12 Facts About Hosea Ballou

Hosea Ballou preached in a number of towns in Vermont, New Hampshire, and Massachusetts.

Hosea Ballou wrote a number of influential theological works, as well as hymns, essays and sermons, and edited two Universalist journals.

Hosea Ballou was born in Richmond, New Hampshire, to a family of Huguenot origin.

The son of Maturin Ballou, a Baptist minister, Hosea Ballou was self-educated, and devoted himself early on to the ministry.

Hosea Ballou was a high-ranking freemason, who attained the position of Junior Grand Warden of the Grand Lodge of New Hampshire in 1811.

Hosea Ballou founded and edited The Universalist Magazine, and The Universalist Expositor, and wrote about 10,000 sermons as well as many hymns, essays and polemic theological works.

Hosea Ballou is best known for Notes on the Parables, A Treatise on Atonement and Examination of the Doctrine of a Future Retribution.

Hosea Ballou is the grand-uncle of Hosea Ballou II, the first president of Tufts University.

Hosea Ballou has been called the "father of American Universalism," along with John Murray, who founded the first Universalist church in America.

Hosea Ballou, sometimes called an "Ultra Universalist," differed from Murray in that he divested Universalism of every trace of Calvinism, and opposed legalism and trinitarian views.

Hosea Ballou preached that those forms of Christianity that emphasized God as wrathful in turn hardened the hearts of their believers:.

In 1844 Hosea Ballou published A Collection of Psalms and Hymns for the Use of Universalist Societies and Families.