Working with the unpublished letters and diaries of Oneida's own members, Klaw has produced a fascinating study of religion, morals, and utopian idealism--"a sympathetic but shrewd account of one of America's most successful--and most sexually obsessed--religious cults" (Geoffrey C. Ward, co-author of The Civil War). 8 pages of photos.
Without Sin chronicles the rise and fall of nineteenth-century America's most succesful experiment in Utopian living: New York's Oneida Community (1848-1880). Founded by the charismatic Christian Perfectioniost John Humphrey Noyes, this remarkable society flourished for more than thirty years as a unique world where property was shared, men and women were equals, sex was free and open, work was to be joyous, and pleasure was felt to be "the very business that God set Adam and Eve about."