Blasphemy!
UU Fellowship of Midland, MI
April 3, 2005
Jane Thickstun

 Reading

The reading is from a letter written by Abner Kneeland to Thomas Whittemore, publisher of the Universalist periodical, the Trumpet.  Kneeland had been a Universalist minister, but had broken ties with them and wanted to communicate his differences.  The letter was published and was the basis for his being tried and convicted in the state of Massachussetts for blasphemy.

 Dear Sir:

            You observed to me the other day, that people still considered me a Universalist, and said to me, “If you will acknowledge that you are not, I will publish it.”  I told you, in substance, that in some respects I am still a Universalist, but that in others I am not.  I shall now answer you more at large, which I hope you will publish in full, and thereby redeem your pledge.

            I still hold to universal philanthropy, universal benevolence, and universal charity.  In these respects I am still a Universalist.  Neither do I believe in punishment after death, so in this also I agree with the Universalists.  But as it respects all other of their religious notions in relation to another world, or a supposed other state of conscious existence, I do not believe in any of them, so that in this respect I am no more a universalist than I am an orthodox Christian.  As for instance,

            1. Universalists believe in a god which I do not; but [I] believe that their god, with all his moral attributes (aside from nature itself) is nothing more than a mere chimera of their own imagination.

      2. Universalists believe in Christ, which I do not; but [I] believe that the whole story concerning him is as much a fable and a fiction as that of the god Prometheus….

      3. Universalists believe in miracles, which I do not; but [I] believe that every pretension to them can be accounted for on natural principles, or else is to be attributed to mere trick and imposture.

            4. Universalists believe in the resurrection of the dead, in immortality and eternal life, which I do not; but [I] believe all life is mortal, that death is an eternal extinction of life to the individual who possesses it, and that no individual life is, ever was, or ever will be eternal….

 

Sermon

            One of the most exciting events in the life of this congregation is coming up in a month.  It’s the Serendipity Auction, and it’s happening May 14, so get that date on your calendar now!  The reason I mention it is that every year I offer a sermon, and today I am preaching the sermon that Cec Frye bought at last year’s auction.  It is also serendipitous that today happens to be Cec’s birthday.  I can’t promise to deliver your sermon on your birthday, but come to the auction and bid on it anyway!

            Abner Kneeland is a figure from our Universalist history.   We Unitarian Universalists have a lot of heretics in our past, but Kneeland was a heretic among heretics, a radical among radicals.  To put him in context, he was getting in trouble in Boston in the 1830's, “rousing times in the intellectual and religious life of Boston,” according to UU historian Clinton Scott. (p. 75)  The Unitarians had just formed as a denomination, and Unitarians like William Ellery Channing, Theodore Parker and Ralph Waldo Emerson were taking this liberal religion in even more liberal directions.  Emerson’s first essay, “Nature” came out, and he started meeting with the group that became the Transcendentalist Club.  Bronson Alcott opened his experimental school, the movement for the abolition of slavery was gaining ground, and utopian communities were being planned.

            “And then there were the Universalists, all of them arguing that by the end of time, all souls will be with god in heaven and none left in hell, the more radical among them arguing that there is no hell. And the leading Universalist preacher and theologian, Hosea Ballou, was both among the radical Universalists, and a minister in Boston.” (Sawyer)

            In the midst of all that radical thought and activity, Abner Kneeland was so radical, it landed him in jail.  He was way ahead of his time, preaching and publishing ideas that didn’t show up again until much later.  Early on, he started to doubt the authenticity of the Scriptures, and eventually he rejected pretty much the whole of Christianity.  He claimed to be a pantheist, yet to those around him he sounded just like an atheist.  His views on social issues were way ahead of his time as well.  For instance, he supported birth control, divorce, interracial marriage, and women’s equality.  He wasn’t the only one who thought such things in his time, but he was outspoken and drew a lot of attention to himself.

            Kneeland was born in 1774 in western Massachusetts.  He started out doing carpentry and teaching school, then started preaching.  He was Baptist, but after reading a book by the Universalist Ellahan Winchester, converted to Universalism.  He was ordained in 1805 and Hosea Ballou preached the sermon at his ordination and welcomed him into fellowship.  He served a church in New Hampshire and became involved with the denomination, serving as clerk of the Universalist General Convention and serving on a committee to produce a hymnbook.  He wrote 138 of the hymns, none of which are in our hymnbook.  A contemporary, Thomas Whittemore, said that Kneeland’s contributions were “weak, and insipid, and unpoetical.”

