D. Elton Trueblood

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David Elton Trueblood (1900 - 1994), usually know as "Elton Trueblood" or "D. Elton Trueblood", was a noted 20th Century American Quaker author and theologian, former chaplain both to Harvard and Stanford Universities. Trueblood abandoned this prestige to settle in the Quaker hub community of Richmond, Indiana to help spur the growth of Earlham College from a tiny regional, religious school and build it into a top flight institution of higher learning. He was a founder of the Earlham School of Religion, a Quaker seminary in Richmond, Indiana and part of a renaissance of American Quaker thought and action spurred on partly by the common experiences of Quaker intellectuals as conscientious objectors during World War II, although Trueblood himself was not a pacifist. He actively sought to mentor younger Quakers into his 90's. Trueblood also founded the Yokefellow movement and supported Stephen Ministries.

He always maintained an internationalist perspective, serving for many years as the permanent representative from the Global Quaker community to the World Council of Churches, an organization he helped bring into being. In the 1950s, Trueblood served as a senior advisor to President Dwight D. Eisenhower, who created a post for him as Director of Religious Information. Later, he served as an advisor to President Richard M. Nixon. He was a political conservative who supported Nixon's foreign policy, including the war in Southeast Asia, and gave the convocation at the 1972 Republican National Convention.

His books include Alternative to Futility, The Logic of Belief, Robert Barclay, Abraham Lincoln, Incendiary Fellowship, The Trustworthiness of Religious Experience (1939 Swarthmore Lecture), A Place to Stand, Your Other Vocation and The Humor of Christ. Trueblood sought to provide the general audience with a great many readable works to promote a depth of religious thought in all people. His final book was an autobiography entitled "While it is Day," which traced his personal journey from his boyhood in Iowa and placed it in the context of the history of his family long connection with Quakerism.

[edit] The Humor of Christ

Trueblood wrote this book “to challenge the conventionalized picture of a Christ who never laughed,” arguing that “there are numerous passages in the recorded teaching which are practically incomprehensible when regarded as sober prose, but which are luminous once we become liberated from the gratuitous assumption that Christ never joked”, e.g.,

• The parable of the shrewd manager (Luke 16:1-9) who discounted the debts owed to his master so that people would welcome him into their houses after he lost his job; the manager was later commended by his master for his actions.
• Jesus said to a Canaanite woman asking for help, “It is not right to take the children’s bread and toss it to their dogs.” (Matthew 15:26 NIV).
• “Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself.” (Matthew 6:34 NIV) According to Trueblood, “some humorless and literal-minded Christians have used this teaching as an excuse to take out no insurance and even to have no savings.”