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The Arian or Anti-Trinitarian
Views Presented in Seventh-day Adventist Literature and the Ellen G.
White Answer

by Erwin Roy
Gane

C H A P T E R   III

EARLY MILITANT ANTI-TRINITARIANS

STEPHENSON STRONGLY ARIAN

Writing in the Review and Herald in 1854, J. M. Stephenson
exposed himself as a militant Arian. In an article entitled "the
atonement" Stephenson forcefully presented his anti-Trinitarian
arguments:

The idea of the Father and Son supposes priority of the
existence of the one, and the subsequent existence of the other.
To say that the Son is as old as the Father, is a palpable
contradiction of terms. It is a natural impossibility for the
Father to be as young as the Son, or the Son to be as old as the
Father.1

He proceeded to point out that the terms "Father" and "Son" would
not have been used by the Bible writers if they had wished "to
convey the idea of the co-etaneous existence, and eternity of the
Father and Son�."2
Stephenson quoted a Trinitarian named Fuller who agreed that the
Father must have existed prior to the Son. The Son is the "first
born" said Stephenson, in the sense that He had an origin at a point
prior to all other forms of life. Christ was begotten. Therefore "he
must have had a beginning." God, he wrote, is the "only supreme
ruler." It would be impossible to have two Supreme Rulers at the
same time. Only the Father is "supremely, or absolutely, good."3
Only the Father is, in the absolute sense, immortal. Only the Father
is self-existent. The Son is therefore dependent on the Father for
the Father gave "the Son to have life in himself."4

Stephenson went so far as to declare that Christ was a created
being:

Col. 1:15. "the first born of every creature." Creature
signifies creation; hence to be the first born of every creature,
(creation) he must be a create being; and as such, his life and
immortality must depend upon the Father�s will just as much as
angels, or redeemed man�.5

FRISBIE IDENTIFIES THE SUNDAY God

Writing in March of the same year [1854], J. B. Frisbie
identifies the "Sabbath God" and the "Sunday God."6
The Sabbath God is a Spirit, but also a personal Being possessing
body and parts. The Sunday God is identified by reference to a
Catholic Catechism and a Methodist work. The Catholic work, as
quoted by Frisbie, maintains that God has no body. There is but one
God, but comprising three persons, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. This
is said not to be tri-theism.

The Methodist work quoted by Frisbie also states that the one
true God does not have body or parts. God is one, but in the unity
which is God there are said to be three persons each of the same
substance, each possessing the same power and eternity of
existence.

Frisbie�s prime purpose in this article is evidently to present
God as a personal being possessing bodily parts. But in opposing
Trinitarian views, which deny that God possesses parts, in this
sense, he also opposes the Trinitarian position in toto, concluding
this section of his article by saying, "these ideas well accord with
those heathen philosophers."7

HULL OPPOSES NICENE CREED

Writing in 1859, D. W. Hull presented in the Review and
Herald a series of two articles discussing the "bible doctrine
of divinity." He sees the Trinitarian position as subversive of the
doctrine of the atonement.8
It is clear that he is, to some extent, reacting to certain extreme
Trinitarian positions, but in the process he attempts to shatter the
whole structure of that doctrine. Hull writes:

The doctrine which we propose to examine, was established by the
Council of Nice [sic], A.D. 325, and ever since that period,
persons not believing this particular tenet, have been denounced by
popes and priests, as dangerous heretics. It was for disbelief in
this doctrine, that the Arians were anathematized in A.D. 513.

