believe in the MORAL PERFECTION OF GOD. We consider no part of theology so important as that which treats of God's moral character; and we value our views of Christianity chiefly as they assert his amiable and venerable attributes.
It may be said, that, in regard to this subject, all Christians agree, that all ascribe to the Supreme Being infinite justice, goodness, and holiness. We reply, that it is very possible to speak of God magnificently, and to think of him meanly; to apply to his person high-sounding epithets, and to his government, principles which make him odious. The Heathens called Jupiter the greatest and the best; but his history was black with cruelty and lust. We cannot judge of men's real ideas of God by their general language, for in all ages they have hoped to soothe the Deity by adulation. We must inquire into their particular views of his purposes, of the principles of his administration, and of his disposition towards his creatures.
We conceive that Christians have generally leaned towards a very injurious view of the Supreme Being. They have too often felt, as if he were raised, by his greatness and sovereignty, above the principles of morality, above those eternal laws of equity and rectitude, to which all other beings are subjected. We believe, that in no being is the sense of right so strong, so omnipotent, as in God. We believe that his almighty power is entirely submitted to his perceptions of rectitude; and this is the ground of our piety. It is not because he is our Creator merely, but because he created us for good and holy purposes; it is not because his will is irresistible, but because his will is the perfection of virtue, that we pay him allegiance. We cannot bow before a being, however great and powerful, who governs tyrannically. We respect nothing but excellence, whether on earth or in heaven. We venerate not the loftiness of God's throne, but the equity and goodness in which it is established.
We believe that God is infinitely good, kind, benevolent, in the proper sense of these words; good in disposition, as well as in act; good, not to a few, but to all; good to every individual, as well as to the general system.
We believe, too, that God is just; but we never forget, that his justice is the justice of a good being, dwelling in the same mind, and acting in harmony, with perfect benevolence. By this attribute, we understand God's infinite regard to virtue or moral worth, expressed in a moral government; that is, in giving excellent and equitable laws, and in conferring such rewards, and inflicting such punishments, as are best fitted to secure their observance. God's justice has for its end the highest virtue of the creation, and it punishes for this end alone, and thus it coincides with benevolence; for virtue and happiness, though not the same, are inseparably conjoined.
God's justice thus viewed, appears to us to be in perfect harmony with his mercy. According to the prevalent systems of theology, these attributes are so discordant and jarring, that to reconcile them is the hardest task, and the most wonderful achievement, of infinite wisdom. To us they seem to be intimate friends, always at peace, breathing the same spirit, and seeking the same end. By God's mercy, we understand not a blind instinctive compassion, which forgives without reflection, and without regard to the interests of virtue. This, we acknowledge, would be incompatible with justice, and also with enlightened benevolence. God's mercy, as we understand it, desires strongly the happiness of the guilty, but only through their penitence. It has a regard to character as truly as his justice. It defers punishment, and suffers long, that the sinner may return to his duty, but leaves the impenitent and unyielding, to the fearful retribution threatened in God's Word.
To give our views of God in one word, we believe in his Parental character. We ascribe to him, not only the name, but the dispositions and principles of a father. We believe that he has a father's concern for his creatures, a father's desire for their improvement, a father's equity in proportioning his commands to their powers, a father's joy in their progress, a father's readiness to receive the penitent, and a father's justice for the incorrigible. We look upon this world as a place of education, in which he is training men by prosperity and adversity, by aids and obstructions, by conflicts of reason and passion, by motives to duty and temptations to sin, by a various discipline suited to free and moral beings, for union with himself, and for a sublime and ever-growing virtue in heaven.
