The early Quakers – part three

In the third and final part of this series I want to look at some early Quaker beliefs and behaviour as well as briefly discussing the importance of writing to the Quakers, before offering some concluding thoughts.

IV. Beliefs

 Besides believing in the light within, early Quakers denied the validity of the sacraments of Baptism and the Lord’s Supper as well as the Lord’s Prayer. Denouncing university trained preachers as hirelings and objecting to the forced maintenance of ministers by tithes, Quakers were steadfast in their opposition to clerical authority and church worship conducted in ‘steeple-houses’. Instead they attended largely silent meetings where they spoke as they were ‘moved by the holy Ghost’ (2 Peter 1:21), and ‘as the Spirit gave them utterance’ (Acts 2:4).

 Turning from modes of worship to attitudes towards the Bible, Apocrypha, extra-canonical texts and occult learning more generally, here the pioneering work was undertaken by Henry Cadbury (1883–1974). Thus Quakers were regularly suspected of wanting to burn their Bibles, although few – so far as can be ascertained – actually did so. An apparent exception was the notorious schismatic John Pennyman (1628–1706), who was imprisoned for suspected bible burning in 1670.

A more common charge was that Quakers denied the Scriptures to be the word of God. Certainly George Fox was accused of dissuading people from reading the Scriptures, telling them the outward letter was ‘carnal’ and that the Scriptures were Antichrist. Similarly, on being indicted for blasphemy James Nayler explained that there was no written word of God; there was only the word of Christ, which was spiritual and not to be apprehended with carnal eyes. Moreover, Quakers were accused of claiming that Scripture should not be expounded (the absence of early Quaker biblical commentaries is striking), and that studying Scripture was redundant. These views of the Bible were part of a broader, generally millenarian, outlook that privileged the spirit over flesh, inner illumination over outward ordinances, divinely revealed knowledge over university-trained scholarship, latter day Apostles (in the guise of humble tradesmen) over Pharisees (ordained ministers).

Francis Bugg, Quakerism Drooping, And its Cause Sinking (1703), p. 84

 As regards the Apocrypha, Quakers seem to have been largely unfamiliar with these writings and seldom cited from them; that is Jewish texts omitted from the Hebrew Bible but found in certain copies of the Septuagint (a Greek version of the Hebrew Scriptures) and together with 2 Esdras included in the Vulgate. Nonetheless, a few Quakers were concerned with the fate of ‘those Scriptures mentioned, but not inserted in the Bible’. This interest in extra-canonical texts is illustrated in a letter of March 1658 to Margaret Fell concerning the anticlerical overtones of the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs together with a request that any Friends evangelising in the Netherlands confer with Dutch Jews about extant copies of the Book of Enoch:

Thomas Killam was telling me, his wife, hath got one of the books I mentioned to thee, called the testament of the patriarchs, he saith, it speaks very much of Enoch’s prophecy, which hints much against the lying priests, it rose in me, to speak to thee, that if any friend were moved to go to Holland, and had any conference with the Jews, that they made enquiry of them, if Enoch’s writings bee extant among them.

About 1659 a catalogue of these writings appeared in Something concerning Agbarus, Prince of the Edesseans. Reminiscent of extra-canonical compositions identified by certain early Christian heretics and later Christian Kabbalists, this list included the prophecy of Enoch (Jude 14); the book of Jehu (2 Chronicles 20:34); the book of the battles of the Lord (Numbers 21:14); the book of Nathan the prophet; the prophecy of Ahijah and the visions of Iddo (2 Chronicles 9:29); the book of Shemaiah (2 Chronicles 12:15); the book of Jasher (2 Samuel 1:18); the book of Gad (1 Chronicles 29:29); a lost Pauline epistle to the Corinthians (1 Corinthians 5:9); the first epistle to the Ephesians (Ephesians 3:3); the epistle to the Laodiceans (Colossians 4:16); Solomon’s three thousand proverbs and one thousand songs (1 Kings 4:32–33); the epistle of Barnabas; and the Revelation of Peter.

