Father Divine - Early Life and Original Name

Early Life and Original Name

Little is definitively known about Father Divine's early life, or even his real given name. Father Divine and the Peace Movement he started did not keep many records. Father Divine himself declined several offers to write his biography, saying that the history of God would not be useful in mortal terms. He also refused to acknowledge relationship to any family. Newspapers in the 1930s had to dig up his probable given name: George Baker. (This name is not recognized by the Library of Congress, and from 1979, there is no further use of that name as a heading for Father Divine in libraries' catalogs.)

In the Dec. 7, 1936 issue of Life magazine, Elizah Mayfield claimed to be Father Divine's mother. Ms Mayfield went further and claimed that his real name Frederick Edwards from Hedersonville, NC, though she offered no proof.

His childhood remains a contentious point. Some, especially earlier researchers, suppose that Father Divine was born in the Deep South, most likely in Georgia, as the son of sharecroppers. Newer research by Jill Watts, based on census data, finds evidence for a George Baker, Jr. of appropriate age born in an African American enclave of Rockville, Maryland, called Monkey Run. If this theory is correct, his mother was a former slave named Nancy Baker, who died in May 1897.

Most researchers agree that Father Divine's parents were freed African American slaves. Notoriously poor records were kept about this generation of African Americans, so controversy about his upbringing is not likely to be resolved.

Father Divine was probably called George Baker around the turn of the century. He worked as a gardener in Baltimore, Maryland. In a 1906 sojourn in California, Father Divine became acquainted with the ideas of Charles Fillmore and the New Thought Movement, a philosophy of positive thinking that would inform his later doctrines. Among other things, this belief system asserted that negative thoughts led to poverty and unhappiness. Songwriter Johnny Mercer credited a Father Divine sermon for inspiring the title of his song "Accentuate the Positive".

Father Divine attended a local Baptist Church, often preaching, until 1907, when a traveling preacher called Samuel Morris spoke to and was expelled from the congregation. Morris, originally from Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, had a soft-spoken and uncontroversial sermon until the end, when he raised his arms and shouted, "I am the Eternal Father!" This routine had him thrown out of many churches in Baltimore and was apparently unsuccessful until Morris happened upon the receptive Father Divine.

In his late 20s, Father Divine became Morris's first follower and adopted a pseudonym, "the Messenger". The Messenger was a Christ figure to Morris's God the Father. Father Divine preached with Morris in Baltimore out of the home of former evangelist Harriette Snowden who came to accept their divinity. Morris began calling himself "Father Jehovia".

Divine and Father Jehovia were later joined by John A. Hickerson, who called himself Reverend Bishop Saint John the Vine. John the Vine shared the Messenger's excellent speaking ability and his interest in New Thought.

In 1912, the three-man ministry collapsed, as John the Vine denied Father Jehovia's monopoly on godhood, citing 1 John 4:15 to mean God was in everyone:

"Whoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God dwells in him and he in God."

Father Divine denied both that Father Jehovia was God and that anyone could be God. Instead, he declared that he himself was the only true expression of God's spirit. In 1912, he parted ways with his former associates and declared himself a god.

See also: International Peace Mission movement