The Great Awakening
In the mid-1700s, the Great Awakening revived and reformed religion by creating a new intensely-emotional approach to Church teachings. New Light preachers added a much needed jolt to this religious slump of boring and uninspiring sermons. They rivaled, and served as serious competition for the traditional “Old Light” teachers. However, was the Great Awakening a key contribution to the American Revolution? I can agree, but, the true answer is indecisive. Whether the “Awakening” did or did not influence independence in America, this new wave of religious freedom is with no doubt an important landmark in history. Despite disagreeing to this next opinion, the “supposedly” ineffective relationship between the Great Awakening and the revolution is supported with heavy content. According to some, this religious involvement was merely, as Jon Butler puts it, an “interpretative fiction”. This states that the Great Awakening was a meaningful symbol with no valid reference; it had “more talk, and less substance”. Butler also argues that historians took “revivals having little connection” and unified them into one big affair. When merging with the world of politics, Church leaders failed to spread religion because of failure to defend it. They never supported the Awakening with “factional alignments” (historical evidence) and even failed to show strong “discontent with the imperial relationship”. Some rebellious factions like Samuel Ward’s and Stephen Hopkins’s in Rhode Island, and several New York resistance parties, were never linked to the Great Awakening. Defiance groups against Britain were already established without the help of a religious influence. The arguments that supported this “enlightenment” weren’t convincing enough to influence such a revolt.
Nevertheless, the Great Awakening inspired a new freely independent way of religious and political thinking in British-America either way. Ezra Stiles was an American clergyman who worried about an imminent
Nevertheless, the Great Awakening inspired a new freely independent way of religious and political thinking in British-America either way. Ezra Stiles was an American clergyman who worried about an imminent