Edward Billing, A Word of Reproof, and Advice to my late Fellow-Souldiers (1659), p. 44

Occurring verbatim in a work by the former soldier Edward Billing (1623–1686) and afterwards placed in some Bibles owned by Quakers, this catalogue may have been compiled by the controversialist and former Baptist Samuel Fisher (1604–1665). In Rusticus ad Academicos (1660) Fisher defended the Quakers from the calumny that they slighted the Scriptures by highlighting at enormous discursive length the Bible’s inherent flaws. By turns learned and satirical, among his central arguments were that during the process of transmission the Bible had become corrupted by scribal errors and consequently that the extant manuscripts had textual discrepancies; that the English translators had made several mistakes in their rendering of the original sense; that the Hebrew Bible had been written without punctuation or vowel points (both later additions, the latter determining the pronunciation of consonant groups); and that the creation of the Biblical canon had been an arbitrary process:

Was it God or was it Man that set such distinct Bounds to the Scripture, so as to say such and such a set number of Books, viz. those that are sum’d up together before your Bibles, excepting the Apocrypha, which stands between them, shall be owned as Canonical, and the rest, though such as were of the same divine Inspiration, be rejected as humane, no otherwise accounted on then other mere men’s Writings, not to be received with such high respect as the other?

All the same, the most infamous example of early Quaker engagement with these sources was undoubtedly James Nayler who wore his hair long not only in the manner of the Nazarites (Judges 13:5), but also provocatively imitated the likeness of Christ as outlined in the apocryphal account of Publius Lentulus.

 While Nayler knew the forged epistle spuriously attributed to Lentulus, the Quaker schismatic George Keith (1638?–1716) and perhaps also George Fox were familiar with some of the corpus of Greek writings written from about the third century B.C.E. to about the fourth century C.E. either ascribed to or written under the name of Hermes Trismegistus, an Egyptian deity. Thus Fox was said to have spoken with a deep and wonderful understanding of ‘the Egyptian Learning, & of the Language of the birds’. Suggestively, his illuminative experience when ‘the creation was opened to me’ resembles a phrase in the English translation of The Divine Pymander of Hermes Mercurius Trismegistus (1649) when ‘all things were opened unto me’. For his part, Keith cited both Pymander and a variation of a saying attributed to Hermes that ‘God is a circle, whose centre is everywhere, and is nowhere circumscribed’.

V. Behaviour

 Following the execution of Charles I there were, in Lodowick Muggleton’s estimation, many ‘false Christs, false Prophets, and false Prophetesses’ in the world. Yet this was only to be expected by those who yearned for the establishment of Christ’s thousand year monarchy since it was interpreted as a warning that the scriptures were being fulfilled. Invariably these charismatic figures of revolutionary England, who claimed to be forerunners of Christ’s second coming, fashioned aspects of their identity from scriptural sources. Among this profusion of people who professed themselves ‘to be God, or Christ, or Prophets, or Prophetesses, or Virgin Marys, or the Lords high Priest’ were several who went ‘about the Streets, and declared the Day of the Lord, and many other wonderful Things’.

 Significantly, prophetic performances warning of impending divine judgement and other comparable symbolic actions were also a feature of certain Quakers’ behaviour. Gesture was a powerful, dramatic medium that enabled the prophet to transmit God’s message in visual form. Through a repertoire of signs, the meaning of which was sometimes unclear, the prophet involuntarily simulated in miniature God’s future intent at large. Though many Quaker signs transgressed accepted codes of conduct they usually had an authority vested in scripture. Thus some Quakers such as James Nayler, George Fox and Richard Hubberthorne undertook extraordinary fasts; a few like Solomon Eccles even challenged their opponents to public trials of fasting, believing that such ordeals would vindicate the purity of their faith. There were also attempts by George Fox to perform miracles – including faith healing and, it seems, raising from the dead – while others engaged in prophetic behaviour by eating their own dung (Nathaniel, colloquially known as ‘Shitten Nat’); becoming silent; trembling; dispensing with items of clothing; going barefoot, bareheaded, and partly or entirely naked; blackening their faces; donning sackcloth; and casting ash upon their heads. Moreover, during a dialogue with Oliver Cromwell in 1655 Thomas Aldam removed his cap and tore it to pieces, informing the Protector ‘so should his kingdom be rent from him’. Similarly, Elizabeth Adams ‘was moved to go to the Parliament that was envious against Friends and to take a pitcher in her hand and break it to pieces, and to tell them so should they be broken to pieces’. In the same spirit Solomon Eccles passed through Bartholomew Fair naked with a pan of coals on his head ‘burning with Fire and Brimstone’ saying, ‘Repent speedily, for God will not be mocked. Remember Sodom and Gomorrah, who are your Examples; they do endure the vengeance of Eternal Fire’.

