by Matthew Gaetano

In an earlier post, I discussed George Keith (d. 1716), a learned Quaker in colonial America, and his discussion of Platonism and religious experience. His 1693 Exhortation and Caution about any Quakers keeping or buying slaves, particularly those of African descent, was an unusually bold statement of opposition to slavery, even among Quakers. It came just a few years after the famous 1688 Germantown Protest, the first protest – also connected to the Quakers in North America – against enslaving Africans in these colonies (for protests in Spanish America just a few years earlier, see here).

Though it should be noted that Keith’s Exhortation came just after his break with the mainstream Quaker movement and his formation of the sect of “Christian Quakers,” the arguments laid out in this document from the 1690s are nonetheless worthy of careful consideration. He begins with the universality of Christ’s atonement, which transcends any distinctions based upon the color of one’s skin. Citing John 1, Keith highlights that Christ is the Light who enlightens “every Man that cometh into the World.” Christ also came as a Liberator–“to ease and deliver the Oppressed and Distressed, and bring into Liberty both inward and outward.” At some points in the Christian theological tradition, interior liberty brought to us by Christ has made the effort to secure outward liberty appear more or less insignificant. Keith here links interior and outward liberty as part of the liberating mission of Christ. Christians bear Christ’s image and thus should have “the Fruits of the Spirit of Christ, which are Love, Mercy, Goodness, and Compassion towards all in Misery, and that suffer Oppression” (2). Such a manifestation of Christ’s love would certainly be part of evangelizing the nations.

The emphasis on outward liberty and “the Liberty the Gospel calleth all men unto” are important elements in Keith’s work. But this work against slavery did not require an intellectual revolution. In other words, the premises of the argument can readily be found in Scripture and the theological tradition, but they are woven together here in an original way. The basic notes are the unity of the human race, the universality of Christ’s atonement, the call of Christians to share in Christ’s love and mercy, and following the Golden Rule. Breaking this rule and the failure of believers to make manifest the restoration of God’s image by His grace are scandalous to the world.

Keith laid out five reasons:

1. Christian Quakers should not buy “stollen Goods” (3). This is something that one could find in earlier discussions of slavery in the Catholic and Protestant theological traditions. There were only a few legal titles to slavery: being defeated as someone on the wrong side in a just war, selling oneself into slavery, being the child of a legitimate slave (particularly if one’s mother is a slave).
2. The Golden Rule: “We and our Children would not be kept in perpetual Bondage and Slavery against our Consent, neither should we keep them in perpetual Bondage and Slavery against their Consent” (3). Keith does suggest here that “notorious Criminal Offendors” are deserving of “such intollerable Punishment to … Bodies and Minds.” These human beings of African descent and their children do not deserve anything like this; they “have done us no harme.” Such an act of grievous oppression – from generation to generation – is utterly “inhumane” (4). Keith does not make it explicit, but there are a number of places where the idea of the condition of slavery being passed down to one’s children is rejected as inhumane and anti-Christian. Is there also a suggestion here that being on the wrong side in a war is not a sufficient basis for such an “intollerable punishment”? Are all captives of war, even if they are truly on the side of injustice, “notrious Criminal Offendors.”
3. Keith offers a controversial (see here and here) interpretation of Deuteronomy 23:15-16 about not returning fugitive slaves. If the Law of Moses “extend[ed] such Mercy,” how much more would “the clear Gospel Ministration” (4). There is an eschatological note sounded with the quotation of Isaiah 66 where God gathers “all Nations and Tongues,” who will “come and see my Glory.” Far off islands “that have not heard my Fame” will hear of God’s glory from “those that escape.”
4. Keith cites Deuteronomy 24:14-15 and Exodus 12:21 to point out that servants, whether “of thy Brethren, or of the Strangers that are in thy Land within thy Gates,” should not be oppressed. And this is in part because “ye were strangers in the Land of Aegypt” (5). “What greater Oppression,” Keith asks, “can there be inflicted upon our Fellow Creatures, than is inflicted on the poor Negroes!” Here he indicates that, while some are stolen, others were captured in war, sold as a payment of debt, and so on. Being taken from their own African lands, divided from their families, put to “continual hard Labour” and even “cruel Whippings,” limited nourishment – how is this not oppression? Keith asserts that some of the treatment here is worse than the treatment of slaves by Turks and other Muslim, a scandal and reproach for the “Christian profession.” Keith concludes this point with the following warning: “Surely the Lord doth behold their Oppressions & Afflictions, and will further visit for the same by his righteous and just Judgments, except they break off their sins by Repentance, and their Iniquity by showing Mercy to these poor afflicted, tormented miserable Slaves!” (6).
5. Keith’s final point has an eschatological dimension. “Come out of Babylon,” Keith says, quoting Revelation 18. The Whore of Babylon was often associated in this time and region with the papacy and other ecclesiastical and political institutions. Keith suggests here that Quakers might end up sharing in the iniquity of this Babylon from the Apocalypse if they buy and keep African slaves. Revelation 18:11-13 says the following:

And the merchants of the earth weep and mourn for her, since no one buys their cargo anymore, cargo of gold, silver, jewels, pearls, fine linen, purple cloth, silk, scarlet cloth, all kinds of scented wood, all kinds of articles of ivory, all kinds of articles of costly wood, bronze, iron and marble, cinnamon, spice, incense, myrrh, frankincense, wine, oil, fine flour, wheat, cattle and sheep, horses and chariots, and slaves, that is, human souls.

According to Keith, “Slaves and Souls of Men are some of the Merchandize of Babylon by which the Merchants of the Earth are made Rich.” Those who share in the liberation of Christ must come out of Babylon and not find themselves in the web of her seductive power, wealth, and pleasures.