A CURIOUS SECT.

Hawke's Bay Herald, Volume XXII, Issue 7697, 21 March 1887, Page 3

A CURIOUS SECT.

The London correspondent of the New York World writes :— " A serious dispnle took place recently among a remarkable sect of religions fanatics who have their headquarters at Koolicster, a city midway between Canterbury anil London. The sect call themselves the now and later "House of Israel," and they claim to be the remnant of the people of Israel, the 14,400 spoken of in the Book of Revelations. The doctrine which they teach is that the niG'"'bers of the sect never die in the ordinary sense of tilt f «nu, but that the body is preserved alive, and, after being ultimately cleansed of blood, passes into the oujoymeu't of a first resurrection. They have had large additions to' their meinborship, and have organised a considerable fund for the bnilding of an immense temple on Chatham Hill. The final cost of this was to amount to £50,000, ami £10,000 of this has already been raised and spent on the building. Contributions to the fund have been coming in at the rate of about £10,000 per annum, and the congregation was in a highly prosperous condition. The leader was one Jessreel, who, strange to relate, died the other day in the ordinary fashion. This naturally upset a good many of his followers, and, though his wife, upon whom the mantle of her husband fell, attempted vaiious explanations of his sudden and unexpected'" departure for another world, there was a largo contingent whe could not be convinced that tlierc was not a mistake somewhere. Mine Jezreel then proceeded to expel these heretics from the sect, on the ground that they were not jiillars of the Church, The quarrel thus made public has revealed much misery in many families ai .Rochester, v/here fathers, mothers, ant children had been misled and led astray by this most ridiculous of absurdities Oiio jjmn of some promince in the'community deserted hjs wife and children and threw up a good position to join' tin sect, hi connection with which he aub mitted himself to all sorts of humiliating ollices. Jezreol appears to have boen ! sort of Brigham Young, except in- tin matter of marriage, and, us lie had iln handling of all moneys paid, in, he an< his wife looked upon it as a lucky ventnre It is almost -lieyoml belief that such i considerable number of men and womei could ho found in England, outside o lunatic asylnms, to l)e thus duped.