Father Divine (abo. 1880 - September 10 1965), was an African-American spiritual leader from about 1907 until his death. His full self-given name was Reverend General Jealous Divine, and he was also known as "the Messenger" and George Baker early in his life. He founded the International Peace Mission movement, formulated its doctrine, and oversaw its growth from a small and predominantly black congregation into a multiracial and international church.
Controversially, Father Divine claimed to be God. Contemporary critics also claimed he was a charlatan, and some suppose him to be one of the first modern cult leaders. However, Father Divine made numerous contributions toward his followers' economic independence and racial equality even if that was not his primary motivation.
Early life and original name
Little is definitively known about Father Divine's early life, or even his real given name. Father Divine and the Peace Movement he started were not good record keepers. Father Divine himself declined several offers to biography his life saying that the history of God would not be useful in mortal terms. He also refused to acknowledge relationship to any family. Newspapers in the 1930s had to dig up his probable given name: George Baker.
His childhood remains a contentious point. Some, especially earlier researchers, suppose that Father Divine was born in the Deep South, most likely in Georgia as the son of sharecroppers. Newer research by Jill Watts, based on census data, finds evidence for a George Baker Jr. of appropriate age born in a African-American ghetto of Rockville, Maryland called Monkey Run. If this theory is correct, his mother was a former slave called Nancy Baker who died morbidly obese in May of 1897.
Most researchers agree that Father Divine's parents were freed African-American slaves. Notoriously poor records were kept about this generation of African-Americans so controversy about his upbringing will not likely be resolved.
Father Divine was probably called George Baker around the turn of the century. He worked as a gardener in Baltimore, Maryland. In a 1906 sojourn to California, Baker became acquainted with the ideas of Charles Fillmore and the "New Thought Movement," a philosophy of positive thinking that would inform his later doctrines. Among other things, this belief system asserted that negative thoughts led to poverty and unhappiness.
Baker attended a local Baptist Church, often preaching, until 1907 when a traveling preacher called Samuel Morris spoke to and was expelled from the congregation. Morris, originally from Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, had a soft-spoken and uncontroversial sermon until the end when he raised his arms and shouted, "I am the Eternal Father!" This routine had him thrown out of many churches in Baltimore and was apparently unsuccessful until Morris happened upon the receptive George Baker.
In his late 20s Baker became Morris' first follower and adopted a pseudonym, "the Messenger". The Messenger was a Christ figure to Morris's God the Father. The Messenger preached with Morris in Baltimore out of the home of former evangelist Harriette Snowden who came to accept their divinity. Morris began calling himself "Father Jehovia".
The Messenger and Father Jehovia were later joined by John A. Hickerson who called himself Reverend Bishop Saint John the Vine. John the Vine shared The Messenger's excellent speaking ability and his interest in New Thought.
In 1912, the three-man ministry collapsed as the John the Vine denied Father Jehovia's monopoly on godhood citing 1 John 4:15 to mean God was in everyone.
- "Whoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God dwells in him and he in God."
The Messenger denied both that Father Jehovia was God and that anyone could be God. Instead he declared that he himself was the only true expression of God's spirit. In 1912, the Messenger parted ways with his former associates and became a self-proclaimed God.
Preaching as God: 1912-1964
In the South: 1912-1914
The Messenger traveled south. He preached extensively in Georgia. In 1913, conflicts with local ministers got him sentenced to 60 days in a chain gang. While serving his sentence, several prison inspectors were injured in an auto accident, which The Messenger viewed as the direct result of their disbelief.
Upon release, The Messenger attracted a following of mostly black women in Valdosta, Georgia. He taught celibacy and the rejection of gender categorizations, which was liberating doctrine for southern black women. Black men, however, were not amused.
On February 6, 1914, several follower's husbands and local preachers had The Messenger arrested for lunacy. This actually expanded his ministry, with reporters and worshippers deluging his prison cell. Some whites even began calling on him. One white disciple, J. R. Moseley, arranged for J. B. Copeland, a respected Valdosta lawyer, to represent him pro bono. The Messenger was found mentally sound in spite of "maniacal" beliefs. However, outraged black males forced him from Valdosta.
