Jonestown Audiotape
Primary Project : Summaries
Summary prepared by Fielding M. McGehee, III. If you
use this material, please credit The Jonestown Institute. Thank you.
Tape Number : Q 953
To read the Tape Transcript, click
here.
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FBI Catalogue: Jones speaking
Date cues on tape: May 1974; L.A. police had just burned down house with
members of Symbionese Liberation Army inside
People named:
Public figures/National and international names:
People in attendance at Peoples Temple service
People in attendance at Peoples Temple service, full name unknown:
Bible verses cited:
Genesis story of Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel, referred to several times (Genesis
3 & 4)
Reference to angel Gabriel (Luke 1:19)
"Jesus said, that heaven is within you." (Luke 17:21, "Neither shall they say,
Lo here! or, lo there! for, behold, the kingdom of God is within you.")
"[Jesus] Said, feed the hungry, clothe the naked, take in the stranger, release
the prisoners." (Matthew 25:35-45)
"Jesus said, when John the Baptist was making his itinerant ministry, he said...
Elias, which was and is to come. In other words, Elias had come back because
something he had not worked out in the previous life, there were things for
him to do." (Relationship between John the Baptist and Elias throughout the
Gospels, including Matthew 17, Mark 9, Luke 9, and John 1)
"John the Baptist also came back again, because in the prison he doubted that
Christ was the particular Messiah at that time. He said, 'Art thou he, or shall
we look for another?'" (Matthew 11:3 "...Art thou he that should come, or do we
look for another?")
"As Jesus said, 'Who is my father, my mother, but he that doeth the will of
Him that sent Me? And he that loves father or mother, sister or brother, is
not worthy of the Kingdom.'" (Matthew 10:37, "He that loveth father or mother
more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than
me is not worthy of me.")
"Hebrews 4, the fourth chapter, the twelfth verse, says the Word of God is
sharper than a two-edged sword. It discerns the thoughts." (Hebrews 4:12. "For
the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword,
piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints
and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.")
General reference to books of Romans, Timothy, Thessalonians
"Bibles murder. Second Corinthians, 3:6. The Bibles murder, the letters murder,
our letters kill, but the spirit maketh a life." (2 Corinthians 3:6: "Who also
hath made us able ministers of the new testament; not of the letter, but of
the spirit: for the letter killeth, but the spirit giveth life.")
"Whosoever loveth is born of God, and knoweth God. So when anyone loves, whether
they're an atheist, an agnostic, a Catholic or Jew, whether they're a communist
or whether they're a moderate capitalist, whatever their politics or their religion,
whatever their race, if they love, they're born of God." (1John 4:7-8, "Beloved,
let us love one another: for love is of God; and every one that loveth is born
of God, and knoweth God. He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.")
"The day you eat that tree, you're gonna be like God. He don't want you to
eat the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, because if you eat of it, you'll
be just like the gods." (Genesis 3:5. "For God doth know that in the day ye
eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing
good and evil.")
"[Jesus] said, 'These things shall you do, and greater because I go to the
Father.' When they came to take him away, he didn't even know why he was being
taken away." (John 14:12, "Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth
on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall
he do; because I go unto my Father.")
"Paul said, don't look up to go to heaven." (Acts 1:10-11, "And while they
looked stedfastly toward heaven as he went up, behold, two men stood by them
in white apparel; Which also said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up
into heaven?")
"Jesus talked ... and he said turn the other cheek" (Matthew 5:39, "But I say
unto you, That ye resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right
cheek, turn to him the other also.")
"[Jesus] walked in, the moneychangers had taken over the temple and he only
had a few disciples, and there was hardly anybody left, and he got to the end
of himself, and he quit talking. He got a whip in his hand, turned upside-down
the tables, whipped the backsides of the moneychangers, drove them out of the
temple. Even Jesus Christ used violence." (Matthew 21:12, "And Jesus went into
the temple of God, and cast out all them that sold and bought in the temple,
and overthrew the tables of the moneychangers.")
"Jesus said, greater than he would come after him." (John 14:12, "Verily, verily,
I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also;
and greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto my Father.")
"And He said, it is written ... in the tenth chapter of John ... all of you are
gods. I'm no different than you. Everybody's a god. So Jesus is God, I am God.
