Coining a New Name

I am indebted in writing this piece to several friends (not all of whom are Friends) helping me puzzle out the nuances of a dead language. Special mention must go, however, to my sister-in-law, and to the helpful folks of the Latin Stack Exchange. I am no scholar of ancient languages myself, though I dabble (as I do in many things). Any errors in how I have made use of Latin are my own, and as I've had to be a little creative I expect there are some.

Much conversation goes on among liberal Friends, at least recently in Britain, concerning our range of names for the Divine. This is why there's a tag for it on this blog, and has become a startling focus of conversation around our theological diversity. Some of the worry – and some of the excitement – about the upcoming revision of Britain Yearly Meeting's Book of Discipline even relates to this. Some of the differences in name reflect the different ways we have of thinking about the Divine, and sometimes using the same name conceals that difference.

We have the old names – God, the Father, Christ, and more esoteric terms early Friends were fond of, such as Seed. Then we have names that are old, but new to Quakers, as other faith traditions feed into our own, and they are too many and varied for it to be easy to pick out a few. We have names that reflect theological liberalism and universalism, delightfully non-committal like my own go-to name, the Divine. We have terms that were used by early Friends and are used today with different nuance, like Light (for early Friends it was often the Light of Christ, or Inward Light; today it is often Inner Light, and for both it would just be shortened to “Light”). Maybe it's time for something new. Something that reflects what we are united on, or at least as united as we ever are, without claiming anything else.