‘Solomon Eagle [Eccles] exhorting the People to Repentance during the Plague of 1665’ by Paul Falconer Poole (1843)

 Another characteristic Quaker gesture was refusing to ‘put off’ one’s hat to anybody, ‘high or low’. Disregarding this ‘Heathenish Custom’, however, provoked criticism. For while Quakers asserted that there was no scriptural justification for honouring ‘men’s persons’, their critics charged them with disrespectful behaviour and flouting the magistrate’s authority. Indeed, it was even maintained that they imitated the precedent set by Ignatius of Loyola (1491–1556), founder of the Jesuits.

VI. Writing

 Recent scholarly interest in the construction, dissemination and reception of manuscripts (scribal publication) and books (print publication) has brought to the fore an important question: which was more important in spreading the Quakers’ message, the spoken or written word? There is no straightforward answer but a few observations can be made. As we have noted, early Quaker worship was largely silent, while prophecies were generally enacted through a combination of speech and symbolic gestures. Moreover, Quaker ministers walked up and down the land and even sailed across the sea to spread their message. If these men and women believed that writing had made itinerant preaching redundant they could have stayed at home instead of feeling inspired to follow scriptural precedents. Writing was clearly important, especially for the leadership, but it must be seen as operating in conjunction with other factors in facilitating the spread of Quakerism.

 It is not known how many Quakers were literate, nor how many read Quaker publications but writing cannot have been an integral feature of Quaker identity since less than 0.3% of Quakers were published authors. Nonetheless, Kate Peters has maintained that writing ‘played an important practical role in the establishment and maintenance of the Quaker ministry’. She estimates that about one hundred Quaker authors had their works published by 1656, contributing to a total of 291 publications. The most prolific was James Nayler, whose name is attached to almost one-fifth of all Quaker publications between 1652 and 1656. Peters also notes that papers, letters, or printed tracts could be ‘more widely dispersed than oral preaching’ and indeed writing enabled the leadership to disseminate their message more widely, to have their activities and sufferings commemorated more effectively, and to replace their absence with a textual trace. Furthermore, Peters has persuasively argued that the Quaker leadership had a strategy for spreading their faith by targeting urban centres with a proselytising campaign. This in turn would create martyrs for the movement whose experiences and sufferings could then be publicized to a wider audience through the medium of print. Writing was also essential in vigorously refuting calumnies and Quakers were quick to use this medium – notably through printed addresses to Parliament – to stress both their lack of involvement in anti-government plots and simple desire for liberty of conscience. In conjunction with disputation writing, moreover, was vital to winning or at least protracting beyond reasonable measure intra-sectarian disputes. Here, as we noted earlier, a key aspect was accentuating doctrinal differences – something well-illustrated in the case of Quaker attacks on the Ranters.

VII. Discipline, organisation and reasons for the Quakers’ longevity

 Beyond devising and co-ordinating evangelising strategies, there is a great deal of evidence indicating the highly organised nature of early Quakerism; at least at leadership level. Thus Quakers corresponded extensively and, with time, began holding regular morning, monthly, six weeks, quarterly and yearly meetings that facilitated the imposition of doctrinal uniformity. Moreover, they collected funds nationally for a common treasury which was variously disbursed relieving prisoners and sufferers, buying clothing and books, and subsidizing printing.

 Like other emerging sects and religious movements, early Quakerism was not immune to schism or free from personal rivalry. And while splinter groups increasingly used printed tracts to rally support, after the Restoration effective institutional mechanisms were developed for disciplining and – where necessary – expelling dissidents and troublemakers.

* * * * *

 As might be expected, it is not always possible to cover everything. So before concluding it is worth highlighting some omissions from this brief overview which, time permitting, might be returned to at a later date. Foremost, of course, are female Quakers and their roles as prophetesses, preachers, pamphleteers, prisoners, publishers, missionaries and letter writers. Other aspects of the movement’s formative years requiring further discussion include Quaker customs and costume; modes of speech and distinctive literary style; not to mention calls for legal and medical reform together with concomitant schemes for alleviating the sufferings of the poor.

 Finally, it is worth repeating some reasons for the success of early Quakerism. These were the appeal of its message and charisma of those who preached it; an organised program of evangelism wedded to contemporary political concerns; the willingness of believers to undergo sufferings and even martyrdom for their faith; the resilience of those engaged in pamphlet wars with competing sects and other detractors; the effective manner in which money was raised to finance and distribute these publications; the ability of the leadership to impose doctrinal uniformity and overcome rivalry and schism; and the ways in which Quakerism was able to evolve and adapt so as to survive the Restoration of the Stuart monarchy in 1660 and the changed political and religious landscape that came in its wake.