Includes bibliographical references (pages 193-246) and index.
Contents:
Introduction -- "Filled to overflowing" : Black weeklies and the fundamentalist presence -- Formulating the faith : the five fundamentals across racial lines -- Polemics from the pulpit : antimodernist preaching and racial applications -- Religious education and interracial cooperation : the American Baptist Theological Seminary -- Contested identities : fundamentalism, race, and Americanism -- Conclusion.
Summary:
"'Black fundamentalists' illuminates how early twentieth century fundamentalism manifested in unique ways across the color line, illustrating how racial context, racial identity, and concerns for racial justice can shape religious expression even within theologically conservative traditions"-- Provided by publisher. "As the modernist-fundamentalist controversy came to a head in the early twentieth century, an image of the 'fighting fundamentalist,' one of a fire-breathing, strident, and almost always white preacher, was imprinted on the American cultural consciousness. But did this major religious perspective really stop cold in its tracks at the color line? 'Black fundamentalists' challenges the idea that fundamentalism was an exclusively white phenomenon. Fundamentalists of the early twentieth century felt the pressing need to defend the 'fundamental' doctrines, such as biblical inerrancy, the divinity of Christ, and the virgin birth, against what they saw as the predations of modernists, who represented a threat to true Christianity. These concerns emerged among Black Christians as well, even as the oppressive hand of Jim Crow excluded them from the most prominent fundamentalist institutions and social crusades, rendering them largely invisible to scholars examining such movements. Black fundamentalists aligned closely with their white counterparts on the theological particulars of 'the fundamentals,' but they often applied their conservative theology in more progressive, racially contextualized ways. Black fundamentalists tied their conservative faith to advocacy for reforms in public education and voting rights, and for the overturning of legal bans on intermarriage. Beyond the narrow confines of the fundamentalist movement, Daniel R. Bare shows how these historical dynamics illuminate larger themes, still applicable today, about how racial context influences religious expression."-- Back cover.
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