There’s a kind of sucker punch in many presentations of American history, wherein we are told that the Puritans left England for America because they had suffered religious persecution—and then the Puritans persecuted other religions here! The hypocrisy is apparently meant to shame Americans about their founding.
Let’s explore this situation. Yes, the Puritans did leave England because they had been persecuted for their religion. For the whole story go to parts 1 and 2 of the Truth v. Myth series on the Protestant Work Ethic. Here, the story in a nutshell is that the Puritans were members of the official state church of England, the Anglican Church, but they felt it needed to be reformed and restructured (purified) to be more Protestant. For their loud and continual protests and complaints against the Anglican Church, the church hierarchy, and even the English monarch and Parliament, the Puritans were disliked and marginalized throughout the late 1500s and early 1600s. When Charles I took the throne and in 1630 made William Laud, a pro-Catholic, anti-Puritan church leader the Archbishop of Canterbury (and thus basically in charge of the Anglican Church), the bulk of England’s Puritan population fled England. Laud harried them out, putting a price on the heads of more outspoken and powerful Puritan ministers, making it a criminal offense to attend Puritan worship services, and generally doing his best to squash all opposition to the Anglican Church.
So in 1630 the Puritans headed to what is now New England. There was already a small outpost of Puritan settlers in Salem (now part of Massachusetts) to welcome the group headed by John Winthrop. But Winthrop’s group soon headed to what is now Boston, and formed the Massachusetts Bay Colony.
So why were the Puritans in New England? Because they had been forced out of England. They were forced out because they wanted to reform human civilization through religion, to wipe out poverty, and to make a heaven on Earth in which everyone was free to discover God’s will for themselves. But these were not generalized goals; that is, the Puritans did not believe that any or every religion, diligently applied, could result in such a paradise. They believed that only their reformed version of Anglican Christianity could put such goals within reach.
They were not completely crazy for thinking so. In the world they knew, the world of European and especially English Christianity, the Puritans were the only group calling for an end to poverty, the only group demanding that all people, even women, be taught how to read (so they could read the Bible, God’s word), and the only group that required its members to work hard to improve the world on a person-by-person basis. Puritans were supposed to live exemplary lives in every respect so that anyone they dealt with—their customers, friends, even strangers they met—would see God through them, and be inspired to seek God themselves.
Thus the Puritans might be excused for thinking their religion was the only one that could save the world. In their limited experience of the world, theirs was the most actively reformist faith. They left England to preserve that faith, so that Puritanism would not be diluted or destroyed. They left England to create a place where Puritanism could thrive, and eventually grow so strong that when England was destroyed by God for its apostasy, the fugitive Puritans would be left to re-establish Christian civilization.
Now we see why the Puritans did not encourage religious diversity or practice religious tolerance in New England. It was not because they were terrible, hateful people. It was because they were on a mission, and they feared God’s wrath upon themselves if they failed in that mission to create a holy nation on Earth. They left England to establish a Puritan state where Puritan Anglicanism—Congregationalism—could be practiced. They did not leave England to establish a state where people were free to practice whatever religion they wanted. It is incorrect to say the Puritans wanted freedom of religion; they did not. They wanted to be able to practice their own religion freely. Those are two very different things, and we should not misrepresent the Puritans by claiming they believed in freedom of religion.
The Puritans in New England broadcast their intentions, making it as clear as they possibly could that people of other faiths were not welcome there. They made no secret of their hostility to outside religious presence. When people of other faiths insisted on entering New England, the Puritans boiled over with anger.
The question we ask ourselves at this point is, why did people of other faiths go to New England when they knew the situation there? Because they were just as zealous and single-minded about their own faiths as the Puritans. We tend to think of the Quakers who were persecuted in New England as gentle innocents who did no wrong. But Quakers in the 17th century were the most radical Protestant sect in England, maybe even in Europe. They entered Puritan towns banging pots and pans, screaming and singing, entering meeting-houses during Puritan worship and yelling to the congregation to hear their words. Sometimes Quakers stripped themselves naked in the center of town to call attention to the need to strip oneself of earthly attachments. They got the derisive nickname “Quakers” because they would go into convulsive fits during their worship services.
The Quakers, then, were a radical and alarming people who went into New England with the express mission to destroy the Puritan way and introduce their own religious beliefs. They were just as feverishly devoted to Quakerism as the Puritans were fanatically devoted to Puritanism. What we have are two radical groups with zero tolerance for other beliefs who were, once the Quakers entered New England, trapped in the same space. Persecution of the Quakers followed, in Boston as it did in London.
It is only if we think that the 18th-century beliefs about religious tolerance enshrined in our Constitution came directly from the 17th century, then, that we can be dismayed to find no freedom of religion in Puritan New England. Almost no one in 17th-century Europe believed in freedom of religion or freedom of conscience. The Quakers did not, the Puritans did not. Almost all sects believed they alone had the truth of God and that they alone should exist. It took 150 years of religious co-existence in America to get to the point where freedom of religion could be put forward as a basic human right.
Instead of shaking our heads over the religious intolerance of the Puritans, we are better served by understanding the passions, fears, hopes and dreams that competed for the soul of Europe from the grey shores of the New World.
