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The Oxford Group and Alcoholics Anonymous, Part 2
by Dick B. Part Two
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The Steps, The Facts, The Oxford Group
The Steps
People in A.A. who are intensely enthusiastic about the Twelve
Steps of recovery are fond of rejecting any "smorgasbord" approach to those
Steps. They’ll say, for example, "The Steps are numbered for a reason." And they
rail against those who "take" and/or "practice" such of the twelve as appeal to
them, yet leave the remainder of the Steps alone.
I’m not convinced that many really do accept or reject in this
manner. Those who are timid about the program are more likely, I believe, to:
"balk" at the Fourth Step; "lie" or withhold facts in their Fifth Step;
"misunderstand" and underestimate the important principles behind Steps Six and
Seven; simply fail to complete Steps Eight and Nine; and somehow overlook the
"continuity" purpose of Steps Ten, Eleven, and Twelve. The last category, for
example, might include those who say, "I practice all of the Steps
every day," or "I do one Step each month," or "I’m doing all
the Steps again." When confronted with a more appropriate order, they may
dodge the criticism by arguing that the steps are "suggestive" only and contain
no requirements. In other words, they probably don’t ignore any of the Steps.
Many–particularly the timid--just haven’t done or perhaps are unwilling to do
the hard work involved in completing the first nine steps and applying what
they’ve learned in "continuing" to practice the principles involved in the last
three steps.
The same thing applies when it comes to learning our spiritual
roots. There are at least six major spiritual roots: (1) The Bible. (2) Quiet
Time. (3) The teachings of Rev. Sam Shoemaker. (4) The life-changing program of
the Oxford Group. (5) The writings of Dr. Bob’s wife Anne Ripley Smith. (6) The
Christian literature they read.
Added to these six roots are: (7) Some of the ideas of Professor
William James (whose very words were used by Rev. Sam Shoemaker in his writings,
and whose book The Varieties of Religious Experience was read by A.A.’s
founders). (8) Some of the ideas of Dr. Carl Jung about conversion. (9) Some of
the new thought phrases of Ralph Waldo Trine, Emmet Fox, and several
"transcendentalists." And then: (10) Some of the fall-out from Dr. William
Silkworth on the "disease," "allergy," and "psychic change" concepts. (11)
Richard Peabody on some of the "treatment" notions covered in his title The
Common Sense of Drinking–also read by the founders and containing language
similar to that found in A.A..
The more you research the more you find that our official,
"reported" history has actually cluttered up the historical facts themselves.
Thus there has been a failure even to explore or detail Dr. Bob’s work in
Christian Endeavor as a youngster. This gap leaves this root of Akron’s "old
fashioned prayer meetings" ignored as a major Bible root. Moreover, the failure
to write about Lois Wilson’s Swedenborgian beliefs, family church membership,
and her own affiliation–together with Bill’s exposure to those
influences--leaves out this possible "spiritualism" influence on, and support
for, Bill’s "spook sessions." It also may contribute to a failure to mention
Lois’s stated opposition to "conversion," "soul surgery," and possibly even to
the Bible itself. The latter being a matter of omission rather than explicit
opposition.
A problem definitely arises out of a "smorgasbord" approach to
our spiritual roots and parts of roots. If you pick at some, pick out
some, and push out others, you don’t have the "Program." By "Program," we mean
whatever Frank Amos meant when he came to Akron and thoroughly investigated Dr.
Bob and those features which had produced such astonishing successes at Akron
No. 1–A.A.’s first group. Worse, you can’t attain an understanding of the
"Program." It is easy to call it too religious, too Christian, too Protestant,
or too Oxford Group–leaving the program itself to float in a sea of unbelief.
You may overlook the Bible because it is so little mentioned
today. You may not appreciate the importance of Quiet Time because it has been
so hacked up by later "meditation" and "reflection" and "twenty-four-hour"
books. You may ignore the immense influence of Rev. Sam Shoemaker because the
details of his specific role and contributions have been missing until recently.
You may decline to look at the Oxford Group principles because of long-standing
Roman Catholic and other opposition to Dr. Buchman and his work some 50 years
ago. You may just plain miss the work of Anne Smith because her "journal" has
been so long on the shelf–in fact, virtually banned from the history scene at
her own home in Akron today. And you may omit the Christian literature early AAs
read because it is voluminous and, for some, controversial. You may, as I did
for quite some time, fail to appreciate or study the effect on A.A. "theology"
of the ideas of William James, Ralph Waldo Trine, Emmet Fox, and others. In so
doing, you may not realize the confusion and conflict fostered by putting some
of our spiritual sources in your thinking, ignoring others, and believing
everything in front of you was and is divinely inspired and just hunky dory.
