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Political Sermons of the American Founding Era, 1730-1805
The early political culture of the American republic was so deeply influenced by the religious consciousness of the New England preachers that it was often through the political sermon that the political rhetoric of the period was formed, refined, and transmitted. Political sermons such as the fifty-five collected in this work are unique to America, in both kind and significance. Political Sermons of the American Founding Era thus fills an important need if the American founding period is to be adequately understood. Ellis Sandoz is Professor of Political Science and Director of the Eric Voegelin Institute at Louisiana State University.
- GenresPoliticsAmerican History
1779 pages, Paperback
First published January 31, 1990
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
May 16, 2021
This review is on volume 2 only, I've reviewed volume 1 separately.
A couple of themes I found most interesting in this book (which covers 1789 through 1805) are the sermons and pamphlets on the French Revolution and on the election of 1800. Noah Webster's 1794 "The Revolution in France" was particularly well written, carefully explaining what led to the current situation, how the situation in Europe might unfold, and describing in detail how destructive the Revolution was and how different it was from the American Revolution, especially in its antireligious and intolerant nature. John Thayer's "A Discourse, Delivered at the Roman Catholic Church in Boston" was particularly poignant in its description of the impact of the Revolution on the Roman Catholic Church, including the deaths and persecutions of much of the Catholic clergy (Thayer's sermon has a personal touch as he was himself ordained a Catholic priest while in Paris). Reading these sermons also gives you a sense of the paranoia and fear held by many Federalists that the Republicans, who supported the Revolution much more and for longer than anyone else, were going to spread French terror to America.
Which leads me to the election of 1800 and the sermons and pamphlets attacking Thomas Jefferson as a Deist (exemplified by John Mitchell Mason's "The Voice of Warning to Christians") and defending him as a Christian (exemplified by Tunis Worthman's "A Solemn Address to Christians and Patriots"). Mason's pamphlet comes across as particularly hysterical and derogatory in its attacks on Thomas Jefferson as an infidel. Especially interesting is Mason's defense of the historical reality of a universal flood as necessary to a belief in Christianity. The way this untenable and fundamentalist reading of the Bible contrasts with Deism's embrace of science and critical studies of the Bible really stood out to me - in a sense, being a harbinger of Christianity's later (and even current) history in America. The American Revolution was a revolutionary era not just politically, in the construction of a new government with a new constitution, but also socially, culturally, and religiously. It was an era with an openness to new ideas and to reevaluating old ideas. In the end, however, the American Revolution was relatively less revolutionary and more conservative than the French one in terms of ideas and religion - for example, leading American Christianity to eschew reconsidering Biblical theology and history based on higher criticism until the second half of the nineteenth century. Paine's "Common Sense" was embraced and a "common sense" Bible reading and belief was encouraged, while Paine's "Age of Reason" and reevaluation of religion's history and foundations was eschewed. A tendency towards fundamentalist Christianity, even before the term was coined, thus became a bedrock of much of America.
A couple of other sermons I found noteworthy in this volume: John Smalley's "On the Evils of a Weak Government," which argued that too weak of a federal government was a much bigger threat than too strong of a federal government. And Jonathan Edwards Jr.'s "The Necessity of the Belief of Christianity" which argued for the necessity of Christian belief as fundamental to political liberty. Given the more religiously diverse country America has become since, and given the conditions of freedom vis-à-vis religion in the world today, Edward's sermon certainly reads as ancient. But it's still an interesting read to consider just how important Christianity was considered to political freedom back in the day, and also of interest in reflecting on the relationship between the two in the world today.
A couple of themes I found most interesting in this book (which covers 1789 through 1805) are the sermons and pamphlets on the French Revolution and on the election of 1800. Noah Webster's 1794 "The Revolution in France" was particularly well written, carefully explaining what led to the current situation, how the situation in Europe might unfold, and describing in detail how destructive the Revolution was and how different it was from the American Revolution, especially in its antireligious and intolerant nature. John Thayer's "A Discourse, Delivered at the Roman Catholic Church in Boston" was particularly poignant in its description of the impact of the Revolution on the Roman Catholic Church, including the deaths and persecutions of much of the Catholic clergy (Thayer's sermon has a personal touch as he was himself ordained a Catholic priest while in Paris). Reading these sermons also gives you a sense of the paranoia and fear held by many Federalists that the Republicans, who supported the Revolution much more and for longer than anyone else, were going to spread French terror to America.
Which leads me to the election of 1800 and the sermons and pamphlets attacking Thomas Jefferson as a Deist (exemplified by John Mitchell Mason's "The Voice of Warning to Christians") and defending him as a Christian (exemplified by Tunis Worthman's "A Solemn Address to Christians and Patriots"). Mason's pamphlet comes across as particularly hysterical and derogatory in its attacks on Thomas Jefferson as an infidel. Especially interesting is Mason's defense of the historical reality of a universal flood as necessary to a belief in Christianity. The way this untenable and fundamentalist reading of the Bible contrasts with Deism's embrace of science and critical studies of the Bible really stood out to me - in a sense, being a harbinger of Christianity's later (and even current) history in America. The American Revolution was a revolutionary era not just politically, in the construction of a new government with a new constitution, but also socially, culturally, and religiously. It was an era with an openness to new ideas and to reevaluating old ideas. In the end, however, the American Revolution was relatively less revolutionary and more conservative than the French one in terms of ideas and religion - for example, leading American Christianity to eschew reconsidering Biblical theology and history based on higher criticism until the second half of the nineteenth century. Paine's "Common Sense" was embraced and a "common sense" Bible reading and belief was encouraged, while Paine's "Age of Reason" and reevaluation of religion's history and foundations was eschewed. A tendency towards fundamentalist Christianity, even before the term was coined, thus became a bedrock of much of America.
