PREFACE
First Printing 1954 Second Printing 1964
THE following essay was first published in Requests for its reprinting have come to Pendle Hill from time to time since that edition was exhausted. The original material is here reproduced because it appears more timely now than when it was first issued more than ten years ago.
The elation produced by war-time prosperity and the attainment of victory seems, at first sight, very different from the gloom of depression during which these pages were written. Yet many are aware that prosperity based on unprecedented destruction of the world's resources is both artificial and dangerous. The social illness which is here diagnosed is more clearly evident now than formerly. It is coming to the surface in a virulent form. This is obvious enough in the so-called enemy countries, where two of the remedies suggested in this book. tribalism and authoritarianism, have been tried to the limit with disastrous results. That the same social illness which has almost destroyed Europe is also attacking us is, perhaps, less obvious.
But here, as there, the individualistic atomization of society is balanced by increasing authoritarianism and mass-mindedness both in economics and politics. I-lere also there is an over-dependence on self-interest, intel-Iectual analysis, and scientific knowledge arising out of a materialistic interpretation of life. Here also there is a tendency for trihalistic nationalism to take the place of the Christian religion in furnishing the object of supreme loyalty. Ideas, if unopposed, have a way of proceeding to their logical conclusion. These ideas lead straight into totalitarianism, though it is riot probable that an American totalitarianism would bear more than a family resemblance to the various types of totalitarianism in other countries.
Man will inevitably sink lower or rise higher than the unstable humanistic level of rationalized self-interest. He must either sink to the sub-human authoritarian level in which his self-centered desires are controlled by force, or he must aspire to a level above the human. The latter condition can be achieved through a religiously centered community life in which selfishness is overcome by an invading Light and Power from above. Such a solution may appear imprcticablc to many owing to the highly individualistic conditioning of modern minds, a con ditioning brought. about by the type of culture in which we live and by the degeneration of spirit into intellect. This is the fault of ourselves, not the fault of the solution. Man is so constructed that he cannot long exist as an isolated sell-centered atom. 1-Ic must either become a cell in a social organism, the soul of which is breathed into it by Divine Love, or he must become a cog in a social mechanism, soulless and controlled from without.
Darkness is now increasing over great areas of the world; perhaps because clouds of selfishness and hatred temporarily obscure the sun; perhaps because the night of a new dark age is setting in. Yet wherever Divine Light enkindled within man's heart shines out into the world there is no darkness.
—HOWARD H. BRThT0N INTRODUCTION
FT' XCEPT for some alteration in phrasing and changes 1 in a few sentences which applied only to the
situation in this essay is reproduced as it was first
published. A new paragraph on agape has been added on page 21.
It may not be out of place to outline briefly the genesis and later development of the ideas contained in this little book. While editing for the American Friends Service Committee a monthly paper entitled Service, Howard Brinton wrote in an editorial (September, 1919) "The recent. war demonstrated that humanity has progressed much further scientifically than it has socially . . . The scientist had better lock up his laboratory until the 'visionary' peace propagandist and the dangerous' economic reformer teach humanity cooperation and self-control."
A scientist himself, Howard Brinton was unwilling to lock up his own laboratory until he could foresee by what means such cooperation and self-control could conic to be. Unexpectedly he found the way toward the answer in the obscure writings of Jacob Boebme (175-I624), the German mystic, who described, by means of the vivid symbolism of alchemy, the process through which Light, the Son of God, enters into the midst of conflicting forces in nature and man, harmonizing them and creating out of this unity a new being with wholly different properties.* Somewhat the same ideas are set forth in the writings of Smuts, Lloyd Morgan, Whitehead and other thinkers of emergent evolutionism. but without the same degree of emphasis on Divine Creative Love uniting the warring parts into a living integrated whole.
Scc The Mystic Will, by Howard H. Brimosi. Macmillan, 1930.
In the history of Quakerism Howard Brinton found evidence of the effectiveness of the Divine Light Within in producing peace and unity both in the individual and the group. This Light was found to be capable of creating what appeared to him to be the next stage in the evolution of life on this planet. the Holy Community. Accordingly in 1928, he did lock up his laboratory after giving a lecture in Philadelphia which was published under the title, Vocal Ministry and Quaker Worship.
In Creative Worship, the Swarthmore lecture. London, iqi, he portrayed the Quaker meeting as capable of becoming an "emergent" or "mutation," a whole greater than the sum of its parts, the crown of a long process of development through which individual parts become fused together into a living organic whole by a Divine integrating factor, the Presence in the midst. In the essay now reprinted, which was delivered as his inaugural address when the author became acting director of Pcndle Hill in iq, this God-indwclt community is pictured as overcoming self-centered individualism and attaining unity not only through worship but, in widely varying degrees, in its economic life also. Soon after this the author became aware of the penetrating criticism of Protestant individualism by modern Catholic philosophers such as Dawson and Maritain and also of the profound psychological analysis of our present social disease by Gerald Heard. These writers furnished valuable supports and supplements to his own conclusions.
In Divine-Human Society, the William Penn Lecture of 1938 (now out of print), the manner in which a religiously centered community may function in its worship, its church business. and in its economic and social relations is described. In Quaker Education in Theory and P,iwtice, (1940, now out of print) Howard Brinton described methods formerly used by the Society of Friends to educate its young people for the responsibility of being members of a Divine-Human society which is "in the world but not of it." Critique h' Eternity (1943) is a series of essays dealing further with the theory that God descends into the world to integrate the individual and the group by rebirth into a new and higher life.
TILE PUBLICATIONS Committee Pendle Hill
1945.
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A RELIGIOUS SOLUTION TO THE SOCIAL PROBLEM
A RELIGIOUS solution to the social problem involves an answer to two preliminary questions—what social problem are we attempting to solve and what religion do we oiler as a solution?
Since religion has assumed a wide variety of forms it will he necessary, if we are to simplify and clarify our approach, to adopt at the outset a definite religious viewpoint. To define our premises as those of Christianity in general is not sufficiently explicit because historic Christianity has itself assumed a wide variety of forms. For the purpose of the present. undertaking 1 shall approach our problem from the original point of view of the Society of Friends, which, in many ways, resembled that of early Christianity. Such an approach need not imply a narrow sectarian view. Early Quakerism exhibited certain characteristics common to many religious movements in their initial creative periods. Later Ouakerism has shared the fate of other movements in failing to carry on the ideals of the founders.
As for the sodal problem for which we seek a solution, it is the fundamental dilemma out of which most present-day social ills arise. Stated as briefly as possible, we seek a remedy for excessive individualism, and we require of this remedy that it s/ia!l at the same time respect the hard-won rights of the individual.
The paradoxical character of this statement suggests that, if there be a solution, it may turn out to be a religious one, for religion feeds on paradox. No merely logical scheme, based wholly on science and reason, will,
It is probable, do more than submerge the individual through some sort of mechanical collectivism. Religion at its highest and most creative stage is, we shall find. the one solvent, for excessive individualism which at the same time enhances the respect for individual personality.
To assume that the problem has a religious solution is not, however, to offer a substitute for economic, sociological, political, or psychological analysis and planning. A budder who uses steam-driven machinery (toes not claim that.steam alone can build a house or a bridge. Obviously, mathematical calculation, materials, tools, and skilled workers are also needed. By similar token the religious thinker does not claim that religion alone can reform our social order. It provides power, not tools, nor blueprints. Many social reformers today are like builders who order "work ahead at full speed," while the fires are going out under the boilers. We are seeking a way to rekindle those fires.
