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2
INTRODUCTION
Revolutions seem to have happened on a regular basis throughout world history. Even in
these current times, revolutions are quite common. Revolutions in Egypt, Syria, and Libya are
just a few in recent memory, and in whatever area of the world or society they occur, they are
almost always volatile. Revolutions result from a long list of offenses, both perceived and real,
that set off a natural chain reaction that quickly becomes irreversible. When people live under
those kinds of provocations, ultimately they will respond, and that response is frequently
explosive.
As Malcolm Gladwell pointed out in his 2000 bestseller, The Tipping Point: How Little
Things Can Make a Big Difference, revolutionary change can come suddenly and dramatically.
The tipping point is the moment of critical mass, the threshold, the boiling point of people or
events. When a large enough group of people reaches a high enough level of frustration, it will
take action first by speaking out more and more forcefully. But if the people’s concerns are
ignored or rebuffed, and if there is no sign that things are getting better, then there can be a
sudden and violent change of direction.1 It doesn’t take much imagination to see that this is
precisely what was happening in Colonial America prior to the American Revolution.
The religious faith of those who first set foot on the shores of North America was the
ultimate catalyst that inspired their love of liberty and emboldened them to demand freedom
from British rule, and the greatest expression of that love of liberty was visible in the Great
Awakening of the 1730s–1750s. During those days, as a national revival spread across the
Colonies, the sparks of revolution were fanned into flame by pastors such as Jonathan Edwards,
1
Malcolm Gladwell, The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference
(New York: Back Bay Books, 2002), 12.
3
George Whitefield, Gilbert Tennent, and others who taught listeners the biblical basis of personal
liberty and obedience to the call of conscience. Alan Heimert points out that Calvinism and the
new evangelical movement among the Colonies brought with them a “radical, even democratic,
social and political ideology.”2
Historian Russell Kirk notes, “Every people, no matter how savage or how civilized, have
some form of religion: that is, some form of belief in a great supernatural power that influences
human destiny.”3 “Culture,” Kirk says, comes from the word “cult.” That is, the distinctive
qualities and customs of every culture arise from the religious beliefs of its people. America’s
success in almost any area is a tribute to the beliefs that shaped the American character. “These
beliefs,” writes Russell Kirk, “are the fatherhood of God, the brotherhood of man, and the
dignity of man. From these beliefs have developed Christian convictions as to how we should
conduct our lives, how we should treat our fellow human beings, and what makes life worth
living.”4
My view of the powerful influence of the Awakening is not shared by everyone. Some
historians argue that if the Great Awakening played any role at all in preparing the Colonies for
the coming Revolution, it was only a small role. Historians such as Jon Butler, in his article for
the Journal of American History entitled “Enthusiasm Described and Decried: The Great
Awakening as Interpretative Fiction,” have gone so far as to declare that the event never
2
Alan Heimert, Religion and the American Mind: From the Great Awakening to the
Revolution (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1966), viii.
3
Russell Kirk, The American Cause (Wilmington, DE: ISI Books, 2002), 18-19.
4
Ibid., 19.
4
happened but was only “interpretative fiction” brought about by the imagination and writings of
religious zealots of the nineteenth century.5
Frank Lambert asserts that the Awakening was only the fabrication of an overactive print
media in America in the 1740s.6 Views such as these are, by far, in the minority among
historians. Most agree that the Awakening was one of greatest influences in the lives of the
citizens of Colonial America in the years leading up to the American Revolution.
Thomas S. Kidd states,
There was a remarkable affinity among evangelicals for the Revolution, yet a direct
connection between the two movements remains elusive ... nevertheless, evangelicalism
bred an egalitarian spirit that fed a deep social transformation, that revolution in “hearts
and minds” accompanying the military and political rebellion. The evangelical revivals
caused the greatest social upheaval of any movement in the colonies prior to the
Revolution. This “massive defiance of traditional authority” must have exercised some
shaping influence on the Revolution.7
Kidd also points to Heimert’s argument that evangelical Calvinism lay at the heart of the
radical, even democratic, social and political ideology that empowered the Revolution.8
Events of the magnitude of the American Revolution do not simply happen in isolation;
they are normally manifestations of prior secular, religious, and economic systems of belief that
have become accepted in the hearts and minds of the people that ignite such a revolution. John
5
John Butler, "Enthusiasm Described and Decried: The Great Awakening as Interpretive
Fiction," Journal of American History 69 (1982): 305-25.
6
Frank Lambert, Inventing the Great Awakening (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University
Press, 1999), 308.
7
Thomas S. Kidd, The Great Awakening: The Roots of Evangelical Christianity in
Colonial America (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2007), 288.
8
Thomas S. Kidd, The Great Awakening: A Brief History with Documents (New York:
Bedford Press, 2008), 22.
5
Adams, second President of the United States, made the following statement in a letter to
Hezekiah Niles in 1818: “What do we mean by the American Revolution? Do we mean the
American War? The Revolution was affected before the War commenced. The Revolution was
in the hearts and minds of the people; a change in their religious sentiments … This radical
change in the principles, opinions, sentiments, and affections of the people was the real
American Revolution.”9
This dissertation begins by examining the unique role of religion in the very beginnings
of our nation. Without knowledge of the historical underpinnings of America’s own religious
systems and beliefs, a portrait of the Great Awakening’s critical role in the spawning and shaping
of the American Revolution would not become clear. It continues by focusing on the elements
that prepared the nation for spiritual revival, the Great Awakening itself with its major characters
and their beliefs, the time period (1750-1776) between these two major historical events, and the
views, values, and personalities that brought about the Revolution.
Many resources have been used in the final compilation of this paper. Alan Heimert’s
Religion and the American Mind and The Great Awakening are classics in the field of religion in
America. Sydney E. Ahlstrom’s large edition of A Religious History of the American People is
also excellent. Jerome Dean Mahaffey’s Preaching Politics: The Religious Rhetoric of George
Whitefield and the Founding of a New Nation, although a recent work (2007), was excellent
reading and should have a lasting impact on this subject. And then, Mark A. Noll, Thomas S.
Kidd, Patricia U. Bonomi, Edwin Gaustad, Leigh Schmidt, and Perry Miller have written
9
Bernard Bailyn, The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution (Cambridge, MA:
Harvard University Press, 1967), 160.
6
informative books that were excellent resources as well. In addition to the volume of information
and ideas from noted books, journals, and lectures, I have also included notes from my personal
lectures and book writings, and materials prepared for classes taken at the Summer Studies
Programs at Oxford University.
Although this paper’s scope and purpose should be met, it is my earnest hope that it will
prove of enough interest to challenge new studies of greater depth concerning America’s First
Great Awakening and its powerful influence upon the American Revolution.
7
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