As we can trace this doctrine not farther back than the origin of
the "man of sin" and as we find this dogma at that time established
rather by force, than otherwise, we claim the right to investigate
the matter, and ascertain the bearing of Scripture on this
subject.9

Hull is at pains to point out that "we" believe in the divinity
of Christ but adds that "we don�t believe, as the m. e. church
discipline teaches, that Christ is the very and eternal God; at the
same time, very man; that the human part was the Son, and the divine
part was the Father."10

He then proceeds to repudiate what he calls "The orthodox view of
God" that he is "�without body, parts, passions, centre,
circumference, or locality.�" It is not difficult to understand his
opposition to this extreme view. He adds, "it certainly appears that
such a God as this, must be entirely devoid of an existence."11

Hull then begins to investigate all the important passages
claimed by Trinitarians in support of their view. In answer to the
Trinitarians� use of Isaiah 9:6 he declares that Christ is here
called mighty, but not almighty. The word he believes is used "in a
limited sense." Christ is the everlasting Father only in the sense
that He is to live everlastingly, certainly not in the Trinitarian
sense.

Hull emphasizes the argument which Joseph Bates used in 1827. If
the divine part of Jesus was the Father, if it was the Father who
was manifested in the flesh, then God and Christ are one person.
Consistently throughout the article, Hull confuses the correct
Trinitarian position with Monarchianism. He argues that Trinitarians
say there is one God and that Christ is God in the same sense as the
Father. Therefore Christ is the Father. They are one and the same
person. But he sees this to be logically impossible and Scripturally
unsound. Father and Son are one just as are a man and his wife. They
are united in interest and purpose. Christ, he says, is not the only
and eternal God. He is not as great as the Father, nor did He
pretend to be so. His power was delegated. The objection is
illustrated as follows:

What would the reader think of a man who moved from the State
of Ohio to Iowa with his family and after enjoying their company
for a season talk of going back to Ohio where he could see his
family? If you cannot allow inconsistencies I men, how can you
accuse the Saviour of leaving the world to go to the Father, and
at the same time assert that the Saviour was Jehovah himself?12

Hull gives further reasons for rejecting what he calls the
Trinitarian position. If Father and Son are one person then the
world was three days without a God, for the Bible says that He was
"put to death in the flesh." Christ cried, "My God, my God, why hast
thou forsaken me?" Trinitarians say that the Godhead had left him.
Then Christ must have been alive after the Godhead had departed from
Him, and the sacrifice was only a human sacrifice.13
But how could a human sacrifice atone for our sins? Thus he objects
to the view that Christ�s soul did not die. It was necessary for
every part of Christ to die that human sin might be adequately
atoned for. He quotes 2 Peter 3:18 and adds, "There is no chance of
escape here. Christ�s soul and every part that dwelt in his flesh
was put to death and buried in sheol, or hades."14
The Trinitarian teaching that Christ�s body descended to the grave
but his soul or divinity, or whatever it might be termed, ascended
to paradise, is rejected as unscriptural and destructive of the
possibility of the atonement.

The three salient reasons which Hull gives for rejecting
Trinitarianism are that the doctrine teaches that God lacks bodily
parts and emotions, that it identifies Father and Son as one and the
same person, and that, because it teaches that the divine in Christ
did not die, it readers the sacrifice a human sacrifice, and
therefore, an inadequate atonement for the sins of man. It is quite
evident that to some extent Hull was opposing an extreme form of
Trinitarianism, but this is not a sufficient explanation of his
anti-Trinitarianism. He relegates the decisions of Nicea to the
category of false doctrine. But he misinterprets the position of the
Nicene fathers. They were at pains to avoid the accusation of
Monarchianism. Hull accuses them of teaching this. Like Joseph
Bates, on this particular point, he is opposing not the Trinitarian
view itself but his own misconception of what that view is.

ENDNOTES

1J. M.
Stephenson, "The Atonement," Review and Herald, VI (November
14, 1854), 128.

2Ibid.

3Ibid., p.
131.

4Ibid.

5Ibid., p.
133.

6J. B. Frisbie,
"The Seventh day-Sabbath [sic] Not Abolished," Review and
Herald, V (March 7, 1854), 50.

7Ibid.

8D. W. Hull,
"Bible Doctrine of Divinity," Review and Herald (November 10,
1859), 93.

9Ibid.

10Ibid.

11Ibid.

12Ibid.,
194

13D. W. Hull,
"Bible Doctrine of the Divinity of Christ," Review and
Herald, XIV (November 17, 1859), 201.

14Ibid.

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