Puritanism

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The Puritans were English Protestants in the 16th and 17th centuries who sought to rid the Church of England of what they considered to be Roman Catholic practices, maintaining that the Church of England had not been fully reformed and should become more Protestant.[1] Puritanism played a significant role in English and early American history, especially in the Protectorate in Great Britain, and the earlier settlement of New England.

Puritans were dissatisfied with the limited extent of the English Reformation and with the Church of England's toleration of certain practices associated with the Roman Catholic Church. They formed and identified with various religious groups advocating greater purity of worship and doctrine, as well as personal and corporate piety. Puritans adopted a covenant theology, and in that sense they were Calvinists (as were many of their earlier opponents). In church polity, Puritans were divided between supporters of episcopal, presbyterian, and congregational polities. Some believed a uniform reform of the established church was called for to create a godly nation, while others advocated separation from, or the end of, any established state church entirely in favour of autonomous gathered churches, called-out from the world. These Separatist and Independents became more prominent in the 1640s, when the supporters of a presbyterian polity in the Westminster Assembly were unable to forge a new English national church.

By the late 1630s, Puritans were in alliance with the growing commercial world, with the parliamentary opposition to the royal prerogative, and with the Scottish Presbyterians with whom they had much in common. Consequently, they became a major political force in England and came to power as a result of the First English Civil War (1642–1646).

Almost all Puritan clergy left the Church of England after the restoration of the monarchy in 1660 and the Act of Uniformity 1662. Many continued to practise their faith in nonconformist denominations, especially in Congregationalist and Presbyterian churches.[2] The nature of the Puritan movement in England changed radically. In New England, it retained its character for a longer period.

Puritanism was never a formally defined religious division within Protestantism, and the term Puritan itself was rarely used after the turn of the 18th century. The Congregationalist Churches, widely considered to be a part of the Reformed tradition of Christianity, are descended from the Puritans.[3][4] Moreover, Puritan beliefs are enshrined in the Savoy Declaration, the confession of faith held by the Congregationalist churches.[5] Some Puritan ideals, including the formal rejection of Roman Catholicism, were incorporated into the doctrines of the Church of England, mother Church of the Anglican Communion.

Terminology

Gallery of famous 17th-century Puritan theologians: Thomas Gouge, William Bridge, Thomas Manton, John Flavel, Richard Sibbes, Stephen Charnock, William Bates, John Owen, John Howe and Richard Baxter

In the 17th century, the word Puritan was a term applied not to just one group but to many. Historians still debate a precise definition of Puritanism.[6] Originally, Puritan was a pejorative term characterizing certain Protestant groups as extremist. Thomas Fuller, in his Church History, dates the first use of the word to 1564. Archbishop Matthew Parker of that time used it and precisian with a sense similar to the modern stickler.[7] Puritans, then, were distinguished for being "more intensely protestant than their protestant neighbors or even the Church of England".[8] As a term of abuse, Puritan was not used by Puritans themselves. Those referred to as Puritan called themselves terms such as "the godly", "saints", "professors", or "God's children".[9]

"Non-separating Puritans" were dissatisfied with the Reformation of the Church of England but remained within it, advocating for further reform; they disagreed among themselves about how much further reformation was possible or even necessary. Others, who were later termed "Nonconformists", "Separatists", or "separating Puritans", thought the Church of England was so corrupt that true Christians should separate from it altogether. In its widest historical sense, the term Puritan includes both groups.[10][11]

Puritans should not be confused with other radical Protestant groups of the 16th and 17th centuries, such as Quakers, Seekers, and Familists, who believed that individuals could be directly guided by the Holy Spirit. The latter denominations give precedence to direct revelation over the Bible.[12]

In current English, puritan often means "against pleasure". In such usage, hedonism and puritanism are antonyms.[13] William Shakespeare described the vain, pompous killjoy Malvolio in Twelfth Night as "a kind of Puritan".[14] H. L. Mencken defined Puritanism as "the haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy."[15] Puritans embraced sexuality but placed it in the context of marriage. Peter Gay writes that the Puritans' standard reputation for "dour prudery" was a "misreading that went unquestioned in the nineteenth century". He said they were in favour of married sexuality, and opposed the Catholic veneration of virginity (associated with the Virgin Mary), citing Edward Taylor and John Cotton.[16] One Puritan settlement in western Massachusetts banished a husband because he refused to fulfill his sexual duties to his wife.[17]

History

Puritanism had a historical importance over a period of a century, followed by fifty years of development in New England. It changed character and emphasis nearly decade by decade over that time.

Elizabethan Puritanism

The Elizabethan Religious Settlement of 1559 established the Church of England as a Protestant church and brought the English Reformation to a close. During the reign of Elizabeth I (r. 1558–1603), the Church of England was widely considered a Reformed church, and Calvinists held the best bishoprics and deaneries. Nevertheless, it preserved certain characteristics of medieval Catholicism, such as cathedrals, church choirs, a formal liturgy contained in the Book of Common Prayer, traditional clerical vestments, and episcopal polity.[18]

Many English Protestants — especially those former Marian exiles returning to England to work as clergy and bishops — considered the settlement merely the first step in reforming England's church.[19] The years of exile during the Marian Restoration had exposed them to the practices of the Continental Reformed churches. The most impatient clergy began introducing reforms within their local parishes. The initial conflict between Puritans and the authorities included instances of nonconformity, such as omitting parts of the liturgy to allow more time for the sermon and singing of metrical psalms. Some Puritans refused to bow on hearing the name of Jesus, or to make the sign of the cross in baptism, or to use wedding rings or the organ.

Yet, the main complaint Puritans had was the requirement that clergy wear the white surplice and clerical cap.[20] Puritan clergymen preferred to wear black academic attire. During the vestments controversy, church authorities attempted and failed to enforce the use of clerical vestments. While never a mass movement, the Puritans had the support and protection of powerful patrons in the aristocracy.[21]

In the 1570s, the primary dispute between Puritans and the authorities was over the appropriate form of church government. Many Puritans believed that the Church of England should follow the example of Reformed churches in other parts of Europe and adopt presbyterian polity, under which government by bishops would be replaced with government by elders.[22] But all attempts to enact further reforms through Parliament were blocked by the Queen. Despite such setbacks, Puritan leaders such as John Field and Thomas Cartwright continued to promote presbyterianism through the formation of unofficial clerical conferences that allowed Puritan clergymen to organise and network. This covert Puritan network was discovered and dismantled during the Marprelate controversy of the 1580s. For the remainder of Elizabeth's reign, Puritans ceased to agitate for further reform.[23]

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Jacobean Puritanism

The accession of James I to the English throne brought the Millenary Petition, a Puritan manifesto of 1603 for reform of the English church, but James wanted a religious settlement along different lines. He called the Hampton Court Conference in 1604, and heard the teachings of four prominent Puritan leaders, including Laurence Chaderton, but largely sided with his bishops. He was well informed on theological matters by his education and Scottish upbringing, and he dealt shortly with the peevish legacy of Elizabethan Puritanism, pursuing an eirenic religious policy, in which he was arbiter.

Many of James's episcopal appointments were Calvinists, notably James Montague, who was an influential courtier. Puritans still opposed much of the Roman Catholic summation in the Church of England, notably the Book of Common Prayer, but also the use of non-secular vestments (cap and gown) during services, the sign of the Cross in baptism, and kneeling to receive Holy Communion.[24] Some of the bishops under both Elizabeth and James tried to suppress Puritanism, though other bishops were more tolerant. In many places, individual ministers were able to omit disliked portions of the revised Book of Common Prayer.

The Puritan movement of Jacobean times became distinctive by adaptation and compromise, with the emergence of "semi-separatism", "moderate puritanism", the writings of William Bradshaw (who adopted the term "Puritan" for himself), and the beginnings of Congregationalism.[25] Most Puritans of this period were non-separating and remained within the Church of England; Separatists who left the Church of England altogether were numerically much fewer.

Fragmentation and political failure

The Westminster Assembly, which saw disputes on Church polity in England (Victorian history painting by John Rogers Herbert).

The Puritan movement in England was riven over decades by emigration and inconsistent interpretations of Scripture, as well as some political differences that surfaced at that time. The Fifth Monarchy Men, a radical millenarian wing of Puritanism, aided by strident, popular clergy like Vavasor Powell, agitated from the right wing of the movement, even as sectarian groups like the Ranters, Levellers, and Quakers pulled from the left.[26][27] The fragmentation created a collapse of the centre and, ultimately, sealed a political failure, while depositing an enduring spiritual legacy that would remain and grow in English-speaking Christianity.[28]

The Westminster Assembly was called in 1643, assembling clergy of the Church of England. The Assembly was able to agree to the Westminster Confession of Faith doctrinally, a consistent Reformed theological position. The Directory of Public Worship was made official in 1645, and the larger framework (now called the Westminster Standards) was adopted by the Church of Scotland. In England, the Standards were contested by Independents up to 1660.[29]

The Westminster Divines, on the other hand, were divided over questions of church polity and split into factions supporting a reformed episcopacy, presbyterianism, congregationalism, and Erastianism. The membership of the Assembly was strongly weighted towards the Presbyterians, but Oliver Cromwell was a Puritan and an independent Congregationalist Separatist who imposed his doctrines upon them. The Church of England of the Interregnum (1649–60) was run along Presbyterian lines but never became a national Presbyterian church, such as existed in Scotland. England was not the theocratic state which leading Puritans had called for as "godly rule".[30]

Great Ejection and Dissenters

At the time of the English Restoration in 1660, the Savoy Conference was called to determine a new religious settlement for England and Wales. Under the Act of Uniformity 1662, the Church of England was restored to its pre-Civil War constitution with only minor changes, and the Puritans found themselves sidelined. A traditional estimate of historian Calamy is that around 2,400 Puritan clergy left the Church in the "Great Ejection" of 1662.[31] At this point, the term "Dissenter" came to include "Puritan", but more accurately described those (clergy or lay) who "dissented" from the 1662 Book of Common Prayer.[32]

The Dissenters divided themselves from all other Christians in the Church of England and established their own Separatist congregations in the 1660s and 1670s. An estimated 1,800 of the ejected clergy continued in some fashion as ministers of religion, according to Richard Baxter.[31] The government initially attempted to suppress these schismatic organisations by using the Clarendon Code. There followed a period in which schemes of "comprehension" were proposed, under which Presbyterians could be brought back into the Church of England, but nothing resulted from them. The Whigs opposed the court religious policies and argued that the Dissenters should be allowed to worship separately from the established Church. This position ultimately prevailed when the Toleration Act was passed in the wake of the Glorious Revolution in 1689. This permitted the licensing of Dissenting ministers and the building of chapels. The term "Nonconformist" generally replaced the term "Dissenter" from the middle of the 18th century.

