Review by Choice Review
Baptists are a moving target, according to historians Kidd and Hankins, both professors at Baptist-affiliated Baylor Univ., where they are associated with the Institute for Studies of Religion. Over their nearly four centuries in the US, Baptists have been united only by belief in adult baptism, congregational independence, and self-identification as Baptists. In this engaging survey, the authors focus on a number of major themes: struggles for religious liberty, revivalism, race and slavery, liberal-fundamentalist disputes, the civil rights movement, and the religious Right. The latter part of the book focuses on the last two topics, with considerable attention to the takeover of the Southern Baptist Convention by fundamentalist forces in the 1980s. A major theme throughout is the "outsider" mentality that pervades much of the Baptist community, a mentality nurtured during colonial persecutions but maintained even after many Baptists had in fact become insiders, "at ease in Zion." The authors eschew excessive detail, but they emphasize the more dramatic aspects of the past half-century or so at the expense of the later fortunes of the mainline ABC (American Baptist Churches) and dissenting Cooperative Baptist Fellowship supported by Jimmy Carter in the South. But overall this is a very good book. Summing Up: Recommended. Lower-division undergraduates through faculty and professionals; general readers. --Peter W. Williams, Miami University
Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
Review by Booklist Review
Baptists have been one of the most influential groups of any kind in American history (notable Baptist figures include Billy Graham and Martin Luther King Jr.). This book covers that remarkable past with a nice mix of readability and reliability. The reliability resides in coauthors Kidd and Hankins, who are professorial colleagues at Baylor's Institute for Studies of Religion. The readability keeps this history from feeling like a textbook. The time span covers a period from the 1500s to the early 2000s, with distinct chapters covering the colonial period, the Great Awakening, the American Revolution, the Great Revival, the time of slavery, and the Civil War period. Post-Civil War sections include one focused on black Baptists, another on whites, and yet another on the civil rights movement in general. The book ends with a chapter on the Southern Baptist Convention, with its controversies in the 1980s and '90s. Research-minded readers will especially appreciate the last 55 pages of the book, which are devoted to extensive endnotes and a bibliography. This work differs greatly from a relatively recent title with the same name Baptists in America, by Bill Leonard (2007). Leonard's work is less chronological and much more thematic and topical in its approach. Highly recommended, especially for academic or religious collections.--Osburn, Wade Copyright 2010 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Library Journal Review
No history of early America can possibly be written without a deep understanding of the role of Protestant yearning for freedom from established religion, a knowledge imparted by the story told in this volume. Baptists Kidd and Hankins (both, history, Baylor Univ.) relate the divisive as well as the evangelistic history of the Baptists in this country, starting with the group's ejection from the Massachusetts Bay Colony as "colonial outlaws" to their current status as the second-largest religious group in America. Nonconformity to mainstream norms is a continuing mark of Baptists' radicalized dissent. Yet, as American Baptists have come to hold significant cultural sway, their Achilles heel is their tendency to divide over threats real or imagined. However, the authors conclude somewhat ironically, the salient historical characteristic is that Baptists kowtow to no authority, even when that authority is themselves. This fascinating piece of cultural history dynamically examines religious tensions between church, state, and evolving U.S. cultural norms. VERDICT Essential for almost any American church historian.-Sandra Collins, Byzantine Catholic Seminary Lib., Pittsburgh © Copyright 2015. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
A thoroughgoing study of Baptists, radicalized by persecution and honed by internal schism.Although both authors are avowed Baptists and teach at the Baptist Baylor University, Kidd (George Whitefield: America's Spiritual Founding Father, 2014, etc.) and Hankins (Jesus and Gin: Evangelicalism, the Roaring Twenties and Today's Culture Wars, 2010, etc.) present a fairly evenhanded account of Baptist history, from the first Baptist colony at Providence to the full-blown clashes over fundamentalist doctrine between the powerful and competing Baptist organizations allied with the political right from the 1970s until today. Baptists emerged originally as a radical element from the Reformation movement ("Anabaptists") that rejected infant baptism, which had become accepted as an "emergency measure" for children in an age of high infant mortality, in favor of "believer's baptism," whereby adults recognized and repented their sins and were reborn. A branch of the Separatists in Colonial America, the Baptists were seen as dangerous dissenters from the Puritan and Anglican mainstream, however, and persecuted relentlessly. The Great Awakening of the 18th century would spur a radical evangelical wing that helped dismantle the older New England churches in favor of new churches in Philadelphia, Charleston, South Carolina, and Sandy Creek, North Carolina. The authors highlight the important role the Baptists played in the American Revolution in their campaign for the disestablishment of the state churches and insistence on pressing for religious liberty. Kidd and Hankins demonstrate how the first schism occurred over the issue of slavery, with growing tensions between northern and southern Baptists and African-American membership doubling. Shut out from political power after Reconstruction, blacks formed their own institutionse.g., the influential National Baptist Convention USA. The authors usefully trace the Baptists' shift from outsiders to consummate insiders, all the way to the White House. An instructive work that allows for a fuller understanding of an important religious element in America. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
