Grzegorz Paweł z Brzezin (English: Gregory Paul of

Brzeziny Brzeziny (; yi, ברעזין, ''Brezin'') is a town in Poland, in Łódź Voivodeship, about 20 km east of Łódź. It is the capital of Brzeziny County and has a population of 12,326 as of December 2021. It once was a thriving Jewish sht ...

, Latin: Gregorius Paulus Brzezinensis) (1525–1591), was a

Socinian Socinianism () is a nontrinitarian belief system deemed heretical by the Catholic Church and other Christian traditions. Named after the Italian theologians Lelio Sozzini (Latin: Laelius Socinus) and Fausto Sozzini (Latin: Faustus Socinus), uncle ...

( Unitarian) writer and theologian, one of the principal creators and propagators of radical wing of the

Polish Brethren The Polish Brethren (Polish: ''Bracia Polscy'') were members of the Minor Reformed Church of Poland, a Nontrinitarian Protestant church that existed in Poland from 1565 to 1658. By those on the outside, they were called "Arians" or "Socinians" (, ' ...

, and author of several of the first theological works in Polish, which helped to the development of literary Polish.

Biography

Paweł was educated at the

University of Königsberg The University of Königsberg (german: Albertus-Universität Königsberg) was the university of Königsberg in East Prussia. It was founded in 1544 as the world's second Protestant academy (after the University of Marburg) by Duke Albert of Prussi ...

, where he encountered the ideas of

Lutheranism Lutheranism is one of the largest branches of Protestantism, identifying primarily with the theology of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German monk and Protestant Reformers, reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practice of the Cathol ...

and

Calvinism Calvinism (also called the Reformed Tradition, Reformed Protestantism, Reformed Christianity, or simply Reformed) is a major branch of Protestantism that follows the theological tradition and forms of Christian practice set down by John Cal ...

. Upon his return he became rector of the school at the Catholic Collegiate Church of St. Mary Magdalene in

Poznań Poznań () is a city on the River Warta in west-central Poland, within the Greater Poland region. The city is an important cultural and business centre, and one of Poland's most populous regions with many regional customs such as Saint John ...

. But he later had to abandon the position due to profession of Calvinism. From about 1550 he began to openly promote the Reformation, and from 1552, celebrated Protestant worship for the inhabitants of

Kraków Kraków (), or Cracow, is the second-largest and one of the oldest cities in Poland. Situated on the Vistula River in Lesser Poland Voivodeship, the city dates back to the seventh century. Kraków was the official capital of Poland until 1596 ...

. He was named pastor in Pełsznicy church, and in 1557 was elected pastor of the church in Kraków. From this time his beliefs became more radical, and in 1562 he broke with Calvinism and became openly

nontrinitarian Nontrinitarianism is a form of Christianity that rejects the mainstream Christian doctrine of the Trinity—the belief that God is three distinct hypostases or persons who are coeternal, coequal, and indivisibly united in one being, or essence ...

. In 1569 Paweł moved to Raków, in the year the settlement was founded by castellan Jan Sienieński, and Paweł became a leader of the radical wing. Robert Wallace, ''Sketches of the lives and writings of distinguished antitrinitarians'' (1850) p. 179 He died before the founding of the

Racovian Academy The Racovian Academy ('' la, Gymnasium Bonarum Artium'') was a Socinian school operated from 1602 to 1638 by the Polish Brethren in Raków, Sandomierz Voivodeship of Lesser Poland. The communitarian Arian settlement of Raków was founded in 1569 b ...

(Polish: ''Akademia Rakowska'') in 1602 by

Jakub Sienieński Jakub Sienieński (died 1639) was a Polish nobleman, representative in the Sejm, who in 1602 founded the Racovian Academy. His father Jan Sienieński (d. 1599) founded the town of Raków, Kielce County in 1569. The family name, also written "z Sie ...

