Jarena Lee

{{Short description|American preacher (1783–1864)}} {{Infobox religious biography | honorific-prefix = | name = Jarena Lee | image = Jarena Lee.jpg | alt = | caption = | religion = Christian | denomination = African Methodist Episcopal | ordained = | school = | lineage = | sect = | subsect = | temple = | order = | institute = | church =  | founder = Wesleyan Holiness Movement | philosophy = | known_for = Preaching | birth_date = {{birth date|1783|02|11|df=y}} | birth_place = Cape May, New Jersey | death_date = {{death date and age |1864|02|03 |1783|02|11}} | death_place = | death_cause = | resting_place = | resting_place_coordinates =  | spouse = Joseph Lee | partner = | children = | parents = | mother = | father = | location = | title = | period = | consecration = | predecessor = | successor = | reason = | rank = | teacher =  | reincarnation_of = | students =  | initiated = | works =  | ordination = | initiation = | initiation_date = | initiation_place = | initiator = | profession = | previous_post = | present_post = | post = | website =  | signature = | background =  }}

'''Jarena Lee''' (February 11, 1783 – February 3, 1864<ref name="Knight 68">{{cite journal|last=Knight|first=Frederick|date=January 2017|title=The Many Names for Jarena Lee|journal=Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography|volume=141|issue=1|page=68|issn=0031-4587}}</ref>) was the first woman preacher in the African Methodist Episcopal Church (AME).<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Hubert|first=Susan J.|date=1998|title=Testimony and prophecy in The Life and Religious-Experience of Jarena Lee|journal=Journal of Religious Thought|volume=54/54(2)|pages=45–52}}</ref> Born into a free Black family in New Jersey, Lee asked the founder of the AME church, Richard Allen, to be a preacher. Although Allen initially refused, after hearing her preach in 1819, Allen approved her preaching ministry.<ref name="r1">[https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/part3/3h1638.html Religious Experience and Journal of Mrs. Jarena Lee]. pbs.org</ref><ref name=":0" /> A leader in the Wesleyan-Holiness movement, Lee preached the doctrine of entire sanctification as an itinerant pastor throughout the pulpits of the African Methodist Episcopal denomination.<ref name="r1" /><ref name="Ingersol2021">{{cite web |last1=Ingersol |first1=Stan |title=African Methodist Women in the Wesleyan-Holiness Movement |url=https://pbusa.org/202001-stan |publisher=Church of the Nazarene |access-date=17 June 2021 |language=English |archive-date=24 June 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210624195636/https://pbusa.org/202001-stan |url-status=dead }}</ref> In 1836, Lee became the first African American woman to publish an autobiography.<ref name=":2">{{Cite web|last=Luders-Manuel|first=Shannon|date=2018-12-15|title=Jarena Lee, The First Woman African American Autobiographer|url=https://daily.jstor.org/jarena-lee-the-first-woman-african-american-autobiographer/|access-date=2022-02-17|website=JSTOR Daily|language=en-US}}</ref>

==Early life== Jarena Lee was born on February 11, 1783, in Cape May, New Jersey, according to the details she published later in life in an autobiography.<ref name=":1">{{Cite web|last=Washington|first=Eric|title=Jarena Lee|url=https://www.christianitytoday.com/history/people/pastorsandpreachers/jarena-lee.html|access-date=2022-02-19|website=Christian History {{!}} Learn the History of Christianity & the Church|date=23 May 2017 |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last=Andrews|first=William|title=Three Black Women's Autobiographies of the Nineteenth Century: Sisters of the Spirit|year=1986|publisher=Indiana University Press|page=[https://archive.org/details/sistersofspiritt0000unse/page/27 27]|isbn=0253287049|url=https://archive.org/details/sistersofspiritt0000unse/page/27}}</ref> She recounts that she was born into a free black family, and that from the age of 7, she began to work as a live-in servant with a white family. Not much detail is known of her family or her early life.<ref name=":1" /> Lee later recalled that she did not receive religious instruction as a child.<ref name=":3" /> She was not formally educated, but taught herself to write.<ref name=":2" />