Puritans in North America

Interior of the Old Ship Church, a Puritan meetinghouse in Hingham, Massachusetts. Puritans were Calvinists, so their churches were unadorned and plain.

Some Puritans left for New England, particularly from 1629 to 1640 (the Eleven Years' Tyranny under King Charles I), supporting the founding of the Massachusetts Bay Colony and other settlements among the northern colonies. The large-scale Puritan migration to New England ceased by 1641, with around 21,000 persons having moved across the Atlantic. This English-speaking population in the United States was not descended from all of the original colonists, since many returned to England shortly after arriving on the continent, but it produced more than 16 million descendants.[33][34] This so-called "Great Migration" is not so named because of sheer numbers, which were much less than the number of English citizens who immigrated to Virginia and the Caribbean during this time, many as indentured servants.[35] The rapid growth of the New England colonies (around 700,000 by 1790) was almost entirely due to the high birth rate and lower death rate per year. They had formed families more rapidly than did the southern colonies.[36]

Death's head, Granary Burying Ground. A typical example of early Funerary art in Puritan New England

Puritan hegemony lasted for at least a century. That century can be broken down into three parts: the generation of John Cotton and Richard Mather, 1630–62 from the founding to the Restoration, years of virtual independence and nearly autonomous development; the generation of Increase Mather, 1662–89 from the Restoration and the Halfway Covenant to the Glorious Revolution, years of struggle with the British crown; and the generation of Cotton Mather, 1689–1728 from the overthrow of Edmund Andros (in which Cotton Mather played a part) and the new charter, mediated by Increase Mather, to the death of Cotton Mather. [37] Puritan leaders were political thinkers and writers who considered the church government to be God's agency in social life.[38]

The Puritans in the Colonies wanted their children to be able to read and interpret the Bible themselves, rather than have to rely on the clergy for interpretation.[39][40][41][42] In 1635, they established the Boston Latin School to educate their sons, the first and oldest formal education institution in the English-speaking New World. They also set up what were called dame schools for their daughters, and in other cases taught their daughters at home how to read. As a result, Puritans were among the most literate societies in the world.

By the time of the American Revolution there were 40 newspapers in the United States (at a time when there were only two cities—New York and Philadelphia—with as many as 20,000 people in them).[42][43][44][45] The Puritans also set up a college (now Harvard University) only six years after arriving in Boston.[42][46]

Beliefs

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Puritanism broadly refers to a diverse religious reform movement in Britain committed to the Continental Reformed tradition.[47] While Puritans did not agree on all doctrinal points, most shared similar views on the nature of God, human sinfulness, and the relationship between God and mankind. They believed that all of their beliefs should be based on the Bible, which they considered to be divinely inspired.[48]

The concept of covenant was extremely important to Puritans, and covenant theology was central to their beliefs. With roots in the writings of Reformed theologians John Calvin and Heinrich Bullinger, covenant theology was further developed by Puritan theologians Dudley Fenner, William Perkins, John Preston, Richard Sibbes, William Ames and, most fully by Ames's Dutch student, Johannes Cocceius.[49] Covenant theology asserts that when God created Adam and Eve he promised them eternal life in return for perfect obedience; this promise was termed the covenant of works. After the fall of man, human nature was corrupted by original sin and unable to fulfill the covenant of works, since each person inevitably violated God's law as expressed in the Ten Commandments. As sinners, every person deserved damnation.[50]

Puritans shared with other Calvinists a belief in double predestination, that some people (the elect) were destined by God to receive grace and salvation while others were destined for Hell.[51] No one, however, could merit salvation. According to covenant theology, Christ's sacrifice on the cross made possible the covenant of grace, by which those selected by God could be saved. Puritans believed in unconditional election and irresistible grace—God's grace was given freely without condition to the elect and could not be refused.[52]

Conversion

Covenant theology made individual salvation deeply personal. It held that God's predestination was not "impersonal and mechanical" but was a "covenant of grace" that one entered into by faith. Therefore, being a Christian could never be reduced to simple "intellectual acknowledgment" of the truth of Christianity. Puritans agreed "that the effectual call of each elect saint of God would always come as an individuated personal encounter with God's promises".[53]

The process by which the elect are brought from spiritual death to spiritual life (regeneration) was described as conversion.[52] Early on, Puritans did not consider a specific conversion experience normative or necessary, but many gained assurance of salvation from such experiences. Over time, however, Puritan theologians developed a framework for authentic religious experience based on their own experiences as well as those of their parishioners. Eventually, Puritans came to regard a specific conversion experience as an essential mark of one's election.[54]

The Puritan conversion experience was commonly described as occurring in discrete phases. It began with a preparatory phase designed to produce contrition for sin through introspection, Bible study and listening to preaching. This was followed by humiliation, when the sinner realized that he or she was helpless to break free from sin and that their good works could never earn forgiveness.[52] It was after reaching this point—the realization that salvation was possible only because of divine mercy—that the person would experience justification, when the righteousness of Christ is imputed to the elect and their minds and hearts are regenerated. For some Puritans, this was a dramatic experience and they referred to it as being born again.[55]

Confirming that such a conversion had actually happened often required prolonged and continual introspection. Historian Perry Miller wrote that the Puritans "liberated men from the treadmill of indulgences and penances, but cast them on the iron couch of introspection".[56] It was expected that conversion would be followed by sanctification—"the progressive growth in the saint's ability to better perceive and seek God's will, and thus to lead a holy life".[55] Some Puritans attempted to find assurance of their faith by keeping detailed records of their behavior and looking for the evidence of salvation in their lives. Puritan clergy wrote many spiritual guides to help their parishioners pursue personal piety and sanctification. These included Arthur Dent's The Plain Man's Pathway to Heaven (1601), Richard Rogers's Seven Treatises (1603), Henry Scudder's Christian's Daily Walk (1627) and Richard Sibbes's The Bruised Reed and Smoking Flax (1630).[57]

Too much emphasis on one's good works could be criticized for being too close to Arminianism, and too much emphasis on subjective religious experience could be criticized as Antinomianism. Many Puritans relied on both personal religious experience and self-examination to assess their spiritual condition.[57]

Puritanism's experiential piety would be inherited by the evangelical Protestants of the 18th century.[56] While evangelical views on conversion were heavily influenced by Puritan theology, the Puritans believed that assurance of one's salvation was "rare, late and the fruit of struggle in the experience of believers", whereas evangelicals believed that assurance was normative for all the truly converted.[58]

Worship and sacraments

While most Puritans were members of the Church of England, they were critical of its worship practices. In the 17th century, Sunday worship in the established church took the form of the Morning Prayer service in the Book of Common Prayer. This may include a sermon, but Holy Communion or the Lord's Supper was only occasionally observed. Officially, lay people were only required to receive communion three times a year, but most people only received communion once a year at Easter. Puritans were concerned about biblical errors and Catholic remnants within the prayer book. Puritans objected to bowing at the name of Jesus, the requirement that priests wear the surplice, and the use of written, set prayers in place of improvised prayers.[59]

The sermon was central to Puritan piety.[60] It was not only a means of religious education; Puritans believed it was the most common way that God prepared a sinner's heart for conversion.[61] On Sundays, Puritan ministers often shortened the liturgy to allow more time for preaching.[20] Puritan churchgoers attended two sermons on Sundays and as many weekday sermons and lectures they could find, often traveling for miles.[62] Puritans were distinct for their adherence to Sabbatarianism.[63]

Puritans taught that there were two sacraments: baptism and the Lord's Supper. Puritans agreed with the church's practice of infant baptism. However, the effect of baptism was disputed. Puritans objected to the prayer book's assertion of baptismal regeneration.[64] In Puritan theology, infant baptism was understood in terms of covenant theology—baptism replaced circumcision as a sign of the covenant and marked a child's admission into the visible church. It could not be assumed that baptism produces regeneration. The Westminster Confession states that the grace of baptism is only effective for those who are among the elect, and its effects lie dormant until one experiences conversion later in life.[65] Puritans wanted to do away with godparents, who made baptismal vows on behalf of infants, and give that responsibility to the child's father. Puritans also objected to priests making the sign of the cross in baptism. Private baptisms were opposed because Puritans believed that preaching should always accompany sacraments. Some Puritan clergy even refused to baptise dying infants because that implied the sacrament contributed to salvation.[66]

Puritans rejected both Roman Catholic (transubstantiation) and Lutheran (sacramental union) teachings that Christ is physically present in the bread and wine of the Lord's Supper. Instead, Puritans embraced the Reformed doctrine of real spiritual presence, believing that in the Lord's Supper the faithful receive Christ spiritually. In agreement with Thomas Cranmer, the Puritans stressed "that Christ comes down to us in the sacrament by His Word and Spirit, offering Himself as our spiritual food and drink".[67] They criticised the prayer book service for being too similar to the Catholic mass. For example, the requirement that people kneel to receive communion implied adoration of the Eucharist, a practice linked to transubstantiation. Puritans also criticised the Church of England for allowing unrepentant sinners to receive communion. Puritans wanted better spiritual preparation (such as clergy home visits and testing people on their knowledge of the catechism) for communion and better church discipline to ensure that the unworthy were kept from the sacrament.[66]

Puritans did not believe confirmation was necessary and thought candidates were poorly prepared since bishops did not have the time to examine them properly.[68][69] The marriage service was criticised for using a wedding ring (which implied that marriage was a sacrament) and having the groom vow to his bride "with my body I thee worship", which Puritans considered blasphemous. In the funeral service, the priest committed the body to the ground "in sure and certain hope of resurrection to eternal life, through our Lord Jesus Christ." Puritans objected to this phrase because they did not believe it was true for everyone. They suggested it be rewritten as "we commit his body [etc.] believing a resurrection of the just and unjust, some to joy, and some to punishment."[69]

Puritans eliminated choral music and musical instruments in their religious services because these were associated with Roman Catholicism; however, singing the Psalms was considered appropriate (see Exclusive psalmody).[70] Church organs were commonly damaged or destroyed in the Civil War period, such as when an axe was taken to the organ of Worcester Cathedral in 1642.[71]

Ecclesiology

Polemical popular print with a Catalogue of Sects, 1647.

While the Puritans were united in their goal of furthering the English Reformation, they were always divided over issues of ecclesiology and church polity, specifically questions relating to the manner of organizing congregations, how individual congregations should relate with one another and whether established national churches were scriptural.[54] On these questions, Puritans divided between supporters of episcopal polity, presbyterian polity and congregational polity.