What Steps?
You won’t spend much time digging in our early "Program" without
realizing that, at its peak percentage-of-success period, which commenced in
1935, there were no Steps. No steps? No steps!" To assure your consideration of
that fact, let’s look at the record:
"Dr. Bob, noting that there were no Twelve Steps at the time
and that ‘our stories didn’t amount to anything to speak of,’ later said
they were convinced that the answer to their problems was in the Good Book"
(DR BOB and the Good Oldtimers, p. 96).
"As Dr. Bob recalled: ‘I didn’t write the Twelve Steps. I
had nothing to do with the writing of them. . . . We already had the basic
ideas, though not in terse and tangible form. We got them. . . as a result
of our study of the Good Book’." (DR. BOB and the Good Oldtimers, p.
97).
"Dorothy [Snyder Murphy] recalled the 1937 meetings when
‘the men would all disappear upstairs. . . After about half an hour or so,
down would come the new man, shaking, white, serious, and grim. And all the
people who were already in A.A. would come trooping down after him. They
were pretty reluctant to talk about what had happened, but after a while,
they would tell us they had had a real surrender. I often wonder how
many people that come in now would survive an experience like that–a regular
old fashioned prayer meeting’." (DR. BOB and the Good Oldtimers, p.
101).
"But Bill did get to see John D. Rockefeller, Jr., who
dispatched Frank Amos out to Akron to investigate what was going on. Mr.
Amos, who was soon to become one of A.A.’s first non-alcoholic trustees, did
a thorough job of investigating what he referred to as the ‘self-styled
Alcoholic Group of Akron, Ohio.’ He called on Dr. Bob and attended meetings.
He questioned members and nonmembers, including professional associates of
Dr. Bob. . . . In his report to Mr. Rockefeller in February, 1938, Mr. Amos
said. . . . ‘they [the stories of the men, their wives, and in some cases
their mothers]. . . were all remarkably alike in ‘the technique used and the
system followed.’ He described the ‘Program’ as follows: ‘1. An alcoholic
must realize that he is an alcoholic, incurable from a medical standpoint,
and that he must never again drink anything with alcohol in it. 2. He must
surrender himself absolutely to God, realizing that in himself there is no
hope. 3. Not only must he want to stop drinking permanently, he must remove
from his life other sins such as hatred, adultery, and others which
frequently accompany alcoholism. Unless he will do this absolutely, Smith
and his associates refuse to work with him. 4. He must have devotions every
morning–a ‘quiet time’ of prayer and some reading from the Bible and other
religious literature. Unless this is faithfully followed, there is grave
danger of backsliding. 5. He must be willing to help other alcoholics get
straightened out. This throws up a protective barrier and strengthens his
own willpower and convictions. 6. It is important, but not vital, that he
meet frequently with other reformed alcoholics and form both a social and
religious comradeship. 7. Important, but not vital, that he attend some
religious service at least once weekly’." (DR. BOB and the Good
Oldtimers, pp. 128-31).
I remember sitting in Wisconsin in the home of an experienced
AA. That was several years ago. We listened to the taped interrogation of Ed
Andy, an A.A. oldtimer from Lorain, Ohio. Ed Andy is dead now. But at the time,
he was questioned again and again as to how he "took the Steps." Most of the
time, he simply responded with talk about other things they did in the old days.
But he also frequently said, "There were no Steps." I really don’t think his
interrogators understood him because they were not that conversant with the
"Program" that Frank Amos and Dr. Bob explained as set forth above. The A.A.
questioners seemed not to believe that this old duffer had been sober so many
years without taking "the Steps."
But there were no steps! The "Program" was described by
Frank Amos. And Amos accurately reported what the pioneers did. They renounced
alcohol. They surrendered absolutely to their Creator for help. They worked at
removing "sins" from their lives. They had devotions in the form of prayer,
Bible study, use of religious literature such as The Upper Room, and
seeking revelation from God in what was commonly called a "Quiet Time." They
helped alcoholics get straightened out. They fellowshipped with other believers.
And they often attended a weekly religious service. No steps! No Oxford Group
program. Just the simple acts described above.
Their actions and their Program were influenced to a greater and
greater degree by what was in the Bible, in Oxford Group writings, in Anne
Smith’s journal, and in the religious literature. And they followed much the
same prayer, Bible study, quiet time, and witnessing ideas Dr. Bob had learned
in his youth in Christian Endeavor in St. Johnsbury, Vermont.
