Shaked. See Almond.
Shakers, the popular name of an American com- munistic sect who call themselves "The United Socie- ty of Believers in Christ's Second Appearing."
I. History. — The Shakers arose as a distinct body in the first half of the 18th century, but are accustomed to trace their origin back to the Camisards (q. v.), or French Prophets. Three of their number went to Eng- land about 1705 and propagated the prophetic spirit so rapidly that in the course of the j-ear there were two hundred or three hundred of these prophets in and about London. The great subject of prediction was the near approach of God's kingdom and the millennial state. In 1747 James Wardley, originally a Quaker, headed a party who had no established creed or particidar mode of worship and professed to be governed as the spirit of God should dictate. In 1757 Ann Lee (Mrs. Stand- ley) adopted Wardley's views, joined the society, and became its head, the society adopting its distinguish- ing name of Shakers. " The work," they said, " which God promised to accomplish in the latter day was emi- nently marked out by the prophets to be a work of shaking." From this time till 1770 Ann Lee professed to have receivcil by special manifestation of divine light those revelations in virtue of which her followers have ever since called her Mother Lee, and have re- garded her as the equal of Jesus Christ, head of all women, as he was head of all men. She lived apart from her husband from that time, and he took another wife. See Lee, Ann.
In 1774, obeying what she believed to be a divine command, Ann Lee sailed from Liverpool and came to the United States. Their tirst settlement was in the town of Watervliet, N. Y., seven miles from Albany, where they remained in retirement till the spring of 1780. In 1779 a religious revival took place, chiefly among the Baptists, at New Lebanon, Columbia Co., N. Y., accompanied by remarkable physical manifesta- tions, and in the spring of 1780 some of those most af- fected visited mother Lee, and there, as they believed, foimd a key to their experiences. ]\Iother Lee travel- led from place to place preaching and advising; in Mas- sachusetts she appears to have remained two years, and, it is asserted, performed miracles in several places. Mother Lee died in 1784, having already broached the idea of community of property, and having formed her little familv into a model for Shaker organizations. IMother Ann was succeeded in her rule over the societv by elder James Whittaker, who had come from England with her. He was called Father James, and under his ministry was erected (1785) '•tiic first house for puijlic worship ever built by the society." He died in July, 1787. In the same year Jose[)h Meachcm, formerly a Baptist preacher and a convert of mother Lee, collected her followers in a settlement in New Lebanon, which still remains as a connnon centre of union. In the course of five years, under the administration of Mea- chem, eleven Shaker settlements were Ajunded— viz. at New Lebanon and Watervliet, N. Y. ; at Hancock, Ty- ringham. Harvard, and Shirley, IMass. ; at Enfield, Conn.; at Canterl)ury and Enfield. N. IL; and at Al- fretl and New Gloucester, Me. There were no otlier
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societies formed till 1805, when three missionaries from New Lebanon established the following: Union ViUage, Watervliet, White Water, and North Union in Ohio; and Pleasant Hill and South Union in Kentucky. They number from six thousand to eight thousand souls.
II. Theolocjical Doctrines. — The Shakers hold: 1. That God has given to man four revelations. " They believe that the first light of salvation was given or made known to the patriarchs by promise; and that these believed in the promise of Christ, and were obedi- ent to the command of God made known unto them as the people of God; and were accepted by him as righteous or jjcrfect in their generation, according to the measure of light and truth manifested unto them ; which were as waters to the ankks, signitied by Eze- kiel's vision of the holy waters (ch. xlvii). The second light of dispensation was the law that was given of God to Israel by the hand of IMoses, which was a fur- ther manifestation of that salvation, as water to the knees (ver. 4). The third light of dispensation was the gospel of Christ's first appearance in the flesh, which was as water to the loins (ver. 4). The^ fourth light of dispensation is the second appearance of Christ, or final and last display of God's grace to a lost world, in which the mystery of God will be finished and a decisive work accom]>lished, to the final salvation or damnation of all the children of men; which, according to the prophe- cies, rightly calculated and truly understood, began in the year of our Saviour 1747." In the first revelation (iod was only known as a Great Spirit. In the second, or Jewish, period he was revealed as the Jehovah, he, she, or a dual being, male and female. In the third cvcle God was made known as the Father; and in the last cj'cle, commencing with 1770, God is revealed as an Eternal Mother, the bearing spirit of the creation of God. Christ they also believe to be dual, male and female, a supermundane being, making in his first ap- pearance a revelation to Jesus, a divinelj' instructed and perfect man, and who hy virtue of his anointing be- came Jesus Christ.