A Recorded Minister was originally a male or female
Quaker
Quakers are people who belong to a historically Protestant Christian set of Christian denomination, denominations known formally as the Religious Society of Friends. Members of these movements ("theFriends") are generally united by a belie ...
who was acknowledged to have a gift of
spoken ministry.
The practice of recording in a Monthly Meeting Minute the acknowledgment that a Friend had a gift of spoken ministry began in the 1730s in
London Yearly Meeting
The Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) in Britain, also known as the Britain Yearly Meeting (and, until 1995, the London Yearly Meeting), is a Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) in England, Sc ...
, according to
Milligan's Biographical dictionary of British Quakers in commerce and industry.
[ Milligan's Biographical dictionary of British Quakers in commerce and industry p. 582 (Glossary)] The acknowledgment did not involve anything like
ordination
Ordination is the process by which individuals are Consecration, consecrated, that is, set apart and elevated from the laity class to the clergy, who are thus then authorization, authorized (usually by the religious denomination, denominational ...
or any payment, in view of early Friends'
testimony
In law and in religion, testimony is a solemn attestation as to the truth of a matter.
Etymology
The words "testimony" and "testify" both derive from the Latin word ''testis'', referring to the notion of a disinterested third-party witness.
La ...
against "Hireling Priests". Acknowledgment did permit the Recorded Minister to attend at
Yearly Meeting
Yearly Meeting is a term used by members of the Religious Society of Friends, or Quakers, to refer to an organization composed of constituent meetings or churches within a geographical area. The constituent meetings are called Monthly Meetings in ...
and
Meeting for Sufferings.
In London Yearly Meeting the practice of recording Ministers was discontinued in 1924.
[
While many Yearly Meetings have discontinued the practice of recording ministers, it is maintained by many others. Today, Friends are recorded as ministers as an acknowledgment of a variety of ministries, including teaching, ]chaplain
A chaplain is, traditionally, a cleric (such as a Minister (Christianity), minister, priest, pastor, rabbi, purohit, or imam), or a laity, lay representative of a religious tradition, attached to a secularity, secular institution (such as a hosp ...
cy, and evangelical and pastoral ministry.Ohio Yearly Meeting ''Book of Discipline'' (2001): sections on recognizing and recording Gospel Ministers
/ref>
See also
* Daughters of Light: Quaker Women Preaching and Prophesying in the Colonies and Abroad, 1700-1775
* : Quaker ministers
References
{{reflist
Quaker ministers
Quaker practices