Now, we object to the systems of religion, which prevail among us, that they are adverse, in a greater or less degree, to these purifying, comforting, and honorable views of God; that they take from us our Father in heaven, and substitute for him a being, whom we cannot love if we would, and whom we ought not to love if we could. We object, particularly on this ground, to that system, which arrogates to itself the name of Orthodoxy, and which is now industriously propagated through our country. This system indeed takes various shapes, but in all it casts dishonor on the Creator. According to its old and genuine form, it teaches, that God brings us into life wholly depraved, so that under the innocent features of our childhood is hidden a nature averse to all good and propense to all evil, a nature which exposes us to God's displeasure and wrath, even before we have acquired power to understand our duties, or to reflect upon our actions. According to a more modern exposition, it teaches, that we came from the hands of our Maker with such a constitution, and are placed under such influences and circumstances, as to render certain and infallible the total depravity of every human being, from the first moment of his moral agency; and it also teaches, that the offence of the child, who brings into life this ceaseless tendency to unmingled crime, exposes him to the sentence of everlasting damnation. Now, according to the plainest principles of morality, we maintain, that a natural constitution of the mind, unfailingly disposing it to evil and to evil alone, would absolve it from guilt; that to give existence under this condition would argue unspeakable cruelty; and that to punish the sin of this unhappily constituted child with endless ruin, would be a wrong unparalleled by the most merciless despotism.
This system also teaches, that God selects from this corrupt mass a number to be saved, and plucks them, by a special influence, from the common ruin; that the rest of mankind, though left without that special grace which their conversion requires, are commanded to repent, under penalty of aggravated woe; and that forgiveness is promised them, on terms which their very constitution infallibly disposes them to reject, and in rejecting which they awfully enhance the punishments of hell. These proffers of forgiveness and exhortations of amendment, to beings born under a blighting curse, fill our minds with a horror which we want words to express.
That this religious system does not produce all the effects on character, which might be anticipated, we most joyfully admit. It is often, very often, counteracted by nature, conscience, common sense, by the general strain of Scripture, by the mild example and precepts of Christ, and by the many positive declarations of God's universal kindness and perfect equity. But still we think that we see its unhappy influence. It tends to discourage the timid, to give excuses to the bad, to feed the vanity of the fanatical, and to offer shelter to the bad feelings of the malignant. By shocking, as it does, the fundamental principles of morality, and by exhibiting a severe and partial Deity, it tends strongly to pervert the moral faculty, to form a gloomy, forbidding, and servile religion, and to lead men to substitute censoriousness, bitterness, and persecution, for a tender and impartial charity. We think, too, that this system, which begins with degrading human nature, may be expected to end in pride; for pride grows out of a consciousness of high distinctions, however obtained, and no distinction is so great as that which is made between the elected and abandoned of God.
The false and dishonorable views of God, which have now been stated, we feel ourselves bound to resist unceasingly. Other errors we can pass over with comparative indifference. But we ask our opponents to leave to us a GOD, worthy of our love and trust, in whom our moral sentiments may delight, in whom our weaknesses and sorrows may find refuge. We cling to the Divine perfections. We meet them everywhere in creation, we read them in the Scriptures, we see a lovely image of them in Jesus Christ; and gratitude, love, and veneration call on us to assert them. Reproached, as we often are, by men, it is our consolation and happiness, that one of our chief offences is the zeal with which we vindicate the dishonored goodness and rectitude of God.
4. Having thus spoken of the unity of God; of the unity of Jesus, and his inferiority to God; and of the perfections of the Divine character; I now proceed to give our views of the mediation of Christ, and of the purposes of his mission. With regard to the great object which Jesus came to accomplish, there seems to be no possibility of mistake. We believe, that he was sent by the Father to effect a moral, or spiritual deliverance of mankind; that is, to rescue men from sin and its consequences, and to bring them to a state of everlasting purity and happiness. We believe, too, that he accomplishes this sublime purpose by a variety of methods; by his instructions respecting God's unity, parental character, and moral government, which are admirably fitted to reclaim the world from idolatry and impiety, to the knowledge, love, and obedience of the Creator; by his promises of pardon to the penitent, and of divine assistance to those who labor for progress in moral excellence; by the light which he has thrown on the path of duty; by his own spotless example, in which the loveliness and sublimity of virtue shine forth to warm and quicken, as well as guide us to perfection; by his threatenings against incorrigible guilt; by his glorious discoveries of immortality; by his sufferings and death; by that signal event, the resurrection, which powerfully bore witness to his divine mission, and brought down to men's senses a future life; by his continual intercession, which obtains for us spiritual aid and blessings; and by the power with which he is invested of raising the dead, judging the world, and conferring the everlasting rewards promised to the faithful.