You are God." (John 10:34, "Jesus answered them, Is it not written in your law,
I said, Ye are gods?")
"How many believe there's a heaven with streets of gold? How many believe there's
12 gates to the city and it's foursquare? Four blocks wouldn't be enough to
get the Ku Klux Klan in." (Revelation 21: 12-27)
Summary:
This sermon and request for donations to Peoples Temple took place in Los Angeles
in May 1974, a short period after the members of the Symbionese Liberation Army
died in a shoot-out and fire in nearby Compton. That event set much of the tone
for Jim Jones had to say that day.
Jones begins by saying that he had needed help to get to the pulpit, because
someone had tried to poison him by placing a needle in his underwear. But, he
is still there, "just as I always will remain." As for those who tried to do
this evil, he hopes they know "that it will take something more to remove God
than you're accustomed to doing."
Later in the service, he explains to newcomers why someone might want to cause
him harm. "They that live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution," he
says, and then takes it one step further: "if you're not getting persecution,
you're not living godly... if you're not getting persecuted, you're not living
the just life." In conclusion, he says he can't be poisoned until his time has
come, and the people who are after him should realize that.
He welcomes the guests with a descriptions of the works of the church: the
children's center, the senior homes, and a 25,000-acre Promised Land in South
America to get them away from the concentration camps in America.
He speaks of the burning of the Temple in San Francisco the previous week,
but many people, churches -- both Christian and Muslim -- and civic agencies are
helping them rebuild.
The church needs money to rebuild, he says, but it also needs money for its
many endeavors, including the preparation of the Promised Land. The first duty
of a church it to "is to take care of... the household of the faith," but that
duty extends to its projects as well, such as its children's homes and senior
centers. "If your church is not taking care of the senior citizens in their
golden years, not ministering to children, it's not a church. It's a form of
godliness denying the power thereof."
And when people give their money to the Temple, little of it goes to him. He
doesn't have a Cadillac like some preachers, the clothes that he's wearing are
used, and "I never bought a pair of shoes in my life." He makes this point again
later in the service.
In describing heaven, Jones talks about how the whites view it, as being paved
with streets of gold. "We don't want to try to get any streets of gold. Nobody
can eat gold." And if it did have gold, "you know who'll be polishing them."
The Promised Land doesn't have gold, he says, but it has fruits and vegetables
growing wild. He also challenges those who believe in heaven to show it to him,
and to show how that squares with the number of starving children, and the persecution
of Jews and blacks. "[T]he only thing you know that loves you is what's in this
house, that's what you know loves you... I believe what Jesus said, that heaven
is within you... Build heaven on earth. That's what He said. Said, feed the
hungry, clothe the naked, take in the stranger, release the prisoners."
Although he conducts no healings in this service, he asks the congregation
how many have seen him raise people from the dead and cure their diseases. He
explains the role of miracles: "To keep some of these folks that are loaves-and-fishes
crowd, to keep 'em around a while so they can find the truth. Everybody first
comes usually to get a healing, and they think I'm gonna heal their toe, and
I end up healing their head." He returns to the subject of healings later on
during his exhortations for more contributions, when he says, "We don't understand
it, but we know it works."
Jones opens the floor to questions. He asks that people not ask about lawyers
or counseling or healings -- they'll help with those, too, but in another forum
-- but says, if people have questions about his teachings, he'd like to hear
them.
One man asks about reincarnation, and asks if they all lived in other bodies
in other lives and had other families. Yes, Jones says, "[t]hat's my particular
persuasion, due to the revelations that we've had here of the ... paranormal."
Then he cites biblical support for the concept. In the end, though, he adds,
"in reference to fellowship in this assembly, it is not required to believe
in the doctrine of rebirth or reincarnation."
He returns to the theme of reincarnation later in his description of karma.
If you don't feel for your fellow man in this lifetime, he says, you may be
in the position of the person you ignored or had prejudice against the next
time around.
He does challenge the questioner's reliance upon families for structure. Again
going to the Bible, Jones reminds the congregation that Jesus told his followers
to abandon their families, "forsake those ties, leave those things which are
behind." If you hold onto your loved ones, he concludes, "[i]f you live in that
realm, you will constantly be reborn in the flesh, and you will die in the flesh."
