‘We have much to be proud of, and much to be ashamed of, and we can learn from both.’ Photo: by Aaron Burden on Unsplash
The good book? Elizabeth Coleman on Quaker history and the Bible
‘Truth is good for us.’
History is important to Quakers. When we first become interested in Quakerism, we learn about George Fox and his contemporaries, and later of John Woolman, who campaigned against slavery in the eighteenth century. There are many things in Quaker history to make us proud: our peace work, our anti-slavery campaigning, and our humanitarian work during the Irish famine and in post-war Germany. Learning our history has inspired us to good work. But it has also perhaps led us to be a bit self-righteous and smug. The fact is that our history contains some shameful truths, and we are only now beginning to come to terms with them. For example, John Woolman was working against slavery within the Society of Friends, where enslavement was the norm, and where some Quakers were slave traders. The Bryant and May factory, where workers (those famous ‘match girls’) suffered appalling conditions including ‘fossie jaw’, was owned by Quakers. Even employers we consider benevolent, such as the Rowntrees and Cadburys, were importing raw materials produced by Africans who often had to work under horrific conditions.
Truth is good for us. We have much to be proud of, and much to be ashamed of, and we can learn from both. We can also be inspired to action by both. In Britain Yearly Meeting we are currently learning from a shameful part of our history: our involvement in slavery, which has led us to look at, and take seriously, the issue of reparations.
I am studying the Hebrew Bible and recently our tutor asked us to consider whether it was possible to hold together two very different approaches to the Bible: the historical-critical approach, and the canonical approach. The canonical approach involves reading the Bible through the lens of church/synagogue tradition. A cornerstone of this is that the first five books were written by Moses. By contrast, the historical-critical approach tells us pretty definitively that the first five books of the Bible were not written by Moses. Perhaps there is a parallel here with how Quakers understand our history: the historical-critical approach tells real history, warts and all, while we also tell ourselves canonical stories about the good we have done in the past.
The Alsatian theologian Albert Schweitzer might help us here. His studies led him to believe that the historical Jesus was very different from the Jesus of the church, but this did not push him away from faith: ‘Since the essential nature of the spiritual is truth, every new truth means ultimately something won. Truth is under all circumstances more valuable than non-truth, and this must apply in the realm of history as to other kinds of truth. Even if it comes in a guise which piety finds strange and at first makes difficulties for her, the final result can never mean injury; it can only mean greater depth. Religion has, therefore, no reason for trying to avoid coming to terms with historical truth’ (Out of My Life and Thought, 1931). I have no doubt that this is true for us Quakers looking at our own history.
But what about when we read the Hebrew Bible? It is a set of documents that are fundamental to three major faiths, and cannot be judged simply as an inaccurate history of the ancient Middle East. While it is made up of different books, and is full of internal contradictions, a modern historical understanding suggests that much of it is about how a people dealt with trauma. This trauma stemmed from the destruction of Jerusalem, including the temple – the ending of the Davidic dynasty, and the taking of many of the wealthier and more educated people into exile in Babylon. The disaster was confusing to the Jewish people, as it was believed that God had promised David that there would always be a Davidic king on the throne, and had been true to his promise for five hundred years: ‘I will give you peace from all your enemies. The LORD has told you that he will build up your royal house. When your life ends and you rest with your forefathers, I will set up one of your family, one of your own children, to succeed you and I will establish his kingdom. It is he shall build a house in honour of my name, and I will establish his royal throne for ever. I will be his father, and he shall be my son’ (2 Samuel 7:11-14 NEB).
A number of the Bible’s books were written, or heavily edited, during or shortly after the Babylonian exile. The purpose of much of this writing is to find a way of dealing with this trauma. Recording an accurate history is not the main aim.
We must be grateful to the Jewish people for giving us the Bible – it is, after all, the foundation of the ethics by which we now try to live. This is perhaps what Quakers value most about these texts. They contain much detail about religious practices that mean little to us now –temple sacrifices and dietary rules for everyday life and so on – but these ethics are still hugely important.
The books of the Bible vary, and arguably the moral principles taught are not consistent – the book of Joshua, for example, could be seen as justifying genocide – but the fundamental values are there:
When an alien settles with you in your land, you shall not oppress him. He shall be treated as a native born among you, and you shall love him as a man like yourself, because you were aliens in Egypt (Leviticus 19:33-34 NEB)
You shall not ill-treat any widow or fatherless child (Exodus 22:23 NEB)
When you reap the harvest in your land, you shall not reap right into the edges of your field, neither shall you glean the fallen ears. You shall leave them for the poor and for the alien (Leviticus 23:22 NEB).
The teaching of the Sermon on the Mount also comes directly from this tradition. This teaching does not seem so extraordinary now, but it was taught in the brutal environment of the Roman Empire. Thank God we have Jewish ethics available to us, and not just the Roman ethics of militarism and conquest.
Our way of looking at ethics developed further during the Enlightenment, with a more scientific way of understanding the world. But the Enlightenment does not inevitably lead to humanism (the valuing of, and kindness to, all people). To get there, we rely on the ethical teaching that comes to us through faith traditions and the Bible. People who have never read the Bible are still deeply influenced by the ethics that it fed into modern thinking.
So, let us be truthful about our own Quaker history. And as we speak these truths let us also remember these lessons from the Bible – not an inaccurate history book, but a conduit that brought us what we most value.
Comments
Rabbi Jonathan Sachs once wrote that the word ‘stranger’ is the most frequently used word in the Torah. Certainly גיר occurs 92 times in the Hebrew Bible.
Exodus 23:9 comes closest to capturing its spirit. “Thou shalt not oppress a stranger: for ye know the heart of a stranger, seeing ye were strangers in the land of Egypt.”
Was there ever a better time to love the stranger in our midst?
By Ol Rappaport on 19th October 2023 - 21:47
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