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Primitive Quakerism Revived: Living as Friends in the Twenty-First Century
Paul Buckley, Charles Martin (Editor)
4.17
18 ratings1 review
The Religious Society of Friends arose as a passionate missionary movement in the 1650s and suffered through decades of persecution before gaining legal toleration in 1689. The new religious sect questioned the fundamental values and underlying principles of English society, pointedly challenging the social, political, and religious status quo. From its inception, members of the Society felt divinely called to model a God-centered alternative to the surrounding culture. Outwardly, this was manifested by such things as distinctive ways of dressing and unique forms of speech. Inwardly, Friends were characterized by their faithful dependence on the immediate direction of the Inward Light of Christ in all aspects of their lives. As the years passed, the outward forms dropped away and the peculiarities of the Quaker way of life gradually disappeared. While in some ways Friends today continue to resist "the world's ways," they have largely accommodated themselves to the forms, customs, and standards of the peoples they live among.
Primitive Quakerism Revived challenges contemporary Friends in each of the Society's branches to reexamine their fundamental beliefs and practices, to identify the changes and additions that have been made in the past three and a half centuries, and to acknowledge which of those are unacceptable compromises that need to be abandoned. This book is a plea to reclaim the essential Quaker principles and mission by modeling a joyfully faithful community of God.
GenresNonfictionChristianityReligion
166 pages, Paperback
Published March 1, 2018
Paul Buckley24 books4 followers
Community Reviews
4.17
18 ratings1 review
Micah
32 reviews3 followers
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December 3, 2021
I read Buckley as a neo-Hicksite, which is interesting - old-school Hicksism is much more conservative theologically and socially than modern-day Liberal Quakerism.
While the book did not speak to me quite as much, given my theological difference with Hicksism, I thought it was a competent introduction to that strain of Quaker thought. I'd recommend this book to Liberal Quakers that sense that what they have found in their meetings is weak sauce and want more.
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dradrianmkthomas
We need "Primitive Christianity Revived."
I enjoyed reading Primitive Quakerism REVIVED, however I think that I came to different conclusions from Paul Buckley. I found his discussion on how the Inward Light morphed into the Inner Light interesting – and he discusses how this change was so very significant. The Inward Light is the Light of the Inner Christ that guides and illumines the soul. The Inner Light is intrinsic to the soul and does not need the presence of God or Christ. Buckley says that “if we truly believe what we say about being Quakers, joy will be the natural result”, and perhaps he really means a natural result and not a spiritual result in the way that the early Quakers believed. Buckley concludes that “It doesn’t matter whether you identify the Light as emanating from Christ or whether you believe in God”. This is not something that the early Quakers would have understood, and could they have conceived of a Light that was separate from Christ and God? It's therefore not obvious what the modern “Light Within’ actually is. I am reminded of the influential Quaker Stephen Crisp and his ‘A Plain Path-way Opened to the Simple-hearted, for the Answering all Doubts and Objections Which do Arise in Them Against the Light and Truth in the Inward Parts’ of 1688. Crisp talks about a natural light which was not a saving gift. Crisp sees that it is Jesus Christ who “should Enlighten every one that cometh into the world, John i, 9, of which number thou art one.” Paul Buckley is to be applauded in his desire to revive Primitive Quakerism, however without Jesus Christ it is not early Quakerism that is being revived. As Stephen Crisp notes: we should “Consider this, That every good and perfect gift cometh from above, from the Father of Lights and Spirits, who would not the death of a sinner, but rather that he should turn and live.” This is the Inward Light of the first Quakers. This is the “Primitive Christianity Revived: In the Faith and Practice of the People Called Quakers” of William Penn.
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