James Nayler


James Nayler was an English Quaker leader. He was among the members of the Valiant Sixty, a group of early Quaker preachers and missionaries. At the peak of his career, he preached against enclosure and the slave trade.
In 1656, Nayler achieved national notoriety when he re-enacted Christ's "Palm Sunday" entry into Jerusalem by entering Bristol on a horse. He was imprisoned and charged with blasphemy.

Early life

He was born in the town of Ardsley in Yorkshire. In 1642 he joined the Parliamentarian army, and served as quartermaster under John Lambert until 1650.

Religious experience

After experiencing what he described as the voice of God calling him from work in his fields, Nayler gave up his possessions and began seeking a spiritual direction, which he found in Quakerism after meeting the leader of the Quaker Friends movement, George Fox in 1652. Nayler became the most prominent of the travelling Quaker evangelists known as the "Valiant Sixty"; he attracted many converts and was considered a skilled theological debater.

Rift with Fox

Fox's concerns regarding the acts of Nayler's "followers"

Beginning in 1656, Fox expressed his concerns to Nayler that both Nayler's ministry, and that of his associate Martha Simmonds were becoming over-enthusiastic and erratic. Fox's concerns apparently centered specifically on Nayler's having allowed a group of his "followers" to effect that Nayler himself might in some sense be a great prophet or even a "messiah figure". They were soon hardly on speaking terms. On 23 September 1656, Fox visited Nayler in his prison at Exeter; when the prisoner refused to kiss his hand, Fox pushed his foot toward him, "It is my foot," clearly displaying his extreme displeasure with Nayler. The two men soon parted ways, their differences remaining sharp and unresolved. Prominent Quaker author Rufus M. Jones provides a description of the strained encounter:
Nayler tried to make a show of love and would have kissed Fox, but the latter would receive no sham kisses from one whose spirit was plainly wrong. "James," he said, "it will be harder for thee to get down thy rude company than it was for thee to set them up."

Bristol Palm Sunday Re-enactment and sentencing for "blasphemy"

In October 1656, Nayler and his friends, including Simmonds, staged a demonstration which proved disastrous: Nayler re-enacted the "Palm Sunday" arrival of Christ in Jerusalem.
Following Nayler's Palm Sunday Re-enactment, Nayler and some of his "followers" were apprehended and subsequently examined before Parliament. The examination found that many of Nayler's followers then referred to Nayler by such titles as, "Lord", "Prince of Peace", etc., apparently believing that Nayler was in some manner representing the return of Jesus Christ. On 16 December 1656 he was convicted of blasphemy in a highly publicised trial before the Second Protectorate Parliament. Narrowly escaping execution, instead he was sentenced to be put in the pillory and on there to have a red hot iron bored through his tongue, and also to be branded with the letter B for Blasphemer on his forehead, and other public humiliations. Subsequently, he was imprisoned for two years of hard labour.
The Nayler case was part of a broader political attack against the Quakers. Initially, it was discussed under the Blasphemy Ordinance of 1648 with the hope of imposing an authoritative Presbyterian religious settlement upon the Commonwealth,. But ultimately, the prosecution did not rely on any statute. Many of the speeches in the debates about Nayler centred on Biblical tradition regarding heresy and generally urged MPs to quash vice and heresy. After the verdict, Cromwell rejected representations on behalf of Nayler, but at the same time wanted to make sure the case did not provide a precedent for action against the people of god.
To modern eyes, Nayler's Palm Sunday Re-enactment might not seem to be particularly outrageous, especially when compared with other "acts" of some of the other early Quaker "activists". Such Quaker "activists" would occasionally disrupt church services, or would sometimes go out disrobed in public, being "naked as a sign", and as a supposed symbol of "spiritual innocence". At that time, Quakers were already being pressed to denounce the doctrine of the Inner Light because of its implication of equality with Christ, and Nayler's ambiguous symbolism was seen as playing with fire. The Society's subsequent move, mostly driven by Fox, toward a somewhat more organised structure, including giving Meetings the ability to disavow a member, seemed to have been motivated by a desire to avoid similar problems.

Aftermath

George Fox was horrified by the Bristol event, recounting in his Journal that "James ran out into imaginations, and a company with him; and they raised up a great darkness in the nation", despite Nayler's belief that his actions were consistent with Quaker theology, and despite Fox's own having occasionally acted in some certain ways as if he himself might have been somehow similar to the Biblical prophets. Nevertheless, Fox and the movement in general denounced Nayler publicly, though this did not stop anti-Quaker critics from using the incident to paint Quakers as heretics, or to equate them with Ranters.

Reconciliation with Fox

Nayler left prison in 1659 a physically ruined man. He soon went to pay a visit to George Fox, before whom he then knelt and asked for forgiveness, repenting of his earlier actions. Afterwards he was formally forgiven by Fox.

Final year, writings and death

After having been accepted again by Fox, Nayler joined other Quaker critics of the Cromwellian regime, condemning the nation's rulers. In October 1660, while travelling to rejoin his family in Yorkshire, he was robbed and left near death in a field, then brought to the home of a Quaker doctor in Kings Ripton, Huntingdonshire. A day later and two hours before he died on 21 October, aged 42, he made a moving statement which many Quakers since have come to value:
James Nayler was buried on 21 October 1660 "in Thomas Parnell's burying-ground at Kings Ripton." According to the village's website "There is also a Quakers Burial ground to the rear of 'Quakers Rest' on Ramsey Road."

Publications