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Conrad Gaard (d. 1969) was an American minister and a key figure in the emergence of Christian Identity from British Israelism. [1] He was one of the first to incorporate the serpent seed doctrine into Christian Identity teaching. [2]
Gaard was the pastor of the Christian Chapel Church in Tacoma, Washington, [3] an Identity congregation. [4] He broadcast over three radio stations, and published a newsletter titled The Broadcaster, formerly titled The Interpreter. [4] He headed the Destiny of America Foundation until his death in 1969. [5] [6]
Gaard was a faculty member of the Dayton Theological Seminary in Dayton, Ohio, an Anglo-Israel training center. [7]
Being involved with the Anglo-Saxon Federation of America, Gaard traveled the United States and western Canada giving lectures on British Israelism [8] [9] and pyramidology.[ citation needed ]
Gaard was one of the most influential theologians in the early formation of Christian Identity. [10] He was one of the four primary theologians responsible for the emergence of Christian Identity out of British Israelism, along with Wesley Swift, William Potter Gale, and Bertrand Comparet. [1]
In the 1940s, Gaard was among a number of British Israel organizers who were mentored by Gerald L. K. Smith, along with Bertrand Comparet and San Jacinto Capt. [11]
Conrad Gaard's origin teaching considered the serpent a pre-Adamite "beast of the field". Although the assumption is that the serpent fathered Cain through adultery with Eve, Gaard considered that made little difference since Cane married a pre-Adamite anyway, resulting in a "mongrel, hybrid race". [12] In Gaard's view, the original sin then was miscegenation. [13] This line was continued through Ham, allowing Cain's line to survive the flood. This continued when Judah had offspring with a Canaanite woman. This line was carried of into Babylonian exile where they joined with "the various Edomite-Amalekite Shelanite-Canaanite elements of the serpent race" which, "under Satanic inspiration they were united in one Conspiratorial group, which became known as the 'Diaspora,' or Dispersion, of the 'Jews'". [12] Gaard's teaching on serpent seed doctrine first appeared sometime in the 1960s, [14] in his book Spotlight on the Great Conspiracy. [3]
Gaard's teachings on eschatology rejected amillennialism and presented a combination of elements from postmillennialism and premillennialism. [10] He believed sin would continue until things were as in Noah's generation, and that Christ would return prior to a millennial reign on Earth under God's law. [15] Gaard rejected the idea of a secret rapture of the Church, teaching that the Church would be saved in the Great Tribulation, as opposed to being saved from it. [16]
British Israelism is the British nationalist, pseudoarchaeological, pseudohistorical and pseudoreligious belief that the people of Great Britain are "genetically, racially, and linguistically the direct descendants" of the Ten Lost Tribes of ancient Israel. With roots in the 16th century, British Israelism was inspired by several 19th century English writings such as John Wilson's 1840 Our Israelitish Origin. From the 1870s onward, numerous independent British Israelite organizations were set up throughout the British Empire as well as in the United States; as of the early 21st century, a number of these organizations are still active. In the United States, the idea gave rise to the Christian Identity movement.
Christian Identity is an interpretation of Christianity which advocates the belief that only Celtic and Germanic peoples, such as the Anglo-Saxon, Nordic nations, or people of the Aryan race and people of kindred blood, are the descendants of the ancient Israelites and are therefore God's "chosen people". It is a racial interpretation of Christianity and is not an organized religion, nor is it affiliated with specific Christian denominations. It emerged from British Israelism in the 1920s and began to take shape during the 1940s-1970s. Today it is independently practiced by individuals, independent congregations, and some prison gangs.
Guido Karl Anton List, better known as Guido von List, was an Austrian occultist, journalist, playwright, and novelist. He expounded a modern Pagan new religious movement known as Wotanism, which he claimed was the revival of the religion of the ancient German race, and which included an inner set of Ariosophical teachings that he termed Armanism.
John Harden Allen was an American minister associated with the Church of God (Holiness), and British Israelism. He came from Illinois, later moving to Missouri in 1879. Originally a pastor in the Methodist Episcopal Church, he later became a pastor in the Wesleyan Methodist Church in California. He was one of the co-founders of the Church of God (Holiness) in 1883. He "evangelized throughout the West and eventually moved to Pasadena, California, where he died". Around 1917 he produced a publication entitled Stone Kingdom Herald.