In 1804, Lee was first introduced to Christianity by a Presbyterian missionary.<ref name=":8">Giver-Johnston, Donna, 'Jarena Lee', ''Claiming the Call to Preach: Four Female Pioneers of Preaching in Nineteenth-Century America'' (New York, 2021; online edn, Oxford Academic, 22 July 2021), {{doi|10.1093/oso/9780197576373.003.0003}}, accessed 12 June 2023.</ref> In 1804, she moved from New Jersey to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, where she continued in domestic service.<ref name=":5">{{Cite web |last=Wilson |first=Teisha |date=2007-01-19 |title=Jarena Lee (1783–185?) • |url=https://www.blackpast.org/african-american-history/lee-jarena-1783/ |access-date=2023-06-12 |language=en-US}}</ref> While there, she was introduced to Christian teachings during religious revivals at Allen's church,<ref name=":9">{{Cite journal |last=Casey |first=Emilie |date=January 13, 2021 |title=Enfleshing the Spirit through Avatar Performance: Objecthood as Resistance in Women Preachers—Rachel Baker, Jarena Lee, and Florence Spearing Randolph |url=http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0966735020965184 |journal=Feminist Theology |language=en |volume=29 |issue=2 |pages=140–155 |doi=10.1177/0966735020965184 |issn=0966-7350|url-access=subscription }}</ref> and felt herself to be a "wretched sinner." Bishop Richard Allen's teachings inspired her to convert, but she continued to struggle in the male dominated church.<ref name=":3" /><ref name=":4">{{Cite news |title=Jarena Lee and the Early A.M.E. Church |url=https://nmaahc.si.edu/explore/stories/jarena-lee-and-early-ame-church |access-date=2023-06-12 |website=National Museum of African American History and Culture |language=en}}</ref> She recounted that she struggled with suicidal thoughts and fantasized about drowning herself on at least several occasions. Through prayer, she finally felt justified and was baptized. After three months of constant prayer, she felt that she had been fully sanctified by the Holy Spirit.<ref name=":3">"American Religious History", ed. Amanda Porterfield, 2002, Blackwell Publishers, Malden, Massachusetts {{ISBN|0631223223}}.</ref>

In 1807, Lee began hearing voices telling her to "Go preach the Gospel! Preach the Gospel; I will put words in your mouth." Lee then told Richard Allen that God had spoken to her and commanded her to preach, but Allen said that there was no provision for women preachers in the Methodist Church.<ref name=":5" /><ref name=":6" />

==Marriage== Jarena married Joseph Lee in 1811, seven years after joining Philadelphia's Mother Bethel. Joseph Lee was a pastor of the African American Society<ref name=":8" /> at Snow Hill, six miles from Philadelphia. Lee moved to Snow Hill with her husband, but knew no one there besides her husband. She found at Snow Hill that she did not find the same closeness that she had in Philadelphia.<ref>{{cite web |title=My Marriage |url=http://digilib.nypl.org/dynaweb/digs-b/wwm9716/@Generic__BookView |access-date=6 December 2012 |archive-date=14 July 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150714061815/http://digilib.nypl.org/dynaweb/digs-b/wwm9716/@Generic__BookView |url-status=dead }}</ref> During their marriage her husband did not want her to preach, so she felt forced to put her spiritual needs on hold for her marriage. It is said that her not being fully committed to her spiritual needs resulted in Lee becoming ill and a sense of discontent. Joseph Lee died six years into their marriage, after having two children with his wife.<ref name=":5" /> Soon after Lee was fully devoted to religious concerns, but her ill health never recovered.<ref>Peterson, p. 73</ref>

==Call to preach== After her husband's death, Lee renewed her advocacy in the ministry.<ref name=":5" /> "If the man may preach, because the Savior died for him, why not the woman, seeing he died for her also? Is he not a whole Savior, instead of half of one?" In 1817, she again requested her ecclesial license to preach, but Allen refused again. Two years later, during a Sunday service at the Mother Bethel the preacher seemed to lose spirit. Lee stepped up and began to preach, the crowd was very intrigued to what she had to say.<ref name=":6">{{cite book|last1=Carson|first1=Clayborne|last2=Lapansky-Werner|first2= Emma J.|last3= Nash|first3= Gary B.|title=The Struggle for Freedom: A History of African Americans|year=2011|publisher=Prentice Hall|location=Boston|isbn=978-0205832415|pages=156–157}}</ref><ref name=":8" /> Following this, Bishop Allen was so impressed with Lee that he publicly endorsed her.<ref name=":4" /> Though he could not issue her a license to preach, he endorsed her as an official traveling exhorter.<ref name=":8" /> Lee went on to preach throughout the United States, including in the South, where she risked enslavement.<ref name=":8" />

Religious belief became a source of self-empowerment for Lee.<ref>Peterson, p. 56</ref> In rebuttal to questions on a female ministry, she responded, "Did not Mary ''first'' preach the risen Savior?".<ref name=":0">Harvey, Paul. (2011). Through the storm through the night: a history of African American Christianity. Landham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers. p. 43. {{ISBN|9780742564732}}</ref> The idea that African Americans and women could preach was an element of the Second Great Awakening, which reached its peak as Lee began her missionary work.<ref name="r2">[https://www.nyhistory.org/womens-history/education/curriculum/saving-washington/module-2-breaking-the-rules-women/life-stories/jarena-lee]. nyhistory.org</ref>

Despite Richard Allen's blessing, Lee continued to face hostility to her ministry because she was black and a woman. She became a traveling minister, traveling thousands of miles on foot. In one year alone, she "travelled two thousand three hundred and twenty-five miles, and preached one hundred and seventy-eight sermons."<ref name="r1" /><ref name=":8" />

