Disposable Lit Reviews

Kingdom Voice Publications, 1977
192 pp.
No ISBN

Out of Print
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Want to know what kind of book we’re in for? At the time of Lemuria, only 20% of the planet’s surface was covered with water. The Earth started out close to Orion, but ended up where it is because of its own negativity. And all of this is just from the preface; we haven’t even reached the introduction yet.

Joseph Jeffers has long been one of my favorite further-out-than-left-field religious visionaries. Beginning as a normal charismatic preacher in the south in the early years of the 20th century, he soon veered off the beaten path when he declared that Yahweh had annointed him as Yahoshua in the mid-’30’s. Why Jeffers? Because he was the reincarnation of Jesus Christ (but don’t call him that, his real name is Yahoshua), the non-divine Son of Yahweh, who had been popping up throughout human history:

…his many lifetimes as a teacher on earth included Adam, Noah, Osiris, Joseph of Egypt [who also designed the Great Pyramid], Joshua, Solomon, Elijah, Hosea, Aristotle (the Persian Zoroaster), Apollo, Amenhotep II, the Great White Spirit of the Inca Indians, Quetzalcoatl of ancient Mexico, Eochaidh the Heremon of Ireland, and Yahoshua the Master of Justice of the Essenes of the Dead Sea. (pp. 79-80)

(And that doesn’t even mention the teachers he was in the last days of both Lemuria and Atlantis.)

It’s tempting just to throw quotes at you out of the book and let Jeffers be hoisted by his howlers; my guess is that the lion’s share of the book was dictated in stream-of-consciousness style, punctuated by ill-referenced newspaper clippings and such (it’s especially amusing when the articles he quotes are little pieces about him from various local papers — does quoting yourself count as corroboration?). And it bounces around from subject to subject so much, it’s hard to condense it into a coherent theology. So here are some high points:

Yahweh is going to wipe out all the wicked (”negative”) people again soon, and this time the seventh age of mankind will finally get it right. Atlantis and Lemuria will soon rise again, thanks in large part to the Giant Pyramid that Jeffers and his followers, Yahweh’s New Kingdom (or “Yahwists”), were at the time constructing in their “Yahweh City” headquarters in Missouri. (Since the organization subsequently moved to Arizona, I’m guessing that whole construction project was put on hold.)

Yahweh abhors the eating of animal flesh, and has never at any time commanded men to sacrifice animals to Him. (Jeffers fails to explain why Yahweh told something entirely different to Moses.) In fact, even cooking vegetables is a sin. Raw is the only holy way!

Jeffers is also a proponent of Christian Identity (the idea that the “lost” Tribes of Israel are actually the Northern European nationalities):

The first race to propagate on earth were dark people. These, Yahweh revealed, were those spirits who rebelled against Him and were the followers of Lucifer (the Bright and Morning Star). The second race of early man to inhabit the earth were white people and they were descendents of Yahweh’s People and Yahweh’s Seed! (p. 29)

Not that the white people then were the same as white people now, mind you; back then, people grew up to seventeen feet tall, but have shrunk since as their spirits have shrunk due to contamination and such. (Our spirits, before they started incarnating on Earth, all started out on Neptune, which is where all the really really advanced souls hang out.)

And naturally, spaceships have to figure into it all:

According to Yahweh, 10,000 years ago He sent a beam of light to the continent of Atlantis; a laser beam of light from Orion. When the Atlanteans turned their backs on Yahweh, He withdrew that beam of light. He reveals, further, that He is again returning that beam of light from Orion (Yahweh’s Headquarters), and it is on this beam of light that Yahweh’s spaceships from Orion will come, to hover over the apex of Yahoshua’s Pyramid Temple, located in Yahweh City. (p. 159)

Not that this accounts for flying saucers, no. According to Jeffers (which means according to Yahweh), garden-variety UFO’s are the result of disaffected Germans and Japanese, still upset about losing WW2, now working for Russia:

Russia, of course, denies having anything to do with the Discs and says that if she were going to experiment with them, she would use the miles of her own territory to do so. This, of course, was a poor alibi indeed. (p. 171)

I dunno, it makes perfect sense to me. But then, I’m not the Son of God, with Yahweh whispering into my ear all the time.

