Ethics

Benjamin Rush, Trinitarian Universalist

By Ed Brayton

Benjamin Rush is another interesting case among the Founders. The Christian Nation crowd offers quotations of his taken out of context. Yes, he was a bit more traditonal in his believes than Washington and the other key Founders. However he was still a theological liberal who denied eternal damnation and opposed the death penalty, both on biblical grounds.

Regarding his theology, Rush described it as "a compound of the orthodoxy and heterodoxy of most of our Christian churches." He converted from Calvinism to Arminianism, and then to theological universalism, believing all would eventually be saved, after a long period of temporary punishment for non-Christians. As he wrote in "Travels through Life," his autobiography:

Full post as published by Dispatches from the Culture Wars on January 11, 2009 (boomark / email).