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Books > Religion & Spirituality > Christianity > Protestantism & Protestant Churches > General
The Oxford History of Protestant Dissenting Traditions, Volume I
traces the emergence of Anglophone Protestant Dissent in the
post-Reformation era between the Act of Uniformity (1559) and the
Act of Toleration (1689). It reassesses the relationship between
establishment and Dissent, emphasising that Presbyterians and
Congregationalists were serious contenders in the struggle for
religious hegemony. Under Elizabeth I and the early Stuarts,
separatists were few in number, and Dissent was largely contained
within the Church of England, as nonconformists sought to reform
the national Church from within. During the English Revolution
(1640-60), Puritan reformers seized control of the state but
splintered into rival factions with competing programmes of
ecclesiastical reform. Only after the Restoration, following the
ejection of two thousand Puritan clergy from the Church, did most
Puritans become Dissenters, often with great reluctance. Dissent
was not the inevitable terminus of Puritanism, but the contingent
and unintended consequence of the Puritan drive for further
reformation. The story of Dissent is thus bound up with the contest
for the established Church, not simply a heroic tale of persecuted
minorities contending for religious toleration. Nevertheless, in
the half century after 1640, religious pluralism became a fact of
English life, as denominations formed and toleration was widely
advocated. The volume explores how Presbyterians,
Congregationalists, Baptists, and Quakers began to forge distinct
identities as the four major denominational traditions of English
Dissent. It tracks the proliferation of Anglophone Protestant
Dissent beyond England-in Wales, Scotland, Ireland, the Dutch
Republic, New England, Pennsylvania, and the Caribbean. And it
presents the latest research on the culture of Dissenting
congregations, including their relations with the parish, their
worship, preaching, gender relations, and lay experience.
Considered by many to be one of the most influential German
Pietists, August Hermann Francke lived during a moment when an
emphasis on conversion was beginning to produce small shifts in how
the sacraments were defined-a harbinger of later, more dramatic
changes to come in evangelical theology. In this book, Peter James
Yoder uses Francke and his theology as a case study for the
ecclesiological stirrings that led to the rise of evangelicalism
and global Protestantism. Engaging extensively with Francke's
manuscript sermons and writings, Yoder approaches Francke's life
and religious thought through his theology of the sacraments. In
doing so, Yoder delivers key insights into the structure of
Francke's Pietist thought, providing a rich depiction of his
conversion-driven theology and how it shaped his views of the
sacraments and the church. The first in-depth study of Francke's
theology written for an English-speaking audience, this book
supports recent scholarship in English that not only challenges
long-held assumptions about Pietism but also argues for the role of
Pietism's influence on the changing religious landscape of the
eighteenth century. Through his examination of Francke's theology
of the sacraments, Yoder presents a fresh view into the
eighteenth-century ecclesiological developments that caused a
rupture with the dogmas of the Reformation. Original and vital,
this study recognizes Francke's importance to the history of
Pietism in Germany and beyond. It will become the standard
reference on Francke for American audiences and will influence
scholarship on Lutheranism, Pietism, early modern German studies,
and eighteenth-century history and religion.
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