John Noyes(1811-1886) spend some quality time with Bible studying at Dartmouth College, Andover Theological Seminary and Yale Theological College before he came to conclusion that Christ’s second coming had taken place in 70 A.D. He was called heretic since than but it didn’t stop him and on February 20, 1834 he declared himself perfect and free from sin. “My new relationship to God cancelled out my obligation to obey traditional moral standards or the normal laws of society” he claimed.
They exclude him from Yale and revoke his ministerial license but he continued to preach and in 1848 he founded Oneida Community. Community started from 87 members and grew to 306 by 1878 when it broke apart. They work together and own everything together including such things as marriage and kids. They believe every man and woman in the commune was married to each other and promote having sex with different partners every night so no two people fall in love with each other. All members where parents of all children in the commune (children from age 2 to 12 were not allowed to become particularly close with their biological parents). The commune had a Eugenics program – the commune leader would select what they thought were the best genetic men and woman and bread them to produce spiritually superior children.
With all that rules and 19th century around it is a miracle that commune lasted for almost 30 years. I guess John was hell of a preacher.

Tags: educational, history