Quaking with the power

“‘The Power of the Lord’ had multiple meanings for Fox and other early Friends, but the most common use of the phrase was to refer to a sensible, divine power or energy. Friends would experience this power surrounding them or flowing through their bodies under a variety of conditions, but most often at the point of convincement, when facing a trial, or during meeting for worship. An experience of the power was often associated with some kind of involuntary physical or mental phenomenon. When seized by the power, some Friends quaked, vocalized, or fell unconscious to the floor, while other Friends saw brilliant light, had visions, experienced healing, or felt a force emanating from them that was capable of subduing an angry and hostile mob…

Far from being some kind of aberration or even unique to Quakers, these phenomena represent ‘archetypal forms’ of religious expression, a ‘surging, ever-present undercurrent’ of religiosity, usually suppressed, but occasionally breaking to the surface when conditions allow. While I am not suggesting that we return to the 17th-century worldview, I do think that we have a lot to learn from these experiences of the early Friends, if only we take them seriously and view them from the vantage point of the increased knowledge available to us today.”