From: heb_roots_chr@mail.geocities.com
Sent: Tuesday, November 25, 1997 12:09 AM
To: Hebraic Heritage Newsgroup
Subject: Puritans / Thanksgiving and Sukkot
From: Ray Hagerty
To: heb_roots_chr@geocities.com
Subject: Re: Puritans / Thanksgiving and Sukkot
heb_roots_chr@mail.geocities.com wrote:
>
> From: Henry Hodgens
> To: heb_roots_chr@geocities.com
> Subject: Thanksgiving
>
> Eddie,
>
> Does anyone in the news group have any information concerning the
> Puritans/Separatists that left England for the New World. We know that they
> were persecuted for their beliefs that the Reformation and Anglican Church
> Doctrines did not go far enough, but what were their beliefs? How close did
> they come to a Messianic understanding? Any relationship between
> Thanksgiving and Sukkot?
>
> Henry Hodgens
>
> **********************************************************************
Dear Henry,
The best book I have ever read on the subject is "THE LIGHT AND THE
GLORY" by Peter Marshall and David Manuel. Their book answers the
question, "Did God have a plan for America?" They start with Columbus
and work forward in history to the Pilgrims and the Puritans. It may
cause you anguish over what America has become, but it is the best
answer I have seen to date. The authors make no mention of Sukkot per
say, but they talk about how the Pilgrims saw themselves in relationship
to the Old Covenant which might be helpful. I was a home school mom
and used this great book for American History because it doesn't read
like a text book, it drew us into our history, allowed us to discover our
heritage, and made us sit up and take a look at how we were living out
our beliefs. Your Library should have this book on the shelf still, we
got ours from our home school supply store.
Maranatha en tachi
Deborah
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From: Kit Weiss
To: <heb_roots_chr@geocities.com>
Subject: Re: Puritans / Thanksgiving and Sukkot
Dear Henry Hodgens:
There is a wonderfull book called The Light and
the Glory, by Peter Maarshall and David Manuel, that tells the story
of the Pilgrims and Puritans very well. They did their homework and
are good at telling the story. The sad truth is that our educational
system has failed to tell the story correctly (if at all). I know you
will enjoy the book. Kit Weiss -8 Great graandaughter of William and
Suzanna White.
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From: Bradley C. Gray
To: <heb_roots_chr@geocities.com>
Subject: Puritans and their beliefs
Henry,
There are two books that I can think of that exemplify the beliefs of
the Puritans. These two are Milton's "Paradise Lost" and Bunyans's
"Pilgrim's Progress." One other book that I can think of is "Plymouth
Colony: Its History and People 1620-1691" by Eugene Aubrey Stratton,
former Historian General of General Society of Mayflower Descendants,
(Ancestry Publishing ISBN 0-916489-18-3, 480pp. 1986).
In Marvin Wilson's book, "Our Father Abraham," he discusses, on
pages 125-132, in some detail about the "RE-JUDAIZATION" of the faith. In
other words, they were wanting a Hebraic approach. Many of the
colleges that are now liberal were founded by the Puritans (Harvard).
Hebrew was an important part of the founding of early colonies.
Harvard, Columbia, Dartmouth, and Yale made Hebrew the center of
their curricula.
In fact, Harvard had the first Messianic Jew graduated from there,
Rabbi Judah Monis (1683-1764). Monis was the instructor of Hebrew.
They had such impact in this country that in 1776, many of the members
of the new congress were advocating adopting HEBREW as the official
language of the United States. One other thing I remember about
William Brewster, a Puritan pastor at Plymouth, strongly felt A.V. was
a liberal translation. He felt it had too many errors for his
parishioners to read. The Puritans despised the A.V. so much that
went with the Geneva Bible. Brewster purchased the A.V.; and he went
through the entire translation, circling the mistakes. This 1611
bible is on display in Plymouth.
Bradley C. Gray
Dayton, OH
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To: heb_roots_chr@geocities.com
Subject: Re: Puritans / Thanksgiving and Sukkot
From: George Brooks
Dear Henry Hodgens:
I am a direct descendant of John Alden, Priscilla Mullins and Myles
Standish - thus I have always had an interest in any connections
between Puritans, Pilgrims and Jewish thought.
1) The people we call "The Pilgrims" referred to themselves as "The
Saints" and were part of a larger group called Brownists (named after
a free thinking fellow named Brown, of course), who were part of a
larger group called the Separatists.
