Servetism
Encyclopedia
Servetism refers to the theology of Michael Servetus
Michael Servetus
Michael Servetus was a Spanish theologian, physician, cartographer, and humanist. He was the first European to correctly describe the function of pulmonary circulation...

, which affirms that Christ
Christ
Christ is the English term for the Greek meaning "the anointed one". It is a translation of the Hebrew , usually transliterated into English as Messiah or Mashiach...

 was God
God
God is the English name given to a singular being in theistic and deistic religions who is either the sole deity in monotheism, or a single deity in polytheism....

 manifested in the flesh, yet not as part of a tri-personal God
Trinity
The Christian doctrine of the Trinity defines God as three divine persons : the Father, the Son , and the Holy Spirit. The three persons are distinct yet coexist in unity, and are co-equal, co-eternal and consubstantial . Put another way, the three persons of the Trinity are of one being...

, and that he did not exist previously as the Son, but as the divine Logos
Logos
' is an important term in philosophy, psychology, rhetoric and religion. Originally a word meaning "a ground", "a plea", "an opinion", "an expectation", "word," "speech," "account," "reason," it became a technical term in philosophy, beginning with Heraclitus ' is an important term in...

 (the manifestation of God, or the Word of God) that became the Son after incarnation.

Servetus believed strongly in the unity of God and in the Divinity of Christ, but denied that the doctrine of the trinity of persons was the way to support these two essentials of Christian doctrine. He looked to the study of the Bible
Bible
The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...

 for answers, and he did not find the traditional Trinitarian doctrine affirmed there. Rather than seeing a traditional Trinitarian view reflected in the Bible, he saw confirmation of the idea that God manifested Himself in the human form of Jesus Christ.

In the preamble to his book, Christianismi Restitutio (1553), he says, "There is nothing greater, reader, than to recognize that God has been manifested as substance, and that His divine nature has been truly communicated to mankind. It is in Christ alone that we shall fully apprehend the manifestation of God Himself through the Word, and His communication to mankind through the spirit."

Although he was a pioneer in this unique view of God he is often lumped in with Unitarian
Unitarianism
Unitarianism is a Christian theological movement, named for its understanding of God as one person, in direct contrast to Trinitarianism which defines God as three persons coexisting consubstantially as one in being....

 or Arian
Arianism
Arianism is the theological teaching attributed to Arius , a Christian presbyter from Alexandria, Egypt, concerning the relationship of the entities of the Trinity and the precise nature of the Son of God as being a subordinate entity to God the Father...

 theology. His view of God is very similar to those of the New Church and Oneness Pentecostals.
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