            After seven years in New Hampshire, where his wife and child died, Kneeland went to serve a congregation in Charlestown, Massachussetts.  According to the Rev. Ken Sawyer, “some years after he left the church in New Hampshire, the two farewell sermons he gave were to be published, until it was discovered that they repeated word for word a long sermon by Ballou.

            That isn’t what got him a “vote of disapprobation” from the New England Convention of Universalists, though. No, they did that, and temporarily removed him from fellowship, because he resigned from the Charlestown Church to work in Salem in the dry goods shop, specializing in bonnets, owned by his new wife.” (sermon 1-30-00)

            The bonnet business failed after a couple of years, though, and Kneeland returned to the ministry.  He served a congregation in a small town in New York, but stayed less than two years.  Then he was called to the Lombard Street Universalist Church in Philadelphia.

            Kneeland’s ministry in Philadelphia was quite successful.  He is described by a colleague at the time:  “He certainly was the most venerable man I ever saw in the pulpit. His commanding presence…; all illuminating blue eyes; his voice never boisterous, his temper never ruffled; … wonderfully impressive in calmness and persuasive candor -- remarkably self-possessed…. Out of the pulpit he was remarkable. He was tall and erect, and there was a quiet dignity in all his movements.  He was never in haste. . . .  Besides all this his moral character was as clear of blemish as we can reasonably hope to see anywhere.” (Scott 72-73)

            While in Philadelphia, Kneeland edited a Universalist magazine, helped his wife with another retail establishment, and took on every Orthodox minister willing to debate.  He also published a book creating a spelling system with a new alphabet that aimed to get rid of silent letters and be much easier for children to learn. Unfortunately, or fortunately perhaps, it never caught on.  During this time, Kneeland published a second hymnbook.  And he even “found time to prepare his own translation of the New Testament, in which he left all references to future punishment, hell, and damnation in the original Greek.” (Miller, 187)

            Also while in Philadelphia, Kneeland grew ever more radical.  He read the works and associated with the followers of Joseph Priestly, the Unitarian from England who had lived in Philadelphia.  He also associated with Robert Owen, a communitarian, and Francis Wright, a radical social reformer and agnostic.  Papa explains that “Wright and Owen were hated because they spoke in favor of equal rights for women, Negroes, children, and working men, and, because they were agnostics, who denigrated religion, and socialists, who derided the rich, and because they were in favor of the right to divorce, and because Robert Owen published a tract explaining birth control.”  And Kneeland later faced hostility himself through his association with them. (Papa, 23)

            After a seven-year successful ministry in Philadelphia, Kneeland went to Prince Street Universalist Church in New York City, which Scott describes as “one of the most conservative churches in the denomination.” (73) Why he went there, I have no idea; none of my sources explains it.  He lasted less than two years there.

            When he left, a group from the church also left and established the Second Universalist Society, with Kneeland as their minister.  He also began as editor of a Universalist weekly called the “Olive Branch.” As Scott says, he “used its pages to express his extreme views on the backwardness of the churches, and reserved for the Universalists his most scathing words.  His denunciations cost him the confidence of many of his Universalist friends.” (73) Meanwhile, things turned sour with the new congregation, especially after he invited the notorious Francis Wright to speak from his pulpit, when nobody else would allow her.  There was a movement to dismiss him from Second Universalist Society, and eventually he resigned, after less than two years with them. 

            The remnant of supporters joined him in a “new venture, a Free Thought organization called the Moral Philanthropists.  They met in a hired hall and Kneeland lectured on the problems of the day, philosophy, and religion, not forgetting to point out the errors in Christian doctrine, and the shortcomings of the clergy,” according to Scott.

