NEWTON ISAAC (1642-1727).

Lot 157
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20000 - 25000 EUR
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Result : 23 400EUR
NEWTON ISAAC (1642-1727).
Autograph MANUSCRIPT; 2 pages and a quarter, in-4 format, on the verso and partially on the recto of a signed autograph letter, signed « C. Barton », Newton’s niece Catherine BARTON, addressed to him (1 page in-4 format), with address and remnants of a red wax seal (slitting to a few folds); in English. Important testimony on Newton’s theological studies on Gnosis and the ancient Gnostics... The manuscript is written directly on a letter received by Newton from his niece Catherine BARTON (1679-1739): there are a number of erasures and corrections, as well as calculations. In this manuscript, one finds two facets of Newton: the theologian and the mathematician. Catherine Barton writes to her uncle about a Mrs Kennedy who has baptized her son and is looking for lodging. Newton offers here a summary of the main points of Gnostic doctrine concerning God’s plurality. Gnosis is a doctrine that developed in the first two centuries, on the basis of Christianity but under the influence of Greek philosophy and other hermetic religious movements. It promoted access to the knowledge of the divine mysteries - leading to salvation - through an inner revelation reserved for the initiated alone. To establish his study, Newton relied mainly on the De Salutari adventu Jesu Christi of ATHANASIUS (295-373, great opponent of Arianism), of which he owned the Opera [Harrison 95 and 96], and also especially on the Adversus Valentini, & similium Gnosticorum haereses of IRENÆUS (second half of the second century) [Harrison 839; Trinity College, Cambridge; NQ.18.10], respectively a refutation of Gnosis and the main source of Gnosticism. The son would be a part of the father acting through the life and the will of the father ... And Irenaeus reports that Cerinthus [Gnostic author, around the year 100] and long before him the Nicolaitans (whom he calls a sect of the Gnostics) said that the creator of heaven and earth was one, the father of our Lord another and Jesus
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