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The Old Faith in a New Nation uses hundreds of sources to show that between the Revolution and the Civil War, American Protestants were deeply interested in the meaning of the Christian past. Even while claiming to rely on "the Bible alone," evangelicals turned to Christian history to navigate pressing questions about church-state relations, Catholic immigration, women's rights and roles, slavery, and more. By tracing how American evangelicals remembered and used Christian history,
The Old Faith in a New Nation interrogates the meaning of "biblicism" and provides context for evaluating the ways in which the religious past is remembered, contested, and memorialized today.
List of contents
- Introduction
- Chapter One: Overturning the Past: The Failure of Christendom and the Disestablishment of American Churches
- Chapter Two: Restoring the Past: Tradition and the Democratization of Christianity
- Chapter Three: Fulfilling the Past: Teaching the Lessons of Christian History to an Exceptional Nation
- Chapter Four: Protecting the Past: The Troubled Place of History in Protestant Seminaries
- Chapter Five: Rewriting the Past: How Women Recovered their Place in Christian History
- Chapter Six: Liberating the Past: Christian History in the Debate over Slavery
- Chapter Seven: Fighting for the Past: Christian History during Crisis and War
- Epilogue
About the author
Paul J. Gutacker holds a PhD in History from Baylor University and the MA and ThM from Regent College (Vancouver, BC). He has published in Church History, The Journal of Ecclesiastical History, Fides et Historia, and The International Journal of Christianity & Education. In addition to lecturing in the History Department at Baylor University, Paul serves as director of Brazos Fellows, a post-college fellowship centered on theological study, spiritual disciplines, and vocational discernment.
Summary
Conventional wisdom holds that tradition and history meant little to nineteenth-century American Protestants, who relied on common sense and "the Bible alone." The Old Faith in a New Nation challenges this portrayal by recovering evangelical engagement with the Christian past. Even when they appeared to be most scornful toward tradition, most optimistic and forward-looking, and most confident in their grasp of the Bible, evangelicals found themselves returning, time and again, to Christian history. They studied religious historiography, reinterpreted the history of the church, and argued over its implications for the present. Between the Revolution and the Civil War, American Protestants were deeply interested in the meaning of the Christian past.
Paul J. Gutacker draws from hundreds of print sources-sermons, books, speeches, legal arguments, political petitions, and more-to show how ordinary educated Americans remembered and used Christian history. While claiming to rely on the Bible alone, antebellum Protestants frequently turned to the Christian past on questions of import: how should the government relate to religion? Could Catholic immigrants become true Americans? What opportunities and rights should be available to women? To African Americans? Protestants across denominations answered these questions not only with the Bible but also with history. By recovering the ways in which American evangelicals remembered and used Christian history, The Old Faith in a New Nation shows how religious memory shaped the nation and interrogates the meaning of "biblicism."
Additional text
Gutacker's book is an excellent contribution to a growing body of scholarship on the depth, variety, and complexity of American historical engagement in the decades between the Revolution and the Civil War.