The Primitive Christian Solution
The primitive Christian community when it met together for worship was like an early Quaker meeting in the freedom with which various members exercised their gifts; also in the absence of a service programmed in advance and dominated throughout by ritual and human leadership. In both early Quakerism and early Christianity religious groups were formed whose individual members were fused together as fire fuses metals, by a living infusion of the Spirit. No outer mechanical bond was necessary.
The coming of the Spirit was indeed the great miracle of early Christianity. The Leader had departed, leaving His followers forlorn and scattered. Suddenly in the flames of Pentecost He returned seeking fresh incarnation in the body of the Church. At the beginning it was the personal leadership of Jesus which held His followers together. Alter Pentecost a new tie of a different sort was formed. Eventually this permeative bond held together every Christian community from Jerusalem to Rome. It came most vividly to consciousness in the a gape or love feast; a common meal partaken of reverently in remembrance of the Last Supper. Congregations became united with each other and with their Leader in a living organic communion. "Christians of the first generation," says Burnett H. Streeter, "troubled themselves little about the theory either of doctrine or of Church Order .......lie most vivid fact of present experience was the outpouring of 'the Spirit'."
In the early Christian meeting for worship, the Spirit exercised the same function that the soul exercises iii the body; it united and coordinated the units of which the whole was composed. The doctrine that the church was the mystical body of Christ arose by a natural process. "The God of our Lord Jesus Christ," writes Paul, "gave Him to he the head over all things to the church which is His body. the fullness of Him that filleth all in ahl.j' Man is saved, therefore, not through an external historical transaction, as has been declared in many Protestant creeds, but through the Spirit of Christ inspiring and unifying the Church. Salvation accordingly becomes a social process in which the group takes part. It is not merely a transaction between God and isolated individuals. Sin is estrangement. The individual in him
Primitive Christianity. p. 73. f Eph. t: 22,2.
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self is lonely and incomplete. He is saved, that is, his isolation is overcome, by finding and being found by a greater Life which unites him at once with Itself and with his fellows. This Life, he feels, does not come up from the biological level below, like the life of the body. It possesses a special quality whereby it is recognized as divine and coming from above. Only the upward glance senses it.. its presence fills the worshiper with reverence and awe. It creates new life in him and new life in the group. It is the same creative spirits which has always brooded over the world, bringing order out of chaos. "Without Him was not anything made that bath been made. in Him was life and the life was the Light of men."
The central doctrine of the great Church of the Mid. dc Ages held that tHan is saved in and through it Christian Society which is the body of Christ inspired by His Spirit. In the hands of theologians and priests this doctrine became mechanized. It was often given .t. ritualistic interpretation. But the Church never forgot that Christ was present in the house of His worship. His presence was realized in the sacrament. Nor was it forgotten that fellow Christians could contribute to one another's salvation, though in the doctrine that sinners might have some share in the abounding merit of the saints only a shadow remained of the early belief. The Catholic Church has developed, more directly than is often realized by non-Catholics, in unbroken continuity out of the Pritniti%'e Christian Church.
There are many ways by which an aggregate of mdi. viduals can overcome excess of individuality in its parts and be united as a whole. The means may be biological. as in the family and the tribe; they may he economic, as in the trade union or business organization; or they may be political, as in the state. There is, however, as history has repeatedly shown, no more dynamic nor effectual means of social integration than that which we call religious. The roots of the Church go deeper than the roots of family, of state, or of any other type of human organization. These roots pierce through the surface life of the intellect to the unseen depths of the soul. The early Church was a religiously integrated group bound together by an invisible presence in the midst. The individuality of each part was not thereby canceled out; rather it was lifted up into something higher, through which the essential purpose of each individual was discovered and fulfilled. Out of this higher unity in the Spirit, the lower types of organization were generated, including the economic structure. The Church at Jerusalem acted at first like one large family. The initial communism was soon given up, but there remained a considerable degree of economic interdependence. The poor continued to he carefully provided for.
The Early Quaker Solution
Early Quarkcristn went, even further than early Christianity in its dependence on it purely spiritual type of unity. Baptism was given up because it was felt to be an unnecessary external addition to an inner spiritual reality. There is some evidence that the agape or love feast occurred in some primitive Quaker groups.' but quite early and generally the supper of the Lord was celebrated wholly in silent spiritual communion.
The Quaker meeting was a religiously integrated
See Barciay's 'innrr 1_ik of the Religious Sockties of Ihr Commonwealth," pp. 57-377. Barclay the Quaker Apologist defines the "Lovc Feast" as "to cat and drink together in the dread and presence of the Lord as His people which cutSorn we1tal( not couth;nn."
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group. There was no bond but the Spirit, no creed but that which came fresh and upwclling from the Eternal Fountain of Truth. The unit was not the individual but. the meeting, for it was the sense of the meeting" and not the sense of the majority of the individuals which determined the course of action.
As in early Christianity, the higher unity generated the lower types. There was in early Quakerism a large degree of economic interdependence—the poor, the sick and the persecuted were carefully looked after by the meeting. Francis Howgill thus describes the nature of the bond which united i he early Friends' meetings: "The Lord a1)1,earc1d daily to us, to our astonishment, ainaciiieri t, at id gTcat admiration. insomuch that we often said one unto another with great joy of heart: "What? Is the Kingdom of God come to he with men?' And from that day forward our hearts were knit unto the Lord and unto one another in true and fervent, love, not by any external covenant or external form, but we entered into the covenant of life with God, and that was a strong obligation or bond upon all our spirits which united us one unto anot.her.'*
The Quaker doctrine of the Inward Light has sometimes been interpreted as an extreme form of religious individualism. This seems at first sight to he a natural deduction. If man has a Light within, he is, by this view, independent of Church. Book, and Society in his search for truth and salvation. 1-Ic is subject to no law outside himself, for his final authority is the Inner Guide. This individualistic interpretation has arisen partly from the mistaken belief that Quakerism is the extreme left wing of Protestantism and the result of Protestant doctrines carried to their logical conclusion.
rtIo- concerning Edward Bunough.
According to this view. Protestantism, in abolishing the Church as a means of salvation, substituted a direct relation between man and God. Fearful, however, of the anarchy resulting from so extreme an individualism, Protestantism sought for a means of external control which it found ready at hand in Bible and in creed. Quakerism, however, did not retreat. It placed its whole dependence on a direct relation with God, Whom it found within. Creed, Bible. and ritual were dispensed with and religion was reduced to pure interiority. Quakerism, according to such an interpretation, is simplicity in religion. By a process of subtraction it would have eliminated all that is institutional, ritualistic, and historical. Protestant individualism is thus carried to its logical conclusion by removing every trace of authoritarianism.
There was, indeed, a Reformation Group in England which followed this path, but it. was not the Society of Friends. The Ranters, with whom George Fox had many vigorous disputes. declared that everyone who considered himself inspired by the Light was a law unto himself. To have God within was to be God and so become incapable of sin or error. Fox denied the Calvinistic doctrine of total dcpravity, but. he as vigorously denied this easy means of attaining perfection.* There was, however, a Ranter party in the early Society of Fricnds.f When a form of church government was
"Justice Hotham said If God had fbi raised tip this principle of life anci light which I preached the nation hint beets overrun with Ranterism."
George Fox's Journal, Vol. L. p 95; 1910 edit.
In early Christianity the new found liberty from the Isiw of Moses gave rz to the same problem. Paul twice warns the Corinthians that "All things are lawful: bitt all things are not expedient." (I Cor.. 13:12:
group. There was no bond but the Spirit, no creed but that which came fresh and upwchhing from the Eternal Fountain of Truth. The unit was not the individual hut. the meeting, for it was the "sense of the meeting" and not the sense of the majority of the individuals which determined the course of action.
