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Is "let go and let God" in the Big Book?

In short:

  • Not as a phrase in the program. "Let go and let God" isn't in the 1939 text (pp. 1–164), the forewords or the appendices. It appears in one personal story in today's edition, in a list of slogans (p. 345), and in later history books.
  • Both halves are in the program text separately. "Let go": the result of holding on to old ideas "was nil until we let go absolutely" (p. 58). "Let God": "So we let God discipline us in the simple way we have just outlined." (p. 88), and Step Six asks whether we are "ready to let God remove" our defects (p. 76).
  • In the program text, letting go and letting God come together with action. Straight after the Third Step decision, "we launched out on a course of vigorous action" (p. 63).

What the search found

All our sources were searched for "let go and let God," "let go" and "let God," with page breaks joined.

  • Program text, forewords, appendices: no "let go and let God." "Let go" appears twice (pp. 58, 76). "Let God" or "let Him" appears at pp. 68, 70, 76 and 88.
  • Personal stories (fourth edition, 2001): "Because I'm an Alcoholic" lists "Let Go and Let God" with "One Day at a Time," "Easy Does It," "Keep It Simple" and "Live and Let Live" as sayings that at first made the writer shudder and later "began to impress me as truths I could live by" (p. 345).
  • "Alcoholic Anonymous Number Three" (Part I) has the man on the hospital bed in 1935 decide "I was willing to let God take over instead of me" (p. 187). That story was written about nineteen years after the visit (p. 188), so it is a later telling, not 1939 program text, and it has "let God" without "let go."
  • Stories printed in 1939 and later dropped (Experience, Strength and Hope, 2003): not there. One 1939 story speaks of a "final agreement" to "let God be first in my life" (Experience, Strength and Hope, 2003).
  • Later books:
  • Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers (1980): the wife of an early Akron member, who says she "couldn't let go" of her drinking husband (Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers, 1980), remembers another wife telling her to surrender him to God: "Let go and let God" (Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers, 1980). She prayed that night, "You can take over," and slept (Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers, 1980).
  • A.A. Comes of Age (1957): Bill W., describing the 1955 St. Louis convention where the founders handed A.A. over to its members, writes: "Clearly my job henceforth was to let go and let God." (A.A. Comes of Age, 1957). Pass It On (1984) quotes the same line.

So in the earliest-written book in our sources that uses it, A.A. Comes of Age (1957), "let go and let God" is about a founder letting go of control of A.A. itself. In the Akron recollection it is about a wife letting go of her husband's drinking.

"Let go" and "let God" in the program text

Letting go of old ideas. Chapter 5's opening, read whole: "Some of us have tried to hold on to our old ideas and the result was nil until we let go absolutely." (p. 58). A few lines later come "Half measures availed us nothing." (p. 59) and "We asked His protection and care with complete abandon." (p. 59).

Letting God remove defects. Step Six: "Are we now ready to let God remove from us all the things which we have admitted are objectionable?" (p. 76). "If we still cling to something we will not let go, we ask God to help us be willing." (p. 76).

Letting God judge and lead. On sex conduct, "we let God be the final judge" (p. 70). On fear: "We never apologize for God. Instead we let Him demonstrate, through us, what He can do." (p. 68). After Step Eleven's directions: "So we let God discipline us in the simple way we have just outlined." (p. 88).

Step Three. The decision "to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him" (p. 59), and the prayer: "God, I offer myself to Thee—to build with me and to do with me as Thou wilt." (p. 63). See: What is the Third Step prayer, and where is it?

Letting God, then acting

The program text doesn't treat letting God as stopping there. Of the Third Step: "This was only a beginning" (p. 63). "Next we launched out on a course of vigorous action, the first step of which is a personal housecleaning" (p. 63). The decision "could have little permanent effect unless at once followed by a strenuous effort" to be rid of what blocked us (p. 64). And right after "we let God discipline us": "But this is not all. There is action and more action." (p. 88).

What this means

The phrase is a later slogan. Its two parts are faithful to words in the 1939 program text, which asks the reader to let go of old ideas absolutely and to let God remove defects, judge and discipline. In that text, surrender is the start of inventory, amends and work with others, not a substitute for them.

Read it yourself

Sources

Source Pages Date
Alcoholics Anonymous, whole fourth-edition text (searched) — 1939 program text; fourth edition 2001
Chapters 5, 6 58–64, 68, 70, 76, 88 1939
"Alcoholic Anonymous Number Three," Part I 187–188 written about nineteen years after June 1935 (p. 188)
"Because I'm an Alcoholic," Part II 345 fourth edition (2001); first edition of the story not shown in our sources
"Another Prodigal Story" (Experience, Strength and Hope) — printed in the first edition, 1939; collected 2003
A.A. Comes of Age — 1957, describing 1955 (post-1950)
Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers — 1980 (post-1950), recalling early Akron
Pass It On — 1984 (post-1950)

Recovery Starts is independent and not affiliated with Alcoholics Anonymous. Quotations are brief and cited; the Big Book, Experience, Strength and Hope, A.A. Comes of Age, Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers and Pass It On are © A.A. World Services, Inc.

These pages answer questions about A.A. from A.A.'s own published literature, read in full, with every quote checked word for word against the page it cites. Recovery Starts is independent and not affiliated with Alcoholics Anonymous. What we read, and when each source was written.