While William Branham and other leaders in the Post WWII Healing Revivals took a strong position against drinking alcohol in their doctrinal teaching, the reality was quite different. Many leaders in the movement were drinking alcohol and some of them in Branham’s inner circle were profiting from alcohol.
Branham’s brother Howard drank alcohol and was the owner of a bar back home in Jeffersonville[1] while he traveled with William Branham and Ern Baxter. Branham himself entered the ministry in Roy E. Davis' Pentecostal Baptist Church of God sect, and Davis publicly described his church as being full of drunkards on most Sundays, much to the protest of other church leaders in the local area.[2]
In my own church in this city I have had to leave the pulpit to raise drunken men out of the laps of members of my congregations. I have had to take women—drunken women—by the arm in the presence of my congregation and lead them to seats. It is not an uncommon thing to see from one to half dozen "drunks" in my audience.[3]
- Rev. Roy E. Davis (While Branham was an elder in the church)
Davis and Branham partnered with former Congressman and revivalist William D. Upshaw,[4] and Upshaw was the face of alcoholic "healing elixirs" such as Sargon[5] — even though Upshaw was also the face of the Prohibition movement in the United States and ran for President under the short-lived Prohibition party.[6] A. A. Allen, who joined Branham’s revivals,[7] was often drunken and was caught driving under the influence.[8] The KKK’s supreme religious chaplain who also held revivals with Branham and Davis, Rev. Caleb A. Ridley, was also caught driving under the influence.[9]
The most interesting of all, however, is Branham’s partner in the revivals from 1947 to 1953, Ern Baxter.[10] According to William Branham’s publicist, Rev. Lee Vayle, Ern Baxter was a "womanizer" and a drunkard. When Baxter and Branham traveled to India after Branham prophesied that the world would hear of "tens of thousands time tens of thousands being saved in India",[11] Baxter allegedly boarded the plane drunk and offended the people of India with his advances toward women.
And I'm going to speak very plainly, and I've said it before. And I'm not the least alarmed to say it, because it's the truth. Baxter was a womanizer. He even got drunk on the plane and came off doing the goose-step and everybody laughing at him. In India, he consorted with women. They came to Brother Branham and said, 'Is it right for the father to have these women?'[12] - Rev. Lee Vayle, Branham's parter and publicist
It should come as no surprise that Branham's alleged India Prophecy ended in failure.
And when…I had been very much constrained to go to—to India. And yet, as many of you might know, the Indian trip wasn't the success that it should've been, because I failed to follow the leading of the Holy Spirit[13]
- William Branham
Drinking alcohol, drunkenness, and "womanizing" was not the only double-standard in Branh
Branham’s brother Howard drank alcohol and was the owner of a bar back home in Jeffersonville[1] while he traveled with William Branham and Ern Baxter. Branham himself entered the ministry in Roy E. Davis' Pentecostal Baptist Church of God sect, and Davis publicly described his church as being full of drunkards on most Sundays, much to the protest of other church leaders in the local area.[2]
In my own church in this city I have had to leave the pulpit to raise drunken men out of the laps of members of my congregations. I have had to take women—drunken women—by the arm in the presence of my congregation and lead them to seats. It is not an uncommon thing to see from one to half dozen "drunks" in my audience.[3]
- Rev. Roy E. Davis (While Branham was an elder in the church)
Davis and Branham partnered with former Congressman and revivalist William D. Upshaw,[4] and Upshaw was the face of alcoholic "healing elixirs" such as Sargon[5] — even though Upshaw was also the face of the Prohibition movement in the United States and ran for President under the short-lived Prohibition party.[6] A. A. Allen, who joined Branham’s revivals,[7] was often drunken and was caught driving under the influence.[8] The KKK’s supreme religious chaplain who also held revivals with Branham and Davis, Rev. Caleb A. Ridley, was also caught driving under the influence.[9]
The most interesting of all, however, is Branham’s partner in the revivals from 1947 to 1953, Ern Baxter.[10] According to William Branham’s publicist, Rev. Lee Vayle, Ern Baxter was a "womanizer" and a drunkard. When Baxter and Branham traveled to India after Branham prophesied that the world would hear of "tens of thousands time tens of thousands being saved in India",[11] Baxter allegedly boarded the plane drunk and offended the people of India with his advances toward women.
And I'm going to speak very plainly, and I've said it before. And I'm not the least alarmed to say it, because it's the truth. Baxter was a womanizer. He even got drunk on the plane and came off doing the goose-step and everybody laughing at him. In India, he consorted with women. They came to Brother Branham and said, 'Is it right for the father to have these women?'[12] - Rev. Lee Vayle, Branham's parter and publicist
It should come as no surprise that Branham's alleged India Prophecy ended in failure.
And when…I had been very much constrained to go to—to India. And yet, as many of you might know, the Indian trip wasn't the success that it should've been, because I failed to follow the leading of the Holy Spirit[13]
- William Branham
Drinking alcohol, drunkenness, and "womanizing" was not the only double-standard in Branh
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