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Theophilus Lindsey (1663-1741)
by bro.Muhammad Ata ur-Rahim
Theophilus Lindsey was born in 1723. He was the organizer of the first Unitarian congregation in England. Using a reformed order to service based on Samuel Clarke's revision of sixty years earlier, and robed without the traditional white surplice, Lindsey conducted the first service in an auction room on Essex Street in London. It was April the seventeenth, 1774. The service was attended by a large congregation including Benjamin Franklin and Joseph Priestly. Here is Lendsey's account of the occasion, contained in a letter which he wrote to a friend the next day.
You will be pleased to hear that everything passed off very well yesterday: a large and much more respectable audience than I could have expected, who behaved with great decency and in general appeared, and many of them expressed themselves, to be much satisfied with the whole of the service. Some disturbance was apprehended, and forboded to me by the great names, but not the least movement of the kind. The only fault found with it, was that it was too small. From the impressions that seemed to be made, and the general seriousness and satisfaction, I am persuaded that this attempt will, through the divine blessing, be of singular usefulness. The contrast between ours and the church-services strikes everyone. Forgive me for saying, that I should have blushed to have appeared in a white garment. No one seemed in the least to want it. I am happy not to be hampered with anything- but entirely satisfied with the whole of the services; a satisfaction never before known-I must again say it, and bless God for it, that we were enabled to being well. And ;we only desire to go on as through His blessing we have begun1.
The formation of the Essex Street congregation soon inspired other Unitarian "chapels" to be built in Birmingham, Manchester, and other English cities. Ecclesiastical independence fostered doctrinal freedomLindsey's belief in the Divine Unity is evident from these words of his:
The Infinite Creator should be worshipped in all places for He
is everywhere .......no place is more sacred than another, but every place
sacred for the prayer. The worshipper makes the place. Whenever there is a
devout humble mind that looks to God, God is three, A mind free from sin is the
true temple of God. 2
Reference
The Epic of Unitarianism, D.B Parke, p.46
Two Dissertations, T. Lindsey
from the Book : Jesus - A prophet of Islam
Author : Muhammad Ata ur-Rahim
(ICRA)