The episcopalians (known as the prelatical party) were conservatives who supported retaining bishops if those leaders supported reform and agreed to share power with local churches.[72] They also supported the idea of having a Book of Common Prayer, but they were against demanding strict conformity or having too much ceremony. In addition, these Puritans called for a renewal of preaching, pastoral care and Christian discipline within the Church of England.[54]

Like the episcopalians, the presbyterians agreed that there should be a national church but one structured on the model of the Church of Scotland.[72] They wanted to replace bishops with a system of elective and representative governing bodies of clergy and laity (local sessions, presbyteries, synods, and ultimately a national general assembly).[54] During the Interregnum, the presbyterians had limited success at reorganizing the Church of England. The Westminster Assembly proposed the creation of a presbyterian system, but the Long Parliament left implementation to local authorities. As a result, the Church of England never developed a complete presbyterian hierarchy.[73]

Congregationalists or Independents believed in the autonomy of the local church, which ideally would be a congregation of "visible saints" (meaning those who had experienced conversion).[74] Members would be required to abide by a church covenant, in which they "pledged to join in the proper worship of God and to nourish each other in the search for further religious truth".[72] Such churches were regarded as complete within themselves, with full authority to determine their own membership, administer their own discipline and ordain their own ministers. Furthermore, the sacraments would only be administered to those in the church covenant.[75]

Most congregational Puritans remained within the Church of England, hoping to reform it according to their own views. The New England Congregationalists were also adamant that they were not separating from the Church of England. However, some Puritans equated the Church of England with the Roman Catholic Church, and therefore considered it no Christian church at all. These groups, such as the Brownists, would split from the established church and become known as Separatists. Other Separatists embraced more radical positions on separation of church and state and believer's baptism, becoming early Baptists.[75]

Family life

The Snake in the Grass or Satan Transform'd to an Angel of Light, title page engraved by Richard Gaywood, c. 1660

Based on Biblical portrayals of Adam and Eve, Puritans believed that marriage was rooted in procreation, love, and, most importantly, salvation.[76] Husbands were the spiritual heads of the household, while women were to demonstrate religious piety and obedience under male authority.[77] Furthermore, marriage represented not only the relationship between husband and wife, but also the relationship between spouses and God. Puritan husbands commanded authority through family direction and prayer. The female relationship to her husband and to God was marked by submissiveness and humility.[78]

Thomas Gataker describes Puritan marriage as:

... together for a time as copartners in grace here, [that] they may reigne together forever as coheires in glory hereafter.[79]

The paradox created by female inferiority in the public sphere and the spiritual equality of men and women in marriage, then, gave way to the informal authority of women concerning matters of the home and childrearing.[80] With the consent of their husbands, wives made important decisions concerning the labour of their children, property, and the management of inns and taverns owned by their husbands.[81] Pious Puritan mothers laboured for their children's righteousness and salvation, connecting women directly to matters of religion and morality.[82] In her poem titled "In Reference to her Children", poet Anne Bradstreet reflects on her role as a mother:

I had eight birds hatched in one nest; Four cocks there were, and hens the rest. I nursed them up with pain and care, Nor cost nor labour I did spare.

Bradstreet alludes to the temporality of motherhood by comparing her children to a flock of birds on the precipice of leaving home. While Puritans praised the obedience of young children, they also believed that, by separating children from their mothers at adolescence, children could better sustain a superior relationship with God.[83] A child could only be redeemed through religious education and obedience. Girls carried the additional burden of Eve's corruption and were catechised separately from boys at adolescence. Boys' education prepared them for vocations and leadership roles, while girls were educated for domestic and religious purposes. The pinnacle of achievement for children in Puritan society, however, occurred with the conversion process.[82]

Puritans viewed the relationship between master and servant similarly to that of parent and child. Just as parents were expected to uphold Puritan religious values in the home, masters assumed the parental responsibility of housing and educating young servants. Older servants also dwelt with masters and were cared for in the event of illness or injury. African-American and Indian servants were likely excluded from such benefits.[84]

Demonology and witch hunts

Like most Christians in the early modern period, Puritans believed in the active existence of the devil and demons as evil forces that could possess and cause harm to men and women. There was also widespread belief in witchcraft and witches—persons in league with the devil. "Unexplained phenomena such as the death of livestock, human disease, and hideous fits suffered by young and old" may all be blamed on the agency of the devil or a witch.[85]

Puritan pastors undertook exorcisms for demonic possession in some high-profile cases. Exorcist John Darrell was supported by Arthur Hildersham in the case of Thomas Darling.[86] Samuel Harsnett, a sceptic on witchcraft and possession, attacked Darrell. However, Harsnett was in the minority, and many clergy, not only Puritans, believed in witchcraft and possession.[87]

In the 16th and 17th centuries, thousands of people throughout Europe were accused of being witches and executed. In England and Colonial America, Puritans engaged in witch hunts as well. In the 1640s, Matthew Hopkins, the self-proclaimed "Witchfinder General", whose career flourished during Puritan rule, was responsible for accusing over two hundred people of witchcraft, mainly in East Anglia.[88] Between 1644 and 1647, Hopkins and his colleague John Stearne sent more accused people to the gallows than all the other witch-hunters in England of the previous 160 years.[89] In New England, few people were accused and convicted of witchcraft before 1692; there were at most sixteen convictions.[90]

The Salem witch trials of 1692 had a lasting impact on the historical reputation of New England Puritans. Though this witch hunt occurred after Puritans lost political control of the Massachusetts colony, Puritans instigated the judicial proceedings against the accused and comprised the members of the court that convicted and sentenced the accused. By the time Governor William Phips ended the trials, fourteen women and five men had been hanged as witches.[91]

Millennialism

Puritan millennialism has been placed in the broader context of European Reformed beliefs about the millennium and interpretation of biblical prophecy, for which representative figures of the period were Johannes Piscator, Thomas Brightman, Joseph Mede, Johannes Heinrich Alsted, and John Amos Comenius.[92] Like most English Protestants of the time, Puritans based their eschatological views on an historicist interpretation of the Book of Revelation and the Book of Daniel. Protestant theologians identified the sequential phases the world must pass through before the Last Judgment could occur and tended to place their own time period near the end. It was expected that tribulation and persecution would increase but eventually the church's enemies—the Antichrist (identified with the Roman Catholic Church) and the Ottoman Empire—would be defeated.[93] Based on Revelation 20, it was believed that a thousand-year period (the millennium) would occur, during which the saints would rule with Christ on earth.[94]

In contrast to other Protestants who tended to view eschatology as an explanation for "God's remote plans for the world and man", Puritans understood it to describe "the cosmic environment in which the regenerate soldier of Christ was now to do battle against the power of sin".[95] On a personal level, eschatology was related to sanctification, assurance of salvation, and the conversion experience. On a larger level, eschatology was the lens through which events such as the English Civil War and the Thirty Years' War were interpreted. There was also an optimistic aspect to Puritan millennianism; Puritans anticipated a future worldwide religious revival before the Second Coming of Christ.[96][94] Another departure from other Protestants was the widespread belief among Puritans that the conversion of the Jews to Christianity was an important sign of the apocalypse.[97]

Cultural consequences

Pilgrims Going to Church by George Henry Boughton (1867)

Some strong religious beliefs common to Puritans had direct impacts on culture. Puritans believed it was the government's responsibility to enforce moral standards and ensure true religious worship was established and maintained.[98] Education was essential to every person, male and female, so that they could read the Bible for themselves. However, the Puritans' emphasis on individual spiritual independence was not always compatible with the community cohesion that was also a strong ideal.[99] Anne Hutchinson (1591–1643), the well educated daughter of a teacher, argued with the established theological orthodoxy, and was forced to leave colonial New England with her followers.[100]

Education

Cotton Mather, influential New England Puritan minister, portrait by Peter Pelham

At a time when the literacy rate in England was less than 30 per cent, the Puritan leaders of colonial New England believed children should be educated for both religious and civil reasons, and they worked to achieve universal literacy.[101] In 1642, Massachusetts required heads of households to teach their wives, children and servants basic reading and writing so that they could read the Bible and understand colonial laws. In 1647, the government required all towns with 50 or more households to hire a teacher and towns of 100 or more households to hire a grammar school instructor to prepare promising boys for college. Philemon Pormort's Boston Latin School was the only one in Boston, the first school of public instruction in Massachusetts".[102] Boys interested in the ministry were often sent to colleges such as Harvard (founded in 1636) or Yale (founded in 1707).[41] Aspiring lawyers or doctors apprenticed to a local practitioner, or in rare cases were sent to England or Scotland.[103]

Puritan scientists

The Merton Thesis is an argument about the nature of early experimental science proposed by Robert K. Merton. Similarly to Max Weber's famous claim on the link between the Protestant work ethic and the capitalist economy, Merton argued for a similar positive correlation between the rise of English Puritanism, as well as German Pietism, and early experimental science.[104] As an example, seven of 10 nucleus members of the Royal Society were Puritans. In the year 1663, 62 per cent of the members of the Royal Society were similarly identified.[105] The Merton Thesis has resulted in continuous debates.[106]

Behavioral regulations

1659 public notice in Boston deeming Christmas illegal

Puritans in both England and New England believed that the state should protect and promote true religion and that religion should influence politics and social life.[107][108] Certain holidays were outlawed when Puritans came to power. In 1647, Parliament outlawed the celebration of Christmas, Easter and Whitsuntide.[109] Puritans strongly condemned the celebration of Christmas, considering it a Catholic invention and the "trappings of popery" or the "rags of the Beast".[110] They also objected to Christmas because the festivities surrounding the holiday were seen as impious (English jails were usually filled with drunken revelers and brawlers).[111] During the years that the Puritan ban on Christmas was in place in England, protests occurred over the repressiveness of the Puritan regime.[112] Pro-Christmas rioting broke out across England, semi-clandestine religious services marking Christ's birth continued to be held, and people sang carols in secret.[112][113] Following the restoration in 1660, when Puritan legislation was declared null and void, Christmas was again freely celebrated in England.[113] Christmas was outlawed in Boston from 1659.[114] The ban was revoked in 1681 by the English-appointed governor Edmund Andros, who also revoked a Puritan ban on festivities on Saturday nights.[114] Nevertheless, it was not until the mid-19th century that celebrating Christmas became fashionable in the Boston region.[115]

Attempting to force religious and intellectual homogeneity on the whole community, civil and religious restrictions were most strictly applied by the Puritans of Massachusetts which saw various banishments applied to enforce conformity, including the branding iron, the whipping post, the bilboes and the hangman's noose.[116] Swearing and blasphemy were illegal. In 1636, Massachusetts made blasphemy—defined as "a cursing of God by atheism, or the like"—punishable by death.[117]

