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truth , and gave them currency ! as Christian dogmas . But Provi * dence did not suffer the essential truths of the gospel to be lost . True , rnany explained , in a blameable manner , the unity of God ; but all agreed that God was one—the creator of all things—that many deities were not to be admitted—which , having reached our day , we must explain in agreement with apostolic authority .
We have spoken of the corrupter—what was the corruption ? Thus , Justin taught respecting the logos . The divine mind is essentially Xoyixor , that is , intellectual , consequently the logos ( existed in the Deity from all eternity . The word logos signifies , that command which is the result of thought , as well as thought or motion itself . The commands of God are all efficient—he speaks , and it is done . By his logos , then , he commanded the world into existence . For this end it went forth from him as
speech from man , assuming a separate and personal existence . All the wise men of antiquity , Justin terms logikoi , that is , partakers of the logos , and therefore he asserts , they may be called Christians ; but Jesus was wholly logikos , wholly intellectualin other words , the peculiar logos of God . Others were wise ,
Jesus was wisdom itself . This wisdom , or logos , used in the creation of the world as the efficient agent , appeared unto the patriarchs and prophets , performing acts inconsistent with the immensity and infinitude of the universal Parent , and was finally made flesh in Jesus for the redemption of the world . Sprung from God , the logos was of a divine nature , and therefore
Godthough inferior to the supreme Being . Of the assumed deity of the Holy Ghost , Justin is silent ; and that the doctrine was not broached in his day is evident from the fact that he vindicates , as well as he can , his teachings from the charge of setting forth not three , but two Gods . Subsequently , when divine honours were arrogated to the Holy Ghost , the corrupters of the Gospel were taxed with holding not two , but three gods .
The doctrine of Justin , however , was simplicity itself compared with that of some of his successors , and for its incompleteness is reprehended by those , who , coming after him , had the happiness of being more richly orthodox than he was . Justin was , in fact , an Unitarian , though we should be ashamed to acknowledge one who did so much to corrupt the Gospel . He was , however , in some sense an Unitarian , since he acknowledged and maintained the supremacy of the Father , while he declared Christ to be God ,
making two unequal deities . From his corruptions , if we turn to the public belief , we find ourselves in another world . Abundant is the evidence from his writings , that the people were still Unitarians and hostile to the innovations of the philosophic and mystic few . Again and again , we learn from him , that 4 prayers of the churches were put up to God the Father through Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit , '—in other words , that l universally prayers and thanksgivings were offered up through
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264 Rise and Progress of the Doctrine of Ihe Trinity .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), April 2, 1832, page 264, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1810/page/48/
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