A.A.’s Two Major
Sources of Ideas
Some Brief Points on
the Bible and on A First Century Christian Fellowship
Dick B.
© 2014 Anonymous. All
Rights Reserved
For reasons
not very clear to me today, those who write and speak on A.A. sources seldom
focus on the Bible. And that is wrong. They also frequently focus on, but
denigrate, the “Oxford Group” (first known as A First Century Christian
Fellowship). That is not wrong; but, if the historical context and disassociation
with the Oxford Group are ignored, it is very wrong. So in this brief starting
point, let’s look at the two identifiable major sources of A.A. ideas. And
where they can be found manifested.
The Bible is the Number
One Sourc
The Bible (also called the Good Book
by most early AAs) was clearly stated as the major source of A.A. program ideas
starting in 1935. The
best and most reliable authority that confirms this source is in A.A. General
Service Conference-approved literature. And the succinct summaries are in The Co-Founders of Alcoholics Anonymous:
Biographical Sketches Their Last Major Talks and in DR. BOB and the Good Oldtimers, page 131—where the Akron Christian
Fellowship program is summarized in seven points.
In The Co-Founders, Dr. Bob’s remarks in
his last major talk are these:
I had refreshed my memory of the Good Book, and I had had
excellent training in that as a youngster (pp. 11-12) . . . I felt that I
should continue to increase my familiarity with the Good Book (p. 13)
. . . we were convinced that the answer to our problems was
in the Good Book. To some of us older ones, the parts that we found absolutely
essential were the Sermon on the Mount [Matthew Chapters 5-7], the thirteenth
chapter of First Corinthians, and the Book of James (p. 13)
It wasn’t until 1938 that the teachings and efforts and
studies that had been going on were crystallized in the form of the Twelve
Steps. 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 I said, as a result of our study of the Good Book (p. 14)
The “Oxford Group” Was
a Detoured Source
In succession, the names for the
group founded by Dr. Frank Buchman about 1922 were: (1) A First Century
Christian Fellowship. (2) the Oxford Group—about 1928. (3) Moral Re-Armament—about
1938; and Initiatives of Change—long after AAs had left the Oxford Group.
This A First
Century Christian Fellowship source of A.A. ideas can be summarized in three
groups:
(1) The twenty-eight Oxford Group ideas
that constituted their original life-changing art. See Dick B., The Oxford Group & Alcoholics Anonymous:
A Design for Living That Works! (pp. 249-297)
(2) The more than 187 parallels between
Oxford Group and Big Book Language, which we will detail in the next article. And
see Dick B., The Oxford Group &
Alcoholics Anonymous (pp. 340-364)
(3) The period which Dr. Bob described as
follows:
Now the interesting part
of all this is not the sordid details, but the situation that we two fellows
were in. We had both been associated with the Oxford Group, Bill in New York,
for five months, and I in Akron, for two and a half years. Bill had acquired
their idea of service. I had not, but I had done an immense amount of reading
they had recommended. See The Co-Founders
(p. 11).
In Akron A.A., the
meetings at T. Henry Williams’s house on Wednesday were regarded as a “clandestine
lodge of the Oxford Group.” We believe it was for two reasons: (1) The
once-a-week gatherings were not at all like Oxford Group meetings being held
world-wide. (2) Many of the Akron AAs did not like them; and sometimes held
meetings in separate rooms—one for the Oxford Group people, and one for the
drunks and their families.
This period ended in 1939
when the Akron people left the Oxford Group meetings.
(4) The association between A.A. and the
Group in New York was quite different: (a) Bill Wilson had received some
indoctrination in Oxford Group ideas from Oxford Groupers Rowland Hazard, F.
Shepard Cornell, Cebra Graves, and Ebby Thacher (b) Both Bill and his wife
attended Oxford Group meetings very frequently from the date of Bill’s discharge
from Towns Hospital in 1934 until—as Lois Wilson described it—“they kind of kicked
us out.” And that was in August of 1937 (c) After he received authorization
from Akronites to write a book, Bill worked with Rev. Sam Shoemaker on the
manuscripts and later asked Sam to write the Twelve Steps, but Shoemaker
declined. Nonetheless, Shoemaker—who distanced himself totally from the Oxford
Group in 1941—continued as a friend, adviser, speaker, and “co-founder” of A.A.
through his friendship with Wilson. See Dick B., New Light on Alcoholism: God, Sam Shoemaker, and A.A., Pittsburgh
ed.
In short,
the Bible influence on A.A. ideas was frequently acknowledged by Dr. Bob, Bill
W., Anne Smith, and Henrietta Seiberling. And the practices of early Akron A.A.
Group Number One were Bible to the core. On the other hand, the Oxford Group
influence was very much confined to the Oxford Group language and Shoemaker
language that Bill used in the “new version of the program the Twelve Steps”—which
were not published until 1939. That situation itself also changed when Bill and
the “committee of four” gave in to atheists and agnostics and opened the “Broad
Highway” of membership for all—regardless of their belief or lack thereof.