We have no desire to conceal the fact, that a difference of opinion exists among us, in regard to an interesting part of Christ's mediation; I mean, in regard to the precise influence of his death on our forgiveness. Many suppose, that this event contributes to our pardon, as it was a principal means of confirming his religion, and of giving it a power over the mind; in other words, that it procures forgiveness by leading to that repentance and virtue, which is the great and only condition on which forgiveness is bestowed. Many of us are dissatisfied with this explanation, and think that the Scriptures ascribe the remission of sins to Christ's death, with an emphasis so peculiar, that we ought to consider this event as having a special influence in removing punishment, though the Scriptures may not reveal the way in which it contributes to this end.
Whilst, however, we differ in explaining the connexion between Christ's death and human forgiveness, a connexion which we all gratefully acknowledge, we agree in rejecting many sentiments which prevail in regard to his mediation. The idea, which is conveyed to common minds by the popular system, that Christ's death has an influence in making God placable, or merciful, in awakening his kindness towards men, we reject with strong disapprobation. We are happy to find, that this very dishonorable notion is disowned by intelligent Christians of that class from which we differ. We recollect, however, that, not long ago, it was common to hear of Christ, as having died to appease God's wrath, and to pay the debt of sinners to his inflexible justice; and we have a strong persuasion, that the language of popular religious books, and the common mode of stating the doctrine of Christ's mediation, still communicate very degrading views of God's character. They give to multitudes the impression, that the death of Jesus produces a change in the mind of God towards man, and that in this its efficacy chiefly consists. No error seems to us more pernicious. We can endure no shade over the pure goodness of God. We earnestly maintain, that Jesus, instead of calling forth, in any way or degree, the mercy of the Father, was sent by that mercy, to be our Saviour; that he is nothing to the human race, but what he is by God's appointment; that he communicates nothing but what God empowers him to bestow; that our Father in heaven is originally, essentially, and eternally placable, and disposed to forgive; and that his unborrowed, underived, and unchangeable love is the only fountain of what flows to us through his Son. We conceive, that Jesus is dishonored, not glorified, by ascribing to him an influence, which clouds the splendor of Divine benevolence.
We farther agree in rejecting, as unscriptural and absurd, the explanation given by the popular system, of the manner in which Christ's death procures forgiveness for men. This system used to teach as its fundamental principle, that man, having sinned against an infinite Being, has contracted infinite guilt, and is consequently exposed to an infinite penalty. We believe, however, that this reasoning, if reasoning it may be called, which overlooks the obvious maxim, that the guilt of a being must be proportioned to his nature and powers, has fallen into disuse. Still the system teaches, that sin, of whatever degree, exposes to endless punishment, and that the whole human race, being infallibly involved by their nature in sin, owe this awful penalty to the justice of their Creator. It teaches, that this penalty cannot be remitted, in consistency with the honor of the divine law, unless a substitute be found to endure it or to suffer an equivalent. It also teaches, that, from the nature of the case, no substitute is adequate to this work, save the infinite God himself; and accordingly, God, in his second person, took on him human nature, that he might pay to his own justice the debt of punishment incurred by men, and might thus reconcile forgiveness with the claims and threatenings of his law. Such is the prevalent system. Now, to us, this doctrine seems to carry on its front strong marks of absurdity; and we maintain that Christianity ought not to be encumbered with it, unless it be laid down in the New Testament fully and expressly. We ask our adversaries, then, to point to some plain passages where it is taught. We ask for one text, in which we are told, that God took human nature that he might make an infinite satisfaction to his own justice; for one text, which tells us, that human guilt requires an infinite substitute; that Christ's sufferings owe their efficacy to their being borne by an infinite being; or that his divine nature gives infinite value to the sufferings of the human. Not ONE WORD of this description can we find in the Scriptures; not a text, which even hints at these strange doctrines. They are altogether, we believe, the fictions of theologians. Christianity is in no degree responsible for them. We are astonished at their prevalence. What can be plainer, than that God cannot, in any sense, be a sufferer, or bear a penalty in the room of his creatures? How dishonorable to him is the supposition, that his justice is now so severe, as to exact infinite punishment for the sins of frail and feeble men, and now so easy and yielding, as to accept the limited pains of Christ's human soul, as a full equivalent for the endless woes due from the world? How plain is it also, according to this doctrine, that God, instead of being plenteous in forgiveness, never forgives; for it seems absurd to speak of men as forgiven, when their whole punishment, or an equivalent to it, is borne by a substitute? A scheme more fitted to obscure the brightness of Christianity and the mercy of God, or less suited to give comfort to a guilty and troubled mind, could not, we think, be easily framed.
