11UTC1IINSON, JOHN, author of a mystical and cabalistic inter pretation of the Hebrew scriptures, was born in 1674, at Spennithorne in Yorkshire. Having received an excellent private education he became at the age of nineteen steward to Mr. Bathurst, in which capacity he afterwards served the Duke of Somerset, who bestowed upon him many marks of confidence and esteem, and when master of the horse appointed Mr. Hutchinson his riding purveyor. Availing himself of the opportunities which his situation afforded him for culti vating his favourite pursuit of mineralogy and natural history, he made a large and valuable collection of fossils, which, with his own observations, he consigned to the care of Dr. Woodward to digest and publish. This duty Woodward failed to discharge, but bequeathed the task and the collection to the University of Cambridge. In 1724, Hutchinson published the first part of a curious work entitled 'Moses's Principle,' in which he attempted to refute the doctrine of gravitation as taught in the Principle' of Newton. In the second part of this work, which appeared in 1727, he oontioued his attack upon the Newtonian philosophy, and maintained, on the authority of scripture, the existence of a plenum. From this time to his death, he published yearly one or two volumes in further elucidation of his views, which are written in a rambling and uncouth style, but evince a profound and extensive knowledge of the Hebrew scriptures. He died on the 28th of August, 1737.
According to Hutchinson, the Old Testament contains a complete system of natural history, theology, and religion. The Hebrew language was the medium of God'e communication with mau ; it is therefore perfect, and consequently as a perfect language it must be coextensive with all the objects of knowledge, and its several terms are truly significant of the objects which they indicate, and not so many arbitrary signs to represent them. Accordingly Hutchinson, after Origen and others, laid great stress on the evidence of Hebrew etymology, and asserted that the Scriptures are not to be understood and interpreted in a literal, but in a typical sense, and according to the radical import of the Hebrew expressions. By this plan of inter pretation, ho maintained that the Old Testament would be found not only to testify fully to the nature and offices of Christ, but also to contain a perfect system of natural philosophy. His editors give the following compendium of the Hutchinsonian theory : "The Hebrew scriptures nowhere ascribe motion to the body of the sun, nor fixed ne.s to the earth ; they describe the created system to be a plenum without any vacuum, and reject the assistance of gravitation, attraction, or any euch occult qualities, for performing the stated operations of nature, which are carried on by the mechanism of the heaveus in their threefold condition of fire, light, and spirit, or air, the material agents set to work at the beginning :—the heavens thus framed by Almighty wisdom are an instituted emblem and visible substitute of Jehovah Aleim, the eternal three, the co-equal and co-adorable Trinity iu Unity :—the unity of substance in the heavens points out the unity of essence, and the distinction of conditions the triune personality in Deity, without confounding the persona, or dividing the substance.
And from their being made emblems they ere called in Hebrew Shemim, the names, representatives, or substitutes, expressing by their names that they are emblems, and by their conditions or offices what it is they are emblems of." As an instance of his etymological interpretation, the word Berith,' which our translation renders Coven ant, Hutchinson construes to signify "he or that which purifies," and so the purifier or purification for,' not with,' man. From similar etymologies he drew the conclusion "that all the rites and ceremonies of the Jewish dispensation were so many delineations of Christ, iu what he was to be, to do, and to suffer, and that the early Jews knew them to be types of his actions and sufferings, and that by performing them as such were in so far Christians both in faith and practice." A complete edition of the works of Hutchinson was published in 1748, entitled The Philosophical and Theological Works of the into truly learned John Hutchinson, Esq.,' 12 vols. 8vo.
Hutchinson's philological and exegetical views found numerous followers, who without constituting a doctrinal sect came to be distin guished as 'Hutchiusonians.' In their number they reckoned several distinguished divines iu England and Scotland, both of the Established churches and of Dissenting communities. Among the most eminent of these were Bishop Horne and his biographer Mr. William Jones Mr. Romaine, and Mr. Julius Bates, to whom the Duke of Somerset on the nomination of Mr. Hutchinson, presented the living of Sutton In Sussex; Mr. Parkhurst, the lexicographer ; Dr. Hodges, provost Oriel; and Dr. Wetherell, Master of University College, Oxford ; Mr. Holloway, author of 'Letter and Spirit ;' and Mr. Lee, author of Sophron, or Nature's Characteristics of Truth.' The principles of Mr. Hutchinson are still entertained by many divince without their professing to be followers of Mr. Hutchinson, but the number of professing Hutchinsonians is now very small.