Brooklyn and marriage to Peninniah: 1914-1919
In 1914, The Messenger traveled to Brooklyn, New York with a very modest number of followers and an all-black congregation. Although he claimed to be God incarnate fulfilling Biblical prophecy, he lived relatively quietly.
He and his disciples formed a commune in a black middle-class apartment building. The Messenger forbade sex, alcohol, tobacco, and gambling among those that lived with him. By 1919 he had adopted the name Reverend Major Jealous Divine. "Reverend Major" was chosen as a title of respect and authority while "Jealous" was a reference to Exodus 34:14 where the Lord says He is a "jealous god". His followers affectionately called him Father Divine.
In this period Father Divine married a follower, Peninniah, who was decades his senior. Like Father Divine, her early life is obscure, but the she is believed to be from Macon, Georgia. The date of the marriage is unknown but probably occurred from 1914 to 1917.
In addition to lending her dignified look to The Messenger, Peninniah served to diffuse rumors of impropriety between The Messenger and his many young female followers. Both Peninniah, who was often called "Mother Divine", and Father Divine would assert that the marriage was never physically consummated. Indeed, no evidence suggests otherwise.
Sayville, New York: 1919-1931
Father Divine and his disciples moved to Sayville, New York (on Long Island), in 1919. Sayville was a seasonal vacation community with relatively few permanent residents. Interestingly, Sayville was founded by a family of witch hunters, the Edwards.
Father Divine and his followers were the first black homeowners in town. Father Divine purchased his 72 Macon Street house from a resident who wanted to spite the neighbor he was feuding with. The two neighbors, both German Americans, began fighting when one of them changed his name from "Felgenhauer" to "Fellows" in response to anti-German sentiment. His neighbor taunted him, and the feud escalated until Fellows decided to move. As a final insult, he specifically advertised his home for sale to a "colored" buyer to presumably lower his neighbors' property values.
In this period, his movement underwent sustained growth. Father Divine held free weekly banquets and helped comers find jobs. He began attracting many white followers as well as black. The integrated environment of Father Divine's communal house and the apparently flaunted wealth of his Cadillac infuriated neighbors. Members of the overwhelmingly white community accused him of maintaining a large harem and engaging in scandalous sex although the Suffolk County district attorney's office found the claims baseless. Nonetheless, neighbors continued to complain.
Sayville arrests, trail, notoriety, and prison: 1931-1932
On May 8, 1931, a Sayville deputy arrested and charged Father Divine with disturbing the peace. Remarkable in the depression, Father Divine submitted his $1000 bail in cash. The trial, not as speedy as the neighbors wanted, was scheduled for late Fall allowing Father Divine's popularity to snowball for the entire Sayville vacation season.
Father Divine held banquets for as many as 3000 people that summer. Cars clogging the streets for these gatherings bolstered some neighbor's claims that Father Divine was a disturbing to the peace and furthermore hurting their property values.
On Sunday, November 15 at 12:15 AM, a police officer was called to Father Divine's raucously loud property. By the time state troopers, deputies and prison buses were called in, a mob of neighbors had surrounded the compound. Fearing riot, the police informed Father Divine and his followers that they had fifteen minutes. Father Divine had them wait in silence for ten minutes, and then they filed into police custody. Processed by the county jail at 3 AM, clerks were frustrated because the followers often refused to give their usual names and stubbornly offered the "inspired" names they adopted in the movement. Seventy-eight people were arrested altogether, including fifteen whites. Forty-six pled guilty to disturbing the peace and incurred $5 fines which Father Divine paid with a $500 bill that the court was embarrassingly unable to make change from. Peninniah, Father Divine, and thirty followers resisted the charges.
Father Divine's arrest and heterodox doctrines were sensationally reported. The New York press feeding frenzy made this event and its repercussions the single most famous moment of Father Divine's life. Although mostly inaccurate, articles on Father Divine propelled his popularity. By December his followers began renting buildings in New York City for Father Divine to speak in. Soon, he often had several engagements on a single night. On December 20 he spoke to an estimated 10,000 in Harlem's Rockland Palace, a spacious former casino.
By May of 1932, meetings were regularly held at the Rockland and throughout New York and New Jersey. Father Divine had supporters in Washington state, California and throughout the world thanks to New Thought devotees like Eugene Del Mar, an early convert and former Harlem journalist, and Henry Joerns, the publisher of a New Thought magazine in Seattle. Curiously, although the movement was predominantly black, followers outside the Northeast were mostly middle class whites.