We believe, too, that this system is unfavorable to the character. It naturally leads men to think, that Christ came to change God's mind rather than their own; that the highest object of his mission was to avert punishment, rather than to communicate holiness; and that a large part of religion consists in disparaging good works and human virtue, for the purpose of magnifying the value of Christ's vicarious sufferings. In this way, a sense of the infinite importance and indispensable necessity of personal improvement is weakened, and high-sounding praises of Christ's cross seem often to be substituted for obedience to his precepts. For ourselves, we have not so learned Jesus. Whilst we gratefully acknowledge, that he came to rescue us from punishment, we believe, that he was sent on a still nobler errand, namely, to deliver us from sin itself, and to form us to a sublime and heavenly virtue. We regard him as a Saviour, chiefly as he is the light, physician, and guide of the dark, diseased, and wandering mind. No influence in the universe seems to us so glorious, as that over the character; and no redemption so worthy of thankfulness, as the restoration of the soul to purity. Without this, pardon, were it possible, would be of little value. Why pluck the sinner from hell, if a hell be left to burn in his own breast? Why raise him to heaven, if he remain a stranger to its sanctity and love? With these impressions, we are accustomed to value the Gospel chiefly as it abounds in effectual aids, motives, excitements to a generous and divine virtue. In this virtue, as in a common centre, we see all its doctrines, precepts, promises meet; and we believe, that faith in this religion is of no worth, and contributes nothing to salvation, any farther than as it uses these doctrines, precepts, promises, and the whole life, character, sufferings, and triumphs of Jesus, as the means of purifying the mind, of changing it into the likeness of his celestial excellence.
5. Having thus stated our views of the highest object of Christ's mission, that it is the recovery of men to virtue, or holiness, I shall now, in the last place, give our views of the nature of Christian virtue, or true holiness. We believe that all virtue has its foundation in the moral nature of man, that is, in conscience, or his sense of duty, and in the power of forming his temper and life according to conscience. We believe that these moral faculties are the grounds of responsibility, and the highest distinctions of human nature, and that no act is praiseworthy, any farther than it springs from their exertion. We believe, that no dispositions infused into us without our own moral activity, are of the nature of virtue, and therefore, we reject the doctrine of irresistible divine influence on the human mind, moulding it into goodness, as marble is hewn into a statue. Such goodness, if this word may be used, would not be the object of moral approbation, any more than the instinctive affections of inferior animals, or the constitutional amiableness of human beings.
By these remarks, we do not mean to deny the importance of God's aid or Spirit; but by his Spirit, we mean a moral, illuminating, and persuasive influence, not physical, not compulsory, not involving a necessity of virtue. We object, strongly, to the idea of many Christians respecting man's impotence and God's irresistible agency on the heart, believing that they subvert our responsibility and the laws of our moral nature, that they make men machines, that they cast on God the blame of all evil deeds, that they discourage good minds, and inflate the fanatical with wild conceits of immediate and sensible inspiration.
