Reading many people’s thoughts on the early Pilgrims, there is an important factor
that most have not taken into account. We
must recognize that there were two groups sailing aboard the Mayflower – the Pilgrim
congregation from Scrooby, England, and the people whom they called “strangers,”
who were random, seafaring adventurers who were not at all connected with the
Pilgrims and did NOT share their frame of mind, or their ideas. Though
only one third of the passengers on the Mayflower were Pilgrims, somehow they get
blamed for it all. This excerpt is the Pilgrim
story summarized from Bradford’s History 1647 in Chapter 8 of my book entitled
“Self-evident Truths” about the Foundations of American Political
Thought.
CHAPTER VIiI.
The Seeds of American
Local Self-government,
Pilgrims to Founding
By the late 1570’s in
England the common people had been exposed to the Bible for a few
generations. Many had come into a
personal relationship with God through Jesus Christ. As these lettered new believers studied the
scriptures they began to come under persecution from the state. They were doing
things strictly forbidden – holding home Bible studies outside the authority of
the English church/state political structure.
From the
Scriptures, however, these believers could find nothing wrong with their
activities. They were hungry to learn about the living God. Nonetheless, they
were raided, imprisoned and relieved of their property by the authorities. The
Christians saw this as unjust and began to clamor for the English church to be
purified back to its original New Testament base. These Christians became known
derogatorily as Puritans. The battle was engaged as the power of the English
church/state combination came up against the conscience and courage of the
Puritans.
A NEW ECCLESIASTICAL STRUCTURE
In 1594 a group of
Puritans in Scrooby, England came to the conclusion that the church/state
political combination in England looked more like the anti-Christ than an
instrument of God. Finally, they reluctantly decided to break away from the
Church of England altogether. Forming
their own self-governing church fellowship they began to reform their lives on
their own. They studied the scriptures to find out how to govern themselves,
their families and their local church fellowship.
This was a radical
move. They were met with both
persecution by the state and disapproval from some of their Puritan friends.
These friends felt it was wrong to separate from the church, but rather reform
the church from within. The Scrooby
Puritans were derisively called “Separatists.”
But their conclusion was that the structure – whether civil or religious
– should exist to serve the individual not the other way around. So they set up
a new structure in accordance with their belief that the individual is to
govern himself under God in every area of life including the ecclesiastical or
religious area. This decentralization was the result of an increase in
self-governing character as they shouldered personal respon-sibility under God.
This was the tiny,
initial seed of local self-government.
ENGLISH SEPARATISTS IN HOLLAND
Under persecution
these separatists ultimately left England and went to Holland. There they spent ten years studying their
Bibles and working basically as slaves. It was very hard because the
separatists were farmers and the Dutch were sea traders and fishermen. The
separatists had left virtually everything they owned when they fled England and
were starting over. They hired themselves out as servants and soon gained a
good reputation for being hard workers, conscientious and honest, which put
them in demand.
Beyond
the physical difficulties was their grief over what had happened in England.
They were God-fearing, honorable Englishmen yet had been hounded out of England
by the church/state in authority there. “Why” they wondered, “would God allow
this?” “What went wrong?” During their ten years in Holland they
searched the Scriptures to find answers to these questions. They continued
together as a local self-governing fellowship, seeking God to learn how they
should govern themselves as a church organization as well as personally.
Life was extremely
difficult in Holland and ultimately they decided it would be better to go to the
“New World” and take their chances there. Their leader, William Bradford, wrote
of their reasons for this decision:[i]
1) Their
situation entailed such difficult labor that few of their friends from England
would join them in Holland, and some of those in Holland were not able to stand
their ground, but returned to England.
2) They saw that
they were beginning to age and needed to make a move before they were unable.
______________________________________________________
Some of the Puritans
left England under persecution and went to Holland and then the new world, and
were known as Pilgrims.
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3) Their
children’s bodies were losing their vigor under the load, and though many had
the best of dispositions, this grieved these Puritans.
4) Some of their
children, as a result of the hardship and the “great licentiousness of the
youth in that country” were being drawn into Dutch sin and society, which
grieved them even more.
5) They desired to
“advance the gospel of the kingdom of Christ in those remote parts of the
world; yea though they should be but even as stepping stones unto others for
the performing of so great a work.”