In responding to a question about Adam and Eve, and Cain and Abel, Jones says
that that was just King James -- a slave runner, a known sexual deviant -- making
things up in the Bible. Adam and Eve is a political story, he says, to justify
the oppression of women. It also has inconsistencies, which he explains. "That's
why you have to have a prophet. How can you hear without a prophet or preacher,
how can he preach lest he be sent? Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the
Word of God. And the Word of God is sitting in this room."
The Word is alive, he says, but the Bible kills. God is love, so "when anyone
loves, whether they're an atheist, an agnostic, a Catholic or Jew, whether they're
a communist or whether they're a moderate capitalist, whatever their politics
or their religion, whatever their race, if they love, they're born of God."
You can disagree if you like, he challenges the congregation. If you can't,
then "throw aside these weights that beset you... The Bible is the root of all
of our problems today." Then returning to the book he has just condemned, he
reminds people that "in the tenth chapter of John... it is written, all of you
are gods... I'm no different than you. Everybody's a god. So Jesus is God, I am
God. You are God."
How does he balance the condemnation with the reliance upon it for his message?
He says he uses the Bible as a reference, to "substantiate truth." He doesn't
need the Bible, except to bring people in who are previously "addicted" to it.
Jones speaks at length about the violence in America which predated -- and led
up to -- such events as the SLA shoot-out, Wounded Knee, the assassinations of
Martin Luther King, Malcolm X and the Kennedy brothers, and associated conspiracy
theories. "We breed that violence. We create that violence," he says. "I don't
like it. I don't like violence at all. But until America stops dropping bombs
on the colored people of the world, there'll be violence in our streets."
Further, he says he understands why groups like the SLA and Black Panthers
react with violence, but says -- despite his own commitment to nonviolence --
he doesn't care. He won't judge them, until the true perpetrators of violence
in the world are judged. "When people in this country stop doing violence in
the name of the law, then we will talk to those out there in the streets."
Towards the end of the tape, he responds to a question about local politics
with a lengthy critique of capitalism and imperialism. The rich elite (personified
by Rockefeller) will sterilize the poor and middle class, because they won't
be needed. In an era of computers, the world will need only one-tenth the workers
it has today.
Despite his earlier criticisms of the American system and his tacit defense
of leftists who commit violence, Jones concludes with a critique of the SLA
that speaks of its futility to bring about change in the way it chose. It will
only lead you to being set up by government infiltrators and informers, he says.
People need to work within the system. Otherwise, the police will bring you
down. Their agents provocateur will start violence "so that the people will
get upset with the mention of change, social change or revolution, that the
people won't want to hear the word." In the end, though, he says the SLA "has
moved us a little closer to change. Yes it has. Yes it has."
Editorial observation: This sermon is representative of Jim Jones' transition
from a preacher of God's word in Indianapolis to his undiluted hostility towards
religion in Jonestown. He criticizes belief in what he calls the Sky God, yet
he invokes many passages of the Bible to grant Peoples Temple the authority
to act as it does. He blasts King James as a slave owner, and says the Bible
was used to enslave African blacks, yet he himself uses the King James version.
This is probably seen best in his description of Christ's ministry as leading
towards a "socialist apostolic ... kingdom." Fifteen years earlier, he would have
called it "God's kingdom"; ten years earlier, it would have been "God's apostolic
kingdom"; eventually, Peoples Temple's work became the "socialist Promised Land."
In the end, it was a "socialist paradise on earth" which criticized those who
maintained a religious faith.
FBI Summary:
Date of transcription: 7/3/79
In connection with the Federal Bureau of Investigation's investigation into
the assassination of U.S. Congressman LEO J. RYAN at Port Kaituma, Guyana, South
America, on November 18, 1978, a tape recording was obtained. This tape recording
was located in Jonestown, Guyana, South America, and was turned over to U.S.Officials
in Guyana and subsequently transported to the United States.
On June 22, 1979, Special Agent (name deleted) reviewed the tape numbered 1B110-17.
This tape was found to contain the following:
JONES leads a sermon to a California congregation coupled with question and
answer sessions. JONES endorses the philosophies of the Symbionese Liberation
Army (SLA) and its activities. This sermon lasts approximately 49 minutes.
The other side contains the same sermon which has been reversed through technological
error.
Differences with FBI Summary:
The summary is accurate and meets the FBI's purposes.