John Alexander Dowie
Encyclopedia
John Alexander Dowie (25 May 1847 – 9 March 1907) was a Scottish
Scotland
Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...

 evangelist
Evangelism
Evangelism refers to the practice of relaying information about a particular set of beliefs to others who do not hold those beliefs. The term is often used in reference to Christianity....

 and faith healer
Faith Healer
Faith Healer is a play by Brian Friel about the life of faith healer Francis Hardy as monologued through the shifting memories of Hardy, his wife, Grace, and stage manager, Teddy.-Synopsis:...

 who ministered in Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

 and the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

. He founded the city of Zion, Illinois
Zion, Illinois
Zion is a city in Lake County, Illinois, United States. The population was 22,866 at the 2000 census, and estimated at 24,303 as of 2005. The city was founded in July 1901 by John Alexander Dowie. He also started the Zion Tabernacle of the Christian Catholic Apostolic Church, which was the only...

, and the Christian Catholic Apostolic Church
Christian Catholic Apostolic Church
Christ Community Church in Zion, Illinois, formerly the Christian Catholic Church or Christian Catholic Apostolic Church, is an evangelical Protestant church founded in 1896 by John Alexander Dowie. The city of Zion was founded by Dowie as a religious community to establish a society on the...

. He was both an eloquent and eccentric figure with impressive powers of persuasion.

Biography

Dowie was born in Edinburgh
Edinburgh
Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland, the second largest city in Scotland, and the eighth most populous in the United Kingdom. The City of Edinburgh Council governs one of Scotland's 32 local government council areas. The council area includes urban Edinburgh and a rural area...

 to John Murray Dowie, a tailor and preacher. He moved to Adelaide
Adelaide
Adelaide is the capital city of South Australia and the fifth-largest city in Australia. Adelaide has an estimated population of more than 1.2 million...

, South Australia
South Australia
South Australia is a state of Australia in the southern central part of the country. It covers some of the most arid parts of the continent; with a total land area of , it is the fourth largest of Australia's six states and two territories.South Australia shares borders with all of the mainland...

 with his parents in 1860 and found work in a prosperous shoe business run by an uncle, Alexander Dowie. After a few months, Dowie left the employment of his uncle and had various jobs through which he advanced his position. At length, he became confidential clerk for the resident partner of a firm that was doing a business of $2 million a year.

His father was president of the South Adelaide chapter of the Total Abstinence Society in 1867, and John Alexander an active member. Around 1868 at the age of 21, Dowie returned to Edinburgh to study theology
Theology
Theology is the systematic and rational study of religion and its influences and of the nature of religious truths, or the learned profession acquired by completing specialized training in religious studies, usually at a university or school of divinity or seminary.-Definition:Augustine of Hippo...

. He then returned to Australia and was ordained pastor of a Congregational church
Congregational church
Congregational churches are Protestant Christian churches practicing Congregationalist church governance, in which each congregation independently and autonomously runs its own affairs....

 at Alma, South Australia (near Hamley Bridge
Hamley Bridge, South Australia
Hamley Bridge is a community in South Australia located at the junction of the Gilbert and Light rivers, as well as the site of a former railway junction....

) in 1872. Dowie received and accepted a call to a pastorate at Manly, New South Wales
Manly, New South Wales
Manly is a suburb of northern Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. Manly is located 17 kilometres north-east of the Sydney central business district and is the administrative centre of the local government area of Manly Council, in the Northern Beaches region.-History:Manly was named...

, in 1873 and at Newtown
Newtown, New South Wales
Newtown, a suburb of Sydney's inner west is located approximately four kilometres south-west of the Sydney central business district, straddling the local government areas of the City of Sydney and Marrickville Council in the state of New South Wales, Australia....

 in 1875. He married his cousin, Jane Dowie, on 26 May 1876. They had three children, Gladstone (1877–1945), Jeanie (1879-1885) and Esther (1881–1902).

He published Rome's Polluted Springs in 1877, the substance of two lectures given at the Masonic Hall, Sydney. In 1879 he also published at Sydney The Drama, The Press and the Pulpit, revised reports of two lectures given the previous March. About this time he gave up his pastorate as a Congregational clergyman and became an independent evangelist
Evangelism
Evangelism refers to the practice of relaying information about a particular set of beliefs to others who do not hold those beliefs. The term is often used in reference to Christianity....

, holding his meetings in a theatre and claiming powers as a faith-healer. He was for a time involved with the Salvation Army
Salvation Army
The Salvation Army is a Protestant Christian church known for its thrift stores and charity work. It is an international movement that currently works in over a hundred countries....

. Coming to Melbourne in the early 1880s, he attracted many followers. In 1882, he was invited to the Sackville Street Tabernacle
Tabernacle (disambiguation)
The Tabernacle most commonly refers to the Jewish Tabernacle , which was a movable tent and worship facility used by the Israelites for the worship of Yahweh as recorded in the Book of Exodus...

, Collingwood
Collingwood, Victoria
Collingwood is an inner city suburb of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, 3 km north-east from Melbourne's central business district. Its Local Government Area is the City of Yarra...

. His authoritarian leadership led to a split in the church, and Dowie was fined and jailed for over a month for leading unauthorized processions. He gave his account of the incident in Sin in The Camp.