Bradford wrote in
1647 from his diary the history of the Scrooby congregation’s wanderings,
entitled “Of Plymouth Plantation.” The vision, integrity, and fortitude of
these people challenge us all and are a source of great encouragement and
wisdom. Through their time of wandering this group of Puritans became known as
Pilgrims.
SEVEN GREAT EXCHANGES
In their Bible study
during these years in Holland the Pilgrims came to seven great exchanges in
philosophy of government (summarized):
1) From the idea
of the infallibility of a church organization, to the idea of the infallibility
of the Bible.
2) From the idea
of political sovereignty belonging to the King or the Pope, to the idea of
political sovereignty resting in the individual governed by God.
3) From the idea
of sovereignty as being external, to the idea of sovereignty as being internal,
ruling in the heart of the individual.
4) From the idea
of a class structure, where the individual’s value is based on external things
(position, wealth, gender, race, age, ability) to the idea of equality for all,
where the individual’s value is recognized as intrinsic, infinite and equal to
every other person’s value. Since all are treated by God as equal under His
law, all must be treated by man as equal under civil law.
5) From the idea
of limited freedoms of the individual as granted by the King, and therefore
revocable by the King, to the idea of unalienable God-given rights of the
individual to life, liberty and property that may not be taken away by man.
______________________________________________________
In
Holland, the Pilgrims exchanged seven historical ideas about God, man and
government.
______________________________________________________
6) From the idea of
the flow of power in a nation being from the state to the people, making the
individual the servant of the state, to the idea of the flow of power in a
nation being from the people to the state through the people choosing
representatives. Thus the state is the
servant of the individual, the individual being the servant of God.
7) From the idea of
compulsory uniformity in the externals in society, to the idea of diversity
with unity, recognizing the differences between people in gift, call and
character. Unity is to be maintained
within this diversity by virtue of the recognition of equality of intrinsic
value and our need for one another.
The Pilgrims set sail
August 5, 1620 on two ships, the Mayflower and the Speedwell. The arduous voyage is chronicled in
Bradford’s diary. The Speedwell sprung a
leak early in the voyage and returned to England. The Mayflower trek was long and bleak. Of the 102 passengers on the
Mayflower, 37 were part of the Scrooby congregation. The rest were seafaring
adventurers whom the Pilgrims called “strangers.” They were all confined below
deck for most of the voyage. They lived
in an area the size of a volleyball court with a 5-foot ceiling. The hatches
were battened down much of the trip due to severe storms that blew them far off
their intended course.
A NEW CIVIL STRUCTURE
Three attempts to
sail to Jamestown were thwarted by weather. Jamestown was an English colony
established nine years earlier by another group of Puritans in present day
Virginia. The Mayflower finally put in for the winter at a random bay on
November 11 to escape the stormy
weather. The Pilgrims named the
settlement they planted Plymouth after their home in England. Their location was in present day
Massachusetts, quite a distance from where they had expected to land. The place
was cold and desolate and very discouraging after their difficult voyage.
The strangers among
them recognized they were not under any government here in the wilderness and
threatened mutiny. Before going ashore, the Pilgrims drew up a new government
for the whole group. The document became
known as the Mayflower Compact.
The purpose of the Mayflower Compact was to
define among them an authority by consent and to establish a promise to obey.
It declares that as a civil body they will meet together to frame laws and
ordinances needed for the good of the colony and that they promise to obey
them. It is given below as written in
Bradford’s history.[ii]
The Mayflower Compact
“In ye name of God,
Amen. We whose names are under-writen, loyall subjects of our dread soveraigne
Lord, King James, by ye grace of God, of Great Britaine, Franc, & Ireland
king, defender of ye faith &c., haveing under-taken, for ye glorie of God,
and advancemente of ye Christian faith, and honour of our king & countrie,
a voyage to plant ye first colonie in ye Northerne parts of Virginia, doe by
these presents solomnly & mutualy in ye presence of God, and one of
another, covenant & combine our selves togeather into a civill body
politick, for our better ordering & preservation & furtherance of ye
ends aforesaid: and by vertue hearof to enacte, constitute, and frame such just
& equall lawes, ordinances, acts, constitutions, & offices, from time
to time, as shall be thought most meete & convenient for ye generall good
of ye Colonie, unto which we promise all due submission and obedience. In
witnes wherof we have hereunder subscribed our names at Cap-Codd ye 11. of
November, in ye year of ye raigne of our soveraigne lord, King James, of
England, Franc, & Ireland ye eighteenth, and of Scotland ye fiftie fourth.
