The Unitarians Henry Gow THE UNITARIANS BY HENRY GOW, MA., D.D. METHUEN & CO. LTD. 36 ESSEX STREET W.C. LONDON First Published in 1929 TO MY WIFE PRIEPTED IN GREAT BRITAIN EDITOR'S PREFACE WORD of explanation seems to be needed in A regard to the title and the sub-title which have been chosen for this series. There is one faith, says St. Paul; but the title of the series indicates more than one. A difficulty un- questionably exists at that point. It has not been overlooked. Had the promoters of this series adopted the former point of view and called it "the Faith" instead of "the Faiths", they would have answered in advance an important question which the series itself should be left to answer. But, equally, by calling the series "the Faiths", instead of "the Faith", have they not -prejudged the question in another way? Of the two positions the latter seemed the less 1 dogmatic. Let us take the world as we find it, in -'whichthe Faiths show themselves as a plurality, and , then, if they are really one, or many varieties of the '.[.same,or if only one is true and the rest false, let the .'lfact appear from the accounts they give of them- I,selve's. -. On no other terms could full liberty have been -accorded to the writers who contribute to the series; ,!on no other terms could the task of editing the series :,be fairly carried out. It would have been obviously vii 3 Y, ' EDITOR'S PREFACE viii THE UNITARIANS the hope is entertained that from the present ation of unfair to demand of each of the contributors that he fj differences in this series there may emerge some should exhibit the faith that is in him as ultimately unities hitherto unsuspected or dimly seen ; but that identical with the faith that is in each of his fellow- $ will be as it may. The issue is not to be forced. contributors. It would have been obviously unfair to 3..&:,..a . To present a complete logical justification of our deny to any contributor the right to exhibit his own title and sub-title is perhaps not possible, and such faith as the only true faith and all the rest as false. justification as we have here offered will probably It would have been obviously unfair to assume that 8 commend itself only to the pragmatic mind. But faith is necessarily singular because St. Paul so 5 objections taken to these titles will be found on describes it. For the degree of authority to be attri- examination to be objections to the series itself. buted to the words of St. Paul is precisely one of the How, we might ask, can any earnest and eminent points on which the contributors to the series must Christian, believing his own variety of Christian be allowed to differ and to speak for themselves. expression to be better than the rest, logically justify The same considerations apply to the sub-title of his co-operation, in such, a series as this, with other the series-"Varieties of Christian Expression". It earnest and eminent Christians whose beliefs in that may be that Christianity has only one mode of ex- matter run counter to his-own? None the less they pression, and that it ceases to be Christianity when are here co-operating. expressed in any other way. But to take that for That such co-operation has been found possible granted would ill become the editor of such a series be reckoned one of the signs- of the times. The as this, and it would become him still worse if he of it lies, not in logic, but in charity. deliberately planned the series so as to lead up to that conclusion. Again we must take the world as we find L, P. JACKS ' it. Among those who claim to be Christians many varieties of expression unquestionably exist which may or may not be only different,ways of expressing the same original truth. So far as the editor is con- cerned this must be left an open question. If to some writers in the series it should seem good to deny the name of Christian to those whose modes of expression differ from their own, they must not be precluded from doing so, and the reader will judge for himself between the claim and the counter-claim. Certainly AUTHOR'S PREFACE ;%:{ i , and sorrow and suffering, are not-, and ought not to be, independent of the past. As Dr. Martineau says AUTHOR'S + PREFACE - in his Types of Ethical Theory, "I cannot rest con- . tentedly upon the past : I cannot take a step towards HE aim of this book is to show that Uni- ' the future without its support". Ttarianism is not, as is sometimes supposed, x. A philosophy of revelation in History is a great mainly negative and critical, but that it is a