After a visit to New Zealand
New Zealand
New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...

, he moved to the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 in 1888. He first settled in San Francisco and later moved to Chicago where he established a tabernacle and healing homes. His healing ministry was successful, but he spent much of 1895 in court fighting allegations he was practicing medicine without a license. In 1896, Dowie founded the Christian Catholic Apostolic Church with himself as general overseer. In 1900, he founded the city of Zion, 40 miles from Chicago, where he owned all property and prohibited smoking, drinking, eating pork and establishing theaters, dance halls, doctors' surgeries and secret lodges. In 1905, he suffered a stroke in Mexico. While absent, he was deposed
Deposition (politics)
Deposition by political means concerns the removal of a politician or monarch. It may be done by coup, impeachment, invasion or forced abdication...

 by Wilbur G. Voliva, his chief lieutenant. He attempted to recover his authority through litigation but was ultimately forced to accept an allowance until his death in 1907.

Theology and influence

Dowie was a restorationist and sought to recover the "primitive condition" of the Church. He believed in an end-times restoration of spiritual gifts and apostolic
Apostle (Christian)
The term apostle is derived from Classical Greek ἀπόστολος , meaning one who is sent away, from στέλλω + από . The literal meaning in English is therefore an "emissary", from the Latin mitto + ex...

 offices to the Church. He was sometimes described as "Elijah the Restorer", "The Prophet Elijah", or "The Third Elijah". He was also an advocate of divine healing and was highly critical of other teachers on healing. This criticism largely stemmed from differences of opinion on the use of "means" or medicine; Dowie was for total reliance on divine healing and against the use of all forms of medicine. He opened a number of healing homes where people could come for instruction in healing and for specific prayer. He emphasized faith in God, "entire consecration", and holiness.

Dowie was a forerunner of Pentecostalism
Pentecostalism
Pentecostalism is a diverse and complex movement within Christianity that places special emphasis on a direct personal experience of God through the baptism in the Holy Spirit, has an eschatological focus, and is an experiential religion. The term Pentecostal is derived from Pentecost, the Greek...

, and many of his followers became influential figures in the early twentieth century revival. Though Dowie did not visit South Africa
South Africa
The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...

, some of his followers went there as missionaries between 1904 and 1908 and established churches at Wakkerstroom
Wakkerstroom
Wakkerstroom, , is the second oldest town in Mpumalanga province in South Africa. It was established in 1859 and its name is an Afrikaans translation of the Zulu name for the river that flows near the town, uThaka, ...

 and Charlestown
Charlestown, KwaZulu-Natal
Charlestown is a small town situated at the top of Laing's Nek pass in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa between Newcastle and Volksrust. It started out as an important railway station and customs post between Natal and Transvaal in 1891 until the Union of South Africa came into being in 1910, and...

 on the Transvaal-Natal
Colony of Natal
The Colony of Natal was a British colony in south-eastern Africa. It was proclaimed a British colony on May 4, 1843 after the British government had annexed the Boer Republic of Natalia, and on 31 May 1910 combined with three other colonies to form the Union of South Africa, as one of its...

 border. After the missionaries left, these churches proliferated into a number of denominations of African Zionism
African Zionism
African Zionism, also known as the "amaZioni" which is a Zulu word meaning the people of Zion. There are between 15-18 million amaZioni throughout Southern Africa making it the largest religious movement in the region. African Zionism is the predominant religion of Swaziland and forty percent of...

, all claiming their origin in Zion, Illinois
Zion, Illinois
Zion is a city in Lake County, Illinois, United States. The population was 22,866 at the 2000 census, and estimated at 24,303 as of 2005. The city was founded in July 1901 by John Alexander Dowie. He also started the Zion Tabernacle of the Christian Catholic Apostolic Church, which was the only...

, which together constitute the largest group of Christians in South Africa.

"Prayer Duel" with Mirza Ghulam Ahmad

Dowie is of particular significance to the turn-of-the-century Islam
Islam
Islam . The most common are and .   : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~...

ic community known as the Ahmadiyya
Ahmadiyya
Ahmadiyya is an Islamic religious revivalist movement founded in India near the end of the 19th century, originating with the life and teachings of Mirza Ghulam Ahmad , who claimed to have fulfilled the prophecies about the world reformer of the end times, who was to herald the Eschaton as...

 Muslim Community. Herein the Ahmadiyya find a sign of God and a proof of their founder's claim to be the Promised Messiah and Mahdi
Mahdi
In Islamic eschatology, the Mahdi is the prophesied redeemer of Islam who will stay on Earth for seven, nine or nineteen years- before the Day of Judgment and, alongside Jesus, will rid the world of wrongdoing, injustice and tyranny.In Shia Islam, the belief in the Mahdi is a "central religious...

. Dowie had claimed to be the forerunner of Christ's second coming. He was particularly hard on Muslims, whom he believed Christ would destroy upon his return. Mirza Ghulam Ahmad had claimed to be the coming of Christ in the spirit (as well as the promised Imam Mahdi), who would establish the final victory of Islam on earth. Mirza Ghulam Ahmad challenged Dowie to a prayer duel, which Dowie declined. Mirza challenged Dowie to "pray to God that of us two whoever is the liar may perish first". Dowie died in 1907 and Ahmad died in 1908.

External links

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