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Prologue
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.
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The Scriptures
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 it is 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.
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Views
Unitarians derive from Scripture 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.
Unity not
Trinity of God 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.
Trinity subverts unity of God
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?
Trinity is unscriptural
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.
Trinity never mentioned by early Christianity's
enemies
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.
Trinity is distracting
from God
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?
Injures devotion to God
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.
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