Religious Enthusiasm in the New World: Heresy to Revolution

David S. Lovejoy

Published by Harvard University Press 1985

Religious Enthusiasm in the New World

Heresy to Revolution

David S. Lovejoy

https://doi.org/10.4159/harvard.9780674431102

Overview
Contents

About this book

In seventeenth- and eighteenth-century England and America, established society branded as "enthusiasts" those unconventional but religiously devout extremists who stepped across orthodox lines and claimed an intimate, emotional relationship with God. John of Leyden, Anne Hutchinson, William Penn, and George Whitefield all shared the label "enthusiast." This book is a study of the enthusiasts who migrated to the American colonies as well as those who emerged there--from Pilgrim Fathers to pietistic Moravians, from the martyr-bound Quakers to heaven-bent revivalists of the 1740s.

This study of the role of religious enthusiasm in early America tells us much about English attitudes toward religion in the New World and about the vital part it played in the lives of the colonists. Both friends and enemies of enthusiasm revealed in their arguments and actions their own conceptions of the America they inhabited. Was religion in America to be an extension of Old World institutions or truly a product of the New World? Would enthusiasm undermine civilized institutions, not only established churches, but government, social structure, morality, and the economy as well? Calling enthusiasts first heretics, then subversives and conspirators, conventional society sought ways to suppress or banish them. By 1776 enthusiasm had spilled over into politics and added a radical dimension to the revolutionary struggle.

This timely exploration of the effect of radical religion on the course of early American history provides essential historical perspective to the current interest in popular religion.

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Acknowledgments Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	vii
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	ix
Introduction Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
1. The Finger of God: Religious Conceptions of the New World Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	5
2. Whirligig Spirits: English Attitudes toward Enthusiasm, 1550-1660 Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	22
3. Separatists and the New World: Plymouth's Pilgrims Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	44
4. Anne Hutchinson and the Naked Christ Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	62
5. New England Enthusiasts and the English Civil War Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	87
6. Quakers of the First Generation: The Martyrs Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	111
7. Quakers from William Perm to John Woolman Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	135
8. Continental Strains: From Plockhoy to the Benezets Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	154
9. The Great Awakening as Enthusiasm Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	178
10. The Great Awakening as Subversion and Conspiracy Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	195
11. Enthusiasm and the Cause of Mankind Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	215
Notes. Index
Abbreviations Used in the Notes Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	232
Notes Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	233
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	281

(Deutsch)

Language: English
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Edition: Reprint 2014
Audience: Professional and scholarly;
Pages
- Front matter: 8
- Main content: 291
Keywords: HISTORY / United States / Revolutionary Period (1775-1800); RELIGION / Christianity / General; HISTORY / United States / Colonial Period (1600-1775)

eBook

Published: October 1, 2013
ISBN: 9780674431102

Hardcover

Published: February 5, 1985
ISBN: 9780674431096