The Missionary Era · 1848-1906 · Britain, N. America
Christadelphians
An open theological question
Historians and Christians themselves are divided on whether this group's core beliefs fall inside the historic Christian creeds.
About This Movement
John Thomas was an English doctor who emigrated to America in 1832, nearly drowned in a shipwreck on the way, and resolved that if he survived he would work out the Bible's teaching for himself rather than take it on anyone's authority. He concluded that most of what the churches taught had been added long after the apostles, and set out the alternative in Elpis Israel in 1848. His followers organized as "ecclesias" — small congregations with no clergy, where members taught and presided in turn. And in 1864 adopted the name Christadelphians, brothers of Christ, largely so they could claim conscientious-objector status in the American Civil War. Robert Roberts, a Scottish printer's apprentice who became the movement's second great figure, gave them a magazine that has run continuously since 1864 and a written confession, the Birmingham Statement of Faith, that they still use.
Sources
- John Thomas, Elpis Israel (1848) and Eureka (1861-68); Robert Roberts, Christendom Astray (1862; as Twelve Lectures 1884) (primary) — These are the movement's own foundational texts, in the founders' own words rather than outside reports about them.
- The Birmingham (Amended) Statement of Faith (1886); The Christadelphian magazine (1864-) (primary) — This is the movement's explicit confessional statement, along with its ongoing self-published record.
- Ecclesial life: ecclesia minute books, fraternal-gathering records; the conscientious-objection filings (the name 'Christadelphian' coined for 1860s draft-exemption) (primary) — This is a modest but genuine self-record. The conscientious-objection filings are a state-facing record of how the movement defined itself to outside authorities.
- Charles Lippy, The Christadelphians in North America (Mellen, 1989), with Andrew Wilson, The History of the Christadelphians 1864-1885 (1997) (secondary) — These are the standard works in a sparse scholarly field.
- Cambridge History of Christianity vol. 8 (chapter assignment hedged): nearest Bebbington's voluntary-religion chapter (Britain) and ch. 22 (Noll, N. America - number verified) (reference) — No chapter in this reference volume is dedicated to this movement; these are the nearest topical fits.