Religion or cult? Throughout history this question has been asked an inestimable amount of times or various groups and organizations. As with anything else in the world, the views and practices that one group of people deems acceptable are always ridiculed and criticized by others, because of either disagreement, lack of understanding, or any number or other reason. The People's Temple was not granted exception from these canonical cynicisms. However, like so many other past criticisms, was The People's Temple judged without justification, or were skeptics correct in their assumptions? The latter seems to be the more widely accepted answer. Although The People's Temple had the potential to be a normal religious faction, its leader Jim Jones made that possibility more or less impossible.
Jim Jones, whose life was stained with abnormality, had some very unique ideas when it came to religion, government, and any other aspect of society. Unique in not only the sense of originality, but also in the sense that his ideas were so far from being mainstream that it was frightening. Granted some of his ideas, such that he himself was a god, were nothing new, but the assemblage of some old ideas with some new ideas, resulted in a truly fearsome person.
However, his profound speaking and manipulation skills allowed him to masquerade his true self from people, and resulted in a large number of followers for him, and his church. Sadly for his followers, Jones had plans for them that would have resulted in them never joining The Peoples Temple had they known said plans. Jones preached of a utopia where his followers could live in peace, but what was in store for them was a dystopia like that out of a book. Jonestown, a small settlement in Guyana, was Jones' utopia, and his followers' dystopia, and ultimately, their grave.
Although many cannot comprehend why Jim Jones had so many followers, by examining and studying his sermons, ideas, statements, and church, the reason for his numerous followers presents itself. His promise of a utopia that they could live in simply by following him, was extremely enticing, and seemingly believable. Understanding his ways is important, because, as with history, unless we learn from past mistakes, we will face similar events.
To completely understand what exactly happened at Jonestown, Jim Jones himself, the man whose ideas Jonestown was based upon, must be examined and understood. Jones was born in Crete, Indiana, in the midst of the great depression. Crete, like many other small towns of the era was affected greatly by the depression, and was also extremely religious. Jones's parents, Layette and Jim Jones, were the typical, run of the mill Hoosier family. Layette Jones was somewhat educated, but worked mainly in factories and fields. She was resentful of her husband's philistine family, but she did not hold him to those faults. Generally, she was a positive person. Her husband on the other hand was not. In fact, “big Jim never amounted to much. In the World War he had received a lung injury from mustard gas, and he took up the life of a disabled veteran upon his return. A government check made him a man of meager means, but the war injury left him an invalid and a very bitter, cynical person” (Hall 4). As a result Jim Jone's father truly had no impact on him, but it was his mother that he looked up to, and respected. In the area of religion “the mother of Jim Jones was not too taken with the idea of a “sky god” in heaven, but she believed in spirits nonetheless” (Childester 10). This idea would later help dictate some of Jones's own sermons, and ideas.
However, during his childhood he constantly had outside influences on the topic of religion. Although his mother made an effort to bestow her religious beliefs in her son, the aforementioned outside influence made an even larger effort. Since there was such a prominent religious force in the town that Jones lived in, the amount of people wanting to “save” the boy whose mother was deemed a heathen was massive. According to Hall,
The Nazarene Mrs. Kennedy and other neighbors exposed the boy to the range of respectable religious experience available in Lynn [the city Jones lived in as a child], including the Methodist church and the pacifist quaker meeting of his father's family. Mrs. Kennedy was the mainstay; she would fox him up and take him to the Sunday school and church and all that sort of thing. But the next thing Lynette knew, a woman from the local Pentecostal church came calling for young Jim. (19)
Jones started attending the Pentecostal services regularly, and became extremely involved and infatuated with the church. Only when Jones stated having fits while sleeping did his mother forbid him from going to any more services. However, the seed a religion was planted in young Jones, and he started conducting services of his own in his home, where local children would attend, to whom he would preach with fervidness to. Jones's interest in religion carried on throughout his adolescence, and although he no longer attended the Pentecostal church, it still was “the only church that impressed him” (Hall 24).
Another aspect of life that would carry on to later affect Jones's ideas and beliefs was social class. All throughout his early life Jones had been in the lower class, and he was well aware of it, in fact he despised his status. “As a child, Jim was “White trash”, suffered for it, and had to fight for the dignity of it, both with his peers and with his teachers” (Childester 20). This led to much hostility within Jones, and ultimately a profound hate for the well-to-do.
