The University of North Carolina Press

384 pp., 6.125 x 9.25, 3 illus., 5 tables, 2 maps, appends., notes, bibl., index

Cloth

ISBN  978-0-8078-3194-6

Published: May 2008

Paper

ISBN  978-0-8078-5877-6

Published: May 2008

The Origins of Proslavery Christianity

White and Black Evangelicals in Colonial and Antebellum Virginia

By Charles F. Irons

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In the colonial and antebellum South, black and white evangelicals frequently prayed, sang, and worshipped together. Even though white evangelicals claimed spiritual fellowship with those of African descent, they nonetheless emerged as the most effective defenders of race-based slavery.

As Charles Irons persuasively argues, white evangelicals' ideas about slavery grew directly out of their interactions with black evangelicals. Set in Virginia, the largest slaveholding state and the hearth of the southern evangelical movement, this book draws from church records, denominational newspapers, slave narratives, and private letters and diaries to illuminate the dynamic relationship between whites and blacks within the evangelical fold. Irons reveals that when whites theorized about their moral responsibilities toward slaves, they thought first of their relationships with bondmen in their own churches. Thus, African American evangelicals inadvertently shaped the nature of the proslavery argument. When they chose which churches to join, used the procedures set up for church discipline, rejected colonization, or built quasi-independent congregations, for example, black churchgoers spurred their white coreligionists to further develop the religious defense of slavery.

About the Author

Charles F. Irons is assistant professor of history at Elon University.

Reviews

"A carefully argued, impressively researched, persuasive book. . . . Convincing and valuable."
--Church History

"Suggest[s] useful ways of thinking about blacks as active agents in the civil and religious debates of the day."
--Georgia Historical Quarterly

"Brings complexity to a history often reduced to a simple morality tale of 'churches in captivity' to white supremacy."
--Register of the Kentucky Historical Society

"Well researched and carefully nuanced. . . . The great success of this book . . . is Irons's demonstration that religion was just as important as race, class or gender in shaping the antebellum South."
--The Christian Century

"A thorough, engaging study. . . . Recommended."
--Choice

"Makes useful contributions to a number of distinct historiographical discussions, including those about Revolutionary-era evangelicalism and slavery, the colonization movement, and the role evangelicals played during the secession crisis and in the Confederacy. . . . Irons shows that Christianity's inherent flexibility and its emphasis on the next world more than on this one made proslavery Christianity possible."
--Civil War Book Review