As in early Christianity, the higher unity generated the lower types. There was in early Quakerism a large degree of economic interdependence—the poor, the sick and the persecuted were carefully looked after by the meeting. Francis Howgill thus describes the nature of the bond which united the early Friends' meetings: "The Lord appeared daily to us, to our astonishment, amazement, and great admiration, insomuch that we often said one unto another with great joy of heart: "What? Is the Kingdom of God come to he with men?' And from that day forward our hearts were knit unto the Lord and unto one another in true and fervent love, not by any external covenant or external form, but we entered into the covenant of life with God, and that was a strong obligation or bond upon all our spirits which united us one unto another."
The Quaker doctrine of the Inward light has sometimes been interpreted as an extreme form of religious individualism. This seems at first sight to he a natural deduction, If man has a Light within, he is, by this view, independent of Church, Book, and Society in his search for truth and salvation. 1-Ic is subject to no law outside himself, for his final authority is the Inner Guide. This individ nalistic interpretation has arisen partly from the mistaken belief that Quakerism is the extreme left wing of Protestantism and the result of Protestant doctrines carried to their logical conclusion.
Ttimony concerning Edward Bunough.
According to this view. Protestantism, in abolishing the Church as a means of salvation, substituted a direct relation between man and God. Fearful, however, of the anarchy resulting from so extreme an individualism, Protestantism sought for a means of external control which it found ready at hand in Bible and in creed. Quakerism, however, did not retreat. It placed its whole dependence on a direct relation with God, Whom it found within. Creed, Bible, and ritual were dispensed with and religion was reduced to pure interiority. Quakerism, according to such an interpretation, is simplicity in religion. By a. process of subtraction it would have eliminated all that is institutional, ritualistic, and historical. Protestant individualism is thus carried to its logical conclusion by removing every trace of authoritarianism.
There was, indeed, a Reformation Group in England which followed this path, but it was not the Society of Friends. The Ranters, with whom George Fox had many vigorous disputes, declared that everyone who considered himself inspired by the Light was a law unto himself. To have God within was to he God and so become incapable of sin or error. Fox denied the Calvinistic doctrine of total depravity, but. lie as vigorously denied this easy means of attaining perfection.* There was, however, a Ranter party in the early Society of Fricnds.t When a form of church government, was
"Justice Hotham said if God had not raited up this principle of life and light which I preached the nation had been overrun with Ra nterism."
George Fox's Journal, Vol. I., p 95; 1910 edit.
In eaiiy Christianity the new found liberty from the law of Mes gave rise 10 the same problem. Paul twice warru the Corinthians that All things are lawful: but all things are not expedient." (I Cot. 6:12; 30:23.)
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set up through meetings for business, there resulted a separation on the part of some who believed in a purely individual form of guidance. This was the Wilkinson-Story separation of 1676.
The Society of Friends took the position that the source of guidance was not merely an individual light but the "sense of the meeting," in other words a communal light. This communal light which illumined the group was reached in a spirit of worship through which each individual aspired to a super-individual level of reality where all individual lights merged into one. It is difficult to make this process clear to anyone who has not actually experienced it. Individual insight is not suppressed, but rather it is expanded into something higher and more inclusive, just as a view gained from the footh ills is not denied, but fulfilled and interpreted by the view from the mountain top. The individual view may not be wholly in error. It may be simply fragmentary and incomplete. The individual, provided, of course, that he is in the true spirit of a worship which orients him toward something higher than himself, finds himself saying in the end, "that is just what I really meant but did not quite see clearly."
Dean Inge says mistakenly that "Quakerism is an individualistic mysticism"*,but Troeltsch is right in asserting that "the Quakers overcame the natural antisocial or rather individualistic tendency of mystic-ism."f The group method of arriving at conclusions is one of two contributions which Quakerism has made to Christian thought and practice, the other being the Quaker form of public worship. Trevelyan says that "George Fox made at least the most original contribu-
The Social Teaching of the Church, P. 21.
f The Social Teachings of the Christian Churches, Vol. II, P. 700.
Lion to the history of religion of any Englishman."
The Quaker method is more than just a secular process of group thinking such as is described in several current hooks. It is a group thinking where God is present in the group. Groups often tend to sag below the moral level of the individuals of which they are composed. But. the divine presence insures integration on a higher level. A mob can be fused into unity by looking downward to the infra-huntan instinctive level. A Quaker meeting aims to become united by looking upward to the supra-humari, that is to something higher than any one individual or any collection of individuals.
This is not a "democratic" method in the narrow sense of that term. There is no domination of a majority over a minority. 11'a good degree of unity is not reached. no action is taken. It sometimes happens, of course, that an individual who disagrees will either submit as best he can or follow his own guidance at all costs. More often he finds that the conclusion arrived at expresses his own deepest insight. The search for unity is not a search for compromise nor for the greatest conunoii divisor of a number of diverse opinions. It comes rather as an integration in which the parts are not overborne, but transmuted into something more complete than any part could become by itself, just as oxygen and hydrogen in uniting to form water are not destroyed. but trims-formed. This figure can be carried further. As in the combination of oxygen and hydrogen energy is released which can cut through the strongest steel; so a group of persons if it be able to arrive at a higher unity generates a spiritual energy which becomes available for practical use.
*Hit4Or1 of bland, p. .15 1.
• Such, for instance. M W. S. Elliott. The Proem al Croup Think-irg. or M. P. Follett, Creative Experience.
9
set up through meetings for business, there resulted a separation on the part of some who believed in a purely individual form of guidance. This was the Wilkinson-Story separation of 1676.
The Society of Friends took the position that the source of guidance was not merely an individual light but the "sense of the meeting," in other words a communal light. This communal light which illumined the group was reached in a spirit of worship through which each individual aspired to a super-individual level of reality where all individual lights merged into one. It is difficult to make this process clear to anyone who has not actually experienced it. Individual insight is not suppressed, but rather it is expanded into something higher and more inclusive, just as a view gained from the loot-hills is not. denied, but fulfilled and interpreted by the view from the mountain top. The individual view may not be wholly in error. It may be simply fragmentary and incomplete. The individual. provided, of course, that he is in the true spirit of a worship which orients him toward something higher than himself, finds himself saying in the end, "that is just what I really meant but did not quite see clearly.'
Dean Inge says mistakenly that "Quakerism is an individualistic mysticism"*, but Troeltsch is right in as.scrtinl.ç that "the Quakers overcame the natural antisocial or rather individualistic tendency of mystic-ism."f The group method of arriving at conclusions is one of two contributions which Quakerism has made to Christian thought and practice, the other being the Quaker form of public worship. Trevelyan says that "George Fox made at least the most original contribu-
The Social Teaching of the Church, P. 21.
f The Social Teachings of the CJLri.tüirz Churches, Vol. 11, p 700.
8
Lion to the history of religion of' any Englishman."
The Quaker method is more than just a secular process of group thinking such as is described in several current hooks. It is a group thinking where God is present in the group. Groups often tend to sag below the moral level of the individuals of which they are composed. But. the divine presence insures integration on a higher level. A mob can he fused into unity by looking downward to the infra-human instinctive level. A Quaker meeting aims to become united by looking upward to the supra-human, that is to something higher than any one individual or any collection of individuals.
