John Eliot - England, Cambridge, Boston, Teacher, Pastor, Indians

John Eliot (1604-1690), called “The Apostle to the Indians,” was the first minister to teach Christianity to the Indians of New England. A graduate of Cambridge, he traveled to Boston in 1631, where he became a teacher and pastor. A young Indian who had converted from paganism to Christianity helped Eliot learn various Indian dialects. John Eliot was responsible for having written the grammar book. In addition, he established 3,600 Indians into over a dozen self-governing communities. In his work, The Christian Commonwealth, 1659, which was a draft of a plan of government for the Natick Indian community, Eliot explained that:

“[It is not for man] to search humane Polities and Platformes of Government, contrived by wisdom of man; but as the Lord hath carried on their works for them, so they ought to go unto the Lord and enquire at the Word of his mouth, what Platforme of Government he hath therein commanded; and humble themselves to embrace that as the best… [The] written Word of God is the perfect System or Frame of Laws, to guide all the Moral actions of man, either towards God or man.” ¹

In 1640, John Eliot along with Richard Mather and Thomas Welch, printed the very first book in the colonies. Using the first printing press in American colonies, located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, this book became the approved hymnal of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Known as the Bay Psalm Book, it was entitled:

“THE WHOLE BOOKE OF PSALMES faithfully TRANSLATED into ENGLISH Metre, Whereunto is prefixed a discourse declaring not only the lawfulness, but also the necessity of the heavenly Ordinances of singing Scripture Psalmes in the Churches of God.” ²

¹ 1659, in his work, The Christian Commonwealth: or, The Civil Policy of the Rising Kingdom of Jesus Christ. John Eidsmoe, Christianity and the Constitution: The Faith of Our Founding Fathers (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, 1987), pp. 23-24. Gary DeMar, The Untold Story (Atlanta, GA: American Vision, Inc., 1993), pp. 125-126.

² 1640, The Bay Psalm Book. Sydney E. Ahlsrom, A Religious History of the American People (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1972), pp. 149-150. Gary DeMar, The Untold Story (Atlanta, GA: American Vision, Inc., 1993), pp. 45-46.

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