The Steps Appear
Some–unduly impressed, or disturbed by, the Oxford Group
influence on A.A.–have asserted that the Oxford Group had six steps.
But it didn’t. I have talked with, corresponded with, and
studied the literature read by almost every significant Oxford Group survivor in
the United States and also several abroad. Most have seen and in fact helped
critique my title The Oxford Group and Alcoholics Anonymous: A Design
for Living That Works. That title documents my finding that there really
were about twenty-eight Oxford Group ideas that impacted on A.A.
You will see from my title Anne Smith’s Journal, 1933-1939,
that Dr. Bob’s wife covered–long before the Big Book was written in 1938--all of
the twelve step ideas Bill eventually put in A.A.’s basic text, the Big Book
You’ll see from my title The Good Book and The Big Book that all of the
twelve step ideas really did stem from Bible principles, just as Dr. Bob said
they did. And you’ll see from New Light on Alcoholism: God, Sam Shoemaker,
and A.A. that the same type of Bible language parallels can be found in the
writings and speeches of Rev. Sam Shoemaker, just as could be inferred by Bill
W.’s tributes to Sam.
If you look at one of earliest Oxford Group pamphlets–written by
Sam Shoemaker’s good friend Rev. Sherwood Sunderland Day about 1922–the
following statement appears on page one: "The principles of ‘The Oxford Group’
are the principles of the Bible." And whether you are reading Sam Shoemaker’s
work, Oxford Group writings, Anne Smith’s Journal, The Upper Room, or
even the new thought ideas of Emmet Fox, you’ll find the Bible cited and at the
core of almost all the thinking.
From all this, you will see that neither the Bible, nor the
Oxford Group, nor the writings of Rev. Sam Shoemaker, nor the Quiet Time
literature, nor Anne Smith’s Journal, nor the other religious writings studied
by A.A. pioneers said anything about "six steps" or "twelve steps" or any
formalized step program at all.
As A.A.’s Conference Approved Pass It On correctly
observes:
In later years, some A.A. members referred to this procedure [an
alleged six word-of-
mouth steps Bill said had been employed] as the six steps of
the Oxford Group. Reverend T. Willard Hunter, who spent 18 years in
full-time staff positions for the Oxford Group and M.R.A., said, "I never
once saw or heard anything like the Six Tenets. It would be impossible to
find them in any Oxford Group-M.R.A. literature. I think they must have been
written by someone else under some sort of misapprehension" (Pass It On,
page 197 and footnote 2 on page 206).
The fact is that Bill Wilson himself described his word-of-mouth
"six steps" in several different ways (See Dick B., The Akron Genesis of
Alcoholics Anonymous, pp. 256-60). How he referred to our Creator seemed to
depend upon the time and the circumstances and the audience. The description
which I believe to be the most accurate rendition of what early AAs really did
as to reliance on our Creator can be found in The Language of the Heart
at page 200. There, Bill describes "step" number 6 as "We prayed to God to help
us to do these things as best we could." In this rendition, Bill felt there were
six steps (certainly not Oxford Group steps)–the last one referring to
"God" our Creator as "God," just as Bill did almost 400 times in the Big Book.
And this usage as to our Creator is consistent with the wording of the very
first draft of the Twelve Steps where "God" our Creator and Heavenly Father is
also referred to as "God"–not some "power" or "higher power" or "God as we
understood Him." (See Pass It On, p. 198).
The Twelve Steps "appeared" in 1934
If you read pages 12 to 15 of the Third Edition of the Big Book,
and a couple of earlier lines in Bill’s Story, you may be puzzled at seeing all
of the Twelve Step ideas on those pages and seemingly propounded by Ebby Thacher
to Bill Wilson at Towns Hospital in 1934. This situation prompted me, during my
visit to Stepping Stones, to give special attention to three different early Big
Book draft manuscripts written by Bill Wilson. And the startling fact is that
Bill relates in detail almost all of the Twelve Step ideas and the explanation
of those Steps in specific terms that Ebby taught him in 1934. These explicit
and lengthy historical portions from Bill’s "story" or "reflections" as he then
called them (which I have set forth in Turning Point: A History of Early
A.A.’s Spiritual Roots and Successes) more than justify the assumption
that the Twelve Steps basics–biblical in nature as Dr. Bob and Rev. Sherwood
Day said–were floating around in rather concrete form in 1934. In fact, they
could well have been passed to Ebby at an earlier point either by Ebby’s mentor
Rowland Hazard or by Rev. Sam Shoemaker himself. You can see the remarkable
detail in the early pages of my title, Turning Point: A History of Early
A.A.’s Spiritual Roots and Successes.