This is not a "democratic" method in the narrow sense of that term. There is no domination of a majority over a minority, if a good degree of unity is not reached. no action is taken. It souictiflics happens, of course, that an individual who disagrees will either submit as best he can or follow his own guidance at all costs. More often he lincis that the conclusion arrived at expresses his own deepest insight. The search for unity is not a search for compromise nor for the greatest conunozi divisor of a number of diverse opinions. It comes rather as an integration in which the parts are not overborne, but transmuted into something more complete than any part could become by itself, just as oxygen antI hydrogen Ill uniting to forum water are not destroyed, but transformed This figure can be carried further. As in the combination of oxygen and hydrogen energy is released which can cut through the strongest steel; so a group of persons if it he able to arrive at a higher unity generates a spiritual energy which becomes available for practical use.
History of Fng!avd, p. 431
Sin ii, for inMance. ac W. S. Elliott. The Proi.cs o (.roup Think-
jug. ui M. P. Follett, Creative EXf.?'i'JCtJCC.
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The History of the Social Problem.
The significance and character of this Quaker method
can be l)Cfler anderstood if we turn now to the social problem, This problem can best be defined through an historical approach. It arises in an age of transition when a highly individualistic culture has run its course and the time is ripe for society to pass over into some more collective form.
A change such as this occurred in the early Christian
centuries when it decadent individualistic Gracco-Roman culture passed over into the collective culture of the Middle Ages. The Graeco-Roman culture at its beginning was centered first in the tribe and then in a collection of tribes forming the city-state. These were essentially religiously integrated communities. Eventually, with the building of great Cities, the expansion of commerce, and the wide development of learning, individualism set in. Society lost all inner cohesion and could only be held together by the dictatorial policy of
L Caesar. Religion, which had once been an integrative
social force, degenerated into a skeptical or pantheistic philosophy, or into a solitary world-denying mysticism, or into a passionate effort to secure personal immortality. Finally when all inherited reserves of social unity had been exhausted; when, in the ruthless struggle for economic advantage, wealth had become concentrated in the hands of a few, the whole structure crumbled to a chaotic mass and barbarians from the north walked in upon the ruins undeterred.
Yet in this chaos and disintegration there existed
islands, religiously integrated groups of Christians who offered to the world a new way of life. They were not thinking of a purely individual salvation. They had their gate fixed upward awaiting a Messiah who had
promised to descend and inaugurate a new social order. But they did not wait passively for His coming. The set UI) examples of that new, promised social order in their own groups where the Messiah had already conic in the Spirit. The visible Church became the kingdom of God on earth at least in germ, as Augustine shows in his "City of God." This Church, the outward body of Christ the Messiah, grew and increased in power until in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries it dominated the whole culture of Europe. In itself the church united all things: philosophy, theology, science, art, politics, language, education. It cut across national boundaries as the League of Nations was designed to do.
But, like all living things. the Church reached its zenith and decayed. Its current of life grew weak until the whole structure seemed to many to be only a lifeless mechanism. in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries a new era of transition set in. This dine it was in the opposite direction from the earlier transition of the fourth and fifth centuries. A growing individualism broke up the old dying group life expressed in church, trade guild, and feudal system. The Protestantisin of Luther and Calvin abolished the church as the means of salvation and substituted an individual relation between man and God. The mechanics of Galileo and Newton revealed a world governed by law, not a world integrated by souls. The Spirit had no place in their system. The great humanists of the Renaissance tiii-covered the brilliant age of classical antiquity when once before man had used the matchless power of his own individual reason to discover truth, goodness, and beauty. Great explorers opened new vistas of human wealth and adventure. Philosophers discovered that knowledge is power to overcome nature with the tools
10 11
of science; wisdom no longer consisted of passive con• templation of changeless truth. Man reveled in his
"like the giant refreshed with new wine." The old supernaturalism with its other-worldly standards of' ilk was thrown off like prison fetters. The seventeenth century was an age of giants whose achievements increased the general self .confidcnce,—Bacon, Shakespeare, Cervantes. Kepler, Galileo, Newton, Harvey, Descartes, Pascal, Locke, Spinoza. Lcibnitz,—the list could be extended much further. Quite naturally there grew up a doctrine, strange to the Middle Ages, that progress is inevitable. The discovery of biological evolution in tLic nineteenth century seemed to confirm this belief.
In the nineteenth century individualism in the well-known form of "liberalism" asserted the right of every man to freedom and equality of opportunity. Among its principal philosophers were Mill and Spencer. Under the stimulating influence of this type of thought a rapid advance was made in many fields of human achievement, though not, in art or religion. To be "liberal" meant to be willing to give to everyone the right to advance his own opinions whatever they might be. The result was new light on many questions. It meant also the right of the strong man to accumulate wealth in whatever rank of society hc might be situated, provided he played according to the rules of the game. The result was a rapid increase in the total amount of wealth. Yet
liberal isimi by itself, however important its achievements, is an incomplete and one-sided philosophy of life. In defending the rights of the parts it tends to forget the rights of the whole. It stands for increased freedom, but
has Less to say of increased responsibility.
With ilic rapid advance of humanism and individualism time sri perh unman has gradually faded from the pic-
Lure. Protestantism venerated it, but banished it to Bible times or to a future state. Science could discover nothing higher than human reason, and reason seemed capable of solving every practical problem. Writers on social theories, endeavoring to be scientific, declared that enlightened selfishness was enough to hold society together. Their "economic irian" pursued his own interests but he was compelled to regard the interests of others in so far as they affected his own. In the nineteenth century science succeeded in reducing the world of matter to a swarm of molecules and atoms each going its own individual way regardless of any spirit of the whole. In the same way scientific economists reduced society to a collection of litmnian atoms each pursuing its OWfl interest, Iii politics also, science set the pace. As in mechanics the bigger swarm of atoms exerts a greater force than the smaller, so in politics the bigger swarm of human atoms Prevails over the smaller swarm. ()ues-ions of right and wrong are settled by counting heads just as in the science of mechanics problems are solved by counting pounds and feet.
In every field of human endeavor the process of atomization continued. Art broke away from the whole of culture and wanted to he art for art's sake. Religion declared that it would stick to its own field and leave politics and social questions alone. Science declared its independence of religion. The field of knowledge be-carne completely departmentalized so that a professor of physics was proud to know nothing of psychology.
It is a curious fact that science, the chief instrument of nian in his victorious struggle against nature, was the first to betray him and hand him over, hound hand and loot, to nature his adversary. Science declared that man has no freedom of wilt, but is the helpless victim of
12 13
blind mechanical forces; that instead of it fallen angel he is only a riseti animal; that his mind (if any) is a mere bundle of reflexes; that his most exalted emotions result from certain chemical compounds exuded by his glands; that his most heartfelt opinions can be manufactured by the science of propaganda. It is as hard to understand why man has endured all these insults from science with such serenity as it is to understand why the Calvinist takes a kind of pride in his total depravity and eternal damnation.
In spite of all this humiliation by science, it general belief in human self-sufficiency lingered until the first World War. The shock of this catastrophe and even more the inability of man to learn anything by it or take any valid measures to prevent its recurrence has given a terrific jolt to faith in the inevitability of huniati pt-ogress. One thing yet remains, however—a faith in the inevitability of scientific progress. The Century of Progress, celebrated at Chicago. clearly marked it great and calctilal>le scientific advance. Here it was shown that if science cannot make life significant, it can at. least make it comfortable. But even this last hope seems now to be vanishing. Vast ogress in the mechanical means 01 in;tuiufacturing goods has not brought physical comfort as much nearer as might be supposed. It has increased the extremes of greed and want and piled up goods which the needly are unable to obtain. The result is a gigantic depression which still contiu ties. No wonder that pessimism is replacing the optimism of a generation ago. It is the pessimism of the isolated individual alone in it friendless universe, with no means of
This sentence, tiihOLIgh now ivapptical)k. tt;tc l)IXII left itt the
fiti printing because t iie e is every reason to believe that the suiir condition will nitirn alter the Latioit of eonsuntjon through dt'structic,n.
meeting the vast impersonal economic and physical forces which bid lair to overwhelm him.