Puritans were opposed to Sunday sport or recreation because these distracted from religious observance of the Sabbath.[108] In an attempt to offset the strictness of the Puritans, James I's Book of Sports (1618) permitted Christians to play football every Sunday afternoon after worship.[118] When the Puritans established themselves in power, football was among the sports that were banned: boys caught playing on Sunday could be prosecuted.[119] Football was also used as a rebellious force: when Puritans outlawed Christmas in England in December 1647 the crowd brought out footballs as a symbol of festive misrule.[119] Other forms of leisure and entertainment were completely forbidden on moral grounds. For example, Puritans were universally opposed to blood sports such as bearbaiting and cockfighting because they involved unnecessary injury to God's creatures. For similar reasons, they also opposed boxing.[61] These sports were illegal in England during Puritan rule.[120]

While card playing by itself was generally considered acceptable, card playing and gambling were banned in England and the colonies, as was mixed dancing involving men and women—which Mather condemned as "promiscuous dancing"—because it was thought to lead to fornication.[107][121] Folk dance that did not involve close contact between men and women was considered appropriate.[122] The branle dance, which involved couples intertwining arms or holding hands, returned to popularity in England after the restoration when the bans imposed by the Puritans were lifted.[123] In New England, the first dancing school did not open until the end of the 17th century.[108]

Puritans condemned the sexualization of the theatre and its associations with depravity and prostitution—London's theatres were located on the south side of the Thames, which was a center of prostitution. A major Puritan attack on the theatre was William Prynne's book Histriomastix which marshals a multitude of ancient and medieval authorities against the "sin" of dramatic performance. Puritan authorities shut down English theatres in the 1640s and 1650s—Shakespeare's Globe Theatre was demolished—and none were allowed to open in Puritan-controlled colonies.[124][125] In January 1643, actors in London protested against the ban with a pamphlet titled The Actors remonstrance or complaint for the silencing of their profession, and banishment from their severall play-houses.[126] With the end of Puritan rule and the restoration of Charles II, theatre among other arts exploded, and London's oldest operating theatre, Drury Lane in the West End, opened in 1663.[127][128] The puppet show Punch and Judy, dominated by the anarchic Mr Punch, made its first recorded appearance in England in May 1662, with show historian Glyn Edwards stating the character of Punch "went down particularly well with Restoration British audiences, fun-starved after years of Puritanism ... he became, really, a spirit of Britain – a subversive maverick who defies authority".[129]

Puritans were not opposed to drinking alcohol in moderation.[130] However, alehouses were closely regulated by Puritan-controlled governments in both England and Colonial America.[108] Laws in Massachusetts in 1634 banned the "abominable" practice of individuals toasting each other's health.[131] William Prynne, the most rabid of the Puritan anti-toasters, wrote a book on the subject, Health's Sicknesse (1628), that "this drinking and quaffing of healthes had it origin and birth from Pagans, heathens, and infidels, yea, from the very Deuill himself."[131]

19th-century portrayal of the burning of William Pynchon's banned book on Boston Common after it was deemed blasphemous by the Massachusetts Bay Colony.

In 1649, English colonist William Pynchon, the founder of Springfield, Massachusetts, wrote a critique of Puritanical Calvinism, entitled The Meritorious Price of Our Redemption. Published in London in 1650, when the book reached Boston it was immediately burned on Boston Common and the colony pressed Pynchon to return to England which he did.[132] The censorious nature of the Puritans and the region they inhabited would lead to the phrase "banned in Boston" being coined in the late 19th century, a phrase which was applied to Boston up to the mid-20th century.[133]

Bounds were not set on enjoying sexuality within the bounds of marriage, as a gift from God.[134] Spouses were disciplined if they did not perform their sexual marital duties, in accordance with 1 Corinthians 7 and other biblical passages. Women and men were equally expected to fulfill marital responsibilities.[135] Women and men could file for divorce based on this issue alone. In Massachusetts colony, which had some of the most liberal colonial divorce laws, one out of every six divorce petitions was filed on the basis of male impotence.[136] Puritans publicly punished drunkenness and sexual relations outside marriage.[107] Couples who had sex during their engagement were fined and publicly humiliated.[107] Men, and a handful of women, who engaged in homosexual behavior, were seen as especially sinful, with some executed.[107] While the practice of execution was also infrequently used for rape and adultery, homosexuality was actually seen as a worse sin.[137] Passages from the Old Testament, including Lev 20:13., were thought to support the disgust for homosexuality and efforts to purge society of it. New Haven code stated "If any man lyeth with mankinde, as a man lyeth with a woman, both of them have committed abomination, they shall surely be put to death"[138] and in 1636 the Plymouth Colony adopted a set of laws that included a sentence of death for sodomy and buggery.[139] Prominent authors such as Thomas Cobbert, Samual Danforth and Cotton Mather wrote pieces condemning homosexuality.[137] Mather argued that the passage "Overcome the Devil when he tempts you to the youthful sin of Uncleanness" was referring "probably to the young men of Sodom".[140]

Religious toleration

Puritan rule in England was marked by limited religious toleration. The Toleration Act of 1650 repealed the Act of Supremacy, Act of Uniformity, and all laws making recusancy a crime. There was no longer a legal requirement to attend the parish church on Sundays (for both Protestants and Catholics). In 1653, responsibility for recording births, marriages and deaths was transferred from the church to a civil registrar. The result was that church baptisms and marriages became private acts, not guarantees of legal rights, which provided greater equality to dissenters.[141]

The 1653 Instrument of Government guaranteed that in matters of religion "none shall be compelled by penalties or otherwise, but endeavours be used to win them by sound Doctrine and the Example of a good conversation". Religious freedom was given to "all who profess Faith in God by Jesus Christ".[142] However, Catholics and some others were excluded. No one was executed for their religion during the Protectorate.[142] In London, those attending Catholic mass or Anglican holy communion were occasionally arrested but released without charge. Many unofficial Protestant congregations, such as Baptist churches, were permitted to meet.[143] Quakers were allowed to publish freely and hold meetings. They were, however, arrested for disrupting parish church services and organising tithe-strikes against the state church.[144]

Quaker Mary Dyer led to execution on Boston Common, 1 June 1660, by an unknown 19th century artist

In New England, where Congregationalism was the official religion, the Puritans exhibited intolerance of other religious views, including Quaker, Anglican and Baptist theologies. The Puritans of the Massachusetts Bay Colony were the most active of the New England persecutors of Quakers, and the persecuting spirit was shared by the Plymouth Colony and the colonies along the Connecticut river.[145]

Four Quakers, known as the Boston martyrs, were executed. The first two of the four Boston martyrs were executed by the Puritans on 27 October 1659, and in memory of this, 27 October is now International Religious Freedom Day to recognise the importance of freedom of religion.[146] In 1660, one of the most notable victims of the religious intolerance was English Quaker Mary Dyer, who was hanged in Boston for repeatedly defying a Puritan law banning Quakers from the colony.[145] The hanging of Dyer on Boston Common marked the beginning of the end of the Puritan theocracy.[147] In 1661, King Charles II explicitly forbade Massachusetts from executing anyone for professing Quakerism.[147] In 1684, England revoked the Massachusetts charter, sent over a royal governor to enforce English laws in 1686 and, in 1689, passed a broad Toleration Act.[147]

Anti-Catholic sentiment appeared in New England with the first Pilgrim and Puritan settlers.[148] In 1647, Massachusetts passed a law prohibiting any Jesuit Roman Catholic priests from entering territory under Puritan jurisdiction.[149] Any suspected Catholic who could not clear himself was to be banished from the colony; a second offense carried a death penalty.[150] A plaque in Southwick Hall at the University of Massachusetts Lowell commemorates "Royal Southwick, Lowell's anti-slavery Quaker senator and manufacturer and a descendant of Lawrence and Cassandra Southwick who were despoiled, imprisoned, starved, whipped, banished from Massachusetts Colony and persecuted to death in the year 1660 for being Quakers".[151]

Historiography

Second version of The Puritan, a late 19th-century sculpture by Augustus Saint-Gaudens

Puritanism has attracted much scholarly attention, and as a result, the secondary literature on the subject is vast. Puritanism is considered crucial to understanding the religious, political and cultural issues of early modern England. In addition, historians such as Perry Miller have regarded Puritan New England as fundamental to understanding American culture and identity. Puritanism has also been credited with the creation of modernity itself, from England's Scientific Revolution to the rise of democracy. In the early 20th century, Max Weber argued in The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism that Calvinist self-denial resulted in a Protestant work ethic that nurtured the development of capitalism in Europe and North America. Puritan authors such as John Milton, John Bunyan, Anne Bradstreet and Edward Taylor continue to be read and studied as important figures within English and American literature.[152]

A debate continues on the definition of "Puritanism".[153] English historian Patrick Collinson argues that "There is little point in constructing elaborate statements defining what, in ontological terms, puritanism was and what it was not, when it was not a thing definable in itself but only one half of a stressful relationship."[154] Puritanism "was only the mirror image of anti-puritanism and to a considerable extent its invention: a stigma, with great power to distract and distort historical memory."[155] Historian John Spurr writes that Puritans were defined by their relationships with their surroundings, especially with the Church of England. Whenever the Church of England changed, Spurr argues, the definition of a Puritan also changed.[8]

The analysis of "mainstream Puritanism" in terms of the evolution from it of Separatist and antinomian groups that did not flourish, and others that continue to this day, such as Baptists and Quakers, can suffer in this way. The national context (England and Wales, as well as the kingdoms of Scotland and Ireland) frames the definition of Puritans, but was not a self-identification for those Protestants who saw the progress of the Thirty Years' War from 1620 as directly bearing on their denomination, and as a continuation of the religious wars of the previous century, carried on by the English Civil Wars. English historian Christopher Hill writes of the 1630s, old church lands, and the accusations that William Laud was a crypto-Catholic:

To the heightened Puritan imagination it seemed that, all over Europe, the lamps were going out: the Counter-Reformation was winning back property for the church as well as souls: and Charles I and his government, if not allied to the forces of the Counter-Reformation, at least appeared to have set themselves identical economic and political objectives.[156]

Notable Puritans

Oliver Cromwell, Lord Protector of the Commonwealth of England, Scotland, and Ireland