And where might Bill’s alleged "six steps" (that preceded the
Twelve) have come from if they weren’t in the Bible, Quiet Time, Shoemaker, the
Oxford Group, Anne Smith’s Journal, or the Christian literature AAs read?
Actually, during A.A.’s formative period from 1934 to 1939,
mixed into the various analyses and descriptions of Oxford Group ideas, were the
following alleged "six basic assumptions" of the Group: (1) Men are sinners. (2)
Men can be changed. (3) Confession is prerequisite to change. (4) The changed
soul has direct access to God. (5) The Age of Miracles has returned. (6) Those
who have been "changed" must "change" others. See Kurtz, Not-God: A History
of Alcoholics Anonymous, 1979, p. 49.
Also, Lois Wilson had described "the Oxford Group precepts" as:
(1) Surrender your life to God. (2) Take a moral inventory. (3) Confess your
sins to God and another human being. (4) Make restitution. (5) Give of yourself
to others with no demand for return. (6) Pray to God for help to carry out these
principles. In fact, however, neither the so-called "six assumptions" nor Lois’s
six Oxford Group "precepts" adequately reflects the complete Oxford Group
thinking that impacted on early A.A. The "assumptions" are, in no sense,
biblical; yet the Oxford Group principles avowedly were. Lois’s "precepts" were
also not biblical; yet Dr. Bob said A.A.’s basic step ideas were based on study
of the Bible.
In sum, it is very doubtful that Dr. Bob would have subscribed
to the idea that the original A.A. "Program" had four steps, six steps, eight
steps, or twelve. His own Christian Endeavor background and extensive studies of
the Bible led him to the very simple program Frank Amos described; and I have
found no particular evidence to indicate Dr. Bob did not use those simple Bible
ideas in bringing recovery to the 5000 alcoholics he personally helped in Akron.
And What of the Oxford Group and Our Twelve Steps
I believe it might be fair to say that A.A. had three approaches
to recovery in its earliest days: (1) An approach directly related to recovery
and based primarily on the Bible and reliance on our Creator–applied by Dr. Bob
and the Akron pioneers (See The Good Book and The Big Book: A.A.’s Roots in
the Bible). (2) An approach that was not directly related to recovery but
involved a "life-changing" program whose principles were biblical and were
applied for recovery–applied primarily in the East, prior to, and then in, early
A.A. (See The Oxford Group and Alcoholics Anonymous: A Design for Living That
Works). (3) An experiment by Bill W. and Dr. Bob utilizing both approaches
and culminating in the Big Book text whose (a) "Steps" were based primarily on
the Oxford Group’s aim of attaining a life-changing experience of God and
continuing in that experience, and whose (b) Big Book "text" was possibly much
more influenced than the Steps by the Bible and yet propounded several
inconsistent and even conflicting theories on alcoholism as an "incurable"
mental, physical, and spiritual malady; required a "conversion" that was more
"change" than a "born again" experience; and "action" seemingly focused more on
doing things than on believing the truths which the Bible said
would make believers free (See Turning Point: A History of Early A.A.’s
Spiritual Roots and Successes).
As to the Steps, however, and even as to many explicit phrases
in the Big Book, you can’t ignore the Oxford Group’s immense influence on A.A.–coming
from the Oxford Group’s twenty-eight principles such as: (a) God is Almighty and
our Creator; (b) God’s Plan; (c) Our Obedience, (d) Initial belief that God is;
(e) Surrender of your "will" to God; (f) A "turning point"--leading to "steps"
embodied in the OG’s 5 C’s--(g) Confidence, (h) Confession, (i) Conviction, (j)
Conversion, (k) Continuance)–five "steps" that would eliminate "sin" "blocking"
one from God and others; (l) Making restitution for harms caused by sins; (m)
Making "daily" surrender that continued to apply the "steps;" (n) "Growing"
spiritually through Bible study, prayer, and Quiet Time observances enabling
receipt of God’s revelation; (o) Becoming "God conscious" as the result of such
obedience; (p) Witnessing to what God had done that the person had been unable
to do for himself; (q) Fellowshipping; (r) Serving; (s) Practicing Christian
principles, made available to believers by their new-found power of God in
Christ which is mentioned in 2 Corinthians 5:17.
This article is simply a synopsis of what I believe is the
practical result of A.A.’s Oxford Group exposure from 1934 through approximately
1941. Much more about the Oxford Group, and also our other spiritual
roots, is covered in detail by my fifteen titles listed and described at
http://www.dickb.com/titles.shtml (Alcoholics Anonymous History).
END
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