John Brown (July 12, 1784 – October 13, 1858), a Scottish divine, studied at Edinburgh and the divinity hall of the Burgher Church at Selkirk and was licensed in 1805 and ordained minister of the Burgher Church of Biggar, Lanarkshire in 1806. After serving several more pastorates he became professor of exegetical theology to the United Associate Synod after 1834. He was strongly in favor of the separation of church and state and in 1845 was tried (and acquitted) before the synod on a charge of holding unsound views concerning the atonement.