The Democratization of American ChristianityA provocative reassessment of religion and culture in the early days of the American republic "The so-called Second Great Awakening was the shaping epoch of American Protestantism, and this book is the most important study of it ever published."—James Turner, Journal of Interdisciplinary History
Winner of the John Hope Franklin Publication Prize, the Society for Historians of the Early American Republic book prize, and the Albert C. Outler Prize In this provocative reassessment of religion and culture in the early days of the American republic, Nathan O. Hatch argues that during this period American Christianity was democratized and common people became powerful actors on the religious scene. Hatch examines five distinct traditions or mass movements that emerged early in the nineteenth century—the Christian movement, Methodism, the Baptist movement, the black churches, and the Mormons—showing how all offered compelling visions of individual potential and collective aspiration to the unschooled and unsophisticated. |
From inside the book
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... person is warranted from the word of God to publish to the world the discoveries of heaven or hell which he supposes he has had in a dream , or trance , or vision . " 21 The early republic was also a democratic movement in a third sense ...
... persons . This church faced the curious paradox of gaining phenomenal influence among layper- sons with whom it would not share ecclesiastical authority . Similarly , the Mormons used a virtual religious dictatorship as the means to ...
... persons who rose to leadership positions in a wide range of popular American churches and religious movements . Using democratic leadership as an organizing principle complements other approaches : the evolution of individual ...
... person and that book ; but got no satisfactory instruction , I frequently wished I had lived in the days of the prophets or apostles , that I could have had sure guides . " LORENZO DOW , 1804 By 1814 Timothy Dwight , the president of ...
... persons who declare , both in their language and conduct , that the desk ought to be yielded up to the occupancy of Ignorance . While they demand a seven - years apprenticeship , for the purpose of learning to make a shoe , or an axe ...
Contents
3 | |
17 | |
49 | |
67 | |
The Sovereign Audience | 125 |
The Right to Think for Oneself | 162 |
Upward Aspiration and Democratic Dissent | 193 |
The Recurring Populist | 210 |
A Sampling of Anticlerical | 227 |
Notes | 244 |
Index | 305 |
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The Democratization of American Christianity Nathan O. Hatch,Professor Nathan O Hatch Limited preview - 1989 |