Ano:Dom. 1620.”
This one-sentence
covenant marked the first time in history that men voluntarily established a
civil form of self-government and agreed to it, both Pilgrims and strangers. It
should be marveled that they knew just how to proceed. Actually they had been
governing themselves as a church body in this way for years, providing the
model for the civil structure they now needed. Bradford said that they saw this
act of theirs to be as secure as any patent granted by England, “and in some
respects more sure.”[iii] This was because they all agreed and
voluntarily accepted it personally.
Some of the Biblical
principles of government involved in the Mayflower Compact included these:
1) The
individual has the responsibility to govern himself in every area of life and
should be left free to do so.
2) The civil
structure exists for protection and the common good.
3) The civil
structure exists to serve the individual, not vice versa.
4) Government
must be by consent of the governed, not by decree from above.
5) All are equal
under the law.
CLASS STRUCTURE CHALLENGED
It should be noted
that the Pilgrims approached their new relationship with the local residents, the Native American
Indians, with these ideas in mind. They made a treaty with the Indians
recognizing that the Indian was of equal value with the Englishman and
therefore was equal under the law. There
was no class difference between them.
The purpose of the treaty was mutual protection not control; to help the
Indians not rule them. Both Pilgrims and Indians agreed to the treaty
(government by consent of the governed) and lived in peace for more than fifty
years.[iv]
______________________________________________________
The Pilgrims in
Plymouth treated the local Indians as equals.
______________________________________________________
This was in contrast
to the experience of the Puritans in Jamestown who had not yet arrived at the
conceptual changes in their ideas of government. Though Godly and sincere, the
Virginia Puritans still possessed the traditional European ideas of government.
They retained concepts of class structure, which viewed the value of the
individual as defined by his station in life. They viewed the main purpose of
civil government as control, rather than protection. Therefore they naturally
saw themselves as superior and saw their duty as imposing government control on
the native peoples. The natives didn’t appreciate this, and there was a good
deal of trouble between them, even bloodshed.
That first winter at
Plymouth was extremely difficult for the Pilgrims. By Spring a full half of the Pilgrims had
died due to hunger, disease and exposure. Yet, when the weather cleared and the
Mayflower returned to England, none of the determined band of Pilgrims went
back with it. They clung to the belief that God was doing something new. They
believed that in spite of the suffering they were enduring, they were in
God’s will. This was truly a people of whom the world is not worthy.
NEW WORLD FARMING
In the spring of 1621
the Pilgrims began to plant crops. God providentially placed a native Indian
among them named Squanto who had been kidnapped from the area years
earlier. Squanto had traveled far away
to North Africa, lived in Spain with Christian monks and learned to speak
fluent English while visiting England. He was also familiar with the
Scriptures. Squanto was part of an Indian tribe that had lived where the Pilgrims
landed, but had died out from a plague during his absence. One day, he showed up and introduced himself
to the Pilgrims, speaking in English.
How astonishing that must have been!
Squanto taught them how to fish and plant corn, and was a liaison
between them and the surrounding Indian tribes. According to Bradford, Squanto
had been prepared by God for fifteen years to help this band of Pilgrims get
established in the new world.
As
had been reluctantly agreed upon with the Merchant Venturers who financed their
voyage, the Pilgrims’ arrangement of economics was to be in essence a system of
“from each according to his ability, to each according to his need.”[v]
This
communal system, however, turned out to have crippling drawbacks, according to
Bradford. Those from the upper classes in England simply would not work the
dirt. People would pretend to be sick. Attempting to force women and children
to labor seemed tyranny to all. Some who actually worked felt it unfair. Then,
when the fields had been planted, no one felt responsible to water, nurture and
protect the crops from the wild animals through the summer.
The
result was that when harvest time came in the fall of 1621, it was virtually
non-existent.