In this period of expansions, several branch communes were opened in New York and New Jersey. Father Divine's followers finally named the movement: the International Peace Mission movement.
Father Divine's trial was finally held on May 24, 1932. His lawyer, Ellee J. Lovelace, a prominent Harlem African American and former US Attorney had requested the trial be moved outside of Suffolk County due to potential jury bias. The court acquiesced and the trail took place at the Nassau County Supreme Court before Justice Lewis J. Smith. The jury found him guilty on June 5, but asked for leniency on behalf of Father Divine. Ignoring this request, Justice Smith lectured on how Father Divine was a fraud and "menace to society" before issuing the maximum sentence for disturbing the peace, one year in prison and a $500 fine.
Smith, 55, died of a heart attack days later on June 9, 1932. Father Divine famously commented on the untimely death, "I hated to do it." The impression that Justice Smith's death was divine retribution was perpetuated by the press, which failed to report Smith's prior heart problems. The death was implied to be more sudden and unexpected than it was.
During his brief prison stay, Father Divine read prodigiously, notably on the Scottsboro nine. After his attorneys secured release through an appeal on June 25 1932, he declared that the foundational documents of the United States of America like the Constitution and Declaration of Independence were inspired. Father divine also taught that contemporary leaders strayed from these ideals, but he would become increasingly patriotic through his life.
Harlem: 1932-1942
Father Divine moved to Harlem, New York where he had accumulated significant following in the black community. Members, rather than Father Divine himself, held most deeds for the movement, but they contributed toward Father Divine's comfortable lifestyle. Purchasing several hotels, which they called "Heavens", members could live and seek jobs inexpensively. The movement also opened several budget enterprises including restaurants and clothing shops that sold cheaply by cutting overhead. These proved very successful in the depression. Economical, cash-only businesses were actually part of Father Divine's doctrine.
By 1934 branches had opened in Los Angeles, California, and Seattle, Washington, and gatherings occurred in France, Switzerland, Canada, and Australia, but the membership totals were drastically overstated in the press. Time magazine estimated nearly 2 million followers, but the true figure of adherents was probably a few tens of thousands, and a larger body of sympathizers who attended his gatherings. Nonetheless, Father Divine was increasingly called upon to offer political endorsements, which he initially didn't grant. For example, New York mayoral candidates John P. O'Brien and Fiorello H. LaGuardia each sought his endorsement in 1933, but Father Divine was apparently uninterested.
An odd alliance between Father Divine and the Communist Party of America began in early 1934. Although Father Divine was outspokenly capitalist, he was impressed with the party's commitment to civil rights. The party relished the endorsement although contemporary FBI records indicate some critics of the perceived huckster were expelled from the party for protesting the alliance.
In spite of this alliance, the movement was largely apolitical until the Harlem Riot of March 19, 1935. Based on a rumor of police killing a black teenager, it left four dead and caused over $1 million in property damage in Father Divine's neighborhood. Father Divine's outrage at this and other racial injustices fueled a keener interest in politics. In January 1939 the movement organized the first-ever "Divine Righteous Government Convention", which crafted political platforms incorporating the Doctrine of Father Divine. Among other things the delegates opposed school segregation and many of Franklin Delano Roosevelt's social programs, which they interpreted as "handouts".
At the zenith of Father Divine's influence, several misfortunes struck the movement.
On December 16 John Hunt, a white millionaire and disciple from California calling himself John the Revelator, met the Jewett family of Denver, Colorado. He kidnapped their 17 year-old daughter Delight and took her back to California without her parent's consent. Renaming her "Virgin Mary," John the Revelator began sexual relations with her. He announced that she would give birth to a "New Redeemer" by "immaculate conception" in Hawaii. Father Divine summoned Hunt to New York, separated the couple and chastised his eccentric follower. The Jewetts, finding their daughter apparently brainwashed into believing she was literally the Virgin Mary demanded compensation. After the movement's attorneys conducted an internal investigation, they refused. Outraged, the Jewetts offered their story to William Randolph Hearst's New York Evening Journal , an established critic of the movement. After a manhunt and trial, John Hunt was sentenced to three years and adopted a new name, the "Prodigal Son". Father Divine publicly endorsed the conviction of John the Revelator contrary to some expectations (some followers expected him to once again "smite" the judge). However, the scandal brought bad publicity to Father Divine. News coverage implied his followers were gullible and dangerous.
