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The Sharp Family (1779-1781) by Johann Zoffany. National Portrait Gallery.

Granville Sharp spent a lifetime on abolition of slavery and other good causes

by Dan Graves

In 1767, David Lisle, a slave-owner from Barbados, seized an escaped slave named Jonathan Strong in front of London’s mayor and others. Granville Sharp tapped Lisle on the shoulder and said, “I charge you, in the name of the king, with an assault upon the person of Jonathan Strong, and all these are my witnesses!” He led Strong away. (Strong, whom Lisle had badly beaten some months earlier, soon died of the after-effects of the brutality.)

Slave masters claimed they could bring their human “property” into England without losing ownership. Seventy years earlier, judges York and Talbot had ruled that baptized Blacks did not become free. Priests had been baptizing slaves to free them.

Jonathan Strong’s case captured Granville Sharp’s heart. Although not a lawyer, he delved into the law and amassed evidence that slavery was illegal in Britain. York and Talbot had ruled incorrectly. During the next four years Sharp rescued other slaves and brought their cases into court. Although he got them freed, he could not obtain a definitive ruling in favor of all slaves. Finally, in the case of James Somerset, a judge ruled that slavery is illegal in Britain.

Granville Sharp continued to work against slavery the rest of his life and advocated a homeland for free Blacks in Sierra Leone. That venture failed. He also advocated for an end of the slave trade and worked with William Wilberforce and others to abolish slavery in all British territories.

Motivated by the Bible, he joined in founding the British and Foreign Bible Society to spread God’s word as widely as possible for others. He had taught himself Greek and Hebrew and studied Bible prophecy. Through those studies, he became convinced Christ’s coming was near and thought Napoleon was the blasphemous “little horn” of Daniel 7:25. Although he was wrong on that score, he made a useful contribution to biblical interpretation known as Sharp’s Rule.* This is important in showing that several New Testament verses attribute divinity to Christ.

Sharp desired to extend the episcopal form of church government to the United States. Because of the Revolution, American churchmen could not take the required oath to the English king and the Church of England could not legally ordain their bishops. The United States’ first Episcopal Church bishop, Samuel Seabury, actually had to go to Scotland for ordination, but Sharp implored the Archbishop of Canterbury to get impediments removed. Meanwhile, he coached the Americans on English church law. Through his intervention, William White and Samuel Provost were able to receive ordination in England. Two grateful American colleges awarded honorary degrees to Sharp.

Early in 1813, the seventy-eight-year-old man began to weaken and to lose his memory. On this day, 6 July 1813, Granville Sharp died quietly at the home of a sister-in-law. A monument in Westminster Cathedral honors him, especially noting his work for the abolition of slavery and the end of the slave trade.

* “When two personal nouns of the same case are connected by the copulet KAI [Greek ‘and’], if the former has the definite article and the latter has not, they both belong to the same person.”

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The Sharp Family by Johann Zoffany In the National Gallery, is a painting called The Sharp Family by Johann Zoffany (1773-1810), a German neoclassical painter. Zoffany, who spent his early years in…

In the National Gallery, is a painting called The Sharp Family by Johann Zoffany (1733-1810), a German neoclassical painter. Zoffany, who spent his early years in England under the patronage of George III (1738-1820) and Queen Charlotte (1744-1818), captured the Sharp Family making music aboard their pleasure boat, Apollo, with All Saints Church, Fulham in the background. The Sharp siblings regularly appeared on the River Thames with their instruments to entertain the public on the banks.

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Granville Sharp was a British scholar, devout Christian, philanthropist and one of the first campaigners for the abolition of the slave trade in Britain. Born i...

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(via Looking Sharp)

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Sharp's Folly, Whitton, Rothbury, Northumberland

Sharp’s Folly, Whitton, Rothbury, Northumberland

The Revd Dr Thomas Sharp (1693-1758) was a son of Dr. John Sharp, Archbishop of York. He followed his father into an ecclesiastical career and became Archdeacon of Northumberland, Prebendary of Durham and Rector of Rothbury. During his incumbency in Rothbury he built this tower as an observatory, and to create employment for the local population. (more…)

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'Wilberforce and the anti-slavery society'

Wilberforce was not always a Christian. Indeed, he was born into the privileged class, and that culture, much like today’s Hollywood, loved gambling, fancy clothes, fast horses, drinking and gluttony. Furthermore, he had denounced the deity of Christ after attending an apostate church much like today’s liberal ones. But in a secular sense, he was succeeding very nicely, entering parliament at 21, and was a good friend of William Pitt the Younger (1759–1806), who would become the UK’s youngest ever Prime Minister at 24.

However, Wilberforce gave his life truly to Christ in 1775, then wanted to quit parliament because of the immorality and infighting. However, he visited John Newton (1725–1807), famous for the great hymn Amazing Grace (hence the name of the film). Newton in his earlier days had been a slave trader himself before his conversion to Christ. Newton was the one who convinced Wilberforce that he would do the most good by remaining in Parliament:

‘It is hoped and believed that the Lord has raised you up for the good of His church and for the good of the nation.’

After Newton’s conversion, he first insisted that slaves were to be treated humanely. But he soon came to see that since the slaves were also created in the image of God, the slave trade was wrong in itself, and could not be humanized. He left the trade, became friends with the great evangelists George Whitfield (1714–1770) and John Wesley (1703–1791) and his brother Charles (1707–1788), became a minister, and testified to King George III (1738–1820) about the atrocities of the slave trade.

John Wesley was instrumental in the conversion of Wilberforce himself. And Wesley’s last letter of his life of 24 February 1791 was to Wilberforce commending his abolitionist work, comparing this to the gallant struggle of Athanasius (c. 293–373) for the vital biblical doctrine of the full deity of Christ.

‘Unless the divine power has raised you up to be as Athanasius contra mundum [Athanasius against the world], I see not how you can go through your glorious enterprise in opposing that execrable villainy which is the scandal of religion, of England, and of human nature. Unless God has raised you up for this very thing, you will be worn out by the opposition of men and devils. But if God be for you, who can be against you? Are all of them together stronger than God? O be not weary of well doing! Go on, in the name of God and in the power of his might, till even American slavery (the vilest that ever saw the sun) shall vanish away before it.’

Another prominent anti-slavery activist in Britain was Granville Sharp (1735–1813), who was most responsible for a law that a slave became free from the moment he set foot on English territory, and founded a society for the abolition of slavery. He was also a joint founder of the British and Foreign Bible Society and the Society for the Conversion of the Jews. A noted Greek scholar, he published a detailed and accurate study, discovering a rule of grammar that’s accepted by the majority of Bible translators today and now bears his name. But the existing English translations had overlooked this rule, thus, as he pointed out, they obscured the deity of Christ in places like Titus 2:13 and 2 Peter 1:1, which should say ‘our (great) God and Savior Jesus Christ’.

Another very important activist was Thomas Clarkson (1760–1846), an evangelical Anglican who first became interested in the issue when he was at Cambridge in 1785. That year, he won a Latin essay competition with an essay called Is it lawful to enslave the unconsenting? His detailed research convinced him of the immorality and horrors of slavery. Next year he translated this essay into English under the title ‘An essay on the slavery and commerce of the human species, particularly the African’, translated from a Latin Dissertation. This essay was very influential in the foundation of the Committee for the Abolition of the Slave Trade soon after, in 1787. Also in that year, he wrote the pamphlet: A Summary View of the Slave Trade and of the Probable Consequences of Its Abolition. He was a most courageous opponent, since early that year, he was attacked in Liverpool by a gang of sailors who had been paid to assassinate him, and he barely escaped with his life.

- Jonathan Safarti

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