Now it group of modern humanists conic forward with their remedy. The excellence of their literary abilities 54:)InewlIan conceals the naïveté of this plan of salvation. They ask man to assert his lutinanity; to deny that he is a l:east or a machine; to defy the tyrant Nature and to declare his independence of natural appetite and natural law. But they can point to no source of power through which this declaration of independence can be made effective. They can only assert that this attitude is essentially reasonable (or human). They do non seem to realize that man can raise himself above the aninial level only by laying hold upon that which is higher than himself. Without external help he cannot lift himself spiritually any more than he c:an lift himself physically. Man is not self-sufficient. He becomes independent of nature only in so far as lie becomes dependent on that which is above nature. The modern literary huxmuiisLs ask u.s to take our standards of conduct from the humanistic ages of classical antiquity or of the Renaissance. But these ages. unlike our own, followed immediately upon epochs when itiam i reached up to the divine and it was largely front those epochs that the humanism of the past drew its reserves of power. An present the reserves of power arc becoming slowly exhausted, and the pull from below appeals stronger than the pull from above, Three centuries ago man began to lose his faith in the super-huitiart- link did lie know then that this loss of faith ill the superhuman would cause It inn to lose faith in the hititnan also. Losing his grip on the higher he sags into the lower.
1'his new fall of IU;L11 is not just a declaration on tfic part of science that man is either an animal organism,
as biology asserts, or a machine as mechanistic physics would have us believe. It is more than a change of viewpoint. if, in this God-forsaken world, man believes that he cannot look upward for help he may conclude that. he can at least look downward. Why not be a beast in fact as well as in theory and enjoy with a clear conscience, the satisfaction of animal appetites. The animals are natural and unaffected. They are not, apparently, tormented by a sense of lonely isolation in a merciless universe. Our human isolation is due to our artificiality and hypocrisy; our attempts to be other than that which. Freud tells us, we really are. Let us therefore forget out-troublesome
urtroublesome pretensions and indulge ourselves in a health),, sincere sensuality.
But can we forget? The sensuality of the modeni man is a deliberate, self-conscious sensuality, not a sell-forgetful animal naturalness. In his endeavor to be it natural beast he becomes an unnatural man. 1 us enjoyment of sensuality often depends largely on the attrac-I ion possessed by forbidden things. The fruit is sweet because it comes from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. This is shown particularly in the sex literature so voluminous today which lives on a knowledge of its owii depravity. Such a sophisticated sex interest is very different from the healthy sensuality of the barn-yard. It is accordingly no real escape from self-Conscious individuality, its emptiness is illustrated by the nature of its principal medium, the silver screen, which, when it portrays the pleseilt time, depicts a civilization as soulless and unstable as the shadows of which the pictures are composed. The moving picture presents. in more senses than one, a two dimensional world with no depth. In order to exist this shadow-world Must always continue in restless motion.
As neither humanism nor sensualism are aware of the true nature of the social problem they make no attdnipt to meet it. They are content to think of man in individual terms. There are, however, three important remedies for excessive individualism which recognize the nature of the problem—the first is autocracy; the second, world denunciation or asceticism; the third is a religiously integrated group. Let us consider each in turn.
The First So1nion—A utocrac'y
When men have lost faith in themselves they tend to seek refuge in a strong man. The rise of dictatorships today, whether of the fascist or communist type, is evidence of the retreat of the individual and his failure of nerve. Just as individual pieces of matter, not united by an inner bond, can he held together and coordinated by force externally applied, so over-individualized men can be forced to cooperate by the power of the state. This is the oldest of all remedies, but it is always a sign of decadence. It means that there is no living power which can vitalize the comm unity. The soul has fled and a mechanisin is left behind. Some philosophers of communism* realize this but. they believe that a dictatorship is a preliminary stage to organic unity. This is probably untrue. Mechanisms produce in ed tan isuis. We do not know of any case where a mechanism has produced life. It may be that a religious (ire is burning beneath the surface in Russia, fusing individual elements, but of this we do not yet know.
The line of retreat to a mechanical level is exhibited also in the growth of extreme nationalism. Past history has shown that international anarchy has front time to
• As, for instuwc. John Macmurra)'.
16 17
nut' EICCII overcome by the dictatorship Of One nation, alter a career of conquest. As there is apparently no present possibility of a Pax Romana,' we must look either to a balance of power which sooner or later will become unstable and result again in war, or to an organic union of nations, such as is imperfectly foreshadowed in the League of Nations. Extreme mdi-vidutalism in nations is as intolerable as extreme indi rid ual isin in persons.t
The Second Solution—World Ren uizciat ion
The second solution proposed for the problem of ,.cv-i ndividualismn is ret, uiuciation. The individual in his loneliness and isolation cannot contend with the forces ag-ainsr him, so he retreats from "the vain pomp and glory of this world." As long as lie is confident of success in this world his religion is generally a religion of action. When, however, this confidence is lost, the pain of individuality and inadequacy is assuaged by complete surrender to that which is above and beyond the world. The ascetic crucifies the flesh that his spirit may be purified and freed from carnal bonds. The solitary mystic purges himself of all that is sensuous in order that he may achieve union with the super-sensuous. This solution was particularly wide-spread at the time when the Graeco-Roman civilization was crumbling into individual atoms. When Indian cult tire had reached a similar stage the Buddha preached a less
When this was written there ap.at'ed no 1bilcy of a Pax Romana but there is now a serious prospect of a "peace" to he enforced by military might
t It is i ceresting to notice In this coflfletlicm that the Council of the League of Nations ;u-rived at its decisions much after the manner or a Quaker meeting. As one objection in m* casts made action impossi-bk it was usLiess to take a vote and so conclusions were anivrd at by general aent.
ascetic form of this method. I-Ic held that suffering is due to desire for possession ins:linling even the desire to possess a self. Eliminate all such ego-centric desire and nothing of the ego will remain which is capable of suffering. The isolated soul by uasilIg to exist as isolated, enters the nameless peace of Nirvana. The process by which desire is eliminated is elabomate, hut the cud is simple. The Buddhist overcomes his individuality by destroying it.. However this may agree with the teaching of the Buddha himself, the history of Buddhist lands shows that this doctrine may solve the individual problem but it does not solve the social problem. No ideal ibis-world community suidi as the Christian King-(torn of God is projected by the Rul(klhist faith.
This method of world renunciation assumes many other intermediate forms. It is not the fashion today to retire to the wilderness but there are many who refuse to light the battle of life because it no longer seems to them important. They are spectators, not part i(:ipators. looking sometimes cynically. sometimes with mild amusement at those who struggle to improve the world. It is good form today not to take anything very scri-ously.* To many this world is sometimes interesting but generally boring. It cannot harm them for they can al ways smile at it, knowing that at any moment the dial can be turned to a different wave length carrying another tune. This sense of futility arises because the individual is alone. He has found no great cause in which he can forget himself, no group in which he can merge his life.
