Before looking at how first the Anabaptist and Unitarians were persecuted using a blasphemy law underpinned by the Athanasian creed, and second how the Catholics became scapegoats (two relatively simple storied). I now want to look at the stranger and more curious case of The Family of Love – I mentioned them earlier in the thread without knowing too much about them. I said then that I’d ask an old friend for some assistance. I haven’t been able to ask him – I haven’t seen him - but I have since read the standard and up to date work on the Family: ‘The Family of Love in English Society 1550 – 1630 by Christopher W,. Marsh – and a very interesting read it is too. And it is sufficient for my purposes.
There is a case for arguing that the ‘Family’ were a Universalist sect inspired by a mix of Christian Humanism and Spiritual Anabaptism. At the very least we can say that their religion had all of the nascent characteristics of the first proper Universalist sects that flourished in England in the following century. Yet I can detect a note of exclusivism in their teachings which seems foreign to Universalism proper – but they were a secret and exclusive society in a time not yet ripe for public expressions of Universalism as we understand it today. And they were a small sect, probably numbering no more than two hundred throughout our period.
However the ‘Family’ were well integrated into society – because of their non-confrontational and non-proselytising ethos, and because they guarded their beliefs with ‘Nicodemean’ dissembling – although these beliefs were often well known to others as were their affiliations. Members of the Family were employed in Elizabeth’s Yeomen of the Guard – who accompanied her on her great Processions through England, and, more intimately, guarded her bedchamber at night. Elizabeth tolerated them and it was only in the late 1570’s/ early 1580’s that the Calvinists kicked up such a fuss about them that they were investigated by the higher Church authorities – usually, it seems, with great mildness and comparative absence of intimidation. Eventually Elizabeth’s Privy Council forced an investigation into the religious affiliations of her Yeomen who, for a time, were sent out on the equivalent of extended leave from duty. However, the scare passed quickly and no serious consequences ensued for any members of the Family.
Before I look at the strange and curious history of The Family I first need to say something about an influential interpretation of who they were and their significance in history given by the atheist Marxist historian Christopher Hill. (Stay with me on this – it is relevant)
Christopher Hill was one of the greatest historians of the English Civil War (or ‘Revolution’ as he would have termed it) in a couple of generations. He had magnificent command of a huge range of sources. When I was young, I saw him speak twice –first on The ‘Diggers and the English Revolution ( at Middlesex Polytechnic (where I studied) and second on the Quakers and the English Revolution (at St Martin’s Lane Meeting House in London). The old boy was spell binding both times. I have noted that his take on Universalism in his book ‘The World Turned Upside Down’ comes with warm commendation from Louise Hickman in the ‘All Shall Be Well’ anthology. In this he gives his view of The Family of Love and many other issues. However, today I have real problems with Hill’s methodology.
Hill was rather doctrinaire in his Marxism. His use of Marxist theory when applied to the Elizabethan period suggests the following way of understanding the evidence is the correct one (I’ll give a crude version of the model to clarify things for you, but I assure you there is plenty/enough truth in what I am about to say).
The Marxist theoretical model has it that society is composed of different groups/classes that stand in a conflict relationship to each other. These groups do not share common interests and the conflict between them is what moves the historical process forwards. In this view religion in Elizabethan England was actually political ideology pure and simple; and each of the conflicting groups in society had a slightly different take on religion.
The Aristocracy – the Queen, the Lords and the Lords Bishops etc – wanted to retain power and hold on to the privileges they had which came from their status as landowners in the previous feudal stage of society. So their religious/political ideology was of a ‘conservative’ nature to justify their retaining hold on power; they made much of theological arguments about the God given, natural order of society – God given and natural as it is, always has been, and always will be – so they wanted to stress continuity with the past/tradition.
The new Middle Classes – merchants, small landowners, people in the professions etc – were the ‘new kids on the block’. They were frustrated with the aristocracy’s hold on power and wanted to overthrow them. They were chiefly represented by the Calvinists. Their religious ideology was based on literacy, thrift, and rampant individualism (hence their stress on individual rather than corporate salvation). At this moment in history they were the good guys – fighting for individual freedom and liberty from the oppression of the Aristocracy, developing commerce, science, technology and industry. However fast forward a few centuries when they have achieved their goal and ushered in Industrial Capitalism and they become the bad guys that need to be liquidated.
Then there were the Common People. Some were land workers who still largely bought into the feudal idea/lie of their obligations to the aristocracy – unless misery and starvation caused them to rebel. However, there was a burgeoning artisan class in the towns and (small) cities that formed the vanguard of what was to become the working class and were properly conscious of their own class interests. The Family of Love in this understanding were s a sort of underground resistance religious movement of the Common People, numbered in their thousands (rather than hundreds) who were Universalists and took the idea of ‘freedom from the law/Freedom in the Gospel’ as a licence for free love. Christopher Hill lauded Universalism, not because he believed it to be true – he was an atheist as I’ve stated above - but because he saw it as an example of the Common People throwing off the shackles of the oppressive ideology of their rulers. For him, belief in Universal salvation was part of the process of the Common People realising that religion is actually ‘false consciousness – a reality distorting ideology based on fictional supernatural sanctions. Therefore we can expect to find plenty of examples of popular religion actually being a vehicle for religious scepticism.’
Obviously I find this view, even in its non-caricature form, unsatisfactory (Hill was actually a bit more subtle than I’ve explained)
I think we need to be pragmatic about how we view groups/classes. Yes society does divide into groups that are unequal in power and wealth, but these groups are not always in conflict – there can be common interests between groups and indeed conflict within groups more bitter than conflict between groups. And if we impose the Marxist model on our evidence unthinkingly we can often be in danger of falsifying the same evidence – and Christopher Marsh’s study of the family reveals that the evidence in no way fits Christopher Hill’s Marxist theory.
Finally, of course I do not believe that religion can be reduced to politics. Religion is about our relationship with God - who transcends history and politics, and is the judge of both. However religion can often become confused with the political order – and it often did big time during the Reformation. I think that the Prophets of Israel were well aware of this general tendency in their critique of Priestly religion.
That’s enough Marxism. I hope it’s all clear and you will see the relevance in my next post.
All the best
Dick
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