RE: great creationists of the past

What would be interesting is to know precisely what "particular and pretty well-researched reasons" Newton had for reaching his conclusions, which I suppose denies the deity of Christ, or more precisely, the Oneness of God in the face of the Trinity. Does anyone know? Did Newton have at hand more than the very same Scriptures we have? Or else, was his conclusion about the nature of Christ based on his prior assumptions on the nature of God.

 
Moorad

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From: asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu on behalf of Jim Armstrong
Sent: Sat 4/15/2006 9:33 PM
To: asa@calvin.edu
Subject: Re: great creationists of the past

I agree that it would be both a slight and inaccuracy to assign Newton to any such a specific pigeonhole. OK, I admit that I know only what I have read in his biographies, but from them I sure have a sense - even from them - that he came to his theological conclusions based on a great deal more thought and personal research than many of us (with some notable exceptions!) have engaged in, personally researching many of the available theology-related manuscripts in their languages of expression. And, it's clear that his beliefs as a body are going to be somewhat idiosyncratic. He was after all a keen observer and problem solver, and the internal wiring (observer, skeptic, critical thinker) that thus made him a good natural philosopher in his day undoubtedly was the driver as well for him to research and seek resolutions to theological discrepancies with more logic and determination than would be required by most of us today. It would not do him justice to simply label and thus!
 all too easily dismiss this considerable aspect of his remarkable life. I expect that any similarity of his beliefs to those of Arius (or anyone else) were arrived at pretty independently, and perhaps even more competently from a western research-competency perspective. Newton was not known to be a particularly peer- or precedence-influenced kind of guy, other than his evident considerable respect for the early writings that brought definition to Christianity! He has some particular and pretty well-researched reasons for reaching his conclusions, hence my concurrence that this particular scientist/theologian not be dismissed too quickly by the expedient of classification. JimA

SatTeacher@aol.com wrote:

        I do have familiarity with Newton -- having read his MSS at Cambridge, Oxford, Jerusalem, Boston, and Palo Alto. I would not call him an Arian nor would I call him a Unitarian. As I read his MSS, I tried repeatedly to fit him into some mold and I could never do it. His views were more complex than any of the categories that we commonly use today. He did believe in creation.
        
        The funny thing about this ASA discussion is a conversation which I had with a high school science teacher about this very topic in an elevator in Chicago in the 1980s. I had just given a presentation on Newton and his unpublished MSS at the Annual NSTA meeting. She asked if Newton believed in Darwin's theory of evolution. The sad thing was that she had no idea that Newton (1642-1727) predated Darwin (1809-1882).
        
        For what it is worth, those are my thoughts,
        Helen Martin
Received on Sat Apr 15 21:46:36 2006