See also

References

Notes

  1. ^ Spraggon 2003, p. 98.
  2. ^ Cliffe 2002, p. 195.
  3. ^ Miller 2008, p. 296: "Congregationalists were theologically descended directly from the Puritans of England and consequently enjoyed pride of place as one of the oldest, most numerous, and most significant religious groups in the colonies."
  4. ^ Morris, John W. (2011). The Historic Church: An Orthodox View of Christian History. Author House. p. 438.
  5. ^ Bremer & Webster 2006.
  6. ^ Spurr 1998, p. 3.
  7. ^ The A to Z of the Puritans. Scarecrow Press. 2008. p. 250.
  8. ^ a b Spurr 1998, p. 4.
  9. ^ Spurr 1998, p. 18.
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  13. ^ Mencken, H. L. (1916). A Book of Burlesques. Puritanism: The haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy
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  20. ^ a b Craig 2008, p. 37.
  21. ^ Craig 2008, pp. 43–44.
  22. ^ Craig 2008, pp. 39–40.
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  24. ^ Neil, Daniel (1844). The History of the Puritans, Or Protestant Noncomformists: From the Reformation in 1517, to the Revolution in 1688; Comprising an Account of Their Principles; Their Attempts for a Farther Reformation in the Church; Their Sufferings; and the Lives and Characters of Their Most Considerable Divines. Vol. 1. p. 246. Archived from the original on 4 May 2016 – via Google Books.
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  114. ^ a b Barnett 1984, p. 3.
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  134. ^ Lewis (1969, pp. 116–117): "On many questions and specially in view of the marriage bed, the Puritans were the indulgent party, ... they were much more Chestertonian than their adversaries [the Roman Catholics]. The idea that a Puritan was a repressed and repressive person would have astonished Sir Thomas More and Luther about equally."
  135. ^ Foster 1999, p. 724.
  136. ^ Foster 1999, pp. 726–727.
  137. ^ a b Crandell 1997, p. 20. sfn error: no target: CITEREFCrandell1997 (help)
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  143. ^ Coffey & Lim 2008, p. 83.
  144. ^ Coffey & Lim 2008, pp. 83–84: "But it was not for their heterodox theology or their own open meetings that they [the Quakers] were arrested and mistreated. It was for disrupting services in what they insisted on calling ‘steeple-houses’ rather than churches; that, or for organising tithe-strikes aimed directly and specifically to undermine the state church."
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  155. ^ Spurr (1998, p. 27) cites and quotes Patrick Collinson, "Fundamental Objections", Times Literary Supplement (17–23 February 1989), p. 156.
  156. ^ Hill, Christopher (1971). Economic Problems of the Church. p. 337.

Sources

Further reading

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Puritan works

24 Annotations

First Reading

steve h  •  Link

The term "Puritan" covered a wide spectrum of both religious beliefs and political views. The common threads are three fold: a desire to purify Christianity (simple forms of worship without robes or music, strict Sabbath observance, dislike of holidays and public entertainments); a determined dislike of Roman Catholicism and Catholic survivals in the Church of England; and a strong belief in personal Bible interpretation.
But under that roof stood many groups. Presbyterians at first abolished the episcopacy (in favor of councils of elders) and strongly suppressed the Church..The moderates (the Army) disliked the Church but did not totally shut it down. allowing some measure of freedom of religion. Cromwell and many other army leaders were Independents (Congregationalists), who saw each congregation as self-governing. Then there were a wide variety of more extreme sects, including the Quakers. These groups, in different ways, supported radical notions from making all citizens equal in status (Levellers), to getting rid of property rights (Diggers or True Levellers), anarchism and free love (Ranters), and theocracy of the pious (Fifth Monarchists). Baptists were mostly theological dissenters, believing in Free Will and adult Baptism. Needless to say, there was almost as much bitterness inside the Puritan movement as was aimed outside. (Excuse the simplifications here in an effort to make it short.)
Puritanism started as a term of derision in the reign of Elizabeth, but grew in respectability through her reign and James I's.

Emilio  •  Link

Like many a religious reform movement, puritanism in general was an effort to get back to an earlier state of the church, to a time before the 'pure' initial impulse had been corrupted by whatever practices troubled a particular group most. Thus the desire to do away with the hierarchy, elaborate ritual, and fancy trappings that they saw as not being part of the early church.
During Cromwell's rise to power, though, puritanism had as much the atmosphere of a popular uprising as a religious movement. Here's how Claire Tomalin describes the scene right outside Sam's door as he was growing up:
The family "grew accustomed to hearing puritan preachers in the street. In 1640 a local leather-seller called Praisegod Barebones [a significant figure in later politics] set up his Baptist congregation right outside, in Fleet Street. . . . The City apprentices who gathered in Westminster in the winter of 1641 shouted 'No Bishops'; there was some fighting, and in the days after Christmas the same boys blocked the river stairs to prevent the bishops newly appointed by the king from taking their seats in the House of Lords, and went on to attack them in their coaches." (97-98)

steve h  •  Link

Macaulay on Puritan zeal during teh Commonwealth

http://www.strecorsoc.org/macaula…

"Severe punishments were denounced against such as should presume to blame the Calvinistic mode of worship. Clergymen of respectable character were not only ejected from their benefices by thousands, but were frequently exposed to the outrages of a fanatical rabble. Churches and sepulchres, fine works of art and curious remains of antiquity, were brutally defaced. The Parliament resolved that all pictures in the royal collection which contained representations of Jesus or of the Virgin Mother should be burned. Sculpture fared as ill as painting. Nymphs and Graces, the work of Ionian chisels, were delivered over to Puritan stonemasons to be made decent. Against the lighter vices the ruling faction waged war with a zeal little tempered by humanity or by common sense. Sharp laws were passed against betting. It was enacted that adultery should be punished with death. The illicit intercourse of the sexes, even where neither violence nor seduction was imputed, where no public scandal was given, where no conjugal right was violated, was made a misdemeanour."

dirk  •  Link

Puritan England

From:
G.K. Chesterton, "A Short History of England", 1917.

"Thus the Puritans, as their name implies, were primarily enthusiastic
for what they thought was pure religion; frequently they wanted to
impose it on others; sometimes they only wanted to be free to practise
it themselves; but in no case can justice be done to what was finest in their characters, as well as first in their thoughts, if we never by any chance ask what "it" was that they wanted to impose or to practise. Now, there was a great deal that was very fine about many of the Puritans, which is almost entirely missed by the modern admirers of the Puritans. They are praised for things which they either regarded with indifference or more often detested with frenzy--such as religious liberty. And yet they are quite insufficiently understood, and are even undervalued, in their logical case for the things they really did care about--such as Calvinism. [...]

From first to last the Puritans were patriots, a point in which they had
a marked superiority over the French Huguenots. Politically, they were
indeed at first but one wing of the new wealthy class which had despoiled the Church and were proceeding to despoil the Crown. But while they were all merely the creatures of the great spoliation, many of them were the unconscious creatures of it. They were strongly represented in the aristocracy, but a great number were of the middle classes, though almost wholly the middle classes of the towns. By the poor agricultural population, which was still by far the largest part of the population, they were simply derided and detested. [...]

The soul of the movement was in two conceptions, or rather in two steps,
the first being the moral process by which they arrived at their chief conclusion, and the second the chief conclusion they arrived at. We will begin with the first, especially as it was this which determined all that external social attitude which struck the eye of contemporaries. The honest Puritan, growing up in youth in a world swept bare by the great pillage, possessed himself of a first principle which is one of the three or four alternative first principles which are possible to the mind of man. It was the principle that the mind of man can alone directly deal with the mind of God. It may shortly be called the anti-sacramental principle; but it really applies, and he really applied it, to many things besides the sacraments of the Church. It equally applies, and he equally applied it, to art, to letters, to the love of locality, to music, and even to good manners. [...]

The next thing to note is that their conception of church-government was in a true sense self-government; and yet, for a particular reason, turned out to be a rather selfish self-government. It was equal and yet it was exclusive. Internally the synod or conventicle tended to be a small republic, but unfortunately to be a very small republic. In relation to the street outside the conventicle was not a republic but an aristocracy. It was the most awful of all aristocracies, that of the elect; for it was not a right of birth but a right before birth [...].

They were certainly public, they may have been public-spirited, they were never popular; and it seems never to have crossed their minds that there was any need to be popular. England was never so little of a democracy as during the short time when she was a republic."

http://www.dur.ac.uk/martin.ward/…

in Aqua Scripto  •  Link

Puritans at the hands of the establishment. A good read be John Bunyan's "Pilgrim's Progress", who be 4 years older than our Samuell, to read how not to get along with the Regime.

A good buy This DAY for $3.33 [plus the TAX] at B&N if thee buy 2 more Classicos for $6.66
see also
Milton,John 'Paridise Lost'

Second Reading

Bill  •  Link

From English Political Thought, 1603-1660, v.1, John William Allen, 1938:

"Throughout the century [the 1600s] the word Puritan continued to used as a term of condemnation or contempt. It seems, indeed, to have been rarely used otherwise. ...

"Such references and citations as have so far been given might easily be multiplied, but to little or no purpose. They serve chiefly only to illustrate the fact, of which evidence abounds, that in the seventeenth century no generally recognized meaning was attached to the word Puritan. Quite early in the century, indeed, the word still had a fairly well-recognized meaning, but by 1640, at least, that meaning had been almost lost. Far more often than not the word was used as a mere term of abuse. That fact might possibly be taken to mean that, whatever a Puritan was, he was not a popular person. But the word was bandied about too freely and too loosely even to indicate that much. The fact that while people spoke of Puritans, they did not speak of Puritanism seems indeed to be of some significance. It suggests an unthinking superficiality in the use of the word. Puritanism seems to be a discovery of later thought and research."

Bill  •  Link

Amidst that complication of disputes, in which men were then involved [during the reign of Charles I], we may observe, that the appellation puritan stood for three parties, which, though commonly united together, were yet actuated by very different views and motives. There were the political puritants, who maintained the highest principles of civil liberty; the puritans in discipline, who were averse to the ceremonies and episcopal government of the church; and the doctrinal puritans, who rigidly defended the speculative system of the first reformers.
---The History of England. David Hume, 1776.

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

While no Native Americans wrote books in European languages during the 17th century, there were some Europeans who wrote works which were not anti-Indian, and were based on observation.

In 1632, Roger Williams wrote a treatise questioning English colonists’ rights to appropriate land under the authority of a royal patent. The book is described as a “large book in Quatro” but no copies survive. His fellow colonists wanted it destroyed.

In “Christenings Make Not Christians” (1645), Roger Williams argued against converting Indians to Christianity. He observed most Christians were as heathen as Indians. He argued Protestants should abstain from Indian missionary work until they succeeded amongst their own people.

Few colonists learned Native American languages. Communication with Native people was important, but English settlers assumed it was up to the Indians to learn English. A few early books included limited vocabulary.

“New England’s Prospects” by William Wood (1634) describes the region’s natural history and native peoples, including a 5-page vocabulary of words and phrases.

Perhaps the most ambitious 17th century work about Native American language is “A Key Into the Language of America” written by Roger Williams (1643). It is a phrase book and guide to Indian customs based on his experience among the Narragansett in Rhode Island. The book is organized in 3 parts: (1) Narragansett words and phrases, (2) geography and natural history, and (3) an account of Indian cultural institutions. He thought the Indians' origin was either Jewish or Greek. This was the first extensive book on Native American language published in English.

