Society of Friends

I

Introduction

Society of Friends (in full Religious Society of Friends), designation of a body of Christians more commonly known as Quakers. Their fundamental belief is that divine revelation is immediate and individual; all persons may perceive the word of God in their soul, and Friends endeavor to heed it. Terming such revelation the “inward light,” the “Christ within,” or the “inner light,” the first Friends identified this spirit with the Christ of history. They rejected a formal creed, worshiped on the basis of silence, and regarded every participant as a potential vessel for the word of God, instead of relying upon a special, paid clergy set apart from the rest.

II

Beliefs

Quakerism emphasizes human goodness because of a belief that something of God exists in everyone. At the same time, however, it recognizes the presence of human evil and works to eradicate as much of it as possible. Quakerism is a way of life; Friends place great emphasis upon living in accord with Christian principles. Truth and sincerity are Quaker bywords; thus, Quaker merchants refuse to bargain, for bargaining implies that truth is flexible. Emulating Christ, the Friends attempt to avoid luxury and emphasize simplicity in dress, manners, and speech. Until late in the 19th century, they retained certain forms of speech known as plain speech, which employed “thee” as opposed to the more formal “you”; this usage indicated the leveling of social classes and the spirit of fellowship integral to Quaker teaching.

In the administration and privileges of the society, no distinction between the sexes is made. Membership qualifications are based on moral and religious grounds and on the readiness of the candidate to realize and accept the obligations of membership. Meetings for worship are held regularly, usually once or twice a week, and are intended to help members to feel God's presence as a guiding spirit in their lives. In these meetings the members measure their insights and beliefs against those of the meeting as a whole. Because the religion of the Quakers was founded as a completely spiritual belief requiring no physical manifestation, the meetings have traditionally had no prearranged program, sermon, liturgy, or outward rites. Today, however, more than half of the Friends in the U.S. use paid ministers and conduct meetings for worship in a programmed or semiprogrammed manner.

In both the unprogrammed and programmed meetings members accept a great deal of responsibility. A group called Worship and Ministry, or Ministry and Oversight, accepts considerable responsibiLity for the spiritual life of the meeting. Overseers undertake to provide pastoral care for the member or share in that care when a regular pastor is employed. The religious discipline and administration of the society are regulated by periodic meetings known as Meetings for Business. One or more congregations constitute a Monthly Meeting, one or more Monthly Meetings form a Quarterly Meeting, and the Quarterly Meetings within a stated geographical area form a Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends. The decisions of the Yearly Meeting are the highest authority for all doctrinal or administrative questions raised in any subsidiary meeting within its jurisdiction. Usually no voting takes place in Quaker meetings; members seek to discover the will of God by deliberation concerning any matter at hand. As an integral part of Quaker doctrine, at meetings members are regularly and formally queried on their adherence to Quaker principles. These queries relate to such matters as the proper education of their children, the use of intoxicants, care of the needy, and, on a broader scale, racial and religious toleration and the treatment of all offenders in a spirit of love rather than with the object of punishment. Most American groups of Friends are represented by the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), founded in 1917. Originally established to handle many of their philanthropic activities, the organization today is primarily concerned with creating a society in which violence need not exist.

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III

Origins

The Society of Friends may be traced to the many Protestant bodies that appeared in Europe during the Reformation. These groups, stressing an individual approach to religion, strict discipline, and the rejection of an authoritarian church, formed one expression of the religious temper of 17th-century England. Many doctrines of the Society of Friends were taken from those of earlier religious groups, particularly those of the Anabaptists and Independents, who believed in lay leadership, independent congregations, and complete separation of church and state. The society, however, unlike many of its predecessors, did not begin as a formal religious organization. Originally, the Friends were the followers of George Fox, an English lay preacher who, about 1647, began to preach the doctrine of “Christ within”; this concept later developed as the idea of the “inner light.” Although Fox did not intend to establish a separate religious body, his followers soon began to group together into the semblance of an organization, calling themselves by such names as Children of Light, Friends of Truth, and, eventually, Society of Friends. In reference to their agitated movements before moments of divine revelation, they were popularly called Quakers. The first complete exposition of the doctrine of “inner light” was written by the Scottish Quaker Robert Barclay in An Apology for the True Christian Divinity, as the Same Is Held Forth and Preached by the People Called in Scorn Quakers (1678), considered the greatest Quaker theological work.

The Friends were persecuted from the time of their inception as a group. They interpreted the words of Christ in the Scriptures literally, particularly, “Do not swear at all” (Matthew 5:34), and “Do not resist one who is evil” (Matthew 5:39). They refused, therefore, to take oaths; they preached against war, even to resist attack; and they often found it necessary to oppose the authority of church or state. Because they rejected any organized church, they would not pay tithes to the Church of England. Moreover, they met publicly for worship, a contravention of the Conventicle Act of 1664, which forbade meetings for worship other than that of the Church of England. Nevertheless, thousands of people, some on the continent of Europe and in America as well as in the British Isles, were attracted by teachings of the Friends.

Friends began to immigrate to the American colonies in the 1660s. They settled particularly in New Jersey, where they purchased land in 1674, and in the Pennsylvania colony, which was granted to William Penn in 1681. By 1684, approximately 7,000 Friends had settled in Pennsylvania. By the early 18th century, Quaker meetings were being held in every colony except Connecticut and South Carolina. The Quakers were at first continuously persecuted, especially in Massachusetts, but not in Rhode Island, which had been founded in a spirit of religious toleration. Later, they became prominent in colonial life, particularly in Pennsylvania and Rhode Island. During the 18th century the American Friends were pioneers in social reform; they were friends of the Native Americans, and as early as 1688 some protested officially against slavery in the colonies. By 1787 no member of the society was a slave owner. Many of the Quakers who had immigrated to southern colonies joined the westward migrations into the Northwest Territory because they would not live in a slave-owning society.

During the 19th century differences of opinion arose among the Friends over doctrine. About 1827, the American Quaker minister Elias Hicks became involved in a schism by questioning the authenticity and divine authority of the Bible and the historical Christ; many Friends seceded with Hicks and were known as Hicksites. This schism alarmed the rest of the society, who became known as Orthodox Friends, and a countermovement was begun to relax the formality and discipline of the society, with a view to making Quakerism more evangelical. The evangelical movement, led by the British Quaker philanthropist Joseph John Gurney, aroused considerable opposition, particularly in the U.S., and another schism resulted among the Orthodox Friends. A new sect, the orthodox conservative Friends, called Wilburites after their leader John Wilbur, was founded to emphasize the strict Quakerism of the 17th century. It is very small today. The general result of these modifications, both those dealing with doctrine and those pertaining to the relations of Quakers to the world in general, was a new spirit among all the Friends. Most abandoned their strange dress and speech and their hostility to such worldly pursuits as the arts and literature.

Numerically, the Friends have always been a relatively small group. In the late 1990s world membership totaled 300,000, distributed in more than 30 countries. The greatest number of Friends is in the United States, where, according to the latest available statistics, the society had 1,100 congregations with about 108,000 members. The Yearly Meetings in Africa, with 43,000 members, and in the United Kingdom and Ireland, with 18,000 members, are the next largest groups. Other groups are located in Central America, Australia, Canada, and New Zealand. The Friends World Committee for Consultation is the international organization of the society.

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