Jesus & the Neo-Deists
Sweden’s New Civil Church Is Not an Icon of Christ but a Mirror of Man
by Folke T. Olofsson
Three years before his death in 1733, the English philosopher Matthew Tindal, one of the most important and radical English deists, published Christianity as Old as the Creation. It was certainly not the first of its kind. Already in 1669 the Irish philosopher John Toland had published a work with the provoking title Christianity Not Mysterious. The conviction brought to the fore in these books was that the Christian faith had no evidence not already to be found in the natural mind and that, therefore, every kind of revelation was unnecessary and even unjust, since it was not given to the millions who did not know of it. As for Jesus, he did not perform miracles; all he wanted was to institute a society for the promotion and practice of virtue.
THIS ARTICLE ONLY AVAILABLE TO SUBSCRIBERS.
FOR QUICK ACCESS:
Folke T. Olofsson is docent of theological and ideological studies at Uppsala University, and is rector of Rasbo parish in the (Lutheran) Church of Sweden. He is a contributing editor of Touchstone.
Get six issues (one year) of Touchstone PLUS full online access including pdf downloads for only $39.95. That's only $3.34 per month!
Get a one-year full-access subscription to the Touchstone online archives for only $19.95. That's only $1.66 per month!
bulk subscriptions
Order Touchstone subscriptions in bulk and save $10 per sub! Each subscription includes 6 issues of Touchstone plus full online access to touchstonemag.com—including archives, videos, and pdf downloads of recent issues for only $29.95 each! Great for churches or study groups.
Transactions will be processed on a secure server.
more from the online archives
32.1—January/February 2019
The Diabolical Failure of Leaders in the Present Crises by James M. Kushiner
18.4—May 2005
The Idylls, Idols & Devils That Corrupt the Moral Imagination by Vigen Guroian
24.6—Nov/Dec 2011
on the Tyranny of Modern Freedom versus the Freedom of Jesus by Gillis J. Harp
calling all readers
Please Donate
"There are magazines worth reading but few worth saving . . . Touchstone is just such a magazine."
—Alice von Hildebrand
"Here we do not concede one square millimeter of territory to falsehood, folly, contemporary sentimentality, or fashion. We speak the truth, and let God be our judge. . . . Touchstone is the one committedly Christian conservative journal."
—Anthony Esolen, Touchstone senior editor
