John Eliot

English-born colonial American theologian and missionary

• Born: August 5, 1604 (baptized)
• Birthplace: Widford, Hertfordshire, England
• Died: May 21, 1690
• Place of death: Roxbury, Massachusetts Bay Colony (now Massachusetts)

The Puritan clergyman Eliot is known as the Apostle to the Indians for his close to fifty years of work among the Indians of Massachusetts. He assisted in the production of the first book published in North America, the 1640 Bay Psalm Book, and translated the first Bible printed in North America, an Algonquian language version.

Early Life

John Eliot was the third of seven children born to Bennett Eliot and Lettese Eliot. He was baptized August 5, 1604, in the parish church of Saint John the Baptist. Within six years of John’s birth, the Eliot family moved to the village of Nazeing, Essex. At the time, many of the clergy and laity of Essex felt strong sympathy for the Puritan cause, a fact that would prove significant for the later development of Eliot’s religious beliefs.

In January of the year Eliot was born, King James I of England refused to allow Puritan reforms within the established Church of England. After the accession of Charles I in 1625, the situation worsened for the Puritans: The archbishop of Canterbury, Archbishop William Laud, held that conformity to the practices of the Church of England was not optional. Although many Puritan leaders did not see themselves as separatists from the established church, they nevertheless saw exile from England as their only alternative. The colonists who founded the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1629 belonged to this group of nonseparatist Puritans, and many Puritans from the County of Essex who moved to the colony about the same time as Eliot did were motivated by the same religious reasons.

Eliot lived with his family in Nazeing until 1618, when he entered Jesus College, Cambridge University. He received a B.A. in 1622. The master of Jesus College at the time was the brother of Lancelot Andrewes , Roger Andrewes, who had helped translate the 1611 King James Bible. In later life, Eliot demonstrated his continued respect for his school by sending his alma mater an inscribed copy of the Bible that he had translated into the Algonquian language from the King James Bible.

There is some debate as to where and when Eliot was ordained a clergyman, but it seems likely that he received ordination from the bishop of Ely before he departed for New England in 1631. After his ordination and before his journey to Massachusetts, Eliot served for a time as an usher in the Puritan Thomas Hooker’s private school in Little Baddow. In July, 1630, Hooker fled Archbishop Laud’s persecution for the safety of Holland. In the summer of 1631, Eliot sailed to New England aboard the ship Lyon to begin a new chapter of his life.

Life’s Work

Eliot is best remembered for his work among the Native Americans of Massachusetts; however, from his arrival in New England on November 2, 1631, until his death in 1690, Eliot primarily served as a clergyman for the Puritan settlers. After his arrival, he conducted worship and preached for the church of Boston until its minister returned from England in May, 1632. He then became the second pastor of the church in Roxbury, Massachusetts, where he would remain for fifty-eight years.

By the time Eliot assumed his post in Roxbury, a number of settlers from Nazeing had arrived, including Eliot’s fiancée, Hanna Mumford, and several of Eliot’s sisters and their husbands. Later, they would be joined by Eliot’s brother Philip. Eliot and his fiancée were married in Roxbury’s first recorded marriage ceremony in October, 1632.

Eliot was very much involved in the education of the young in Roxbury and helped found the Roxbury Latin School (Eliot’s brother Philip was the first schoolmaster). In 1637, he was involved with other Boston-area clergy in the trial, excommunication, and banishment of Anne Hutchinson on charges of sedition. Eliot also contributed to the first book published in North America, the Bay Psalm Book (1640; printed by Stephen Day in Cambridge). The Bay Psalm Book provided translations in English meter of the entire Psalter for use in congregational singing.

From the initial days of the founding of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, the settlers had expressed interest in performing Christian missionary work among the Massachusetts Indians. The seal of the colony portrayed an Indian speaking these words: “Come over and help us.” The colony’s charter enjoined the colonists to bring to the Native Americans the “knowledge and obedience of the onlie true God and Savior of mankinde.” After learning the Algonquian language from an Indian named Cockenoe, Eliot started preaching to the Massachusetts Indians in the fall of 1646. He began modestly, in the village of Nonantum (now Newton) within the wigwam of an Indian chieftain named Waban. In the Algonquian language, Eliot read a Bible verse (Ezekiel 37:9), preached, and asked some theological questions of those present.

Eliot’s preliminary effort was well received, and it was the beginning of many years’ work among the Massachusetts Indians. In the course of his work with the Algonquian language, Eliot produced The Indian Grammar (1666), an incomplete introductory grammar of the language of the Massachusetts Indians. Eliot’s work with the Algonquian language was crowned with the publication in 1663 of his Indian Bible, printed by Samuel Green and Marmaduke Johnson in Cambridge. Eliot had translated the psalms into the Algonquian language in 1653, and in 1658, he published Algonquian translations of the Book of Exodus and the Gospel of Matthew. Interestingly, two specially bound copies of Eliot’s Indian Bible were presented to King James II, whose grandfather (James I) had authorized the translation of the Bible Eliot used as the basis for his Algonquian version, and under whose father (Charles I) Eliot had felt compelled to leave England.

