Essays for Tihleigh: Part II - What are Quakers? – George Fox: the First Quaker

Quakers generally trace the beginning of the movement back to a mid-17^th century nonconformist religious reformer named George Fox. At age 19, Fox left home and began wandering around England, seeking spiritual enlightenment and a true connection with God or divinity. While Fox spoke with many religious leaders, he failed to find answers to questions that had plagued him from childhood. The people he spoke to were intelligent and well educated, but they seemed to lack any sort of true spiritual connection with God.

After becoming disillusioned with the leaders of the church of that day and the church in general, Fox claims to have heard an inner voice. From his journal:

And when all my hopes in them and all men were gone. . . I heard a voice which said, "There is one, even Christ Jesus, that can speak to thy condition," and when I heard it, my heart did leap for joy.

Fox then felt led to climb Pendle Hill in Northern England and was there given a vision of “a great people to be gathered.” Thus was the heart of Quakerism born.

Fox continued to travel around England, now as an itinerant preacher. Where he went, he urged people to seek direct contact with divinity. He told them that they could learn directly from the Christ and that only the Christ was in a position to judge them for any sins they committed. While this seems to be a basic tenant of the Christian faith in general, the Church of the time was very set in it’s hierarchy and most of the Christian faith felt there must be some sort of intercessor between them and God or even the Christ. The power of the Church of the day and Fox’s direct contradiction of that power landed him in jail many times. Fox believed that everyone born has a divine spark of God implanted in their soul, the “seed of Light” (“The true Light, that lighteth every man that cometh into the world.” – John 1:19, KJV) and because of this direct connection with God, all people had the right (and the duty) to understand and hold opinions regarding Christianity and spiritual matters.

Fox’s travels took him over the whole of England. However, in northern England, he encountered another group of dissenting Christians. Little about the nature of this group (generally referred to as the Westmorland Seekers) is known, but some aspects of their worship became incorporated into the slowly gelling Quaker practice. The Seekers did not employ priests in their worship, instead observing silence and allowing any who felt moved to speak during services. Fox became a spiritual leader in this movement and the scattered congregations of Seekers gradually turned into the Publishers of Truth and eventually the Religious Society of Friends.

In 1965, Fox arrived at Swarthmoor Hall near Macomb Bay. Swarthmoor was the estate of Judge Thomas Fell and his wife, Margaret. Initially, Fox met with the parish priest, William Lampitt. The dislike between the two was immediate and actively hostile. Fox refers to Lampitt in his journal as “a man filled with filth.” However, when Margaret Fell returned to the estate and talks with Fox, she discovers that his ideas are the exact sort of religious practice she’s been looking for and invites him to preach at the parish church. Fox does so (in true Quaker fashion, first asking permission of Lampitt to speak to his congregation, even though he truly despised him) and over the next three weeks converts the entire Fell household, family and servants, to his ideas.

Judge Fell returned to the estate and, while he never actually becomes a Friend, he allows Fox to use Swarthmoor Hall as a base of operations for the slowly growing movement (much to the displeasure of Lampitt). Margaret develops and administers a monetary fund to serve those imprisoned for spreading the Friend philosophy and help meet expenses of “the Valiant 60”, the early group of Friend evangelists who walked the countryside, talking to those who would listen (and those who wouldn’t) about their beliefs. When judge Fell dies, Margaret and Fox marry, even though Fox never stops his travels and spreading his vision of the relationship between God and Man.

Essays For Tihleigh: Part I - On Finding My Faith

(Okay, T, I'm doing this in installments because I've got a lot to say.)

About six years ago, I took an online test regarding faith and religious belief. The test claimed that, by answered quite a few weighted questions about whatever general spiritual beliefs you may have, it could give you a ranking of your compatibility with faiths and religious practices from all over the world.

At the time, I was going through an agnostic phase. I had recently figured out that my fiery atheism of my early twenties was just as big a ruse as the Christian evangelicalism of my early to mid teens. Neither one really encompassed my true feelings about the nature of divinity or what we might know or owe to such a being. One was based on fear, rules and blind subservience to the will of others while the other was based on misplaced anger, pride and an insufferable sense of superiority to others. Neither one was fundamentally honest or really had anything to do with God. I had settled into agnosticism and just being fascinated by the diversity and wealth of human belief and was quite comfortable not knowing while watching everyone else know.

After working through the test, I eagerly examined my results to find out which faith was right for me. The third most compatible path was Baha’i. I read up on that faith (which I had never heard of before) and was intrigued by some of the ideas, but not really moved by the teachings. It seemed too “cultish” for my sensibilities. Also, I have always been somewhat leery of religions that involve avatars, even Christianity. One of the basic tenants of Christianity is a personal relationship with God. If that’s true, then why add another level of abstraction, namely some sort of “messenger” from God? So while I enjoyed learning about a very relevant and valid path of faith, I still remained unmoved.

The second most compatible faith was Unitarian Universalism. I had never been quite sure what to make of Unitarians. It had always seemed less like a religion and more like a self-help group. I had always appreciated, though, their plurality of views regarding various religious backgrounds and the ideal that those religious principles, while certainly valid and helpful to many, were not the end all, be all of the spiritual experience. Again, though, I was intrigued, but unmoved to reconsider my agnosticism.

The most compatible faith was The Religious Society of Friends, or The Quakers. Like most people, I only knew two things about Quakers. One, they were pacifists. Two, they really liked oatmeal. Other than that, I was at a loss, so I began to read about the tradition.

Like a door opening, something clicked.

At first, I didn’t know what to make of it. What I was reading seemed to eerily mirror my private and personal ideals of what a religion should be in order to have any value. The establishment of an individual and uniquely personal relationship with God or divinity. An understanding of and reverence for the interconnectedness of all life and all of the moral paradoxes that entails. A stressing that spiritual development comes not only from inner reflection, but from external work and not just talking or “witnessing,” but actually getting involved in causes and organizations and attempting to bring about change. A respect for the equality of all people, be they different sexes, religions, nationalities or what have you.

As I read further, a realization began to dawn on me that forced me to fundamentally realign my faith and belief: I was a stealth Quaker.