Biblical Unitarian: Isaac Newton
The climate in England during Newton’s time prevented him from speaking too openly about his faith. Isaac Newton rejected Trinitarianism (the belief that God existed as three persons in one being), a stance England punished by death. Isaac Newton’s religious writings were unknown for a very long time because England’s repressive religious laws prevented him from publically disseminating these religious writings. His secret essentially died with him until a famous economist purchased a trunk full of Newton’s writings. John Maynard Keynes purchased the papers that were thought to consist primarily of Newton’s writing on the subject of Alchemy, one of Newton’s most passionate subjects, second only to the Bible. Keynes donated these papers to Kings College Cambridge, where scholars soon discovered the real Isaac Newton. The world’s leading scholar of Isaac Newton’s religious writings is Dr. Stephen Snobelen, who happens to be a Christadelphian.
Newton strongly disagreed with the Trinity, believing the Father was God, Jesus was a human that was the Son of God, and the Holy Spirit was a personification of God’s power. The evidence often cited by the Catholic Church was 1 John 5:7-8, which adds, “these three are one.” However, this is only found within the Textus Receptus, which the King James Version was translated from. Newton believed “these three are one” was an addition and forgery to the text. Textual scholars, who dubbed the forgery the “Johannine Comma”, would later vindicate Newton. Newton also believed that the Trinity was not originally the Christian doctrine of the Godhead, a position later vindicated by scholars. The method Newton used in determining the authenticity of the Johannine Comma, or the lack thereof, was to compare texts and writings of some early Catholic Church Fathers. None of the text mentioned the phrase, including those trying to prove the Trinity. Accordingly, Newton concluded it was not authentic.
Sources:
Observations Upon the Prophecies of Daniel and the Apocalypse of St. John
Misquoting Jesus: The Story Behind Who Changed the Bible and Why
How Jesus Became God: The Exaltation of a Jewish Preacher from Galilee
When Jesus Became God: The Struggle to Define Christianity during the Last Days of Rome
The Doctrine of the Trinity: Christianity’s Self-Inflicted Wound