The local New England clergy supported Eliot throughout his missionary work, and he received support from England through the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in New England and Parts Adjacent in North America, established by an act of Parliament in 1649. This organization was the first Protestant missionary society and provided funds for supplies, Eliot’s translation work, and the education of Indian students. For 120 years, this missionary society worked among the native peoples of New England.

In 1650, the first village of “praying Indians” was organized. The Christian Indians of Nonantum moved to Natick and were organized by Eliot around Old Testament patterns. A common assumption of the seventeenth century New England Puritans was that the native peoples around them were the lost ten tribes of Israel. Whether Eliot fully accepted this theory is not known, but in any event, he found in the Old Testament story of Jethro’s advice to Moses a model for the villages of Christian Indians that sprang up under his guidance. Senior members of the community were chosen to be leaders of groups of ten, fifty, and a hundred individuals. The towns pledged a “civil covenant” that bound them together as a Christian community.

In outward appearance, these Native American towns were organized on a European model. They had meeting houses, organized streets, and even some English-style homes, although the majority of the Indians preferred wigwams. Schools were opened, and English was taught along with European crafts so that the villages, which were self-governing under Massachusetts law, could be self-supporting. From these villages, Eliot drew and trained preachers and teachers to help catechize and lead worship in the communities. In all, Eliot helped organize fourteen Christian villages, which grew to contain around four thousand individuals. These communities eventually became casualties in Metacom’s War (1675-1676, also known as King Philip’s War) during which the followers of Metacom (or King Philip), the son of Massachusetts Indian chief Massasoit, fought the English settlers. The four Christian Indian villages that were not destroyed during the conflict were not able to recover economically once it was over. Nevertheless, Eliot’s work among the Indians continued. A second edition of his Indian Bible was published in 1685 to replace those lost in Metacom’s War. Eliot died in Roxbury on May 21, 1690.

Significance

In 1894, 204 years after his death, a stained-glass window was dedicated to the memory of Eliot in the church of St. John the Baptist, Widford, England. To this day, he is remembered as the Apostle to the Indians for his missionary work in Massachusetts.

Eliot is also remembered for his enlightened views on the rights of the Indians. His attitude toward the Massachusetts Indians and their plight stands in contrast to the indifference or outright hostility toward the Indians displayed by many of his fellow New England Puritans. He took the time and energy to learn their language and customs. He helped the villages of Christianized Indians become self-sufficient and taught them trades that made them less reliant on the English colonists. He taught individual Indians to read both English and Algonquian and promoted the development of Native American schools. With his Indian grammar, the two editions of his Indian Bible, and the publication of a number of other works in the language of the Massachusetts Indians, Eliot helped foster the study of Indian languages and has provided researchers with invaluable insights into the linguistic heritage of one branch of Native American peoples.

Bibliography

Adams, Nehemiah. The Life of John Eliot: With an Account of the Early Missionary Efforts Among the Indians of New England. Boston: Massachusetts Sabbath School Society, 1847. Offers details of Eliot’s work in New England, plus an appendix with samples of his correspondence.

Clark, Michael P., ed. The Eliot Tracts: With Letters from John Eliot to Thomas Thorowgood and Richard Baxter. Westport, Conn.: Praeger, 2003. The majority of these tracts were written by Eliot and published in London between 1643 and 1671. The tracts describe British missionary activity in New England.

Cogley, Richard W. John Eliot’s Mission to the Indians Before King Philip’s War. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1999. A comprehensive examination of the Puritans’ mission in New England, combining an analysis of Eliot’s theological writings with a historical account of the mission’s development. Includes biographies of Native Americans who accepted the mission, histories of settlement towns, and an appendix of primary sources.

Eliot, John. John Eliot and the Indians, 1652-1657: Being Letters Addressed to Rev. Jonathan Hanmer of Barnstaple, England. Edited by Wilberforce Eames. New York: The Adams and Grace Press, 1915. Provides details of Eliot’s work with the Indians and of his relations with neighboring clergy and the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in New England. Includes facsimiles of title pages from a number of Eliot’s published works.

‗‗‗‗‗‗‗. John Eliot’s Indian Dialogues: A Study in Cultural Interaction. Edited by Henry W. Bowden and James P. Rhonda. Contributions in American History 88. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1980. Contains the text of Eliot’s “training manual,” intended for use by Indian preachers and teachers. An introduction places this work in context to help readers understand seventeenth century Puritan and Indian cultural interactions.

Moore, Martin. Memoirs of the Life and Character of Rev. John Eliot, Apostle of the N. A. Indians. Boston: T. Bedlington, 1822. An insightful account of Eliot’s work written by a minister of the church in Natick, Massachusetts. Presents a number of letters from Eliot about his work with the Indians.

Tinker, George E. Missionary Conquest: The Gospel and Native American Cultural Genocide. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1993. A revisionist history, maintaining that missionaries reaped personal gain from policies of colonial genocide. Focuses on four missionaries, including John Eliot in a chapter entitled “John Eliot: Conversion, Colonialism, and the Oppression of Language.”

Winslow, Ola Elizabeth. John Eliot: “Apostle to the Indians.” Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1968. A very insightful biography, offering information on Eliot’s upbringing, his Puritan background, and his work in Massachusetts. Has a useful appendix of Eliot’s published works.