The doctrine of occasional retirement from the world Since this was written, World War II has given to inatty a great
cau for which to live and die. Btit the sense of lut ilir will return
when it is seen i lr.it the world has not become better through war but worse.
18 19
may, however, become the very essence of a healthy normal religion. As the body must sometimes rest, so the spirit cannot always strive. There must be some area of calm into which the wearied soul may withdraw for renewal of strength. There must be some quict time of worship when life's course is reset by pilot stars. There must be some pause on the journey when the traveler can refresh himself at the well of eternal life. It is only when such a period of refreshment becomes the only goal that religion is a method of escape. The Soviets called religion "an opiate of the people," and such indeed it can be if its whole emphasis is on the other world. But the life which is wholly this-worldly is often like a stream which runs dry because it is not renewed by a source beyond itself. The world's great religious leaders and social reformers have in general discovered a balance between a this-world religion of good works and an other-world religion of retirement from struggle; a retirement in which strength and insight are renewed.
The Third Solution—The Religio u51y
Integrated Group
In our third type of release from over-individualism we find a balance between world-affirmation and world-renunciation. This has already been described as existing in the early Christian community and the early Friends' COMM till iIV. in such groups, when they live up to their ideal, the individual is neither suppressed by authority nor eliminated by retirement. His mdi-viduality is lost in that of the group but it is regained on a higher plane. In submitting to authority he falls to an infra-individual mechanistic level. In uniting with the spirit of the group he rises to a super-individual organic level.
This word "organic" is olteii used in a purely biological sense. It is used here metaphorically to designate a type of social organism made up of persons who are bound together not externally by force but internally by love and friendship. To the scientific mind which recognizes no categories except those of mechanistic science it is incredible that a unified group can be formed of persons who fully respect one another's freedom and individuality. Time answer to this paradox is not scientific in the narrow sense but religious. The cementing force is not. only love of one another: It is also the love of God. If the members of the group looked only to each other they might react against each other like billiard halls, striking and rebounding. Instead they look to that which is al)Ovc them all yet in them all; they look to the Spirit which unites from above.
Such a synthesis of the vertically directed love of God and the horizontally directed love of man is called in the Greek of the New Testament agape (pronounced a gá pay). It is different from another type of love which the Greeks called eros (pronounced eros) which is human alld possessive. Agape says l';tul "se.eketh not her own" (1 Cor. 13:5). The Corinthian Church was disordered by rival claims. The cure, said Paul, is agape. "Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels and have not. agape, I am become as sounding brass and a tinkling symbol." John declares that "God is love (agape) - * If we love one another God dweticth in us" (I John 4;8, 12). John also says. "God is light - . - If we walk in the light as he is in the light we have fellowship one With another. (I John 1:5, 7)
ibis phrase k totloweti by ";iiut Ole- blood ot frsu.. (:h km hi Son d,,aitseth us frrm :ill sin. Wineei our rheolog liii', may seem to he
i tn-%ruiui - Rut it liis a piolound iuw'aniutg. (See .\ppcudix for
further (ii imttt;Irv.
20 21
This method according to which religion comes into the world as a lbower which creates social unity has a Ion- history. !hc tribe and the patriarchal family were largely biological units but, when individualism arose, they could not depend wholly on biological tics. Tribal or family religion was of such a character that the indi—vidual itt participating in its ritual felt himself united to a whole. In the Chinese patriarchal family the shrine where the ancestors are worshiped has been the tiiost powerful of family bonds. The totem of the tribe is worshiped as a symbol of an integrating life force, At a time when the 01(1 Greek deities were rio longer intellectually accepted. Greek statesmen advocated their continued worship as a means of unifying the City-state. It was the worship of Jehovah which held Israel together and made her victorious over tier enemies. Many races and peoples look back to some golden age when the individual I outid freedoiti and joy as a mew her of i gwitp.
But this family or tribal type of religion was rooted in the soil. Its gods were localized in field or Ironic or tcinple. When commercial expansion first came and men began to move freely over the earth this local tic began to weaken. 1-lorses, iron, larger ships, broke up the old gi-oups and gave men new power over theit fellows. The rich grew richer and the poor, poorer. Through the disintegrating force of commerce which mixed up men from widely scattered places the first great age of individuahisni set in—roughly about the seventh and sixth centuries B.C. Many like Amos bewailed the good old days and pronounced a doom on greedy merchants who exploited their brethren. Almost at the satire time in widely scattered places great religious geniuses appeared offering their remedies for the decline of social forms of religion. Jeremiah preached a personal religion, a new convenant written not on tables of stone but on the heart. In China, Confucius and Laotze; in India, Buddha, Mahavira and the writers of the Upanishads: in Persia, Zoroaster: in Greece, the first philosophers and the nameless founders of the "mystery religions"; all appeared to offer some solvent, for an excess of individuality. Sin is estrange-merit, loneliness, separation. Salvation is it closing of the gap between the isolated life arid a higher life, an atonement or at-one-merit with deity. The remedy is a re-direction of will (Judaism) or a mystic union (Taoism, Orphism) or annihilation of isolated sel fhmood (Buddhism) or social adjustment through decorum (Confucianism).
These methods of aiding the isolated human atom, either to endure existence or to dispose of it, have met the needs of many millions for many centuries hut it is doubtful whether any of them will widely appeal to the occidental world of the twentieth century. Nor can we go hack no the tribe, the patriarchal family, or the siiiall city-state. There is, however, one remedy which fully meets the difficulty arid which is consistent with modern life and modern conceptions of the universe. 'VEils is the religiously intqqrated community comparable to that which existed in early Christianity and early Quakerism.
It may well be asked.—why insert the adverb "religiously''? Are there not amotind us a vast nunriher of associations of all sorts in which the modern individual in some measure overcomes his isolation; such associa tioris as clubs, lodges, political parties, trade UfliOflS, and organizations for the advancement or elimination of everything conceivable? These, however, are held
99 23
together by what might he called a horizontal relation between man and man. Those who have common interests find cooperation and mutual adjustment of individual desires essential to success. Such associations range all the way from a business corporation organized through a system of authoritative control to a discussion group interested only in a search for truth. These associations may contain religiously-minded individuals but, Willi some possible exceptions, they are not religiously integrated. In religious worship the horizontal bonds are supplemented by vertical bonds leading up to a higher Being who unites men by drawing them all to Himself. The integration is on a higher level. When Jesus said, "Wherever two or three are gathered to. gether in my name there am I in the midst of them,' he did not mean that he would come as one individual among other individuals. His Spirit includes but tran-scends
ramscend.s each individual. "I am the vine, ye are the branches" (John xv, ). "And I. if I be lifted up, will draw all men unto inc" (John Xli, 32). Men can be united by all falling into the same pit or they can be itinted by climbing by various paths to the same mountain top. A lynching mob is obviously integrated on a lower level than a religious meeting gathered into unity by the spirit of Christ.
An upward striving toward a higher world can, under Certain conditions, create the strongest human bond, This is the fundamental paradox of religion which resists all attempts at rationalization because it is creative of the new and uiipredic:table. So lal progress is a child both of this world and of a higher world. Each world is sterile without the other. The other-wordly person seeks only for a flight Iroiu this "vale of tears" to a haven of peace and security; the this-worldly person
24
ignores the "supernatural"" as mere "wish fulfillment," a means of escape for those unfit for life's struggle. Yet the history of mankind shows, especially in Lite great creative periods, that it is only the fertile union of both worlds which can bring about a new birth on a higher level of existence.