After high school Jones surprised no one, save his mother who wanted him to become a doctor, and went on to college to become a minister. As many would expect given his upbringing, the message that Jones preached was nothing but extreme. His hate for the class system was deeply embedded in all of his sermons. Hall emphasizes this by stating “As a preacher Jim Jones forged a religion for the déclassé, people who no longer accepted the existing class and ethnic structuration of U.S. Society.” (35). Jones's first true preaching position came in 1952 at the Sommerset Southside Methodist Church. At this point he was married to Marcie Baldwin, though he preaching and views always took priority over his marriage. The position at Sommerset was viewed by Jones as an opportunity, an opportunity to get his message out, and into the public. Jones's radical, sometimes communistic sermons, and his attempt to integrate the church led to termination, but nonetheless it was a start. Jones worked at a few other churches, one of which was a Baptist church, and from being there he learned the manipulative powers of “healing”, which he would later use to impress and gain followers.
Soon there after Jones was approached by a Pentecostal minister who “called him out and anointed him with the words: 'I perceive that you are a prophet that shall go around the world.... And tonight ye shall begin your ministry.'” (Hall 42). Jones accepted, and began preaching for the Pentecostals. His success was unprecedented, using his developed style of mixed ideas and theories he astounded all who heard him speak. The ministry of Jones was born. While with the Pentecostals Jones gained a lot of reputation for both his “healing” and “fortune telling” abilities. Granted, as most people know, these skills are based on the ability of the person performing them to manipulate his client, and the client's willingness to believe. Nonetheless, Jones had a knack of sorts that let him do these two things extremely well.
All of the attention Jones was receiving did not go unnoticed by other ministers. Jones was approached by many other extremists who respected him, and often welcomed him to come preach at their churches. Jones accepted one of the offers from a church in Indianapolis, and took the position as the head minister there. His current congregation followed him there, and soon he had absorbed the new church's congregation as his own. After meeting some opposition from the church's board, Jones and his loyal followers decided to form their own church; Wings of Deliverance resulted. Shortly after it's formation Wings of Deliverance changed its name to The Peoples Temple.
The beliefs of the Peoples Temple are actually quite intriguing, not only because they are odd, but because they are so developed and complex that they are truly the work of someone who worked compassionately. Firstly are the views on classification of persons. According to Hall, “The classification system of the Peoples Temple created a symbolic universe within which superhuman resources could be located that could elevate victims of a subhumanizing social system into a fully human identity.” (51).
This most certainly stemmed from Jones's lower class position earlier in his life, and his want to eliminate such systems from the world. In the Peoples Temple there were three levels of classification. There were superhumans, subhumans, and humans. The superhuman classification was reserved for Gods.
Jones's theories on god were extremely different from classical views. Jones thought the notion of a “Sky god”, or a unknown god, such as the one most religions believe in, was totally incorrect. In fact he even went as far as to say that “if such a god did exist it would be guilty of enormous crimes against humanity” (Hall 52). Jones also made outlandish statements about how any “Sky god” was an egotist, and how the worshipping of a “sky god” was the result of political oppression. Instead Jones insisted that he was a god. Childester raises the question,
How could Jones claim to be a god? He certainly did no identify himself with the Sky God, Creator God, or God of biblical faith. He even objected when his followers tended to confuse him with the Sky God. Some of the members of the Peoples Temples, Jones complained, “want me plus the Sky god... They want to lock that shit up in Jim Jones and have the two together!” (Q1059, part 5). But Jones insisted that he was the embodiment of the real god. He declared himself as the living manifestation of a God that was Principle, that was Love, that was Socialism. (Childester 56)
The real god that Jones speaks of, is what he and his followers believed to be the true god. Jones had always favored socialism, and didn't hesitate when bringing it into his religion. The true god, he claimed was a “personification of socialism” (qtd in Childester 56). Only this god, and himself were deserving of the title of “superhuman” in the Peoples Temple.
The subhuman classification, was reserved for those who were considered, well, less than human.
In America, especially during the time that the Peoples Temple was forming, there was an abundance of racism and sexism. Along with those two, there were many other factors that people used to judge, and discriminate a person. In the eyes of Jones, you were only subhuman if you allowed yourself to be put under a discriminatory label, ergo you were only subhuman, if you allowed society to label you as subhuman. Furthermore, anybody who discriminated against another person was also labeled as subhuman, because acknowledging the existence of such things, was just as bad as letting yourself fall under one of them.
Lastly is the human classification. Most of the members of the Peoples Temple fell under this category.