Richard Reader Harris, K.C. (1847 – 25 March 1909) was a prominent English

barrister A barrister is a type of lawyer in common law jurisdiction (area), jurisdictions. Barristers mostly specialise in courtroom advocacy and litigation. Their tasks include arguing cases in courts and tribunals, drafting legal pleadings, jurisprud ...

King's Counsel A King's Counsel (Post-nominal letters, post-nominal initials KC) is a senior lawyer appointed by the monarch (or their Viceroy, viceregal representative) of some Commonwealth realms as a "Counsel learned in the law". When the reigning monarc ...

and Master of the Bench of

Gray's Inn The Honourable Society of Gray's Inn, commonly known as Gray's Inn, is one of the four Inns of Court (professional associations for barristers and judges) in London. To be called to the bar in order to practise as a barrister in England and Wale ...

, who was also a

Methodist Methodism, also called the Methodist movement, is a Protestant Christianity, Christian Christian tradition, tradition whose origins, doctrine and practice derive from the life and teachings of John Wesley. George Whitefield and John's brother ...

minister, founder of the Pentecostal League of Prayer, and author of 34 Christian books. He is particularly remembered as an advocate of

British Israelism British Israelism (also called Anglo-Israelism) is a pseudo-historical 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 ...

, the belief that people of Western European descent are also the direct lineal descendants of the

Ten Lost Tribes The Ten Lost Tribes were those from the Twelve Tribes of Israel that were said to have been exiled from the Kingdom of Israel (Samaria), Kingdom of Israel after it was conquered by the Neo-Assyrian Empire around 720 BCE. They were the following ...

Professional career

He started his career as a

civil engineer A civil engineer is a person who practices civil engineering – the application of planning, designing, constructing, maintaining, and operating infrastructure while protecting the public and environmental health, as well as improving existing i ...

for the

Great Western Railway The Great Western Railway (GWR) was a History of rail transport in Great Britain, British railway company that linked London with the southwest, west and West Midlands (region), West Midlands of England and most of Wales. It was founded in 1833, ...

(GWR) and

Great Eastern Railway The Great Eastern Railway (GER) was a pre-grouping British railway company, whose main line linked London Liverpool Street to Norwich and which had other lines through East Anglia. The company was grouped into the London and North Eastern R ...

(GER), before taking a post as chief engineer to the Republic of Bolivia. On his return to London in 1883 he trained for the bar, and was called at

, where he was later elected to the Bench.

Christian life

Early beliefs

Reader Harris drifted from the liberal view of

Christianity Christianity is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion, which states that Jesus in Christianity, Jesus is the Son of God (Christianity), Son of God and Resurrection of Jesus, rose from the dead after his Crucifixion of Jesus, crucifixion, whose ...

of his teens to join

Charles Bradlaugh Charles Bradlaugh (; 26 September 1833 – 30 January 1891) was an English political activist and atheist. He founded the National Secular Society in 1866, 15 years after George Holyoake had coined the term "secularism" in 1851. In 1880, Br ...

's Ethical Society. Bradlaugh, an

atheist Atheism, in the broadest sense, is an absence of belief in the existence of deities. Less broadly, atheism is a rejection of the belief that any deities exist. In an even narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there no ...

, mocked Christians who lived immoral lives while he lectured on

Bible The Bible is a collection of religious texts that are central to Christianity and Judaism, and esteemed in other Abrahamic religions such as Islam. The Bible is an anthology (a compilation of texts of a variety of forms) originally writt ...

texts and advocated that his audience abide by ideas expressed in the

Sermon on the Mount The Sermon on the Mount ( anglicized from the Matthean Vulgate Latin section title: ) is a collection of sayings spoken by Jesus of Nazareth found in the Gospel of Matthew (chapters 5, 6, and 7). that emphasizes his moral teachings. It is th ...

. As a member of the

Puritan The Puritans were English Protestants in the 16th and 17th centuries who sought to rid the Church of England of what they considered to be Roman Catholic practices, maintaining that the Church of England had not been fully reformed and should b ...

wing of Bradlaugh's Ethical Society, Harris pledged not to smoke or drink.

Marriage & Christian Conversion

When Reader Harris married Mary Griffin Bristow in 1880, he converted to Christianity. At the same time the elevated social status of his wife's family brought him entry to the upper strata of

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

society.

Pentecostal League of Prayer

In 1891 both he and his wife founded the Pentecostal League of Prayer as "an interdenominational union of Christian people who, conscious of their own need, would join in prayer to fill believers with the Holy Spirit; revive Christian churches and spread scriptural holiness." Harris became a close friend of evangelist

Oswald Chambers Oswald Chambers (24 July 187415 November 1917) was an early-twentieth-century Scottish Baptist evangelist and teacher who was aligned with the Holiness Movement. He is best known for the daily devotional ''My Utmost for His Highest''. Youth a ...

. When the new League began publishing the ''Tongues of Fire'' magazine it became associated in the mind of the public with the emerging " tongues movement". Reader Harris claimed that the two had no connection other than their reference to the second chapter of the

Book of Acts The Acts of the Apostles (, ''Práxeis Apostólōn''; ) is the fifth book of the New Testament; it tells of the founding of the Christian Church and the spread of The gospel, its message to the Roman Empire. Acts and the Gospel of Luke make u ...

(Acts 2:6-12). In November 1907 he stated that:

There is nothing wrong with speaking in tongues; it was the privilege of the early Church, and it may be the privilege of any believer today.

Wife

His wife was a leader in her own right, which was uncommon but not unheard of for a woman in her day. Another more famous example was

Catherine Booth Catherine Booth (''née'' Mumford, 17 January 1829 – 4 October 1890) was co-founder of The Salvation Army, along with her husband William Booth. Because of her influence in the formation of The Salvation Army she was known as the 'Moth ...

, who was also of Methodist background. Apart from having helped him start the League of Prayer, she was also an author who went under the name Mrs Reader Harris.

''Ten Lost Tribes''

In 1907 Reader Harris wrote his book "The Lost Tribes of Israel", which expressed his belief in the theory that the

Anglo-Saxons The Anglo-Saxons, in some contexts simply called Saxons or the English, were a Cultural identity, cultural group who spoke Old English and inhabited much of what is now England and south-eastern Scotland in the Early Middle Ages. They traced t ...

are descended from the

Such then are the Scriptures that appear to me to furnish strong evidence in favour of the contention of those who believe that in the Anglo-Saxon race God possesses today the descendants of the house of Israel. If this be true, it adds tremendously to our responsibilities, and opens before us in a way that no human tongue can describe, spiritual possibilities, temporal possibilities, national possibilities, and universal possibilities.

Death

On 25 March 1909, Reader Harris suffered a stroke and remained in a coma at his home in London. Without regaining consciousness he died four days later at the age of sixty-one. On 6 April, two thousand people attempted to attend his funeral at

West Norwood Cemetery West Norwood Cemetery is a rural cemetery in West Norwood in London, England. It was also known as the South Metropolitan Cemetery. One of the first private landscaped cemeteries in London, it is one of the " Magnificent Seven" cemeteries of ...

. Hundreds stood outside.

References

External links

''The Lost Tribes of Israel''
excerpts from the book by Richard Reader Harris with links to other works by Pentecostal writers on the same subject. {{DEFAULTSORT:Reader Harris, Richard English Methodist ministers English Pentecostals English barristers British Israelism 1847 births 1909 deaths Burials at West Norwood Cemetery Members of Gray's Inn 19th-century English lawyers 19th-century English Methodist ministers