Statement of Faith - History - Other Resources

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A History of Creeds and Confessions of Faith In Christendom and Beyond With Historical Tables

 

William A. Curtis, B.D., D.Litt. (Edin.)

Professor of Systematic Theology in the University of Aberdeen, ABERDEEN.

 

Printed for the University

 

MCMXI

 

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CONFESSIONS OF THE CHRISTADELPHIAN CHURCHES.

 

The Christadelphian Ecclesiæ trace their foundation to the inspiration of Dr. John Thomas, a London physician, who emigrated to the United States in 1832, and joined the Campbellites, but was soon led to renounce many of their doctrines and their fellowship. His personal study of the Bible led to a complete breach with the historical Churches, their doctrine and organization. He published his conclusions, furnished with Scripture proofs, in a popular Summary of the Christianity revealed in the Bible.¹ These became the basis, e.g. of the prosperous Ecclesia which sprang up in Birmingham. But some of his negative conclusions as to “fables current in the religious world” have been omitted in other statements. He coined the name “Christadelphian” in 1864.

 

We may take as representative statements those of the Ecclesiæ of Birmingham and of Balham, London. It will be observed that the Divine Trinity and the existence of a personal Devil are denied, adult Baptism is required, the resurrection and salvation of heathens, idiots, and those who die in infancy is denied, the restoration of Israel to Palestine at the Second Coming, and the gift of immortality to baptized believers alone at the Resurrection, are taught. In the Christadelphian system the extreme and the anarchical elements which have never been wholly absent from the outskirts of Anabaptist and Baptist movements are found combined into a singular unity.²

 

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¹ Halifax, 1865.

 

² See further art. “Christadelphians,” by F. J. Powicke, in Encycl. of Religion and Ethics.

 

CreedsConfessionsChristadelphian.pdf