Williams contrasted Native American and European culture. He challenged the assumption of European superiority by pointing out that while Indians appear to lack civilization and Christianity, their culture was imbued with more civility and Christ-like spirit than European civilization.

“New English Canaan”, by Thomas Morton (1637) contains 3 parts: (1) “The Origins of the Natives; their Manners and Customs,” (2) “A Description of the Beauty of the Country,” and (3) “A Description of the People.” He writes about Indian medicine men and ways they had to prove their powers.

“New-Englands Rarities Discovered” by John Josselyn (1672) was based on his observations of the Eastern Abenaki in Maine. He was critical of Puritan policies so his work was criticized by his contemporaries.

Indians were portrayed as “children of the devil” in “The Present State of New-England, Being a Narrative of the Troubles with the Indians” by William Hubbard (1677). The book had a map which reduced Native American presence by assigning non-Indian names to features shown. The book listed acts for which Indians were deemed responsible: burned barns, slaughtered stock, and human massacre.

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/…

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

The New York Times' 1620 Project explains the way religious laws were used in the New World:
https://www.chroniclesmagazine.or…

Early Puritan Colonies are often described as theocracies, but this was not the case if, by "theocracy", we mean either rule directly by God or rule by priests.

Non-Separatists were allowed to join the Mayflower Compact, and were included in Plymouth Colony’s civic life.

Clergy in Massachusetts Bay were initially banned from holding civic offices, and early Puritan legal codes specifically prohibited ecclesiastical courts. These statutes also stipulated ecclesiastical sanctions like excommunication did not impact civic officials.

Puritans committed to creating social and political institutions they believed were mandated by the Bible. E.G. the 1672 Declaration by the Connecticut General Court:
“We have endeavored not only to ground our capital laws upon the Word of God, but also all other laws upon the justice and equity held forth in that Word, which is a most perfect rule.”

Scriptural influence is obvious in each colony’s capital laws:
Crimes such as adultery and incest were not punished by death in England, but the Puritans took guidance from the Old Testament. Each capital law cited scriptural authority. E.G.:
"If any child, or children, above sixteen years old, and of sufficient understanding, shall CURSE, or SMITE their natural FATHER, or MOTHER; he or they shall be put to death: unless it can be sufficiently testified that the Parents have been very unchristianly negligent in the education of such children; or so provoked them by extreme, and cruel correction: that they have been forced thereunto to preserve themselves from death or maiming. Exodus 21:17. Leviticus 20:9. Exodus 21:15.

Such laws are harsh, but the death penalty was rarely enforced. Only 3 people were hanged for adultery in New England and none for disrespecting their parents.

In practice, the Puritans’ use of Scripture was liberalizing.
In 17th century England, a person could be executed based on circumstantial evidence. The Puritans required two eyewitnesses in capital cases, based on Deuteronomy 19:15:
“One witness shall not rise up against a man for any iniquity, or for any sin, in any sin that he sinneth: at the mouth of two witnesses…”

Similarly, 1/3 of English criminals were sentenced to death; you could die for stealing property worth a shilling.
American Puritans used biblical texts like Exodus 22:4 (“If the theft is certainly found alive in his hand, whether it is an ox or donkey or sheep, he shall restore double”) to require restitution as the penalty for theft rather than death.

Literacy was a factor. In Italy and France the mid-17th century literacy was 23% and 29% respectively. About 95% of males in New England read.
Widespread literacy helped undermine hierarchies and promoted republican self-government.

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

A contemporary view of the Puritans is given in Cosmo, the future Grand Duke of Turin's travelogue. He visited England in the Spring of 1669.

I corrected scanning errors I could figure out, and increased the number of paragraphs. I apologize if I guessed incorrectly:

The preachers of the Anglican religion have but a thin attendance at their discourses, the people thronging in much greater crowds to the meetings of the Presbyterian sect; from which, as well as from that of the Hierarchy, which is a mixture of Calvinism and Lutheranism, have since been derived all those numerous and sub-divided Sectarians which are now to be found in London, daily multiplying in all the vigor of independence.

They are as follow:
Protestants or those of the Established Religion, Puritans, Presbyterians, Atheists, Brownists, Adamites, Familists or the Family of Love, Anabaptists, Libertines, Independents, Fanatics, Arians, Antiscripturists, Millenarians, Memnonists, Enthusiasts, Seekers, Sabbatarians, Antisabbatarians, Perfectionists, Fotinians, Antitrinitarians, Sceptics, Tremblers or Quakers, Monarchists or Fifth Monarchy-Men, Socinians, Latitudinarians, Origenites, Deists, Chiliasts, Antinomians, Armenians, Quintinists, Ranters, and Levellers.

...

SECT OF THE PURITANS.
The sect of the Puritans is united to the Calvinists of Geneva; and in England they are called Puritans, from considering themselves pure, and free from all sin, leaving out, in the Lord's Prayer, Et dimitte tiobis debita nostra, "And forgive us our trespasses."

426

They are divided into Wet Puritans, who incline a little to Lutheranism, and Rigidy who admit nothing but pure Calvinism. Nevertheless, they unite together in being sworn enemies of the Catholics, as also of the Protestants, and of the monarchical government.

From these, come the Presbyterians; and from these again arose the Independents in the late rebellion, the object of which was to unite all the sects in a league for the suppression of the royal dignity.

PRESBYTERIANS are so called, because they assign the government of the Church to pastors alone, to the exclusion of bishops.

With their tenets, the greater part of the nobility, and some of the commons, were tinctured; and their example was followed by the merchants and citizens of London, who were intent upon changing the Aristocratical form of government, when the Independents, with the greatest part of the members of the Lower House of Parliament, aimed at a Democratical one, and the extinction of the royal family as a necessary consequence of it; for this is the tendency of the sect of Calvin, from which the Presbyterians derive their origin.

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

PART 2

427

They maintain the following dogmas:
1. The Gospel is administered by priests, and also the dispensation of the holy mysteries manifested in the flesh of Christ.
2. The parts of this administration are three: preaching the Gospel, the administration of the sacraments, and the power to bind or loose.
3. The ecclesiastical power consists in the imposition of hands.
4. All the ministers of the Church are not ministers of the Gospel; deacons and deaconesses being ministers of the Church only.
5. The prophets of the New Testament, and the administrators of the Gospel, are not the same.
6. The elders and priests ought to be distinguished from others.
7. The 70 Disciples were not subject to the Apostles.
There are, besides these, 70 other dogmas professed by the Calvinists.

...

SECT of THE LIBERTINES.

The sect of the Libertines, which sprung from the Calvinism of the Puritans, boasts for its legislator one Quintin, a tailor in Picardy, and for its restorer in England, under the shelter of the Presbyterians and Independents, one Burton.

435

He, taking away freewill, taught that all the good and ill which is done by men, is not done by them but by the Holy Spirit which is in them; and, consequently, that the treachery of Judas and the Conversion of St. Paul were brought about by God, who has with equal efficacy and certainty decreed the salvation of the predestined and the damnation of the reprobate.

Besides these, he published the following propositions, as the rule of his perverse belief:

DOGMAS OF THE LIBERTINES.
1. The Spirit of God, which dwells in us, operates all the evil that we do.
2. Sin is only an opinion.
3. In punishing sin, God punishes himself.
4. He alone is re-born, who has no remorse of conscience.
5. He alone is good, who confesses that he never committed any evil.
6. Man may be perfect and innocent in this life.
7. The knowledge of the Resurrection of Christ is only a suspicion.

436

8. They are perfect, who, despising Scripture, trust to their own inspiration.
9. John the Evangelist was a foolish youth; Matthew, a cheating banker; Paul, a broken vessel; Peter, a denier of Christ.
10. No more credit ought to be given to the canonical books, than is given to the books of the profane historians.

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

PART 3

SECT OF THE INDEPENDENTS.

The sect of the Independents, which proceeds from that of the Puritans, was revived in England by John Robinson, a preacher of the latter persuasion at Leyden, in the year 1634; but as Puritanism set itself up against the Anglican Protestant Church, it was expelled from the kingdom by a royal edict, through the exertions of Laud, Archbishop of Canterbury; part of its members retired into the provinces of Holland and Guelderland, and part, passing over into North America, which is called New England, took up their abode, and built churches there, and, at the suggestion of Robert Cotton, a designing man, and Ann Hutchinson, a woman of great saga city and by profession a Calvinist (who preached in public, and disposed of all matters of religion throughout the country like an high priest) decided for Independentism.

437

Being then introduced into England afresh, the sect was propagated under Thomas Fairfax and Oliver Cromwell, the latter General of the Armies, and the former his Lieutenant-General, offices conferred upon them by the Parliament, and which had been taken from the Earls of Essex and Manchester, and Waller, assigning as motives for this deprivation, that they were of the Presbyterian faction, to which the newly-chosen generals were adverse, as being of the sect of Independents.

These are a set of people who, if they did not at least apparently acknowledge the worship of one God, and if they were not baptized, might be ranked among Gentiles and Atheists.

They do not attach themselves to any sect; but their conscience and faith are regulated at their own discretion, they being fond of liberty, which admits no dependence upon any synod, or political arrangement.

They will have no churches, altars, or sacred rites; pretending, that whatever regards doctrine and ecclesiastical discipline, is best regulated by their private meetings, at which every member of the sect makes a speech, according to his caprice, thinking that God is pleased with prayers only, and that every heart receives its portion of the Holy Spirit.

438

Many are the articles professed by the Independents of London, some of which are in conformity to those of the Brownists and the Independents of New England, and some different.

They agree with the former in many of their articles, and more particularly in those which follow.

ARTICLES OF THE LONDON INDEPENDENTS, AND THOSE OF AMERICA.

1. That the revelations made to the above-mentioned Cotton, and to the woman Hutchinson, are of the same authority as the Scriptures.
2. No Christian ought to be forced to profess any particular faith.
3. The soul dies with the body.
4. All the saints on earth have two bodies.
5. The body of Christ is not in heaven.
6. Christ had no other body than the Church.
7. Man is justified, and united to Christ, without faith.
8. Man is not actually a part of Christ, until he has confidence that he is so.

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

PART 4

439

9. This confidence is proved by the testimony of the Holy Spirit.
10. Sanctification is not a sure sign of a state of grace.
11. The hypocrite may have the same grace as Adam had in his state of innocence.
12. Sin ought not to disturb the sons of God, for whoever is disturbed by the sins which he has committed, cannot be a son of God.
13. A man may have all possible grace, and yet be without Christ.
14. The activity of the Christian consists in this, that he is constantly sinning.
Besides these, there are 20 other articles.