In March 1937, Peninniah fell ill in Kingston, New York. Father Divine rarely comforted her on what was widely believed to be her deathbed. He kept running the church, only visiting her once in Kingston, again causing bad publicity. Peninniah, however, claimed that she was not seriously ill or in pain.
On April 20, 1937, a violent outburst occurred in a meeting when two men tried to deliver Father Divine summons. One of the men, Harry Green, was stabbed as Father Divine fled. Father Divine went into hiding to evade authorities.
During this time, one of Father Divine's most prominent members, called Faithful Mary, defected and took control of a large commune, which was technically in her name. Of the Father she said, "he's just a damned man." She furthermore alleged that he defrauded his followers to maintain a rich lifestyle for himself. Faithful Mary also made a number of sexual allegations including a charge that Father Divine coerced females to have sex with key disciples.
In early May, Father Divine was located and extradited from Connecticut and faced criminal charges in New York. That summer, Hearst's Metronone newsreel distributed mocking footage of Father Divine's followers singing outside police headquarters "Glory, glory, hallelujah! Our God is in our land!"
Later in May 1937, an ex-follower called Verinda Brown filed a lawsuit for $4,476 against Father Divine. The Browns had entrusted their savings with Father Divine in Sayville back in 1931. They left the movement in 1935 wishing to live as husband and wife again, but were unable to get their money back. In light of their evidence and testimony from Faithful Mary and others critical of the movement, the court ordered repayment of the money. However, this opened up an enormous potential liability from all ex-devotees, so Father Divine resisted and appealed the judgment.
Father Divine bounced back in 1938. He was cleared of criminal charges and Mother Divine recovered. Faithful Mary, impoverished and broken, returned to the movement. Father Divine made her grovel for forgiveness, which she did. By the late 1930s the movement stabilized although it had clearly passed its zenith.
Father Divine's political focus on anti-lynching measures became more resolved. By 1940, his followers had gathered 250,000 signatures in favor of an anti-lynching bill he wrote. However, passage of such statues came slowly in New York and elsewhere.
The Verinda Brown lawsuit against Father dragged on and was sustained on appeal. In July, 1942 he was ordered to pay Brown or face contempt of court. Instead, Father Divine fled the state, and re-established his headquarters in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He still visited New York, however. State law forbade serving subpoenas in New York on Sunday, so he often spoke on the Sabbath day in Harlem, the Promised Land (his Kingston commune), and Sayville.
Pennsylvania: 1942-death
After moving to Philadelphia, Father Divine's wife Peninniah died. The exact date is not known because Father Divine never talked about it or even acknowledged her passing. However, it occurred sometime in 1943 and biographers believe Peninniah's death rattled Father Divine, making him aware of his own mortality. It became obvious to Father Divine and his followers that his doctrine might not make one immortal as he asserted, at least not in the flesh.
After his first wife died, Father Divine married a white Canadian woman called Edna Rose Ritchings in Washington D.C. on April 26 1946. Interracial marriage was then illegal in Pennsylvania and the ceremony was kept secret even from most members until Ritching's Visa expired. Critics of the movement believed that Father Divine's seemingly scandalous marriage to 21 year-old Ritchings would destroy the movement. Instead, most followers rejoiced, and the marriage date became a celebrated anniversary in the movement. To prove that he and Ritchings adhered to his doctrine on sexual abstinence, Father Divine assigned a black female follower to be her constant companion.
He claimed that Ritchings, later called "Mother S. A. Divine", was the reincarnation of Peninniah. Reincarnation was not previously part of Father Divine's doctrine, and did not become a fixture of his theology. Followers believed that Peninniah was an exceptional case and viewed her "return" as a miracle.
Going into the 1950s, the press rarely covered Father Divine, and when it did, it was no longer as a menace, but as an amusing relic. For example, light-hearted stories ran when Father Divine announced Philadelphia was capital of the world, and when he claimed to inspire invention of the hydrogen bomb. Father Divine's predominantly lower class following ebbed as the economy swelled.
