Blog Va: Summary of The Great Awakening: A Brief History with Document: Part 1, introduction

Thomas Kidd describes three keystone camps of the first Great Awakening: the “radicals” or revivalists, the moderates, and the anti-revivalists. Kidd brings to light several unsung social groups that influenced and participated in the Great Awaking including women, African Americans, and even Native Americans. He talks about the high and low points of James Davenport’s life as a religious leader. Draws the distinction between the first and second Great Awakenings (I did not know there were 2 before this reading). Kidd said the revivalist movement started in the 1720s with the call for more of the “Holy Spirit” in the protestant movement. Revivals were all about 2 things, religious fervor (Spirit) and the number of conversions. Detractors claimed that revivalists caused/had “overheated emotions” and that that would cause excess, chaos and heresy. Proponents or revivalism claimed that traditional preaching methods were “dull [and], uninspired” and thus just were not saving the people from hell. Both sides were for the most part very steadfast in their beliefs, this caused a division among the protestants of the day. Radical evangelicals believed in modern miracles and divine interventions widening the divide. This division lead to having different churches in the same geographical area, this put the government of that area in a compromising position. You see back then it was in many cases illegal to no go to and believe the doctrine of the officially indorsed church. In many cases, this conflict was resolved by running the new preacher out of the colony or town, but over time, this (and other things) lead to the legal separation of church and state. It should also be mentioned: The majority of revivalists did not really care about your race or sex, everyone was the same under the eyes of God. This idea lead to African American, and female religious leaders and possibly, many years later, the civil rights movement.