Part 1 : Resource Material

Testimony of Integrity

What is a testimony?

“(T)he testimonies grow out of our inward religious experience and are intended to give outward expression to the leading of the Spirit of God within; or put another way, they are formed by the voice of conscience illumined by the Light of Christ within.”
Wilmer Cooper, The Testimony of Integrity in the Religious Society of Friends. p. 7

Inwardly, they are our guide to the nature of our Creator, the source of our inspiration, the medium of our understanding … externally they are our guide to life, a sign of the divine love for creation, the means of our prophetic witness. They therefore take their meaning from the highest reality we know. …. We have to look for the root of the testimonies in the inner life, not the outer.”
Punshon as quoted in Cooper, p.8-9

Testimonies start as a matter of choice, a radical departure from generally accepted norms of behavior. They are not a creed (a statement of belief), they describe a standard of behavior.

“(T)he underlying conception of a testimony is that it is a form of communication.  If it does not say something to somebody else, it can scarcely be a testimony.”
John Punshon, Testimony and Tradition, p. 27

The five or six Testimonies commonly referred to today (Simplicity, Peace, Integrity, Community, Equality and Stewardship) were not used by early Quakers. This list was created for use in Quaker education in the twentieth century.  The early Quaker list was much longer but did focus a lot on integrity, which is considered to be the original basis for all the testimonies.

Some of the names that early Quakers used for themselves were Publishers of the Truth or Friends of the Truth. They based that on bible verses from Matthew and James.

·         But let your communication be, Yea, yea; Nay, nay: for whatsoever is more than these cometh of evil. Matthew 5:37

·         But above all, my brethren, do not swear, either by heaven or by earth or with any other oath. But let your “Yes” be “Yes,” and your “No,” “No,” lest you fall into judgment. James 5:12

George Fox railed against hypocrisy again and again in his writings. His vocabulary of words to describe against lying was extensive, using terms such as deceit, unrighteousness, hard-heartedness, wronging, cozening, cheating, and telling a falsehood, a flattery, defrauding, or unjust dealing.  He specifically named two types of dishonesty: false weights and measures, and negotiation.  On the subject of weights and measures, he referenced Proverbs 20:10:  “Unjust weights and unjust measures, both these are an abomination to the Lord.” The prohibition against negotiation gets much more attention.  In addition to repeating the Matthean phrase he used in his Journal “Let your yea be yea and your nay be nay”, he stated more clearly do not “ask more for your commodity than it is worth” and “set no more upon the thing you sell than what you will have.”  When a merchant “ask(s) many times double the worth of the thing…(there) lies the deceit.” The danger he sees was that many words “multiply sins” so that sticking to “yea and nay: will ... keep you out of the evil.” Finally, he described a vision of honesty – if you keep to these strictures, “that will be pleasing to God that you do righteously…  that you may be trusted for faithfulness and honesty.”

Fox wasn’t the only one who focused on honesty. Honesty was the basis of a sermon given by Luke Cock (a butcher) in York in 1721, which has been preserved though the centuries in Britain Yearly Meeting’s Quaker Faith and Practice.  In this sermon, the butcher describes the spiritual awakening he had and the struggle that ensued before he finally was honest in his trade. Presumably, he had been cheating customers using a common practice of the day, using short weights to measure the meat he sold (i.e., that a pound measure was actually less than a pound). Here is what he said in his sermon:

I remember when I first met with my Guide. He led me into a very large and cross [place], where I was to speak the truth from my heart—and before I used to swear and lie too for gain. “Nay, then” said I to my Guide, “I mun (sic) leave Thee here: if Thou leads me up that lane, I can never follow: I’se (sic) be ruined of this butchering trade, if I mu not (sic) lie for a gain.” Here I left my Guide, and was filled with sorrow ... So, I found my Guide again and began to follow Him up this lane and tell the truth from my heart. I had been nought but beggary and poverty before; and now I began to thrive at my trade, and got to the end of this lane, though with some difficulty. (Britain Yearly Meeting Faith and Practice)

 Wilmer Cooper identifies five ideas as part of the Testimony of Integrity:
1. Truth telling,
2. Testimony against oaths, one price system (no bargaining)
3. Authenticity, genuineness, veracity
4. Obedience to the light within
5. Wholeness.