The Historic Present 
Excellent post. A strong summation of Puritan religion in the New World. Keeping in mind the factthat the Puritans believed so deeply in their faith, it comes as no surprise that they would expel people like Roger Williams from their congregation. And as you state, this wasn’t because they were inherantly evil.
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Recommend those interested read The Light and The Glory by David Manuel and Peter Marshall
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I think the negative comments on puritans are more based on these new settlers took over a land that wasn’t theirs, and then nearly wiped out the natives whom had helped them survive in a ruthless bloodshed and injustice. It isn’t really the “religious intolerance” that shames the founding of the American nation, it is the act of taking away the land that belonged to the natives along with many lives and the freedom of the remaining. That alone is a nasty way to form a nation.
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It is nasty, and unfortunately the way every kingdom, city-state, or country has been formed by human beings as far back as records go. Human nature is difficult to curb and perhaps impossible to change. Understanding conquest through an objective lens is important in every national history.
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After 12 Generations let us finally correct the record
The Truth Shall Set You Free
God Bless, Roger H Frost
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After 12 Generations let us finally correct the record
God Bless, Roger H Frost
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The wars between Iroquois and Settlers started when the Puritans witnessed one native murder another. The Puritans captured, the native, found him guilty, and put him to death. The chief concurred with the actions—but the chiefs son did not. When later 5he chief died, and son took over is when attacks on the Puritans began. It was the chief’s son’s hatred for the Puritans that began the wars.
Also, it is my understanding that King James I, helped the Puritans in settling as a way of keeping things peaceful in England— James didn’t hate the Puritans, but their fervor/zeaslousness could be a bit too much, and the King, in his wisdom, united the United Kingdom in a way no other king has before or sins.
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So you defend Puritans by your ignorance of Quakers, using extreme (just as one could use extremes about the Puritans!)? Why can’t we point out good points about both groups? Your revised history is alarming! I admit the Puritans get a “bad rap”…they were NOT bad people…much, much good was handing us by them…but now you have given Quakers an equally “bad rap”…. Perhaps you need to read about Mary Dyer…and other Quakers who did NOT behave as you generalize the Quakers did…
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Hello Scott; why don’t you explain the story of Mary Dyer to everyone? We’d like to have your take on it.
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The Quakers DID believe in freedom of religion and freedom of conscience, as shown by the fact that both were guaranteed in William Penn’s “Holy Experiment” of Pennsylvania. The Quakers disagreed vocally with the Puritans in New England, but they never practiced or advocated persecution. Quakers sometimes seemed rude to others because they avoided fancy language and titles and insisted on treating everyone as equal, to the extent of opening their petition to the king with the words “Dear Charles Stuart” rather than “Your Royal Highness”! They were known for refusing to take off their hats and “bow and scrape” to members of the nobility, which of course infuriated them. The Quaker custom of shaking hands (i.e. treating the other as an equal) did not become widespread in America until egalitarianism became a widespread social ideal in American culture. (Note that I say “ideal” not “practice”…)
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Hello Andrew–you’re right that the Quakers did tolerate minority religious groups in their colony. Still their proselytizing in Puritan New England has overtones of intolerance in that they were unwilling to acknowledge NE as a voluntary association of Puritans who had left England expressly to be in Puritan community, and insisted on evangelizing for their own faith there. Clearly, like everyone else in those days, the Quakers felt their own faith and religious practice were preferable to that of the Puritans.
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Praise the Lord Jesus Christ. For 43 years I have been looking for written documentation to help explain the determination for my kinfolk in 21st century America. Have this culture in North America retreated to 16th century Europe? Praise to my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ for the boldness that only he can give, and my kinfolk, [Thank the Lord] used in their lifetime.
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Praise God. My early ancestor’s. 11 generations ago had stronger and closer family ties. Jesus is the answer.
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I love what you guys are up too. This sort of clever work and coverage!
Keep up the fantastic works guys I’ve added you guys to blogroll.
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Wow. I love the Puritan’s pastoral writings, and have for years. In large degree they’ve held their value. Their illustrations and, to some degree, their theology is dated, but their understanding of human nature is thorough, helpful, and compassionate. I’ve long found it hard to align their first-person teachings with the third-person descriptions I hear of them. Your historical snapshots here are a tremendously helpful framework. Thank you!
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Thanks!That’s what we’re here to do.
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I need to cite this website for an english assignment but I need the author or publisher’s name can you tell me your name
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Hello Amber: it’s R. Sos
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thank you so much
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Following Jesus is the Way
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Some of the above is interesting and helpful, but there are errors and important omissions. –I just read some of them in other comments. The error that I was going to point out was the reason Quakers were stigmatized (it was meant as an insult at the time) by that name: they said that they quaked before God, and before no one else–and I think they first said that in relationship to a trial one of their members had undergone for not using deferential language to those in the nobility.
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Thanks for posting this!!! This helped me do my homework!!!
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Sorry you have such a low information mind to understand the truth. The Truth Will Set you free, you know
Jesus did say a lot of people will listen but not hear and see but see.
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