"As the Oracles of God" examines how Quakers in colonial America sought to control both the written and spoken word in their religious communities. It looks at the ways in which American Friends set up committees to censor texts deemed heterodox, as well as the ways Quakers sought to moderate the words of believers through encouraging self-censorship as a way to access personal revelation, while also paying particular attention to the experiences of those who ran afoul of Friends' rules in these regards, either by publishing works without the consent of their meetings or speaking in un-Quakerly fashion. Debates over freedom of speech, the work asserts, defined early modern religious communities just as much as it did more formal legal institutions.
S. Spencer Wells, Ph.D. (2018), The College of William & Mary, is a lecturer in Interdisciplinary Studies at Southern Utah University. His research focuses on church discipline in early America.
Acknowledgements Abstract Keywords
âIntroduction
â1âPolicing Quaker Speech
â2âPolicing Quaker Print Ways
â3âDisputing the Word
âConclusion
âReferences
All interested in the history of early modern Quakerism, as well as anyone concerned about issues revolving around issues of freedom of speech and censorship prior to the nineteenth century.