Boreel was ordained into the
Dutch Reformed Church, but broke away. In
Ad legem et testimonium (1645), he argued the
sola scriptura position that no religious authority other than the Bible should be acknowledged. He was attacked by
Johann Hornbeek (
Apologia pro ecclesia Christiana non apostatica 1647), and by
Samuel Maresius. Boreel's associates included
Peter Serrarius, a fellow
millenarian,
Baruch Spinoza, who moved with the Collegiants after exclusion from the Amsterdam Jewish community, and
Henry Oldenburg, a correspondent. Boreel was close also to
John Dury. They were a fringe group, but are considered important as representative of the 'Third Force', trying to reconcile religious orthodoxy with scientific
scepticism. In the early 1660s the Collegiants became harder to distinguish from other movements, of
Quakers,
anti-Trinitarians, and
Socinians. Adam Boreel is reputed to be the author of
Lucerna Super Candelabrum (
The Light upon the Candlestick, 1663), a mystical text accepted by both the Collegiants and the Quakers. ==Interest in Judaism==