A couple of other sermons I found noteworthy in this volume: John Smalley's "On the Evils of a Weak Government," which argued that too weak of a federal government was a much bigger threat than too strong of a federal government. And Jonathan Edwards Jr.'s "The Necessity of the Belief of Christianity" which argued for the necessity of Christian belief as fundamental to political liberty. Given the more religiously diverse country America has become since, and given the conditions of freedom vis-à-vis religion in the world today, Edward's sermon certainly reads as ancient. But it's still an interesting read to consider just how important Christianity was considered to political freedom back in the day, and also of interest in reflecting on the relationship between the two in the world today.
March 29, 2024
Sandoz has put together a very helpful collection of sermons from the revolutionary era and after. These sermons are my first exposure to actual sermons from the time, and it is shocking how much better they are than I thought they would be. Sermons in this 2-volume set give fantastic examples of the historicist hermeneutic being put into practice.
If you are not very familiar with historicism as a hermeneutic, then I highly recommend reading some of these for just that purpose. The paperback is bound very nicely, but it is also free online as a downloadable pdf document from Liberty Fund.
If you are not very familiar with historicism as a hermeneutic, then I highly recommend reading some of these for just that purpose. The paperback is bound very nicely, but it is also free online as a downloadable pdf document from Liberty Fund.
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March 24, 2022This review brought the book to my attention.
https://lawliberty.org/classic/early-...
https://lawliberty.org/classic/early-...
August 26, 2016
If I was just reading from a theological standpoint, this is a two star book at a go-go-gadget-arm stretch. You've got some good stuff, but you also have some horrendous sentimentalist pious gush, some embarrassingly Arminian codswallop, and the last author evidently drank the pre-Joseph Smith Koolaid of Swedenborg, who advocated the second coming happened on a spiritual plane beholden to only one man (himself, because he's so special) in the year 1757. Yeah, you can't make up that level of lobotomized malarkey. And hey! good news...he had the ear of a lot of politicians. The Stupid is strong with this crowd.
But...its a good reference on the theological and ecclesiastical issues during the American founding era. You get to see the deterioration of theology (and the general ability to process rational thought) through the lesser "great awakening". You get to see the tipping point when the humanists get wise and realize they'll need to keep up religious jargon if they want the citizenry to allow them to shift the government institutions to their oligarchical, atheistic ideal without universal revolt--hello, headwaters of the Unitarian church. Looks like a duck, walks like a duck, acts like a duck, smells like a duck...but talks like a chicken, so it must be a chicken.
And there are some nuggets of really, really good stuff. Stuff we should be teaching our kids. Stuff I wish our current institutionalized governmental buffoons would know. Source documents beat their contemporary historiofictional analyses every day of the week--and twice on Tuesdays.
But...its a good reference on the theological and ecclesiastical issues during the American founding era. You get to see the deterioration of theology (and the general ability to process rational thought) through the lesser "great awakening". You get to see the tipping point when the humanists get wise and realize they'll need to keep up religious jargon if they want the citizenry to allow them to shift the government institutions to their oligarchical, atheistic ideal without universal revolt--hello, headwaters of the Unitarian church. Looks like a duck, walks like a duck, acts like a duck, smells like a duck...but talks like a chicken, so it must be a chicken.
And there are some nuggets of really, really good stuff. Stuff we should be teaching our kids. Stuff I wish our current institutionalized governmental buffoons would know. Source documents beat their contemporary historiofictional analyses every day of the week--and twice on Tuesdays.
October 13, 2009
There's 33 chapters/sermons, about 1000 pages...that's only in the first volume of this set.
I'm only reading three sermons of the first volume.
If I write a review, it'll be sadly lacking.
...tell me again why we paid so much money for this book?
*EDIT*
Not a very enlightened review, since I only read 1/10 of this...
These sermons were sort of...predictable? Lots of Christianese, mentions of grace, mercy, repentance...etc...more sermon than political to me. Although I suppose that in this day and age, no pastor/preacher would dare to make similar political statements...
Not that sermons are bad, but I was looking forward to more political ideas, combined with the sermons...
I'm only reading three sermons of the first volume.
If I write a review, it'll be sadly lacking.
...tell me again why we paid so much money for this book?
*EDIT*
Not a very enlightened review, since I only read 1/10 of this...
These sermons were sort of...predictable? Lots of Christianese, mentions of grace, mercy, repentance...etc...more sermon than political to me. Although I suppose that in this day and age, no pastor/preacher would dare to make similar political statements...
Not that sermons are bad, but I was looking forward to more political ideas, combined with the sermons...
January 30, 2013
It is good in that it goes back before all the bull and bile was being printed about this country by our modern news media. It has many different types of reads in it. One I enjoyed because of it's style was called "Oration Upon the Beauties of LIBERTY, on the Effential Rights of the Americans". Example: "Methinks, that even your Lordship, will not blame them if they stand fast in the liberty wherein they were made free."
I love that!
I love that!
July 30, 2021
That was quite a slog. And most of these sermons aren’t really what I would consider a Law gospel sermon. Many are political speech’s almost completely devoid of Christian theology. I’m glad I read them, I already wish I’d taken a better note, cause I’m not reading it again…
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September 23, 2010"Political sermons of the American founding era, 1730-1805 by Ellis Sandoz (1998)"
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews