SCRIPTURE PROOFS

OF

UNITARIANISM.

INTRODUCTION.

DIFFERENT OPINIONS CONCERNING GOD, JESUS CHRIST, AND THE HOLY SPIRIT;

WITH BRIEF REMARKS ON THE MIS APPLICATION OF CERTAIN TERMS.

SO MANY and so conflicting have been the opinions entertained by the Christian church respecting the essence of the Godhead and the person of Jesus Christ, that it would be altogether impracticable to state them in a few pages with sufficient accuracy and precision. To some readers, however, it may not be uninstructive to ascertain the principal points of difference that subsist among the leading sects; and for all who feel disposed to peruse the following treatise, it will be necessary to know in what sense the author uses appellations, designed to indicate the peculiar notions of the disciples of Jesus, but unhappily too often employed as epithets of ridicule or intolerance.

The commonly received opinion is, that the Supreme Being consists of three persons, to each of whom belong the essential attributes of Deity; and that these three persons constitute only one God. Of those who adopt this hypothesis, some consider that the terms Father, Son, and

Holy Ghost, are merely relative;-that the persons in the Trinity did not exist under these characters from all eternity;—that there is no precedence amongst them, either in time, order, or dignity. Others, whose professed standard is the creed attributed to Athanasius, believe that the Father, whom they designate the first person in the Godhead, is alone the Source or Fountain of the Deity; that the Son, who, according to them, is the second person, was begotten of the Father; and that the Holy Ghost, the third person, proceeded from the Father and the Son and yet that these three persons are co-equal, co-essential, and coeternal. Some, again, have been of opinion, that the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, are not three persons, but three modes, characters, or relations; and that only one and the same agent is meant by the sacred writers, whether they treat of the Father, the Son, or the Spirit: while, on the other hand, some have employed language concerning the three persons in the Godhead, unequivocally expressing the notion of three distinct Gods. The maintainers of these different opinions agree, that Christ was perfect man, as well as perfect God; and they are generally distinguished by the appellation of TRINITARIANS, but sometimes called, according to their peculiar views, Athanasians; Sabellians, or Nominalists; Tritheists, or believers in three distinct, infinite minds, or intelligences.

In this statement of the belief of Trinitarians, we employ the word person agreeably to their own usage; at the same time remarking, that, in relation to God and Christ,—the one represented as a Father, and the other as a Son: the former as the Sender and Inspirer, the latter as the Sent and Inspired,—the only conception we can form of its meaning is that of a mind, or an intelligent being. But the precise import of the term, as used by Trinitarians, it is difficult to ascertain: some of them defining it as 66 a mode

or attribute;" some, as “an infinite mind;" others, as 66 an intelligent or absolute substance"-" a distinct subsistence"-" a real distinction"-" a perfect hypostasis." On this point, however, the more modern advocates of the Trinity are comparatively silent; making use of the word person without professing to employ it as the representative of any definite idea.

Another and a very different class of Christians, termed Arians, profess to believe that God is one person only; that his Son Jesus Christ is distinct from and inferior to him; and that the Holy Spirit is either a being inferior to them both, or merely an attribute or a gift of God. Respecting Christ, some of them hold that he was begotten of the Father before all ages, being a subordinate Deity, but superior to all other intelligences; and that, under the selfexistent God, he created the universe, and supports and governs it. Others believe that he was a superangelic being, employed by the Almighty in forming the solar system, or "in reducing this globe out of a chaotic state to its present habitable form."* Others, again, affirm that he was a pre-existent spirit, but deny that he had any concern in the making of the universe, or in the formation of any world or system of worlds. All Arians, however, concur in opinion, that the Son of God came down from heaven, clothed himself with human flesh, and lived and died as a man, to accomplish the important ends for which he was sent by the Father into the world. Few of this denomination, if any at the present day, consider either the Son or the Spirit as an object of address in prayer.

The Socinians admitted the strict oneness of God, and

* DR. PRICE: who seems to have considered Christ as the instrumental agent in the formation only of this world.-See his "Sermons on the Christian Doctrine," pp. 62, 91-93, Belfast edition.

the simple humanity of Christ, but conceived that, on account of Jesus' exaltation to the right hand of the Father, he is entitled to religious worship both from angels and from men.

Those Christians who assume the name of Proper Unitarians, but who are not unfrequently styled Humanitarians, believe that God is one, in the strictest sense of the word; that he alone is entitled to religious worship; and that his Son and Servant, Jesus Christ, was in nature only a human being, but in office superior to all other divinelycommissioned teachers ;—that his mission was of a holier and a higher character;-that he was the Messiah, the Author and Finisher of our Faith, the great medium of communication from God to men, and the appointed of his Father to be Judge of all mankind. Some Humanitarians admit the doctrine of Christ's miraculous conception; others reject it, believing Jesus to have been the son of Joseph as well as of Mary. With the Socinians, however, they unite in considering the Holy Spirit to signify, in the Bible, either the Father himself, or his power, wisdom, influence, gifts, &c.

The Proper Unitarians are sometimes named Socinians, but most erroneously. Socinus and his Polish brethren, with the old English Unitarians, were professed worshippers of Jesus Christ; but the believers in his simple humanity now earnestly contend, that the God and Father of all is the only proper object of religious worship. To class this sect, therefore, with those who pay divine homage to the Saviour, while they consider him, in respect to nature, as only a human being, seems to indicate either ignorance of the real import of the word Socinian, or a determination to misapply a name, which, however honourable to those whom it originally designated, is well known to be universally disclaimed by the "true worshippers of