That
year, fall and winter were extremely difficult for them. The Pilgrims spent
their time foraging for sustenance, and some became servants to the Indians or
sold them their blankets and goods, what little they had, for food.
A NEW ECONOMIC SYSTEM
In their distress
again that winter they sought God for answers. They came to the conclusion that
“they should set corne every man for his
owne perticuler.”[vi] In other words, each should govern his own
life in the economic sphere as well.
When spring 1622 came
they did something new. They divided up the land and gave a piece of property
to each family. Each single person was assigned to work with one of the
families. They then gave each family a
portion of the seed they had left. They basically said, “Here is your seed and
there is your land. Do what you like with it.”
______________________________________________________
The Pilgrims decided
they should govern themselves under God in the area of economics as in all
other areas.
______________________________________________________
Bradford wrote that
since they were again facing starvation, everyone went directly to work. Along
with the able-bodied men the English upper classes, the women, the sick, the
children and even the pregnant were all out hard at work preparing their fields
and planting seed. Each family nurtured its own piece of property through the
summer. The result was that there was a plentiful harvest that second autumn.
Each family had enough to eat, store, replant and trade.
This was the seed of an
individual enterprise system of economics, the application of Christian
self-government in the economic sphere.
Bradford believed
that the problem had been the system, not the people. He wrote,
“The experience they
had . . . may well evince the vanity of that conceit of Plato and other
ancients, applauded by some of later times; that the taking away of property,
and bringing in community into a common wealth, would make them happy and
flourishing; as if they were wiser than God. For this community (as far as it
was) was found to breed much confusion and discontent, and retard much
employment that would have been to their benefit and comfort . . . And would
have been worse if they had been men of another condition [non-Christians]. Let
none object this is men’s corruption, and nothing to the course [system]
itself. I answer, seeing all men have this corruption in them, God in His
wisdom saw another course fitter for them.”[vii]
DEPENDENCE ON GOD
Bradford also notes,
however, that lest they become dependent on their new system, "God seemed
to intervene against their hopes of a crop –
By a great drought
which continued from the third week in May, till about the middle of July,
without any rain, and with great heat (for the most part), insomuch as the corn
began to wither away, part whereof was never recovered. Upon which they set
apart a solemn day of humiliation, to seek the Lord by humble and fervent
prayer, in this great distress. And He was pleased to give them a gracious and
speedy answer, both to their own and the Indian’s admiration, that lived among
them. Though it was hot through the morning and most of the day, toward evening
it began to grow overcast and then rain gently in abundance without wind or
thunder or violence.”[viii]
It was an answer to
their prayer, “as was wonderful to see, and made the Indians astonished to
behold.” God then gave them just the
weather and rain they needed the rest of the growing season. That fall they had an abundant harvest.
Bradford wrote, “For
which mercy (in time convenient) they also set apart a day of thanksgiving.”
______________________________________________________
We must acknowledge
our dependence on God both for the system and for the working of the system.
______________________________________________________
This first
Thanksgiving Day of theirs in the new world was celebrated specifically for
this answer to their prayer for rain as they humbled themselves before God. It
was recognized as a feast of gratitude to God, who was sovereign in their
experience.
Though they
recognized that they had a system from God that could bring fourth abundance,
it became evident to the Pilgrims that they still needed to recognize their
daily personal dependence on God, just as the children of Israel had done in
the wilderness they had faced, thousands of years before. We must acknowledge
our dependence on God both for the system and
for the working of the system.
THE ESSENTIAL PILGRIM CHARACTER
A few aspects of the
Pilgrim’s character should be mentioned since they are part of the spiritual
heritage of America. In addition to
the faith and steadfastness,
self-governing, self-educating and entrepreneurial character mentioned, there
were clear expressions of faithfulness, charity and forgiveness to those who
met and dealt with them.
There is no clearer
example of these latter qualities than how the struggling colony at Plymouth
dealt with those who had sponsored them in their quest to America. The English
merchant venturers had financed the Pilgrim’s voyage via the Mayflower at a
usurious 40% interest. In return for this, the merchants had promised the
Pilgrim settlers regular support shipments of food, tools, grain and other
survival essentials. Instead, the unscrupulous merchants literally sent
shiploads of freedom-seeking people, who were completely unprepared to deal
with the harsh realities of life in the new world wilderness.