2) These Separatists/Brownists had a few interesting ideas: they only
believed in what they found in the New Testament. So, they did not see
marriage as a religious sacrament. They felt it was a contract about
"interests" and money and inheritance. It wasn't until the mid-1700's that
people of Pilgrim stock in the Cape Cod area of Massachusetts actually
started having marriages in churches. The waters are slightly muddied
by the fact that the Town Hall was usually also the Sunday "meeting
place." But marriages were "civil" not "religious", in any case.
3) Like today's Jehovah's Witnesses, they were not fans of the
"papist" celebration of Christmas, having "no warrant" (as they would
say) for celebrating the birth of Jesus on December 25.
4) The Pilgrims, who were never very large in number (even back in
Holland), also had several NON-SAINTS as part of their community.
So, ironically, the Pilgrims tended to keep religious rules separate from
"civil" rules, because they were never quite sure if the NON-SAINTS
around them might try to "react" by taking charge, by majority vote,
and vote in all the Anglican "nonsense" they were trying to leave
behind. This tended to give the Pilgrims a very moderate approach to
law. During the Salem Witch scare, they did not execute any "alleged"
witches.
5) The Puritans, who came in increasingly large numbers from 1630 on
(a decade after the Mayflower's arrival) in Salem and Boston areas,
sought to PURIFY the Anglican church - - they did NOT want to separate
from the Anglican body. They did not believe in too much
"congregationalism" or local rule by any particular congregation.
They believed in THEOCRACY and a fairly COMPLETE MERGER of civil
and religious law. And, one day, they hoped to bring this "purity" to the
entire Anglican church. It was this COMPLETE approach to law in the
community which led to the Salem Witch trials.
6) Sometime before or after Cromwell came to power in England (the
details are vague to me at this point), the Puritans realized there
was no way to purify the Anglican church sufficiently, and they
settled into a highly HIERARCHICAL form of congregationalism - - today
we would say it looks an awful like Presbyterianism. Associations of
clergy ran tight control over an association of congregations.
Eventually this "rulership" would become more and more flexible until
we arrive at what we recognize as the almost complete freedom of
congregational style churches. During this process, Harvard
University, which was created for the training of clergy in Puritan
ways, eventually became a non-religious school (a secular
institution).
7) There quickly were far more Puritans than Pilgrims in the
colonies. In fact, Plymouth Colony of the Pilgrims eventually became
swallowed up by the Massachusetts Bay Colony (into present day
Massachusetts). The Puritans had nothing to fear from the Pilgrims.
But they DID still fear the eventual, seemingly inevitable
interference from the Anglican Church. This is what triggered the break
between the two communities, which was facilitated by the fact the
Anglican church DELIBERATELY did not send any Anglican Bishops to
America. They thought a Bishop on American soil would breed too much
independence. But it also meant that no Anglican power base could grow
in America either. And the Puritan ministers, and their successors all the
way up to the time of the American Revolution, MOST ALWAYS supported
an independent American mindset in order to lessen the likelihood that
Anglican "corruption of the true faith" would gain any control in America.
8) As you can see, there is precious little connection here to a
Jewish point of view. Though the term "The Saints" does have a nice
background in Jewish thought somewhere, I think. The closest we come
to a First Testament frame of mind is that Rhode Island was founded (I
can't recall the name right now) by someone that the Puritans EXILED
because he was a Sabbatarian (!) Sabbatarian Baptists (and other
Sabbath-oriented groups) were quite common, though not
populous - they met on THE Sabbath. Brown University used to be a
Sabbatarian institution I think. But, over decades, Sabbatarianism
faded away into general New England protestantism.
George Brooks
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From: Stan Grams
To: heb_roots_chr@geocities.com
Subject: Re: Puritans / Thanksgiving and Sukkot
Henry,
A few weeks ago I came across a site on the subject. It is called "The
Character of an Old English Puritan, or Non-Conformist" and is located
at http://www.cet.com/~mtr/GereeChar.html It's preface reads,
"While researching the seventeenth century theological discussion
over baptism, it was my great joy to discover this little work by John
Geree. Writing as an Oxonian Puritan, Geree defends for his own time
the scriptural platform upon which Puritans stood. And for us, who
have become so muddied in our definitions of the same, Geree lays
out the essence of a Puritan with grace and clarity .
When one asks, "What was a Puritan?" You could do no better than
to send them to this little spot on the internet. Therefore, it gives me
great pleasure to introduce to the modern reader, Master John Geree.
May this work bring glory to God as it edifies your soul. "
Hope it provides some answers...
Stan Grams
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