Eccl. Hist. [f. ADOPTION + -IST.] One of a sect who maintained that Jesus Christ is the son of God by adoption only; commonly known under their Latin appellation of adoptiani. Also used attrib.
1847. in Craig.
1853. C. Hardwick, Hist. of Chr. Ch., iii. 66. The controversy known as the Adoptionist, but in reality a phase of Nestorianism revived.
1874. Blunt, Dict. of Sects, 7. The Gnostics were in a certain sense Adoptionists.
