Editing British Israelism (section)

===Peak of adherence to British Israelism – late 19th and early 20th centuries===
[[File:William Pascoe Goard.jpg|thumb|[[William Pascoe Goard]]]]
The extent to which the British clergy became aware of the existence of the movement may be gauged by the comment which [[Cardinal (Catholicism)|Cardinal]] [[John Henry Newman]] (1801–1890) made when he was asked why he had left the [[Church of England]] in 1845 in order to join the [[Catholic Church|Roman Catholic Church]]. He said that there was a very real danger that the movement "would take over the Church of England."<ref name=Strong1986>{{cite book |last=Strong |first=Patience |title=Someone had to say it |publisher=Bachman & Turner |place=London |year=1986 |isbn=978-0-85974132-3}}</ref>{{rp|86}}

In the late 19th century, [[Edward Hine]], [[Edward Wheler Bird]], and Herbert Aldersmith developed the British Israelite movement. Hine and Bird achieved a degree of "doctrinal coherence" by eliminating competing forms of the ideology: in 1878, the Anglo-Ephraim Association of London, which followed Wilson by accepting the broader community of western European Germanic peoples as fellow Israelites who were also favoured by God, was absorbed into Bird's Metropolitan Anglo-Israel Association, which espoused the Anglo-exclusive view promoted by Hine.<ref name=Kidd2006/>{{rp|209}}

By 1886, the "Anglo-Israel Association" had 27 affiliated groups throughout Britain.{{r|Barkun|p=9}} Hine later departed for the United States, where he promoted the movement.<ref name=Parfitt2003/>{{rp|56}}{{r|Fine 2015|p=176}}

The 1906 edition of the ''[[Jewish Encyclopedia]]'' stated that British Israelism's adherents "are said to number 2,000,000 in England and the United States",<ref name=TJE600>{{cite book |contribution=Anglo-Israelism |last=Jacobs |first=Joseph |title=Jewish Encyclopedia: Anglo-Israelism |editor-first1=Isidore |editor-last1=Singer |editor-link=Isidore Singer |date=1901 |publisher=[[Funk and Wagnalls]] |location=New York |page=600 |isbn=978-1-11791895-2 |url=http://d2b4hhdj1xs9hu.cloudfront.net/BJ1J6JJS.jpg}}</ref> an unreliable figure if association membership and journal subscription numbers are any guide; the number of passive Protestant sympathisers is almost impossible to determine.<ref name=Kidd2006/>{{rp|209}}

Between 1899 and 1902, members of the British-Israel Association of London dug up parts of the [[Hill of Tara]] in the belief that the [[Ark of the Covenant]] was buried there, doing much damage to one of [[Ireland]]'s most ancient royal and archaeological sites.<ref>{{cite news |title=The Ark at the seat of kings |newspaper=The Irish Times |url=https://www.irishtimes.com/news/the-ark-at-the-seat-of-kings-1.356282 |access-date=13 November 2019}}</ref> At the same time, British Israelism became associated with various pseudo-archaeological [[pyramidology]] theories, such as the notion that the [[Great Pyramid of Giza|Pyramid of Khufu]] contained a prophetic [[numerology]] of the [[British peoples]].<ref>Moshenska, G. (2008). 'The Bible in Stone': Pyramids, Lost Tribes and Alternative Archaeologies". ''Public Archaeology''. 7(1): 5–16.</ref>

In 1914, the thirty-fourth year of its publication, the ''Anglo-Israel Almanack'' listed the details of a large number of Kingdom Identity Groups which were operating independently throughout the British Isles as well as in Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Canada, and the United States of America.{{citation needed|date=April 2017}}

In 1919, the [[British-Israel-World Federation]] (BIWF) was founded in London, and [[Covenant Publishing]] was founded in 1922. William Pascoe Goard was the first director of the publishing house. During this time, several prominent figures patronized the BIWF organization and its publisher; [[Princess Alice, Countess of Athlone]] was its Patron-in-chief prior to [[World War II]]. One of its highest-profile members was [[William Massey]], then Prime Minister of [[New Zealand]]. Due to the expansive nature of the [[British Empire]], believers in British Israelism spread worldwide and the BIWF expanded its organization to the [[British Commonwealth]]. [[Howard Rand]] promoted the teaching, and he became the National Commissioner of the [[Anglo-Saxon Federation of America]] in 1928. He published ''The Bulletin'', later renamed ''The Messenger of the Covenant''. More recently, it was renamed ''Destiny''.<ref name=Parfitt2003/>{{rp|57}}

A prolific author on British Israelism during the later 1930s and 40s was [[Alexander James Ferris]].<ref>{{cite book |last=Cottrell-Boyce |first=Aidan |title=Israelism in Modern Britain |date=2020-08-31 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-1-000-17236-2 |language=en |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Wy3tDwAAQBAJ&dq=%22the+idea%22+A+J+Ferris&pg=PT35}}</ref>