Views

He preached an early form of socialist utopianism, including community assets and common work. He claimed that the true Christians, that is the Polish Brethren, did not need a State, which was created only for evil people to control and punish them. Although he stressed the need to comply with the secular authorities, he believed that

Arians Arianism ( grc-x-koine, Ἀρειανισμός, ) is a Christological doctrine first attributed to Arius (), a Christian presbyter from Alexandria, Egypt. Arian theology holds that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, who was begotten by God t ...

should not participate in the government of the State nor resolve disputes before the courts. He was an unconditional pacifist (like Martin Czechowic). In the religious sphere he denied the

immortality of the soul Christian mortalism is the Christianity, Christian belief that the human Soul (spirit), soul is not naturally Immortality of the soul, immortal and may include the belief that the soul is “sleeping” after death until the Resurrection of the ...

, claiming that the soul cannot exist outside the body. He also denied the

Trinity The Christian doctrine of the Trinity (, from 'threefold') is the central dogma concerning the nature of God in most Christian churches, which defines one God existing in three coequal, coeternal, consubstantial divine persons: God the F ...

, Jesus was only a perfect human being, miraculously born for the salvation of humanity, and after the resurrection exalted by God because of the sanctity of his life. He saw the Holy Spirit as allegorical, a personification of all that is "under God". In 1567 a split occurred among the Brethren. The majority followed the views of

Fausto Sozzini Fausto Paolo Sozzini, also known as Faustus Socinus ( pl, Faust Socyn; 5 December 1539 – 4 March 1604), was an Italian theologian and, alongside his uncle Lelio Sozzini, founder of the Non-trinitarian Christian belief system known as Socinian ...

, advocated by Grzegorz Paweł z Brzezin and the Silesian

Georg Schomann Georg Schomann (Polish ''Jerzy Szoman'') (Racibórz 1530 - Chmielnik 1591) was a Socinian (Unitarianism, Unitarian) theologian. In his youth, was distinguished by a deep Catholic religiosity. In the years 1552-1554 he studied at the Kraków Academy ...

who denied the

pre-existence Pre-existence, preexistence, beforelife, or premortal existence, is the belief that each individual human soul existed before mortal conception, and at some point before birth enters or is placed into the body. Concepts of pre-existence can enco ...

of Christ, though they still accepted the

virgin birth of Jesus The virgin birth of Jesus is the Christian doctrine that Jesus was conceived by his mother, Mary, through the power of the Holy Spirit and without sexual intercourse. It is mentioned only in and , and the modern scholarly consensus is that the ...

, unlike later

Unitarianism Unitarianism (from Latin ''unitas'' "unity, oneness", from ''unus'' "one") is a nontrinitarian branch of Christian theology. Most other branches of Christianity and the major Churches accept the doctrine of the Trinity which states that there i ...

. The minority seceded, holding to the divinity of Christ and

pre-existence of Christ The pre-existence of Christ asserts the existence of Christ before his incarnation as Jesus. One of the relevant Bible passages is where, in the Trinitarian interpretation, Christ is identified with a pre-existent divine hypostasis (substantive ...

(

deism Deism ( or ; derived from the Latin ''deus'', meaning "god") is the Philosophy, philosophical position and Rationalism, rationalistic theology that generally rejects revelation as a source of divine knowledge, and asserts that Empirical evi ...

). In 1568 Grzegorz Paweł z Brzezin translated into Polish the commentary on the first chapter of the Gospel of John, by

Major works

* ''Rozdział Starego Testamentu od Nowego'' (division of the Old Testament from the New) (c. 1568) * ''O prawdziwej śmierci'' (on the mortality of the soul) (c. 1568) * ''O różnicach teraźniejszych'' (of the distinctions in the present-day) (1564)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Pawel Z Brzezin, Grzegorz 1525 births 1591 deaths Polish Unitarian theologians Translators of the Bible into Polish Unitarian socialists European Christian socialists Christian socialist theologians