Protestantism has failed to bring about such a union because, by its very nature, it seems doomed to he one-sided. For a long time it condemned this world as evil, teaching a purely individual salvation through faith in Book, creed, sermon, and ritual. Now it is either swinging toward the old exclusive dependence on the supernatural and transcendent, or it is preaching a social gospel devoid of characteristically religious elements. Protestantism has evolved no religious method nor theory for [using the two. Nearly a thousand years ago Catholicism effected a practical synthesis of nature and super-nature which satisfied the mind of the Middle Ages but which carries into thc present so much obsolete baggage that it cannot without making serious concessions to modernism lead in social or theoretical advance. In early Judaism, as described in the Old Testament, the conception of a iloly Community integrated by a common worship of Jehovah was devcl-oped by the prophets and in large measure actualized. This Holy Community was the parent of the Christian Church, In modern Judaisni, scattered about as it is over the face of the earth, there is little opportunity to revive this ancient order.
• Such words as "si,permttnal" and "other worldly" are tiiifortunatc Inheritances front the. past A life which is qiialir.atively higher is no more 'unn;it nial'' nor "miracukins" than the lower, nor i It othej-worldly in tile sense that it cinitnc come into organic relation with ihik world.
25
Qieakensrn and The Ideal Corn munity Quakerism combines in religious worship two elc-ine its which are usually considered incompati blc,—a mystical approach to God and a social relation to our fellows. The lonely mystic knows only the vertical relation to God, the exponent of the social gospel too often only the horizontal relation to man. but group rnysti-cim takes account of both God and man. in the group we find that we need our fellow worshipers in the search for God and we need God in the search for our fellows. Each search leads into the other. In the silence of living worship we strive to create a sensitivity to the Divine Presence by removing selfish, individual desires. We find that the partition which separates God and nian also separates man and man. Or we may first reach out in love toward our fellows in an endeavor to understand them and the conflicts and problems which rouble thcrn;—and suddenly some window of the soul Opens and the breath of a diviner air comes in. Once more the Spirit which has brooded over chaos from the beginning has sJ)okcml the creative Word and chaotic human atoms are reborn into the unity of a higher life. "We know that we have passed out of death into life l)ecalise we love the brethren" (I John c:
Tire words "one another" occur with surprising fre-
quency in the early Friends' writings. Fox in his letters often identifies the tie which unites worshipers to God with the tic which unites them to each other. "Mind," he says, "that which is pure in one another which joins you together"; "therefore, all Friends, obey that which is pure within you and know one another in that which brings you to wait on the Lord"; "Friends, meet together and know one another in that which is eternal which was before the world was." "feel the power of
26
God in one another," ''that all may he as one family l)uildiIIg up one another and helping one another."* Penn, in his preface to Fox's Journal, speaks of the early Friends as "treating one another as those that believed and felt God !)reflt."
The group that has thus found God has solved the social problem within itself. None of its members henceforth face the world alone as individuals. The ties which bind it together are not easily broken by material or economic forces. It cannot ignore the needs of any of its members. But it., is not a Noah's ark built to save a few ftoni a drowning world. Experience proves that an over-plus of spiritual power is generated which seeks outlet in a larger field. If there is no going ow. from the group to transform the world into a greater 1101)' Corn-munity then the group is either dead, or it is a plantlike existence. If the group is to resemble the highest type of living things it must, like them, modify its etiviioflht)eflt. An inner sense of peace, security, and spiritual power is attained in group worship but it is not henceforth confined to any particular place or time. Each member carries this about in his heart wherever he goes and acts according to it. Ile becomes an apostle of a new social order patterned after time type 01 procedure which created a living unity in his own more limited group.
This type of social order is based not on the tyranny of an individual nor of a majority of individuals who use violence or threat of violence to enforce their wishes. Differences are adjusted by a process of integration in which no individual is submerged but in which every viewpoint finds some 1Aacc or exerts sonic influence in the
These qilouttions ttic taken from flryshaw. 'Tiic Qttrr.%," page 99.
27
final acliicvcniciit. The way to bring about such a new social order is to achieve it first, in one's heart and in the religious group to which one belongs and then to live in it wherever one may be. The same spirit, will then be aroused in the hearts of others. It will grow by contagion. Such a method involves serious risk to those who undertake it for a person living in this kind of a social order becomes subject to the violence of those who are not within it. Nevertheless this method of venture and sacrifice is the one method by which the kingdom of God propagates and reproduces itself.
Quakerism at its best presents this answer to the Social Problem. It is not a plan based on (though it does not exclude) economic or political theories. It is a social dynamic arising out of a certain type of unifying experience. The history of the Society of Friends gives ample evidence that this experience is intimately bound up, both as cause and effect, with social reforms of a practical and far-reaching character. But the general application of the Quaker method has hardly begun. There are large areas of conflict, particularly in industry, Mitch await pioneers of social improvement.
There are some reasons why the present age may be more favorable to the Quaker religious and social method than was Lite seventeenth century wimemi the Society of Friends arose. In the seventeenth century, as we have already seen, the man of western Europe was ;tisi emerging from the control of medieval culture and acquiring an unlimited confidence in himself. A new continent awaited his exploitation and a new science was ready to furnish him with the means to exploit it. Newton was a contemporary of Fox but Newton in-
Such as religious liberty, fxce. the abolition of slavery, temper-atlet', prison reform, the care of ilic insane, etc
creased while Fox decreased. As science developed, man's faith in his ability to control his destiny grew and faith in a religion which looked to the superhuman for help correspondingly lessened. The Society of Friends retired into a shell of rigid discipline in order to preserve the pattern of life which it had developed. But in the last few years the current has changed its direction. Humanism. which was everywhere triumphant a moment ago, stands baffled and without resources before a crumbling social order. Man is losing confidence in the power of science to save him. What is even more significant and prophetic, the greatest scientists of today have turned to philosophy and have discovered that the older mechanistic conceptions describe only a shadow world. The deeper reality, they say, is living and its nature is revealed not through clock, balance or measuring rod but by the mystic vision.
An age of collectivism of some sort is apparently dawning. The central question is this: will il be a collectivism based on external authority to meet a purely economic or political need or will it he a genuine culture,—that is, a collectivism based on Spirit which guides men from within. If the second alternative is the hoped-for answer we must realize that this can be achieved not through sonic sudden revolution but only through a long, slow process of growth. Because the Kingdom of Heaven is an organism and not a mechanical collectivism Jesus compared itt to a tree which begins in a very small seed. Like a tree, it cannot grow if it is cut. off either front the Light of Heaven above or from the dark earth beneath.
That the case is Ear from hopeless can be shown by it comparison of the present time with the time in which Christianity arose. There is the same excess of mdi-
28 29
vidualism and a corresponding effort to establish a collectivism based on authority. There is the same failure of nerve, the same cynicism, scepticism, and stoic apathy. the same sense of futility in the face of blind economic and political forces. No wonder that to many men of the first century the situation seemed hopeless and the only remedy a sudden revolution and the coining of the Messiah from the clouds of heaven. No wonder that to many men today changes wrought by violence seem the only remedy.
But the early Christians did not wait, for revolution. They set up the new social order in their own religious communities. These communities were the seeds of the kingdom. The Church became the kingdom of God on earth, very imperfectly of course, but a living entity through which men were raised up to a higher and a more than individual life. That the Church later compromised with the state and adopted some of its methods does not detract from its great achievement in offering a real solution to the problem of excessive individualism. The hope of building up a social order in which the Sermon on the Mount would he accepted for what it obviously means was never given up. In the monastery a sincere effort was made to avoid compromise with the world and to create spiritual and economic interdependence in a religiously integrated community.