The articles of the London Independents [ABOVE] differ from those of the Independents on the other side the Atlantic, in asserting:

1. That any congregation whatever, provided it consist of seven persons, possesses entire and absolute ecclesiastical authority, without being dependent upon anyone under heaven.
2. All the power exerted by synods, whether national or general, is anti-christian and tyrannical.

440

3. Whoever subjects himself to the decision of any synod, deprives himself of that Christian liberty which Christ has purchased for us.
4. Faith is of no avail towards salvation.
5. The power of the keys belongs equally to men and women.
6. Women may repudiate their husbands, if they do not consent to follow the rules of the new Independent Church. a s^umn
7. It is lawful for women to preach, and to cavil in churches, but not to sing,
8. From the day that anyone enlists himself among the members of the Independent Church, till his death, he is holy, and worthy to receive the Lord's Supper.
9. The followers of Independentism, inasmuch as they are perfect and always holy, ought not to listen to any f^jl^ijP
10. Communicants ought to partake of the Lord's Supper with their heads covered, and sitting; the minister is to give it uncovered, and to distribute it to those sitting, through the medium of the deacon or deaconess.
11. The Independent Churches have authority to excommunicate.
12. No one ought to be admitted either to ecclesiastical or civil government, who is not a true and cordial Independent.

441

13. The ministers of the Independent Churches are to be members of the Supreme Court, and of Parliament, with the power of voting.
14. All sects are to be tolerated indiscriminately, provided they are not Papists or Presbyterians.
15. God is the author of all the ill that is done.
To these are added more than 20 other dogmas.

@@@

From:
TRAVELS OF COSMO THE THIRD, GRAND DUKE OF TUSCANY,
THROUGH ENGLAND,
DURING THE REIGN OF KING CHARLES THE SECOND (1669)
TRANSLATED FROM THE ITALIAN MANUSCRIPT
https://archive.org/stream/travel…

Consider Cosmo only as a traveler. Under his direction, the narrator was Count Lorenzo Magalotti, afterwards Secretary to the Academy del Cimento, and one of the most learned characters of Ferdinand II's court.

They were all good Catholics.

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

“For every Church is orthodox to itself; to others, erroneous or heretical.” — John Locke, A Letter Concerning Toleration, 1689

As C. John Sommerville pithily phrases it, in little more than 100 years “England moved from the extermination of heresy to the harassment of nonconformity.”

The conceptual shift from “heresy” to “nonconformity” is a profound one: it makes dissent a political rather than a theological error.
The various government Acts after the Restoration made religion a concern of state power, while they tacitly and slowly understood that national religious conformity was no longer a practical model for England, Scotland and Ireland.

For more on this pithy subject, and John Locke's essay, see
https://www.academia.edu/3021131/…

Third Reading

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

Puritan: 1556 (Oxford English Dictionary)

Puritanism = second generation theology => sought to advance and complete the work of the early reformers. Quest for purity => Puritans constantly challenged the beliefs, practices and mores of their time.
• Protested against the English Reformation, which in their view did not go far enough. Desire for a revival of the Church (=> evangelical revival in 18C)
• The expression of Puritanism as a growing dissenting voice also owes its success to the printing press. At least half of the 100,000 titles published between 1558 and 1700 were religious works. A strong proportion of these were puritan writings (autobiographies, conversion narratives, diaries…); many were written in prison and became bestsellers (Fox, Baxter, Bunyan…). Puritans not only made use of the printed medium, but they also strongly encouraged the spread of literacy to give people direct access to the Bible => Puritans championed freedom of religion, and freedom of the press. They often published anonymously and with clandestine of foreign presses to avoid fines and censorship.
• All believed in the doctrine of justification by faith alone (sola fide), the doctrine of grace (sola gratia) and the primacy of the Scriptures (sola scriptura).
• They strongly believed in the Calvinist doctrine of predestination and therefore minimised the value of good works in reaching one’s salvation => Emphasis on discipline and repentance (austere image).

• Puritan = derogatory term => Arminians within the Anglican Church used the term ‘Puritan’ against orthodox Calvinists as a synonym for ‘killjoy’, while the Puritans thought of themselves as ‘God’s Elect’. Definition not set in stone, but evolved over time => Royalists used it as a label to stigmatise rebellious MPs during the Civil War, while the term designated nonconformists after the Restoration (1660).

• Puritanism => broad label for a wide movement:
• All were Calvinist, all believed in predestination, and all believed it necessary to purify the Anglican Church from its remaining Catholic components (garments, liturgy …)
• Presbyterians: wanted a system of Church government based on a hierarchy of Elders. Opposed separation from the Church.
• Independents or Congregationalists, wanted each congregation to be legally independent of every other one. The individual Church was the highest authority

• Separatists wanted to separate from the established Church altogether.
• => two main Puritan currents: those advocating reform of Church structure vs those emphasis freedom of conscience and religious toleration.

• Not merely a national movement => colonial America.

FROM THE DEFINITIONS SECTION OF
English Puritanism from Cromwell to Wesley
Lipscomb University - Anglo Educational Services
By Dr. Lionel Laborie, Goldsmiths, University of London
5 March, 2015.
https://www.academia.edu/11289655…

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

From our Wiki page about Puritanism:
"The marriage service was criticised for using a wedding ring (which implied that marriage was a sacrament) and having the groom vow to his bride "with my body I thee worship", which Puritans considered blasphemous.
"Swearing and blasphemy were illegal. In 1636, Massachusetts made blasphemy — defined as "a cursing of God by atheism, or the like" — punishable by death.
"In 1649, English colonist William Pynchon, the founder of Springfield, Massachusetts, wrote a critique of Puritanical Calvinism, entitled 'The Meritorious Price of Our Redemption'. Published in London in 1650, when the book reached Boston it was immediately ruled as blasphemous by the Massachusetts Bay Colony and was burned on Boston Common. The colony pressed Pynchon to return to England which he did."

@@@

Some 79 countries continue to enforce blasphemy laws. In Afghanistan, Brunei, Iran, Nigeria, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, violation can result in the death penalty.
https://theconversation.com/what-…

Laws prohibiting blasphemy and blasphemous libel in the UK date to medieval times as common law and, in some special cases, as enacted legislation.
The common law offences of blasphemy and blasphemous libel were formally abolished in England and Wales in 2008 and Scotland in 2024. Equivalent laws remain in Northern Ireland.

An Act of Edward VI (the Sacrament Act 1547) set a punishment of imprisonment for reviling the sacrament of the Lord's Supper. It was repealed in 1553 and revived in 1558.

From the 16th century to the mid-19th century, blasphemy against Christianity was held as an offence against common law.

When formulating his new Church of England's doctrines in the 1530s, Henry VIII made it an offence to say or print any opinion that contradicted the Six Articles (1539).

Blasphemy was also used as a legal instrument to persecute atheists, Unitarians, and others.

The interregnum Parliament in 1650, "holding it to be [its] duty, by all good ways and means to propagate the Gospel in this Commonwealth, to advance Religion in all Sincerity, Godliness, and Honesty" passed "An Act against several Atheistical, Blasphemous and Execrable Opinions, derogatory to the honor of God, and destructive to humane Society", known as the Blasphemy Act of 1650 and intended to punish those "who should abuse and turn into Licentiousness, the liberty given in matters of Conscience".

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

PART 2 OF UK BLASPHEMY LAWS:

In 1656, two weavers, William Bond and Thomas Hibbord were indicted in Wiltshire for atheistic statements.
Also in 1656, Alexander Agnew, known as "Jock of Broad Scotland", was convicted and hanged for blasphemy in Dumfries.
And also in 1656, the Quaker James Naylor was sentenced by the Second Protectorate Parliament to flogging, to be pilloried, branded on the forehead and the piercing of his tongue by a red-hot poker, and thereafter kept in prison on hard labour indefinitely.
In sentencing Naylor, the judge, Lord Commissioner Whitelock, makes the distinction between heresy and blasphemy.

All acts passed during the Interregnum were void after the Restoration because of lack of royal assent.

The death penalty for blasphemy in the UK was abolished in 1676.

Taylor's Case in 1676 was the first reported case of the common law offence of blasphemy. There may have been unreported earlier cases. Lord Sumner said "Taylor's case is the foundation stone of this part of the law".
The report by Ventris contains this: "Hale said that such kind of wicked blasphemous words were not only an offence to God and religion, but a crime against the laws, State and Government, and therefore punishable in this Court. For to say, religion is a cheat, is to dissolve all those obligations whereby the civil societies are preserved, and that Christianity is parcel of the laws of England; and therefore to reproach the Christian religion is to speak in subversion of the law.

Those denying the Trinity were deprived of the benefit of the Toleration Act 1688.

The Blasphemy Act 1697 enacted that if any person, educated in or having made profession of the Christian religion, should by writing, preaching, teaching or advised speaking, deny that the members of the Holy Trinity were God, or should assert that there is more than one god, or deny the Christian religion to be true, or the Holy Scriptures to be of divine authority, he should, upon the first offence, be rendered incapable of holding any office or place of trust, and for the second incapable of bringing any action, of being guardian or executor, or of taking a legacy or deed of gift, and should suffer 3 years imprisonment without bail.

Profane cursing and swearing was made punishable by the Profane Oaths Act 1745, which directed that the offender be brought before a JP, and fined an amount that depended on his social rank.
It was repealed by the Criminal Law Act 1967.

Since 1838, blasphemy was considered only to be a crime against the beliefs of the Church of England.
All blasphemies against God, including denying his being or providence, all contumelious reproaches of Jesus Christ, all profane scoffing at the Holy Scriptures, and exposing any part thereof to contempt or ridicule, were punishable by the temporal courts with death, imprisonment, corporal punishment and fine.

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

CONCLUSION OF UK BLASPHEMY LAWS:

The last person in Britain to be sent to prison for blasphemy was John William Gott in 1921. He had 3 previous convictions for blasphemy when he was prosecuted for publishing 2 pamphlets called 'Rib Ticklers, or Questions for Parsons and God and Gott'.
Gott satirised the biblical story of Jesus entering Jerusalem (Matthew 21:2–7) comparing Jesus to a circus clown.
He was sentenced to 9 months' hard labor despite suffering from an incurable illness; he died shortly after release. The case caused public outrage.

In a 1949 speech, Lord Denning placed the blasphemy laws in the past, saying "The reason for this law was because it was thought that a denial of Christianity was liable to shake the fabric of society, which was itself founded upon Christian religion. There is no such danger to society now and the offence of blasphemy is a dead letter".

Not so fast: in 1977 Whitehouse v Lemon (involving the periodical Gay News publishing James Kirkup's poem 'The Love that Dares to Speak its Name') demonstrated that the offence of blasphemous libel, long thought to be dormant, was still in force.
During the House of Lords appeal Lord Scarman said that "I do not subscribe to the view that the common-law offence of blasphemous libel serves no useful purpose in modern law. ... The offence belongs to a group of criminal offences designed to safeguard the internal tranquillity of the kingdom."
In 2002, a well-publicised public reading of 'The Love that Dares to Speak its Name' was held on the steps of St. Martin-in-the-Fields in Trafalgar Square and failed to lead to any prosecution.