            At this point, the Universalists were getting pretty upset with him, and a group of congregations in Maine, who had no jurisdiction over him at all, withdrew his fellowship.  This upset Kneeland, who made an appeal, claiming at this point to believe in a Supreme Being and the basic tenets of Christianity, though admitting to doubting the authenticity of the bible.  Soon after, however, he broke with Universalism and Christianity too.  He said in a public article that “he did not believe either in the existence of God or in man’s consciousness in any form after physical death. . . . Kneeland likewise expressed his disbelief in the resurrection of Christ.” (Miller, 189) 

            Kneeland’s fellowship as a Universalist minister was withdrawn after 25 years of service. “You must imagine what an embarrassment Kneeland was to Universalists, who had a hard enough time trying to convince society that they were not a threat to all that is right and decent. Universalism itself was a radical movement, and a scary one to many on the grounds that if there is no fear of eternal damnation for those who do wrong, chaos will ensue.

            Just as damaging was the charge that if you accept a liberal view of God, like Unitarians and Universalists alike had done, you are on the fast track to downright atheism. And here was Kneeland, a former Universalist minister, promoting all manner of social chaos and what looked for all the world like atheism, even if it wasn’t that to him.” (Sawyer)  As Scott says, “Kneeland’s extreme opinions, stated in unrestrained language, were an embarrassment and a hindrance that the ministers and churches could ill afford.” (74) 

            In 1831, Kneeland moved to Boston, where he started the “Boston Investigator,” a weekly paper sponsored by the Free Thought movement.   He also became the leader of the First Society of Free Inquirers.  In both capacities, he advocated for social reform, calling for abolition of slavery and imprisonment for debt, advocating shortening the work day to ten hours and generally improving labor conditions, supporting a national education system for all children, women’s rights and birth control.  Says Scott, he “stood for freedom to think, speak and write; he was against all authority in religion except the authority of reason and conscience.” (75) Kneeland was lecturing throughout the country at this point.  It is said that when he was preaching to his Society of Free Inquirers in Boston, “on occasion he would quote some of the more objectionable passages concerning female menstruation from the [Old Testament] and then hurl the book across the auditorium as unfit for reading.” (Cassera, 165) During this time, Kneeland managed to produce a third hymnbook called “National Hymns, Original and Selected: for the use of Those Who Are ‘Slaves to No Sect.’” (Papa 47)

            The December 20, 1933 issue of the Investigator contained three articles that got Kneeland into big trouble.  The Grand Jury of Massachussetts had Kneeland arrested and indicted for blasphemy.  Of the three, the only article actually written by Kneeland was the one we heard in the reading.  To refresh your memory, he wrote: “1. Universalists believe in a god which I do not. 2. Universalists believe in Christ, which I do not; 3. Universalists believe in miracles, which I do not;  4. Universalists believe in the resurrection of the dead, in immortality and eternal life, which I do not.” It was on this article that the trial focused, and in particular on that first statement about a belief in a god.  They claimed he broke the law, in that he “did wilfully blaspheme the holy name of God, by denying and contumeliously reproaching God, his creation, government, and final judging of the world, and by reproaching Jesus Christ and the Holy Ghost, and contumeliously reproaching the holy word of God.”

            By the way, though Kneeland was the last person to be jailed for this offense, the law still stands on the books, with the wording barely changed.  The main change is in the punishment, which now includes a fine.  Massachussetts is one of the few states that still has a blasphemy law.

            Kneeland went through four years of litigation, which included multiple appeals, three hung juries, the death of his attorney after the first two trials and his taking on his own representation after that.  He tried to argue that the blasphemy law was unconstitutional because it violated the principle of free speech.  He was unsuccessful. 

            He also tried to argue that he wasn’t an atheist.  He argued that he meant only that he didn’t believe in the god that the Universalists believe in, but not that he didn’t believe in God.  The statement says  “a god” with a small “g”, and no comma after it, whereas the other three points all have a comma.  They didn’t buy that argument either. 

            He also tried to argue that he wasn’t an atheist, but rather a pantheist, seeing God as Nature, not a separate being, but not non-existent either.  He actually had written a document called A Philosophical Creed in May of 1833, in which he defines his creed.  He says, “I believe that the whole universe is NATURE, and that the word NATURE embraces the whole universe, and that God and Nature, so far as we can attach any rational idea to either, are perfectly synonymous terms.  Hence I am not an Atheist, but a Pantheist, that is, instead of believing there is no God, I believe that in the abstract, all is God. . .” (Cassera, 167) They didn’t buy that either.

