BOREEL, ADAM. - Founder of the Boreelites, born at Duinbeke (Holland) in 1603, died in 1667. While serving as a Protestant minister in the province of Zeeland, he at a certain point resigned his office, explaining that he had realized that, with the death of the Apostles, the Christian Church had fallen into decay.
In order to remedy the damage, around 1645 he founded at Amsterdam a sect of his own, without churches, Sacraments, or external worship, which advocated the Bible alone, austerity of morals, and philanthropic generosity. It was indeed an imitation of the Quakers, but not—as some alleged—tinged with Socinianism. Among other things, B.—an expert in Hebraism—left behind the normative work of his group, Ad Legem et Testimonium. His followers—the Boreelites—still today constitute a minor sect within Protestantism.