A01=Frank Lambert
Apologetics
Artifice
Author_Frank Lambert
Biblical authority
Calvinism
Category=NHK
Category=NHTB
Category=QRM
Category=QRMB39
Category=QRVS4
Charles Chauncy
Christian
Christian revival
Christianity
Church of England
Clergy
Congregational church
Cotton Mather
Creed
Dissenter
Divine grace
Divine inspiration
Doctrine
Enthusiasm
eq_bestseller
eq_history
eq_isMigrated=1
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
Evangelism
First Great Awakening
George Whitefield
Gilbert Tennent
God
God's Grace
Great Awakening
Isaac Watts
Itinerant preacher
James Davenport (clergyman)
John Wesley
Laity
Layperson
Log College
Methodism
Minister (Christianity)
Missionary
Mr.
Narrative
New Testament
Newspaper
Ordination
Pamphlet
Parish
Pastor
People of God
Pietism
Piety
Polemic
Prayer
Prayer meeting
Preacher
Preface (liturgy)
Presbyterianism
Protestantism
Publication
Puritans
Religion
Religious experience
Religious text
Salvation History
Second Great Awakening
Sermon
Sin
Solomon Stoddard
Synod
Testimonial
The Reverend
Theology
Thomas Prince
Worship
Writing
Product details
- ISBN 9780691086910
- Weight: 482g
- Dimensions: 152 x 235mm
- Publication Date: 23 Jan 2001
- Publisher: Princeton University Press
- Publication City/Country: US
- Product Form: Paperback
Secure
checkout
Fast Shipping
Easy returns
This book is a history of an astounding transatlantic phenomenon, a popular evangelical revival known in America as the first Great Awakening (1735-1745). Beginning in the mid-1730s, supporters and opponents of the revival commented on the extraordinary nature of what one observer called the "great ado," with its extemporaneous outdoor preaching, newspaper publicity, and rallies of up to 20,000 participants. Frank Lambert, biographer of Great Awakening leader George Whitefield, offers an overview of this important episode and proposes a new explanation of its origins. The Great Awakening, however dramatic, was nevertheless unnamed until after its occurrence, and its leaders created no doctrine nor organizational structure that would result in a historical record. That lack of documentation has allowed recent scholars to suggest that the movement was "invented" by nineteenth-century historians. Some specialists even think that it was wholly constructed by succeeding generations, who retroactively linked sporadic happenings to fabricate an alleged historic development.
Challenging these interpretations, Lambert nevertheless demonstrates that the Great Awakening was invented--not by historians but by eighteenth-century evangelicals who were skillful and enthusiastic religious promoters. Reporting a dramatic meeting in one location in order to encourage gatherings in other places, these men used commercial strategies and newly popular print media to build a revival--one that they also believed to be an "extraordinary work of God." They saw a special meaning in contemporary events, looking for a transatlantic pattern of revival and finding a motive for spiritual rebirth in what they viewed as a moral decline in colonial America and abroad. By examining the texts that these preachers skillfully put together, Lambert shows how they told and retold their revival account to themselves, their followers, and their opponents. His inquiries depict revivals as cultural productions and yield fresh understandings of how believers "spread the word" with whatever technical and social methods seem the most effective.
Frank Lambert is Associate Professor of History at Purdue University and the author of "Pedlar in Divinity": George Whitefield and the Transatlantic Revivals. 1737-1770 (Princeton).