Among the virtues, we give the first place to the love of God. We believe, that this principle is the true end and happiness of our being, that we were made for union with our Creator, that his infinite perfection is the only sufficient object and true resting-place for the insatiable desires and unlimited capacities of the human mind, and that, without him, our noblest sentiments, admiration, veneration, hope, and love, would wither and decay. We believe, too, that the love of God is not only essential to happiness, but to the strength and perfection of all the virtues; that conscience, without the sanction of God's authority and retributive justice, would be a weak director; that benevolence, unless nourished by communion with his goodness, and encouraged by his smile, could not thrive amidst the selfishness and thanklessness of the world; and that self-government, without a sense of the divine inspection, would hardly extend beyond an outward and partial purity. God, as he is essentially goodness, holiness, justice, and virtue, so he is the life, motive, and sustainer of virtue in the human soul.
But, whilst we earnestly inculcate the love of God, we believe that great care is necessary to distinguish it from counterfeits. We think that much which is called piety is worthless. Many have fallen into the error, that there can be no excess in feelings which have God for their object; and, distrusting as coldness that self-possession, without which virtue and devotion lose all their dignity, they have abandoned themselves to extravagances, which have brought contempt on piety. Most certainly, if the love of God be that which often bears its name, the less we have of it the better. If religion be the shipwreck of understanding, we cannot keep too far from it. On this subject, we always speak plainly. We cannot sacrifice our reason to the reputation of zeal. We owe it to truth and religion to maintain, that fanaticism, partial insanity, sudden impressions, and ungovernable transports, are anything rather than piety.
We conceive, that the true love of God is a moral sentiment, founded on a clear perception, and consisting in a high esteem and veneration, of his moral perfections. Thus, it perfectly coincides, and is in fact the same thing, with the love of virtue, rectitude, and goodness. You will easily judge, then, what we esteem the surest and only decisive signs of piety. We lay no stress on strong excitements. We esteem him, and him only a pious man, who practically conforms to God's moral perfections and government; who shows his delight in God's benevolence, by loving and serving his neighbour; his delight in God's justice, by being resolutely upright; his sense of God's purity, by regulating his thoughts, imagination, and desires; and whose conversation, business, and domestic life are swayed by a regard to God's presence and authority. In all things else men may deceive themselves. Disordered nerves may give them strange sights, and sounds, and impressions. Texts of Scripture may come to them as from Heaven. Their whole souls may be moved, and their confidence in God's favor be undoubting. But in all this there is no religion. The question is, Do they love God's commands, in which his character is fully expressed, and give up to these their habits and passions? Without this, ecstasy is a mockery. One surrender of desire to God's will, is worth a thousand transports. We do not judge of the bent of men's minds by their raptures, any more than we judge of the natural direction of a tree during a storm. We rather suspect loud profession, for we have observed, that deep feeling is generally noiseless, and least seeks display.
We would not, by these remarks, be understood as wishing to exclude from religion warmth, and even transport. We honor, and highly value, true religious sensibility. We believe, that Christianity is intended to act powerfully on our whole nature, on the heart as well as the understanding and the conscience. We conceive of heaven as a state where the love of God will be exalted into an unbounded fervor and joy; and we desire, in our pilgrimage here, to drink into the spirit of that better world. But we think, that religious warmth is only to be valued, when it springs naturally from an improved character, when it comes unforced, when it is the recompense of obedience, when it is the warmth of a mind which understands God by being like him, and when, instead of disordering, it exalts the understanding, invigorates conscience, gives a pleasure to common duties, and is seen to exist in connexion with cheerfulness, judiciousness, and a reasonable frame of mind. When we observe a fervor, called religious, in men whose general character expresses little refinement and elevation, and whose piety seems at war with reason, we pay it little respect. We honor religion too much to give its sacred name to a feverish, forced, fluctuating zeal, which has little power over the life.
Another important branch of virtue, we believe to be love to Christ. The greatness of the work of Jesus, the spirit with which he executed it, and the sufferings which he bore for our salvation, we feel to be strong claims on our gratitude and veneration. We see in nature no beauty to be compared with the loveliness of his character, nor do we find on earth a benefactor to whom we owe an equal debt. We read his history with delight, and learn from it the perfection of our nature. We are particularly touched by his death, which was endured for our redemption, and by that strength of charity which triumphed over his pains. His resurrection is the foundation of our hope of immortality. His intercession gives us boldness to draw nigh to the throne of grace, and we look up to heaven with new desire, when we think, that, if we follow him here, we shall there see his benignant countenance, and enjoy his friendship for ever.
I need not express to you our views on the subject of the benevolent virtues. We attach such importance to these that we are sometimes reproached with exalting them above piety. We regard the spirit of love, charity, meekness, forgiveness, liberality, and beneficence, as the badge and distinction of Christians, as the brightest image we can bear of God, as the best proof of piety. On this subject, I need not, and cannot enlarge; but there is one branch of benevolence which I ought not to pass over in silence, because we think that we conceive of it more highly and justly than many of our brethren. I refer to the duty of candor, charitable judgment, especially towards those who differ in religious opinion. We think, that in nothing have Christians so widely departed from their religion, as in this particular. We read with astonishment and horror, the history of the church; and sometimes when we look back on the fires of persecution, and on the zeal of Christians, in building up walls of separation, and in giving up one another to perdition, we feel as if we were reading the records of an infernal, rather than a heavenly kingdom. An enemy to every religion, if asked to describe a Christian, would, with some show of reason, depict him as an idolater of his own distinguishing opinions, covered with badges of party, shutting his eyes on the virtues, and his ears on the arguments, of his opponents, arrogating all excellence to his own sect and all saving power to his own creed, sheltering under the name of pious zeal the love of domination, the conceit of infallibility, and the spirit of intolerance, and trampling on men's rights under the pretence of saving their souls.
We can hardly conceive of a plainer obligation on beings of our frail and fallible nature, who are instructed in the duty of candid judgment, than to abstain from condemning men of apparent conscientiousness and sincerity, who are chargeable with no crime but that of differing from us in the interpretation of the Scriptures, and differing, too, on topics of great and acknowledged obscurity. We are astonished at the hardihood of those, who, with Christ's warnings sounding in their ears, take on them the responsibility of making creeds for his church, and cast out professors of virtuous lives for imagined errors, for the guilt of thinking for themselves. We know that zeal for truth is the cover for this usurpation of Christ's prerogative; but we think that zeal for truth, as it is called, is very suspicious, except in men, whose capacities and advantages, whose patient deliberation, and whose improvements in humility, mildness, and candor, give them a right to hope that their views are more just than those of their neighbours. Much of what passes for a zeal for truth, we look upon with little respect, for it often appears to thrive most luxuriantly where other virtues shoot up thinly and feebly; and we have no gratitude for those reformers, who would force upon us a doctrine which has not sweetened their own tempers, or made them better men than their neighbours.
We are accustomed to think much of the difficulties attending religious inquiries; difficulties springing from the slow development of our minds, from the power of early impressions, from the state of society, from human authority, from the general neglect of the reasoning powers, from the want of just principles of criticism and of important helps in interpreting Scripture, and from various other causes. We find, that on no subject have men, and even good men, ingrafted so many strange conceits, wild theories, and fictions of fancy, as on religion ; and remembering, as we do, that we ourselves are sharers of the common frailty, we dare not assume infallibility in the treatment of our fellow-Christians, or encourage in common Christians, who have little time for investigation, the habit of denouncing and condemning other denominations, perhaps more enlightened and virtuous than their own. Charity, forbearance, a delight in the virtues of different sects, a backwardness to censure and condemn, these are virtues, which, however poorly practised by us, we admire and recommend; and we would rather join ourselves to the church in which they abound, than to any other communion, however elated with the belief of its own orthodoxy, however strict in guarding its creed, however burning with zeal against imagined error.