In 1953, a follower called John Devoute gave Father Divine Woodmont, a 72 acre (0.3 km²) hilltop estate in Gladwyne, Pennsylvania outside of Philadelphia. This French gothic manor served as his home and primary site of his increasingly infrequent banquets until his death in 1965.
As his health declined, he continued to petition for civil rights. In 1951 he advocated reparations, to be paid to the decedents of slaves. He also argued in favor of integrated neighborhoods. However, he did not participate in the burgeoning civil rights movement because of his poor health and especially because he disliked the use of racial labels, denying he was black.
On September 10, 1965, Father Divine died of natural causes at his Woodmont estate. His widow and remaining followers insist his spirit is still alive and always refer to Father Divine in the present tense. Believers keep the furnishings of Father Divine's personal rooms at Woodmont just as they were as a shrine to his life.
Mrs. S. A. Divine became spiritual leader of the movement. In the 1972 she fought an attempt by cult leader Jim Jones to take over the movement's dwindling devotees. Jones based some of his doctrines on the International Peace Mission movement, and claimed to be the reincarnation of Father Divine.
After the People's Temple mass suicide in Jonestown, Guyana, Father Divine was posthumously slandered in a made-for-TV movie, "Guyana Tragedy: The Story of Jim Jones". In the movie, Father Divine, played by James Earl Jones, advises the Jim Jones character to bring sexual desires to fruition.
Physical characteristics and preaching style
Father Devine was a lightly built African American man at a diminutive 5 foot, 2 inches (1.57 m). Through most of his life he maintained a moustache which he kept well groomed. His hair was invariably combed, and since his days in Sayville, New York he almost always wore a suit in public.
Like many religious or cult leaders, Father Divine was said to be very charismatic. His sermons were emotionally moving and freely associated between topics. His speech was often peppered with words of his own invention like "physicalating" and "tangeblated". Other eccentricities were drawn from his doctrine. For example, nearly every sermon began with the greeting and exhortation, "peace!" Father Divine believed that "peace" should replace "hello."
See also: Doctrine of Father Divine
Civil rights legacy
Some biographers such as Robert Weisbrot suppose that Father Divine was a forerunner to the civil rights struggles of the 1950s and 1960s, heavily influenced by his upbringing in the segregated South. Others, such as Jill Watts reject not only this characterization, but also the theory Father Divine grew up in the Deep South. Watts subscribes to the Rockville, Maryland theory of his upbringing and asserts that Rockville was less oppressive than the south or even Baltimore, Maryland. Watts believes his civil rights positions are unintelligible without evaluating them in context of the Doctrine of Father Divine
Although Father Divine strove extensively against lynching and bigotry, he accepted many of the negative characteristics assigned African Americans. He concluded that those who identified themselves as "black" manifested these characteristics. In short, he believed blacks perpetuated their own oppression by thinking racially. He once said that he was not poor because he did not belong to a poor downtrodden race—that he was not black.
In spite of Father Divine's "conservative" positions dissimilar to later civil rights leaders, his symbolic success story empowered his followers and other African Americans.
Religious legacy
As of 2004, Edna Rose Ritchings (Mother Divine) is still alive and conducts services for the old and dwindling congregation. The movement still owns several properties such as the Divine Tracy Hotel near the University of Pennsylvania. This budget hotel has separate floors for men and women in accord with Father Divine's teachings. Other properties include Father Divine's Gladwyne estate "Woodmont" and his former home in Sayville, New York.
Chapters exist in California as well as in Pennsylvania and New York, but the Movement is not centralized and exists through a number of inter-related groups.
Father Divine is thought to be an influential and original African American religious figure whose reputation was marred by the countercult movement of the 1970s.
References
-
God Comes to America: Father Divine and the Peace Mission Movement, Kenneth E. Burnham, Boston: Lambeth Press, 1979 ISBN 0-93-118601-3
-
Father Divine and the Struggle for Racial Equality, Robert Weisbrot, Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1983 ISBN 0-79-101122-4
-
God, Harlem U.S.A: the Father Divine story, Jill Watts, Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1992 ISBN 0-52-007455-6
External links
Last updated: 05-07-2005 12:52:33
Last updated: 05-13-2005 07:56:04