'I'lic world today awaits such ministration to its needs as the early Christian communities offered to the needs of their time. The remedy for social disintegration is not more centralized authority which sooner or later is destroyed by the very forces which it sets in motion. Nor is it a retreat to a monastery, nor to an attitude of indifference, nor to a purely other-world mysticism. We must have a kind of social cement which binds from within so that the unity formed is not mechanical but living. Where can we get it except from the source whence it has always conic; from a type of religious experience which at once creates and is created by an organic social order? In this task we can take only one step ata time. Mechanical thing-scan be made quickly but. living things grow slowly. It is in our power, if we have patience to wait for real growth, to build up small bits of the kingdom here and there wherever a group of persons become united and lifted up by the "Presence in the midst." Such groups will increase and multiply, for reproduction is the law of all life. It is essential that we help bind up the wounds of the world. It is even more important that we set about making a world in which wounds shall not occur.
Christianity." says Heiler in The Spirit of Worship,. "is weary of individualism which weakens and divides; it. IS striving to escape from the narrow bondage of the subjective into the wide freedom of the objective, the Universal; from the limitations of the isolated individual to the ftilness of strength of the great Corn-inunity." Many are the seekers searching for such fulness of strength. They will find it in an upreaching self-forgetful mind which unites and creates; in a mystical insight which senses both the upward pull of Divine power and the frail tendrils of lonely human lives reaching out for support: in a sacrament which is at once communion with God and with man. This was the earliest human search. It will also be the last.
THE FUNDAMENTAL CHRISTIAN
DOCTRINE*
Can there be a social salvation which ignores the Christian (locrnnc of the atonement? To many persons today this is not an important question, but its consideration brings to bear on our central problem some interesting and significant facts. The individualistic interpretation of the atonement, as set forth in most Protestant creeds, is of little help. but primitive Christianity, as we have already seen, did not put its central emphasis on individual salvation. It provided a social gospel to meet a social need.
In the history of our religion we find many attempts to express by symbols the nature of that living power which holds society together from within. The early Christians symbolized it in the common meal partaken of in memory of the Last Supper. In the first account of that Supper to be written (I Cor. ii). Jesus takes the cup and says "This cup is the new covenant in my blood." These words may mean little to us today but to the men who heard them spoken they were fraught with profound meaning. Perhaps their minds went back to the old covenant tuade between Jehovah and Israel at Mount Sinai. Here a contract was sealed according to which the people of Israel formally adopted Jehovah as their God and promised to serve Him only. He, in turn, prom. iscd to aid and protect them. The Old 'resrament, taking its name from this contract, was written to show that Jehovah had always kept His part of the agreement. but Israel had been many times unfaithful and had suffered in consequcncc. MOSeS sealed the conirau by -in impressive ritual (Exod. XXIV). The people stand before Jehovah who is represented by an altar. Animals are sacrificed and their blood is poured into bowls. I-fall of the blood is sprinkled over the altar. Moses then reads the terms of the agreement and the people say. "All that the Lord hath spoken will we do and be obedient." The remainder of the blood is then sprinkled over the people. with the words "behold the blood of the covenant."
This ritual had a profound meaning. The blood represented "life" (Lev. XVII: is. i.4). Two parties formerly independent of
Contimiaticn of fOotnOte page 21.
32 each other are united into a living whole because each is made to share in the same blood, that is. in the same vital essence, To accomp1ih this it is necessary that the life of a third living creature be sacrificed in order that its life, being shared by the other two, may unite them into a single life. Before the covenant was sealed Jehovah and Israel were external to each other. After the covenant they were united by a living bond, a third life, in which both shared.
What more natural than that Jesus, knowing that his own life would he sacrificed on the morrow, should think of his blood as the "blood of the new covenant" creating like the blood of the old covenant a living bond between man and God. His life was to become that third life, bridging the gap between the divine and human, thus overcoming the isolation of the individual, the estrangement which is called "sin." This is "at-onemcnt," she central doctrine of the Christian faith.
'Fhouglu the symbols by which religion speaks change from age to age, old truths remain. It is in that inner bond of unity between man and God which Moses and Jesus symbolized by blood that we must seek the power of social salvation. In the early Church Jesus saved the individual because it was His Spirit which was the soul of the Christian community, and it was in and through the Christian community that the individual was saved from insufficiency and isolation. Among the early Quakers it was the Christ within. Who was the Spirit not only within the individual but also within the group as a living whole Who bridged the gap between the separate individual and a larger whole of life. In the religiously integrated community the individual finds his problem solved for he is no longer alone. He has found man and Cod, each through the other.
"But now in Christ Jesus ye that once were far off are made nigh in the blood of Christ. For he is our peace who hatli made both one, and broken down the middle wall of partition" (Fplt. II:iq.
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PENDLE HILL PAMPHLETS
Occasional studies or essass related to thc life and wk at Penile Hill
and representing a variety of individual ints of view of persons com-
petent to quicken thought on current issues.
2. A RuGious SouirioN to THE Socr.kr. PROrn.r.n
Howard H. Brinton (Second Edition) Twenty-five cents
4. TIlE TorAI.rmsuAN CLAIM OF THE (k)srL3
Dora Willson Ten rents
ii. A DISCIPLINE FOR N0N-VioI.ENc.E
Richard B. Gregg Ten cents
14. RELIGION AND POLITICS
W. F. SOUInaIUI Fifteen cents
i. Nr.w NATIONS FOR Oi.n
Kenneth Roukling Twenty.ive cents
18. ANTHOLOGY WITH Cor.
Elisabeth Janet Gray Twenty-five cents
20. Gumr. To QUAKER Pacncr.
Howaxd H. I3rinton Twenty-five cents
21. REALITY OF THE SPIRITUAL Woai.o
Thomas K. Kelly Twenty-five cents
22. Rrs.isr AND RECONSTRUCTION
Roger Wilson Twenty-five cents
. Cc..sn BY Ntatr
Wallace Hamilton Twenty-flue cents
24. Wi'. j%RF. ,CCrmIIAKf.V; A Vuw W MENIAL INStIIt'TSON$
Leonard Edelstein Twenty-five cents
5. MILITARISM IOR AMERICA
Grover I.. Hartman Twenty-five cents
CRITIQUE BY E1-r.ILNI-rv
1-low2rd H. Bmlrtwn (cloth) $1.00
Byw,vs IN QUAKER HISTORY
Edited by Howard H. Btinton (cloth) $2.50
PAMPHLETS OUT OF PRINT ARB*
1. Cooperation and Coercion as Methods of Social Change, Vincent fl icho3-
son: J, Th Value ol Volniiiary Simplicity. Richard B. Gregg '; 5, Pacifist Pro-
gram. Richard B. Gregg; 6, Fucion-.il Poverty, Mildred B. Youag; . A Quisker Mutatioa Gerald Heard: 8. Rethinking Quaker Principles. Rufus M. Jones; 9. Quaker duciztion in Theory and Practice. Howard H. Brinton; 10. Community and Woynhup. Douglas V. Stem; 12, A Standard of LivinR. Mildred IL Vou
34. The World Task of Pacifism. A. J. Music; IS. War is the Enemy. A Mwste; 16. Peaccrsuiker& Dilemma, Bertram Pldcacd; 19, Parlicip.stion in Rum] Life, Mildred B. Young; alsoorw.al Studies 1, Negro Menuhsrsliuo in the Society of Friends, Henry J Cadbury; '. Yenily Meetings of the Religious Society of Frtendp, Robert J, Leach.