I have thus given the distinguishing views of those Christians in whose names I have spoken. We have embraced this system, not hastily or lightly, but after much deliberation; and we hold it fast, not merely because we believe it to be true, but because we regard it as purifying truth, as a doctrine according to godliness, as able to "work mightily" and to "bring forth fruit" in them who believe. That we wish to spread it, we have no desire to conceal; but we think, that we wish its diffusion, because we regard it as more friendly to practical piety and pure morals than the opposite doctrines, because it gives clearer and nobler views of duty, and stronger motives to its performance, because it recommends religion at once to the understanding and the heart, because it asserts the lovely and venerable attributes of God, because it tends to restore the benevolent spirit of Jesus to his divided and afflicted church, and because it cuts off every hope of God's favor, except that which springs from practical conformity to the life and precepts of Christ. We see nothing in our views to give offence, save their purity, and it is their purity, which makes us seek and hope their extension through the world.
My friend and brother; -- You are this day to take upon you important duties; to be clothed with an office, which the Son of God did not disdain; to devote yourself to that religion, which the most hallowed lips have preached, and the most precious blood sealed. We trust that you will bring to this work a willing mind, a firm purpose, a martyr's spirit, a readiness to toil and suffer for the truth, a devotion of your best powers to the interests of piety and virtue. I have spoken of the doctrines which you will probably preach; but I do not mean, that you are to give yourself to controversy. You will remember, that good practice is the end of preaching, and will labor to make your people holy livers, rather than skilful disputants. Be careful, lest the desire of defending what you deem truth, and of repelling reproach and misrepresentation, turn you aside from your great business, which is to fix in men's minds a living conviction of the obligation, sublimity, and happiness of Christian virtue. The best way to vindicate your sentiments, is to show, in your preaching and life, their intimate connexion with Christian morals, with a high and delicate sense of duty, with candor towards your opposers, with inflexible integrity, and with an habitual reverence for God. If any light can pierce and scatter the clouds of prejudice, it is that of a pure example. My brother, may your life preach more loudly than your lips. Be to this people a pattern of all good works, and may your instructions derive authority from a well-grounded belief in your hearers, that you speak from the heart, that you preach from experience, that the truth which you dispense has wrought powerfully in your own heart, that God, and Jesus, and heaven, are not merely words on your lips, but most affecting realities to your mind, and springs of hope and consolation, and strength, in all your trials. Thus laboring, may you reap abundantly, and have a testimony of your faithfulness, not only in your own conscience, but in the esteem, love, virtues, and improvements of your people.
To all who hear me, I would say, with the Apostle, Prove all things, hold fast that which is good. Do not, brethren, shrink from the duty of searching God's Word for yourselves, through fear of human censure and denunciation. Do not think, that you may innocently follow the opinions which prevail around you, without investigation, on the ground, that Christianity is now so purified from errors, as to need no laborious research. There is much reason to believe, that Christianity is at this moment dishonored by gross and cherished corruptions. If you remember the darkness which hung over the Gospel for ages; if you consider the impure union, which still subsists in almost every Christian country, between the church and state, and which enlists men's selfishness and ambition on the side of established error; if you recollect in what degree the spirit of intolerance has checked free inquiry, not only before, but since the Reformation; you will see that Christianity cannot have freed itself from all the human inventions, which disfigured it under the Papal tyranny. No. Much stubble is yet to be burned; much rubbish to be removed; many gaudy decorations, which a false taste has hung around Christianity, must be swept away; and the earth-born fogs, which have long shrouded it, must be scattered, before this divine fabric will rise before us in its native and awful majesty, in its harmonious proportions, in its mild and celestial splendors This glorious reformation in the church, we hope, under God's blessing, from the progress of the human intellect, from the moral progress of society, from the consequent decline of prejudice and bigotry, and, though last not least, from the subversion of human authority in matters of religion, from the fall of those hierarchies, and other human institutions, by which the minds of individuals are oppressed under the weight of numbers, and a Papal dominion is perpetuated in the Protestant church. Our earnest prayer to God is, that he will overturn, and overturn, and overturn the strong-holds of spiritual usurpation, until HE shall come, whose right it is to rule the minds of men; that the conspiracy of ages against the liberty of Christians may be brought to an end; that the servile assent, so long yielded to human creeds, may give place to honest and devout inquiry into the Scriptures; and that Christianity, thus purified from error, may put forth its almighty energy, and prove itself, by its ennobling influence on the mind, to be indeed "the power of God unto salvation."
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