As it turned out, the
new arrivals were sent without personal provisions and the merchants neglected
to include the support supplies they had promised the needy Pilgrims. Though
betrayed by the English company several times, the Pilgrims arrived at the
decision that they had contracted their voyage with the merchants in good faith
and must keep their word and honor their end of the agreement. Jesus told them in Matthew 5:37, “Let your
yes be yes.”
______________________________________________________
The Biblical
character qualities hammered out by the Pilgrims were the spiritual foundation
of the new American nation.
______________________________________________________
The Pilgrim
settlement eventually paid off the entire sum with interest. This demonstration
of the character of the American forefathers is to us a precedent when tempted
to default on financial agreements due to unjust, or even only irritating,
treatment. The Bible instructed the early Americans to honor their word and
contracts. The Pilgrims of the Plymouth colony saw this integrity as part of
the spiritual roots of the new land.
The Pilgrims took in
the new arrivals and helped and taught them instead of turning them out to make
their own way in the wilderness. This was at considerable strain to their own
inadequate provisions and comfort. The Bible instructed them to love their
neighbors as themselves, not mentioning circumstances. Jesus taught, “Whatever
you wish others to do for you, do so for them.” The context of this care was an
attitude of forgiveness towards those in England who were using the new colony
to line their own pockets.
God honored the
Plymouth settlers. Over the years, the Pilgrims’ ideas of character, civil
government and economics became cornerstone foundations of the American
political and economic systems.
It took 150 years of
preparing the character of the colonists before God released them to break from
England and become a nation. It also took the Great Awakening to unite the
colonists. The constitution of a land is first internal then external, first
real individual character then the piece of paper.
The first Great
Awakening in America took place in the period from approximately 1740 to
1780. Multitudes throughout the colonies
came into a personal relationship with Jesus Christ in a true grass roots
Biblical revival. It was a sovereign move of God. Along with individual surrender to God and an
increase in personal righteousness came understanding of God’s ways in
government by moral principle and Biblical principles of civil government.
Rather than a general
rebellion, the American Revolution was essentially Biblical self-defense
against increasingly unjust oppression by the mother country, as enumerated in
the Declaration of Independence.[ix] The American Revolution had purpose and
design. It was carefully thought through
and not simply anarchy against legitimate authority. In contrast, the French
revolution’s lack of this foundation in Biblical principle resulted in a reign
of terror, anarchy, great arbitrary bloodshed, and tyranny.
A BACKSLIDDEN NATION
As a nation, America has
in our generation turned from God. We
have ceased governing ourselves under God in many areas. We have been turning
our freedom into license towards anarchy while at the same time becoming more
dependent in character. The civil government has stepped in to take up the
slack in education, welfare, health care, safety laws and other areas. This
strengthens external government, eliminating freedoms and increasing the
potential for corruption.
America needs a new
spiritual awakening now in order to turn this downward, tightening spiral
around, strengthening internal government so liberty can be restored and
maintained.
STUDY QUESTIONS – Chapter VIII
·
Why were the Puritans of Scrooby, England opposed so dramatically
by the English church and state?
·
Describe the life of the Pilgrims in Holland and their reasons for
finally making the voyage to the New World.
·
Explain the seed ideas contained in the Mayflower compact and
their historical significance.
·
Describe the first economic system used by the Pilgrims and its
effects.
·
Explain why the system of "individual enterprise"
brought forth a new mentality of work and responsibility among the Pilgrims.
·
Explain the first Thanksgiving and the reasons for this Pilgrim
festival. How can you make a tradition of telling the true Thanksgiving story in your
family and sphere of influence?
[i] Hall, Verna M. The
Christian History of the Constitution of the United States of America,
Christian Self-Government, San Francisco, Foundation for American Christian
Education, 1966, pp. 191-193, Of Plymouth Plantation.
[ii] Ibid. p. 204. Mayflower
Compact.
[iii] Ibid. p. 204.
[iv] Ibid. p. 206.
[v] Ibid. p. 211.
[vi] Ibid. p. 213.
[vii] Ibid. p. 213.