In R v Chief Metropolitan Stipendiary Magistrate, ex parte Choudhury (1991), a divisional court held that the blasphemy offence prohibited attacks only on the Christian religion, and did not prohibit attacks on the Islamic religion.
It was also held that the failure of these offences to prohibit attacks on non-Christian religions did not violate article 9 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (which relates to freedom of religion).

On 5 March 2008, an amendment was passed to the Criminal Justice and Immigration Act 2008 which abolished the common law offences of blasphemy and blasphemous libel in England and Wales. The peers also voted for the laws to be abandoned during March, and the relevant section came into force on 8 July 2008.

Excerpted from
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bla…

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

US BLASOHEMY LAWS:

The USA has a long history of blasphemy laws.

Many of the original plantations established blasphemy laws, which became state laws. The U.S. Supreme Court did not rule that blasphemy was a form of protected speech until 1952. Even then, it has not always been protected.

The plantations/early states often developed legal protections for Christians to practice their specific version of the Christian religion so these safeguards often did not extend to non-Christians.

Maryland’s Toleration Act of 1649 was the first Colonial act to refer to the “free exercise” of religion and was designed to protect Christians from religious persecution from state officials. It did not extend that “free exercise” of religion to non-Christians, instead declaring that anyone who blasphemes against God by cursing him or denying the existence of Jesus can be punished by death or the forfeiture of their lands to the state.

In 1811, the U.S. held one of its most infamous blasphemy trials, People v. Ruggles, at the New York Supreme Court. John Ruggles received a 3-month prison sentence and a $500 fine — about $12,000 in 2024 — for stating in public that “Jesus Christ was a bastard, and his mother must be a whore.”
Chief Justice James Kent argued that people have freedom of religious opinion, but opinions that were malicious toward the majority stance of Christianity were an abuse of that right.
He also stated that similar attacks on other religions, such as Islam and Buddhism, would not be punishable by law, because “we are a Christian people” whose country does not draw on the doctrines of “those imposters.”

In 1824, a member of a debating society was convicted of blasphemy by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court for saying during a debate: “The Holy Scriptures were a mere fable, that they were a contradiction, and that although they contained a number of good things, yet they contained a great many lies.”
In this case — Updegraph v. Commonwealth — the court argued it was a “vulgarly shocking and insulting” statement that reflected “the highest offence” against public morals and was a disturbance to “public peace.”

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

CONCLUSION OF US BLASPHEMY LAWS:

By the end of the 19th century a free thought movement rejected religion as a guide for reason. They embraced the public critiquing of Christianity and challenged laws that favored Christians, such as blasphemy laws and mandatory Bible readings in public schools.
Members regularly faced threats of blasphemy charges.
By this time, even in cases where freethinkers were convicted of blasphemy, judges appeared to offer leniency.

By 1917, Michael X. Mockus, who had previously been convicted of blasphemy in Connecticut for his free thought lectures, was acquitted in a similar case in Illinois.
While expressing a dislike for blasphemy, Judge Perry L. Persons argued that the court’s job is not to determine which religion is right. He said “the Protestant, Catholic, Mormon, Mahammedan, the Jew, the Freethinker, the Atheist” must “all stand equal before the law.”

In 1952 the US Supreme Court heard the case of Joseph Burstyn, Inc. v. Wilson after New York rescinded the license for the film “The Miracle.” The film was deemed sacrilegious because of its supposed mockery of Catholism.
The Court ruled that states could not ban sacrilegious films. That would be a violation of the separation of church and state, it ruled, and an unconstitutional restriction on freedom of religion and speech.

Even after the Supreme Court decision, in 1968, when Irving West, a 20-year-old veteran, told a policeman to “Get your goddam hands off me” after getting in a fight, he was charged with disorderly conduct and violating Maryland’s blasphemy law.
When West appealed, a circuit court judge ruled the law was an unconstitutional violation of the First Amendment.

Then in 1977, Pennsylvania enacted a blasphemy statute banning businesses from having blasphemous names after a local businessman wanted to name his gun store “The God Damn Gun Shop.”
In 2010 the Pennsylvania Supreme Court finally deemed this statute unconstitutional.
The decision followed a case in which the owner of a film production company sued the state after his request to register his company under the name “I Choose Hell Productions, LLC” was denied on the grounds that it was blasphemous.
Citing the 1952 Joseph Burstyn, Inc. v. Wilson case, the judge ruled that the statute was a violation of First Amendment rights.

As historian David Sehat highlights in “The Myth of American Religious Freedom,” since the USA was founded there have been arguments over what religious freedom looks like. The blasphemy laws have been key to this.

Adapted from
https://theconversation.com/what-…

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

Pilgrims arose from the English Puritan movement that originated in the 1570s. Puritans wanted the English Protestant Reformation to go further. They wished to rid the Church of England of “popish” – that is, Catholic – elements like bishops and kneeling at services.

Each Puritan congregation made its own covenant with God and answered only to the Almighty. Puritans looked for evidence of a “godly life,” meaning evidence of their own prosperous and virtuous lives that would assure them of eternal salvation. They saw worldly success as a sign, though not necessarily a guarantee, of eventual entrance into heaven.

After 1605, some Puritans became what scholar Nathaniel Philbrick calls “Puritans with a vengeance.” They embraced “extreme separatism,” removing themselves from England and its corrupt church.

These Puritans would soon become “Pilgrims” – literally meaning that they would be prepared to travel to distant lands to worship as they pleased.

In 1608, a group of 100 Pilgrims sailed to Leiden, and became a separate church living and worshipping by themselves.

They were not satisfied in Leiden. Believing the Dutch Republic also to be sinful and ungodly, they decided in 1620 to venture to the New World in a leaky vessel called the Mayflower. Fewer than 40 Pilgrims joined 65 nonbelievers, whom the Pilgrims called “strangers,” in making the arduous journey to what would be called Plymouth Colony.

Most Americans know that more than half of the Mayflower’s passengers died the first harsh winter of 1620-21. The fragile colony survived only with the assistance of Native Americans – most famously Squanto. To commemorate, not celebrate, their survival, Pilgrims joined Native Americans in a grand meal during the autumn of 1621.

But for the Pilgrims, what we today know as Thanksgiving was not a feast; it was a spiritual devotion. It was not a holiday.

Still, Plymouth was dominated by the 65 strangers, who were largely disinterested in what Pilgrims saw as urgent questions of their own eternal salvation.

There were few Protestant clerics among the Pilgrims, and in few short years they found themselves to be what historian Mark Peterson calls “spiritual orphans.” Lay Pilgrims like William Brewster conducted services, but they were unable to administer Puritan sacraments.

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

PART 2

Pilgrims did not seek the conversion of Native Americans. According to scholars, the Pilgrims appreciated and respected the intellect and common humanity of Native Americans.
An early example of Pilgrim respect for the humanity of Native Americans came from the pen of Edward Winslow. Winslow was one of the chief Pilgrim founders of Plymouth. In 1622, just two years after the Pilgrims’ arrival, he published in England the first book about life in New England, “Mourt’s Relation.”

While opining that Native Americans “are a people without any religion or knowledge of God,” he nevertheless praised them for being “very trusty, quick of apprehension, ripe witted, just” and added “we have found the Indians very faithful in their covenant of peace with us; very loving. … we often go to them, and they come to us; some of us have been 50 miles by land in the country with them.”

In Winslow’s second published book, “Good Newes from New England (1624),” he recounted at length nursing the Wampanoag leader Massasoit as he lay dying, even to the point of spoon-feeding him chicken broth. Fraser calls this episode “very tender.”

The thousands of non-Pilgrim Puritans who remained behind and struggled in England would not share Winslow’s views. They were more concerned with what they saw as their own divine mission in America.

After 1628, dominant Puritan ministers clashed openly with the English Church and, more ominously, with King Charles and the then Bishop of London, William Laud.

Thousands of Puritans made the momentous decision to leave England and follow the tiny band of Pilgrims to America. These Puritans never considered themselves separatists. Following what they were confident would be the ultimate triumph of the Puritans who remained in the mother country, they often returned to help govern England.

The American Puritans of the 1630s and beyond were more ardent, and nervous about salvation than the Pilgrims of the 1620s. Puritans tightly regulated both church and society and demanded proof of godly status, meaning evidence of a prosperous and virtuous life leading to eternal salvation. They were also acutely aware of that divine-sent mission to the New World.

Puritans believed they must seek out and convert Native Americans so as to “raise them to godliness.” Tens of thousands of Puritans poured into Massachusetts Bay Colony in what became known as the “Great Migration.”
By 1645, they already surrounded and would in time absorb the remnants of Plymouth Colony.

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

CONCLUSION

Dominated by hundreds of Puritan clergy, Massachusetts Bay Colony was all about emigration, expansion and evangelization during this period.
As early as 1651, Puritan evangelists like Thomas Mayhew had converted 199 Native Americans labeled by the Puritans as “praying Indians.”
For Native Americans who converted to Christianity and prayed with the Puritans, there existed an uneasy harmony with Europeans.
For those who resisted what the Puritans saw as “God’s mission,” there was harsh treatment – and often death.
But even for those who succumbed to the Puritans’ evangelization, their culture and destiny changed dramatically and unalterably.

A devastating outcome of Puritan cultural dominance and prejudice was King Philip’s War in 1675-76. Massachusetts Bay Colony feared that Wampanoag chief Metacom – labeled by Puritans “King Philip” – planned to attack English settlements throughout New England in retaliation for the murder of “praying Indian” John Sassamon.

That suspicion mushroomed into a 14-month, all-out war between colonists and Native Americans over land, religion and control of the region’s economy. The conflict would prove to be one of the bloodiest per capita in all of American history.

By September 1676, thousands of Native Americans had been killed, with hundreds of others sold into servitude and slavery. King Philip’s War set an ominous precedent for Anglo-Native American relations throughout most of North America for centuries to come.

Puritans and Pilgrims came out of the same religious culture of 1570s England. They diverged in the early 1600s, but wound up 70 years later being one and the same in the New World.

In between, Pilgrim separatists sailed to Plymouth, Mass., and survived a terrible first winter. However, the humanity that Pilgrims like Edward Winslow showed toward the Native Americans they encountered was lamentably and tragically not shared by the Puritan colonists who followed them.

Extracted from
https://theconversation.com/how-t…

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References

Chart showing the number of references in each month of the diary’s entries.

1661

  • Sep

1662

1664

1668

  • Sep