            So he eventually went to jail, and it caused quite a furor in Boston, and across the country.  People who had no sympathy for Kneeland himself still thought it unfair that he should be jailed for expressing his opinion.  William Ellery Channing, leader of the Unitarian association, put together a petition to the Governor asking for a pardon for Kneeland on the basis that religious expression should be protected by freedom of speech and the press.  They got 168 signatures, including people like Parker, Emerson, and Alcott.  “However,” notes Scott, “the conservative clergy circulated a counter-petition and obtained 230 names.” (44)

            Stephan Papa, who wrote the book, The Last Man Jailed for Blasphemy, believes Kneeland was prosecuted as much for his political and social beliefs as for his religious beliefs. The prosecuting attorney said in the summation of the second trial, “Gentlemen, Blasphemy is but one part of the system Fanny Wright has introduced among us.  It is but one step, but a fatal one indeed, … in the road to ruin. It is to lead the way to atheism…. Atheism is to dethrone the Judge of heaven and earth; a future state of rewards and punishments, is to be described as a nursery bug-bear; moral and religious restraints are to be removed by proclaiming death to be an endless sleep; marriage is to be denounced as an unlawful restraint on shifting affections…; illicit sexual intercourse to be encouraged by physiological checks upon conception; the laws of property are to be repealed as restrictions upon ‘the greatest possible good’…. These horrible experiments are to be introduced here as fast as possible and to pervade the world…..

            “Abner Kneeland and his detestable dissemination of obscenity, and impiety, and blasphemy … may be considered by his acts and doctrines to be the common enemy of the human race….” (Papa 39)

            They were afraid of the effects on society if any of Kneeland’s recommended social reforms took hold, and they blamed his alleged atheism for the ideas of these reforms, or social ills, as they would see it.  We now have achieved many of the things Kneeland was advocating: contraception, easy divorce, interracial marriage, advances in women’s rights and rights of other minorities, though we have a way to go to reach real equality.  Poverty and labor issues have improved since Kneeland’s time, but are turning back the other way.

            When Kneeland was in jail, Theodore Parker wrote to a friend, “Abner was jugged for sixty days; but he will come out as beer from a bottle, all foaming, and will make others foam.” (Scott 78)

            But when he came out of jail, Kneeland was done making Bostonians foam.  In 1839 he took his family to Iowa to start an intentional community of like-minded people that would live up to his social ideals.  The community was called Salubria, and while a few families settled there with him, and they got a progressive school started, the community never really took hold.  But he was a presence in the area, and later Christian missionaries had to overcome the “Kneelandism” they found there.  Abner Kneeland died there in 1844 at 71 years of age.

            Kneeland is one of the more colorful characters of our history.  I find it fascinating to find people who lived that long ago espousing the same ideas we hear in this congregation today, ideas that sometimes feel under attack as they were in Kneeland’s day.  It is a shame that Kneeland had to leave Universalism to keep his integrity when his beliefs changed.  It is a shame that he was treated badly by the denomination he devoted himself to for a long time.  Unitarian Universalism today is proud of its non-creedal nature, its insistence on the authority of reason and conscience in religion, its acceptance of a diversity of beliefs. Let us remember to treat others with different beliefs with respect, the respect we wish to be accorded ourselves.        

            Kneeland’s grandaughter wrote the following words:

            “My grandfather, Abner Kneeland, who was jailed for blasphemy, was at heart a most religious man – If he failed at aught it was that he put his worship of truth above his instinct for loving kindness. . . . He was impelled to teach what he regarded as the truth even tho’ the consequences might seem to be painful.  For this he sacrificed his career as a popular and successful minister. . . . I can see in his life a fine and noble spirituality. . . . He hesitated to say he believed in God because he was reaching for a conception of a creative force more sublime. . . yet he was unable to find words to convey his own idea.  The best he could do was to admit the incomprehensibility of God to the human mind.  But he was not content that it should be so – he kept groping. . . .  He believed in Universal Love . . .I have regretted that it was not possible for my grandfather to continue in his ministry, teaching only what he believed to be true.  Such a ministry would have been fruitful of much good.  For it was only in what he disbelieved or doubted that controversy arose.” (Papa 74)

            May we remember to focus on the positive content of our beliefs, and may we find the Universal Love of our Universalist heritage reflected in our own lives.