Liberal Quaker preacher and abolitionist, born in Hempstead, Long Island, New York, USA. A carpenter by trade, he became a preacher in the American Society of Friends (Quakers) in 1775, and worked for the abolition of slavery. Because of his successful opposition to the adoption of a set creed in 1817, he was held responsible for the subsequent split of the Quakers into Orthodox and Hicksite Friends (18278), which continued into the 20th-c.
Elias Hicks (March 19, 1748 - February 27, 1830) was an itinerant Quaker preacher from Long Island, New York. He promoted doctrines that embroiled him in controversy that led to the first major schism within the Religious Society of Friends. Elias should not be confused with his younger cousin, Edward Hicks, then known like Elias as a Quaker preacher, but now remembered mostly for his paintings.
Early life
Elias Hicks was born at Rockaway, Long Island, New York. Hicks’s parents were not Friends themselves.
Hicks married Jemima Seaman January 2, 1771. They moved to her family farm, which Hicks eventually took over when his parents-in-law died.
Ministry
At about the age of twenty-seven, Hicks was recognized as a preacher by the Friends in his meeting. The term "preacher" in Hicksite meetings is not comparable to the ordained ministers of Orthodox Quaker meetings and many other sects, some Friends have indeed become known as speakers on subjects of spiritual import.)
Hicks was one of the early abolitionists among the Friends.
Hicks' Reported Views
Hicks considered “obedience to the light within” the primary tenet and the foundational principle of the Religious Society of Friends.
These views were consistent with a Freethought tradition already prevailing in America, particularly among Deists of Quaker heritage such as Thomas Paine. The most original aspect of Hicks's theology was his rejection of Satan as the source of human "passions" or "propensities." Hicks stressed that basic urges, including all sexual passions, were neither implanted by an external Devil nor the product of personal choice, but were aspects of human nature created by God. Hicks taught that evil and suffering occurred not because human nature harbored these "propensities," but rather resulted from "an excess in the indulgence of propensities."
In 1858, Walt Whitman--one of Hicks's most famous exponents--astutely assessed Hicks as "a wonderful compound of the mystic with the logical reasoner," and explained that Hicks was "destined to make a radical revolution in a numerous and devout Society, and his influence to be largely felt outside of that Society..." The Quaker theology of "God within" (another name for the Inner Light) appeared subsequently in the theory of the Free Love movement, where it was deemed compatible with the religious sociology of Charles Fourier.
Disputes Among Friends
The controversy over Hicks' teaching interrupted the normally calm proceedings of the Religious Society of Friends in 1827. For five years elders of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting had tried to prevent Hicks from speaking in their city, and this resulted in a division within that yearly meeting. Those who agreed with Hicks were generally called Hicksites, and his detractors were called Orthodox Friends. Each side considered itself the legitimate heir to the legacy of earlier Friends, such as George Fox, Margaret Fell and Robert Barclay.
The split was not purely doctrinal. It reflected tensions that had been growing between the elders — who were mostly from the cities — and Friends who lived farther away from major communities and Meetings. Hicksite Friends were mostly country Friends who perceived urban Friends as worldly. Many of the Philadelphia Friends were wealthy businessmen, and many of the country Friends kept less peculiar in matters of "plain speech" and "plain dress", which by this point in time had become a sort of jargon and a sort of uniform, respectively.
Many scholars have written about various aspects of these controversies.
Later life
At the age of 80 Hicks went on his final ministry trip. He covered 2,400 miles and was harassed and shunned by Orthodox Friends along the way. When they replaced the cotton blanket with a woolen one, Hicks relaxed and nodded in approval.
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