Willem de Vos, born 1737 at Amsterdam, died there 8 January 1823, married to Elizabeth Kops in 1766, a mem­ber of the de Vos family, was a Dutch Men­nonite pastor. It is not known how or where he was trained for the ministry, but it is certain that he re­ceived a good education, including a Th.D. degree. In 1759-62 he was pastor of the Mennonite congre­gation of Haarlem and from 1762 of the Lamist church, and after the merger (1801), of the United Mennonite congregation at Amsterdam, until he re­tired in 1814. He was a cofounder of the Algemeene Doopsgezinde Sociëteit in 1811, and its first moderator 1811-12. He also acted as curator of its seminary. He promoted the merger of the Amsterdam Lamist and Zonist churches, which came about in 1801. Willem de Vos was a man of great learning, specializing in philoso­phy. His studies on (a) "De Grondregel der Protestanten . . . om in zaken van den godsdienst voor zich zelven te oordeelen," (b) "In hoeverre Jezus en zijne apostelen . . . zich naar de toen heerschende volksbegrippen hebben geschikt," and (c) "De genoegzaamheid van het inwendig bewijs voor de goddelijkheid der Evangelieleer" (these essays are also known under somewhat modified titles) were given awards by the Teyler Foundation at Haarlem and published in its Verhandelingen, vols. IX (1789), XI (1791), and XV (1795). De Vos wrote an appreciative sketch of his colleague Allard Hulshoff, d.1795, in Leven en Character van A. H. (Amsterdam, 1795). In 1786 he taught phi­losophy and religion in the Mennonite seminary. He was a member of a number of learned societies, for which he sometimes delivered addresses on re­ligious and timely subjects.

Bibliography

Adapted by permission of Herald Press, Harrisonburg, Virginia, and Waterloo, Ontario, from Mennonite Encyclopedia, Vol. 4, p. 856. All rights reserved. For information on ordering the encyclopedia visit the Herald Press website.

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