==Late life and death== In 1836, Lee became the first Black woman to publish an autobiography, which she titled ''The Life and Religious Experience of Jarena Lee.''<ref name=":4" /><ref name=":7">{{Cite web |title=Preacher Jarena Lee: Praise in the Meantime |url=https://www.searchablemuseum.com/preacher-jarena-lee-praise-in-the-meantime/ |access-date=2023-06-12 |website=www.searchablemuseum.com |language=en}}</ref> She published an extended version with a hired publisher in 1849, including 70 pages revealing names of those who had rejected the Spirit’s movement within her preaching.<ref name=":2" /><ref name=":5" /><ref name=":9" /> Much of the known information about Lee's life is from these sources.<ref>Peterson, pp. 56, 73</ref> It is known as the first autobiography of a black woman, and was also pioneering in the theological genre.<ref name=":8" />

In 1852, the African Methodist Episcopal Church officially ruled that women were not allowed to preach. Following this decision, Lee disappeared from the historical record.<ref name=":8" /> However, Dr. Frederick Knight identified her amongst the speakers at the 1853 American Anti-Slavery Society’s convention, at which she joined the Pennsylvania Female Anti-Slavery Society and supported the anti-colonization resolution.<ref name="Knight 68" />

Lee's date of death is unclear. Archival research by Dr. Knight suggests that Jarena Lee died penniless in Philadelphia and was buried at Olive Cemetery.<ref name="Knight 68" /> However, records of Mount Pisgah AME Church Cemetery indicate that she died in 1855 and was buried there. Other sources list her death in 1857.<ref name=":5" />

==Legacy== Lee is recognized as the first woman to preach in the African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church.<ref name=":5" /> Her life story exemplifies the 19th-century American religious movement's focus on personal holiness and sanctification. She has been compared to influential African American women of her time, such as Maria W. Stewart and Sojourner Truth.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Dickerson |first=Dennis C |url=https://www.cambridge.org/core/product/identifier/9781139017930/type/book |title=The African Methodist Episcopal Church: A History |date=2019-12-31 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-1-139-01793-0 |edition=1 |doi=10.1017/9781139017930}}</ref> In the decades after Jarena Lee became a preacher, other women such as Juliann Jane Tillman gained prominence as evangelists within the AME Church.<ref>{{Cite book |last1=White |first1=Deborah Gray |url=https://ebin.pub/freedom-on-my-mind-a-history-of-african-americans-with-documents-3nbsped-1319265677-9781319265670.html |title=Freedom on my Mind: A History of African Americans, with Documents |last2=Bay |first2=Mia |last3=Martin Jr. |first3=Waldo E. |publisher=Macmillan Learning |year=2020 |isbn=9781319265670 |edition=3 |via=EBIN}}</ref>

Jarena Lee was the subject of a research project at Harvard Divinity School entitled "The Resurrection of Jarena Lee." Womanist Biblical scholar Nyasha Junior is involved with this project.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Nyasha Junior|url=https://hds.harvard.edu/people/nyasha-junior|access-date=2020-11-22|website=hds.harvard.edu|language=en}}</ref>

<gallery> File:Jarena Lee (7222590302).jpg|National Park Service panel on Jarena Lee. </gallery>

==References== {{reflist}}

==Bibliography==

*{{cite book|last=Peterson|first=Carla L.|title=Doers of the Word: African American Women Speakers and Writers in the North (1830–1880)|year=1995|publisher=Oxford University Press|location=New York|isbn=0813525144}} *[https://archive.org/details/bim_early-english-books-1641-1700_lee-jarena_1849_ia40330201-13 ''Religious Experience and Journal of Mrs. Jarena Lee'']. 1849.

==External links== {{Wikiquote}} * [https://hdl.handle.net/11299/166257 Jarena Lee - Voices from the Gaps] * [https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/godinamerica-early-american-individuals/ pbs.org] * [https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/part3/3h91.html Portrait of Jarena Lee] * [https://blog.nyhsdev2.org/sites/default/files/newfiles/cwh-curriculum/Module%202/Life%20Stories/Jarena%20Lee%20Life%20Story.pdf Women and the American Story - Jarena Lee] * https://www.nyhistory.org/womens-history/education/curriculum/saving-washington/module-2-breaking-the-rules-women/life-stories/jarena-lee *https://daily.jstor.org/jarena-lee-the-first-woman-african-american-autobiographer/ *https://www.christianitytoday.com/history/people/pastorsandpreachers/jarena-lee.html *https://www.womenhistoryblog.com/2012/02/jarena-lee

{{DEFAULTSORT:Lee, Jarena}} Category:1783 births Category:Methodists from Pennsylvania Category:1864 deaths Category:19th-century American women writers Category:American religious writers Category:American women religious writers Category:African Methodist Episcopal Church clergy Category:Methodist circuit riders Category:Women Protestant religious leaders Category:19th-century American Methodist ministers Category:People from Cape May, New Jersey Category:19th-century African-American writers Category:19th-century African-American women writers Category:19th-century American writers Category:Writers from Cape May County, New Jersey