Wednesday 29 July 2009

The Oneida Community - Cults of America no.3

Doctrines
(1) COMPLEX MARRIAGE - This is where every man and every woman is married to each other. They could engage in sexual intercourse, but could not be attached to each other as stated earlier.
(2) MALE CONTINENCE - This was a form of birth control where during and after sexual intercourse the man could not ejaculate.
(3) ASCENDING FELLOWSHIP - This is where the young virgins in the community were brought into the practice of Complex Marriage. The older godly members who were in a special group and were called Central Members would pick a virgin to be spiritually responsible for. This took place when the young people were about fourteen years old.
(4) MUTUAL CRITICISM - In Mutual Criticism, each member of the community that was being reprimanded was taken in front of either a committee or sometimes the whole community to be criticized for their action.
(5) CONFESSION - The members of the community, according to Noyes, were sinless after conversion, so no confession would be needed.
(6) REGENERATION - That Christ's death was not for the sins of man, but was the first blow to Satan. But that by believing in the death of Christ, one was released from sin, because Christ destroyed the central cause of sin. By believing then, one is regenerated (Whitworth 101-102).
(7) SEPARATION - The members did separate into a community, but their main separation was to be a sexual one.
(8) REVELATION - Noyes never said that he received special revelation, though he did have some twisted interpretations. Noyes once wrote an article in "The Berean" and emphasized the credibility of scripture and denounced those who denied the validity and relevance of scripture.
(9) EQUALITY OF THE SEXES - The Oneida Community believed in equality of the sexes as stated earlier.
(10) MILLENNIAL KINGDOM - That the Millennial Kingdom had been introduced in A.D. 70 at which time Noyes thought Christ had made His Second Coming (Hudson 186).

2 comments:

Stephen Nelson said...

six sex sox sux sex etc.

Stephen Nelson said...

I've always had an interest in experimental community, especially community based on religious principles. Here's a fascinating combination of Christianity and Tantra. Two disparate ancient traditions blended to create something new, something totally unique and original. Seems like a formula for experimental writing. I also love glorious failure - that comes with being Scottish - and life lived flying in the face of conventional thinking. To attempt to live in a completely new and original way, without spiritual or psychological precedent, seems to me totally daring and commendable. One opens oneself up to failure, exploitation, abuse, but also the possibility of new creation. In an age of conventionality and sameness, perhaps we need a bit more of that, even if only in the writing.

(The whole idea was reformulated in the 60s hippie period with mixed success, although there are some communes based on the twin peaks of sex and religion still flourishing today - see Timothy Miller's book "The 60s Communes - Hippies and Beyond")