As you can see, the broad outlines of Jeffer’s doctrines aren’t that uncommon; it’s the framework of Judaeo-Christianity with plenty of New Age trappings. It’s the details that are enchanting. For instance:

Yahweh had revealed to us previously that the two continents were originally called Lemuriyah and Atlantiyah. (p. 17)

Apparently no one told Yahweh that the name “Lemuria” comes from the pre-plate tectonic theory that a Pacific continent had facilitated the dispersion of the lemurs whose skeletons are found on separated continents. (On the other hand, Yahweh doesn’t seem too keen on plate tectonics either.)

Yahweh revealed to me that he will pull the salt and brine out of the waters, and with this brine He will mix another chemical, found in the atom bomb, and this will cause the land which has been green, to turn brown. He plans to wipe off every bit of area not covered by water until there is not a green twig remaining. This chemical is presently unknown to man. It becomes stronger at the fullness of the moon and is the cause of the forming of rust and other similar corrosion. It has a salty taste and its explosive power is vastly triumphant over gasoline explosives and nitroglycerine. (p. 26)

The seventh cycle of civilization will be the culminated and perfected civilization. The sun will never go down, for there will never again be darkness upon the earth. There will be more than one sun to light the earth and give it energy. The moon will no longer be, for it has always had a negative effect upon the planet Earth. (p. 150)

I guess nocturnal animals are SOL, huh? You got it:

[Yahweh speaking:] “Many of the animals you have on earth today will not be seen after the shifting of the poles, for then the new earth will contain only that which is beneficial. Many things such as rats, roaches, scorpions, poisonous spiders, poisonous snakes, etc. were produced, believe it or not, by man’s own negativity!” (p. 151)

Of course, there are some animals which are simply more spiritual than others, right? Of course right:

…Yahweh reveals that the horse, a very sensitive animal, will have the ability to talk as he indeed does at this moment on the constellation of Sagittarius. (p. 188)

Not that Yahweh is the only being revealing nuggets of wisdom to Jeffers; far from it. In addition to his dead mother Helene, other telepathic souls made contact with him on a regular basis — for instance:

“I, King Kull, am from the Galaxy of Colors. Yahweh has placed me in charge of the Galaxy of Colors. It consists of many thousands of planets. I am all powerful in my galaxy. We are twenty feet in height, and our skin is bluish white in color. We communicate with Yahweh and our power is unlimited. We are five billion light years away. However, our space vehicles can travel to your galaxy in a matter of days. We travel by teleportation and we travel through Yahweh’s vibration.” (p. 182)

King Kull, huh? Too bad no other Howardian heroes make an appearance; I was particularly curious as to the wisdom Solomon Kane might provide.

Those may be the best ones, but only because they seized my fancy. The whole book (and, presumably, the seven he had written previously) is like that: meandering bits of fancy, tied together with logical non sequiturs. You have the urge to read it out loud to friends and have a literary MST3K party.

As with most such unique leaders, everything fell apart when Jeffers died in the mid-’80’s. I first found this book about ten years ago, and tracked Yahweh’s New Kingdom to their Arizona home; they kindly sent me a packet of current publications, but even with Jeffers guiding them “from the other side,” much of the novelty had already leached out. They had become another generic New Age group, preaching a nebulous Aquarian rebirth without sea-water explosives and talking horses. As of this week, their website at yahwehsnewkingdom.com has been under construction “for a few weeks” since February 2000; the architecture’s there, but there’s no content except for photos of Joseph Jeffers and his mother Helene. For an organization that was meant to spread the voice of the reincarnated Yahoshua across the face of the earth, there’s not much missionary zeal there.

If you cannot see this truth, then I am afraid you are not meant for the New Age. (p. 79)

Nathan Shumate