develop- #need for all Liberal Christians who accept modern ment out of orthodoxy under the influence of a belief - Biblical criticism, and at the same time look at the in the freedom of/ the spirit in its worship and in %:;Bible with deep reverence, and at the life and its search for truth. Most Unitarians would agree l&-;veaching of Jesus Christ in a spirit of humble with some words of Lord Haldane's in the Hibbert ",aiscipleship. Everyone must feel the value of the Jozlrnal for January 1928 :- k~ibleas great religious literature, but its value as "There may be great divergence of belief about evelation in History, what Baron von Hiigel the Gospel narrative. But there is none about the alls "its factual happenings", is very difficult to presence of God in the soul, or about the tremendous efine. Such a subject is beyond the scope of this significance of the teaching of Christ .' ook. But it must be recognized that Liberal No one can speak authoritatively for all Uni- hristianity, while unable to accept the dogmatic tarians, seeing that they have no binding creed to authority of the Bible for life or thought, does not be expounded, no Articles of Faith to be explained. attempt to live and think by reason and conscience I can only trace in outline something of their history, and its own religious experience alone. The Bible and give my impressions of their thought and spirit. has no mere sentimental value for it as a fading It is a most difficult problem for all Liberal relic of the past. It finds God in History, and above Christians to whom the Bible, and especially the all in certain great moments and personalities in Gospels, are no longer wholly true, to define the History, as well as in present experiences. The relation of the free spirit to History. How far do we philosophical justification for such reverence and depend for our religion on the past ? How far ought dependence, upon Jesus is outside the purpose of We to depend upon the past? What has the Jesus this book, but for most Unitarians, as for other of History to say to us? With what authority does Liberal Christians, that reverence and that sense of he speak to us? It is surely certain that reason and the centrality of Jesus remain not merely unspoiled conscience and the personal experience of religion by Biblical criticism, but even deepened and purified. through prayer and communion, and through love X H. GOW March 1928 CONTENTS CHAPTXk I. INTRODUCTION . CHAPTER I 11. BIBLE RELIGION . '4 INTRODUCTION III. SERVETUS AI~DSOCINUS . IV. BEGINNINGS OF UNITARIANISM IN ENGLAND . PORADIC Unitarianism is to be found from the V. THE LATITUDINARIAN MOVEMENT first age of Christianity. Heretical thinkers who enied that the doctrine of the Trinity is taught in the VI. THE ACT OF UNIFORMITY . Bible appeared from time to time, but there is no one VII. DEVELOPMENTS IN' NONCONFORMITY outstanding thinker from whom Unitarian thought is VIII. CIVIL AND RELIGIOUS LIBERTY %derived and from whose initiation a continuous develop- &,&ment can be traced. IX. THE INFLUENCE OF DEISM . 5 Neither can we find any Unitarian Church in patristic X. NONCONFORMITY AND EDUCATION . or medieval times. There was no community of Christian XI. PRIESTLEY AND LINDSEY . worshippers for whom Jesus was simply an ideal of- XII. UNITARIANISM IN THE EARLY NINETEENTH human goodness and love, a teacher of the way of life, CENTURY . and a revealer of the will of God. For the Jewish Christian he was the Messiah, about whom all the XIII. CHANGE OF INTELLECTUAL AND CRITICAL Prophets and Psalmists had written. The Messiah was POINT OF VIEW certainly not God, but he was certainly also more than XIV. DR. MARTINEAU . an ideal of human goodness and a teacher of the way XV. FREFDOM IN RELIGION 3f life. The early Jewish Christian community cannot be XVI, UNITARIANISM IN THE U.S.A. described as Unitarian in the sense of 'regarding Jesus as a very great Prophet and nothing more. XVII. UNITARIANLAYMEN . I For the Pauline Church, Christ was a divine Being XVIII. PRESENT CONDITION OF UNITARIANISM . who had pre-existed through all time, by whom the XIX. THE FAITH OF UNITARIANS world was made, and who was manifested in the fullness INDEX . ,.- of time to bring salvation to men by his death and xii resurrection. Although much of St. Paul's Gospel is 1 <v, . B, g!!2' THE UNITARIANS + -. INTRODUCTION 8 capable of being re-interpreted in a sense which enables either Jewish Christianity, nor that of St. Paul, nor Unitarians to accept it, and although it may be admitted rd&at of St.