Talk:Testimony of Integrity

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[edit] Text from RSoF article

I removed the following text from the Religious Society of Friends article, and it probably makes sense to work this content in here.

In Fox's Journal, he gives an account of being arrested for failing to swear an oath of loyalty to the King. Fox's stand on swearing oaths was well known, but he was not compelled to swear because he held no office, being not dependent up on offices for his financial needs. His enemies surreptitiously named him to a petty office, then arrested him on charges that he would not swear an oath, as required.

In his defense, Fox lectured the crowd about being casual with the truth, of swearing one thing or its opposite, based on convenience rather than on conviction.

His opponents angrily denied this. Fox then asked who among them had sworn an oath to the king. Most raised their hands. Fox then asked them who had sworn an oath to Cromwell, who had been replaced by the King. Caught in this rhetorical net, many of the people present grew nervous. Then Fox asked how many had sworn oaths to Charles I, who had been deposed by Cromwell. His journal then tells how he was eventually freed due to a lack of any person of repute willing to swear against him.

Fox was thus apparently opposed to the very idea of swearing an oath, testifying that through their frequent use we had made truth into a vain and common thing. If God is Truth, he reasoned, then treating truth so casually must be an affront.

For Fox, then, the subject or the form of the oath made no difference; The establishment of a higher level of truthfulness in the sworn statement must imply that other, non-sworn statements are less true. Fox claimed that speaking only truth all of the time was the only allowable condition in which to live.

Later Friends took this prinicple as partial support for their stand against theatre and many of the arts. We should not applaud someone's attempt to be untruthful, whether this be in the role of an actor lying in pretending to be someone else or of the painter who strove to improve upon God's creation, who is the only Truth.

--Ahc 02:50, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

I hope that it shall be done. There is a need for the Testimony on Oaths to be stated clearly, together with the right to affirm. At present the WP article Affirmation is a bit of a mess. The WP article Swear not at all is redirected to Expounding of the Law which has a paragraph on Matthew 5: 33-37 saying

"Several important Christian groups do not however accept such re-interpretations, preferring to uphold what the text actually says; most notably the Quakers and Mennonites firmly reject all oaths, a stance that has led to their persecution by governments that insist on oath taking."

It does not detail Quaker grounds for their interpretation of the text. === Vernon White (talk) 18:57, 21 February 2007 (UTC)