Elias Hicks (March 19, 1748 – February 27, 1830) was a traveling Quaker minister from Long Island, New York. In his ministry he promoted doctrines deemed unorthodox by many which led to lasting controversy, and caused the second major schism within the Religious Society of Friends (the first caused by George Keith in 1691).
Elias Hicks was born in Hempstead, New York, in 1748, the son of John Hicks (1711–1789) and Martha Hicks (née Smith; 1709–1759), who were farmers. He was a carpenter by trade and in his early twenties he became a Quaker like his father.
On January 2, 1771, Hicks married a fellow Quaker, Jemima Seaman, at the Westbury Meeting House and they had eleven children, only five of whom reached adulthood. Hicks eventually became a farmer, settling on his wife's parents' farm in Jericho, New York, in what is now known as the Elias Hicks House. There he and his wife provided, as did other Jericho Quakers, free board and lodging to any traveler on the Jericho Turnpike rather than have them seek accommodation in taverns for the night.
In 1778, Hicks helped to build the Friends meeting house in Jericho, which remains a place of Quaker worship. Hicks preached actively in Quaker meeting, and by 1778 he was acknowledged as a recorded minister. Hicks was regarded as a gifted speaker with a strong voice and dramatic flair. He drew large crowds when he was said to be attending meetings, sometimes in the thousands. In November 1829, the young Walt Whitman heard Hicks preach at Morrison's Hotel in Brooklyn, and later said, "Always Elias Hicks gives the service of pointing to the fountain of all naked theology, all religion, all worship, all the truth to which you are possibly eligible—namely in yourself and your inherent relations. Others talk of Bibles, saints, churches, exhortations, vicarious atonements—the canons outside of yourself and apart from man—Elias Hicks points to the religion inside of man's very own nature. This he incessantly labors to kindle, nourish, educate, bring forward and strengthen."
Elias Hicks was one of the early Quaker abolitionists. In 1778 on Long Island, he joined with fellow Quakers who had begun manumitting their slaves as early as March 1776 (James Titus and Phebe Willets Mott Dodge). The Quakers at Westbury Meeting were amongst the first in New York to do so and, gradually following their example, all Westbury Quaker slaves were freed by 1799.
In 1794, Hicks was a founder of the Charity Society of Jericho and Westbury Meetings, established to give aid to local poor African Americans and provide their children with education.
In 1811, Hicks wrote Observations on the Slavery of Africans and Their Descendants and in it he linked the moral issue of emancipation to the Quaker Peace Testimony, by stating that slavery was the product of war. He identified economic reasons for the perpetuation of slavery:
Q. 10. By what class of the people is the slavery of the Africans and their descendants supported and encouraged? A. Principally by the purchasers and consumers of the produce of the slaves' labour; as the profits arising from the produce of their labour, is the only stimulus or inducement for making slaves.
and he advocated a consumer boycott of slave-produced goods to remove the economic reasons for their existence:
Q. 11. What effect would it have on the slave holders and their slaves, should the people of the United States of America and the inhabitants of Great Britain, refuse to purchase or make use of any goods that are the product of Slavery? A. It would doubtless have a particular effect on the slave holders, by circumscribing their avarice, and preventing their heaping up riches, and living in a state of luxury and excess on the gain of oppression …
Observations on the Slavery of Africans and Their Descendents gave the free produce movement its central argument. This movement promoted an embargo of all goods produced by slave labor, which were mainly cotton cloth and cane sugar, in favor of produce from the paid labor of free people. Though the free produce movement was not intended to be a religious response to slavery, most of the free produce stores were Quaker in origin, as with the first such store, that of Benjamin Lundy in Baltimore in 1826.
Hicks supported Lundy's scheme to assist the emigration of freed slaves to Haiti and in 1824, he hosted a meeting on how to facilitate this at his home in Jericho. In the late 1820s, he argued in favor of raising funds to buy slaves and settle them as free people in the American Southwest.
Hicks influenced the abolition of slavery in his home state, from the partial abolition of the 1799 Gradual Abolition Act to the 1817 Gradual Manumission in New York State Act which led to the final emancipation of all remaining slaves within the state on July 4, 1827.
Hicks ministry would be part of the first schism within Quakerism, the 1827–1828 Hicksite–Orthodox split.
The central doctrinal focus of the Hicksite–Orthodox split was the role of the Bible and Jesus Christ. Both Hicksites and Orthodox Quakers viewed their positions as continuations of the original Quakers views. On the other hand, historians such as Glen Crothers argue that the schism resulted from the Second Great Awakening in the United States leading to Orthodox Quakers adopting more Biblical views as influenced by American Evangelicals.
Elias Hicks argued that Inward Light in each individual is the primary focus of an individual's faith over creed or doctrine, which follows George Fox and early Quaker concepts of inward light as "the presence of Christ in the heart", God's presence in each person, and the Holy Spirit speaking through each person. (The interchangeable use of Jesus, God, and the Holy Spirit is due to his and early Quaker rejection of the Trinity.)
As a consequence, the Bible was to Hicks a secondary source of faith and understanding of God, as it is written entirely and divinely inspired by the Holy Spirit. He wroteI confirm my doctrine abundantly from their testimony: and I have always endeavored sincerely to place them [the scriptures] in their true place and station, but never dare exalt them above what they themselves declare; and as no spring can rise higher than its fountain, so likewise the Scriptures can only direct to the fountain from whence they originated – the spirit of truth: as saith the apostle, 'The things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God'; therefore when the Scriptures have directed and pointed us to this light within, or Spirit of Truth, there they must stop – it is their ultimatum – the top stone of what they can do And no other external testimony of men or books can do any more.Hicks sparked great controversy for writing in letters to his friends that the scriptures created more harm than good, because different factions of Christians held the Bible in too high a regard and without using the inward light as the primary source of understanding with which to interpret the Bible.
In a personal letter he wroteFor it is my candid belief, that those that hold and believe the Scriptures to be the only rule of faith and practice, to these it does much more hurt than good. And has anything tended more to divide Christendom into sects and parties than the Scriptures? and by which so many cruel and bloody wars have been promulgated [promoted]. And yet at the same time, may it not be one of the best books, if rightly used under the guidance of the Holy Spirit? But, if abused, like every other blessing, it becomes a curse. Therefore to these it always does more hurt than good; and thou knowest that these comprehend far the greatest part of Christendom!Regarding Jesus Christ, Hicks wrote that the miracles Jesus performed were meant to prove the existence of God. He argued that Jesus was the savior of the Jewish people by replacing the law put forth by Moses. He also argued that Jesus provided the path to salvation for all people exemplified by his life, which was perfectly and entirely guided and united with the Holy Spirit through his inward light. To Hicks, Jesus divinity by being united with God and the Holy Spirit occurred at two points of Jesus' life, his divine conception and his baptism by John the Baptist.