The pre-Adamite hypothesis or pre-Adamism is the theological belief that humans existed before the biblical character Adam. Pre-Adamism is therefore distinct from the conventional Abrahamic belief that Adam was the first human. "Pre-Adamite" is used as a term, both for those humans believed to exist before Adam, and for believers or proponents of this hypothesis.
The doctrine of the serpent seed, also known as the dual-seed or the two-seedline doctrine, is a controversial and fringe Christian religious belief which explains the biblical account of the fall of man by stating that the Serpent mated with Eve in the Garden of Eden, and the offspring of their union was Cain. This event resulted in the creation of two races of people: the wicked descendants of the Serpent who were destined for damnation, and the righteous descendants of Adam who were destined to have eternal life. The doctrine frames human history as a conflict between these two races in which the descendants of Adam will eventually triumph over the descendants of the Serpent.
Else Christensen (1913–2005) was a Danish proponent of the modern Pagan new religious movement of Heathenry. She established a Heathen organisation known as the Odinist Fellowship in the United States, where she lived for much of her life. A Third Positionist ideologue, she espoused the establishment of an anarcho-syndicalist society composed of racially Aryan communities.
The Allgermanische Heidnische Front (AHF) was an international neo-Nazi organisation, active during the late 1990s and early 2000s, that espoused a form of racial Germanic Neopaganism. It grew from the Norsk Hedensk Front (NHF), which was claimed to be led and founded by the musician Varg Vikernes in 1993, although he and the organisation denied it. The program was based on his first book, Vargsmål (1994), published shortly after he was convicted for church arson and the murder of fellow musician Euronymous.
Christian Nationalist Crusade was an American political advocacy organization founded by Gerald L. K. Smith in 1947. It nominated Smith for President in 1948 and Douglas MacArthur in 1952.
Wesley A. Swift was a minister from Southern California who was known for his white supremacist views and was a central figure in the Christian Identity movement from the 1940s until his death in 1970.
Edward Hine was an influential proponent of British Israelism in the 1870s and 1880s, drawing on the earlier work of Richard Brothers (1794) and John Wilson (1840). Hine went as far as to conclude that "It is an utter impossibility for England ever to be defeated. And this is another result arising entirely from the fact of our being Israel."
The Church of Israel is a denomination that emerged from the Church of Christ in the Latter Day Saint movement. The denomination is noted for explicit white supremacist beliefs similar to the Christian Identity movement.
The Shepherd's Chapel is a Christian church and broadcast facility in Gravette, Arkansas. The church was founded by Arnold Benjamin Murray, who served as senior pastor until his death. As of February 2014, his son Dennis Arnold Murray, the former associate pastor, presides as senior pastor of the church. Arnold Murray's other son, David Vernon Murray, was also an associate pastor until his death.
Howard Rand, also known as Howard B. Rand and Howard Benjamin Rand was a lawyer, inventor, and three-time candidate for Massachusetts state office on the Prohibition Party ticket, He headed the former Anglo-Saxon Federation of America, a British Israelist group. He served from 1937 to 1968 as editor of its affiliate Destiny Publishers, which put out Destiny magazine.
William Potter Gale was an American political activist who was involved with several white supremacist groups, including Christian Identity and the Posse Comitatus. He had connections to the Church of Jesus Christ–Christian, Aryan Nations, the sovereign citizen movement, and the militia movement.
Bertrand Lewis Comparet (c1900-1983) was an influential figure in the development of the Christian Identity movement.
Sheldon Emry was a Christian Identity minister and the founder of America's Promise ministries.
James K. Warner was an early recruit to George Lincoln Rockwell's American Nazi Party (ANP) as part of the core of the party and national secretary. He later became involved with the National States' Rights Party (NSRP). After moving to Los Angeles, he was converted to Christian Identity by Wesley Swift and started the New Christian Crusade Church. Warner succeeded Richard Girndt Butler as leader of the Christian Defense League. He eventually moved both the New Christian Crusade Church and the Christian Defense League to Louisiana. Warner later became the Louisiana Grand Dragon of David Duke's Knights of the Ku Klux Klan.