religious fundamentalism essay

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Christian fundamentalism in america.

Margaret Bendroth Margaret Bendroth Congregational Library and Archives
https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780199340378.013.419
Published online: 27 February 2017

Fundamentalism has a very specific meaning in the history of American Christianity, as the name taken by a coalition of mostly white, mostly northern Protestants who, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, united in opposition to theological liberalism. Though the movement lost the public spotlight after the 1920s, it remained robust, building a network of separate churches, denominations, and schools that would become instrumental in the resurgence of conservative evangelicalism after the 1960s. In a larger sense, fundamentalism is a form of militant opposition to the modern world, used by some scholars to identify morally absolutist religious and political movements in Islam, Judaism, Christianity, and even Hinduism and Buddhism. While the core concerns of the movement that emerged within American Protestantism—defending the authority of the Bible and both separating from and saving their sinful world—do not entirely mesh with this analytical framework, they do reflect the broad and complex challenge posed by modernity to people of faith.

fundamentalism
fundamentalist
antimodernism
biblical inerrancy
dispensational premillennialism
evangelicalism
evangelicals

“Fundamentalism” is a complicated word. It has a very specific meaning in the history of American Christianity, as the name taken by a coalition of mostly white, mostly northern Protestants who, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, united in opposition to theological liberalism. Scholars also use it in a broader sense to describe militant opposition to the modern world, referring to morally absolutist movements in Islam, Judaism, Christianity, and even Hinduism and Buddhism. In popular usage, however, “fundamentalist” has become a label applied to all kinds of conservative groups, religious as well as political. The result is a motley mix of awkward bedfellows—from Southern Baptists to Islamic revolutionaries to free-market economists—squeezed into one all but meaningless category.

Despite the potential for confusion, both the specific and the broader uses of the term help us understand the meaning and significance of fundamentalism. The baseline of this essay is historical, focusing on the development of the American Protestant movement that first adopted the term. Yet American fundamentalism is not sui generis , a one-time historical event with no broader significance. Because its vocabulary of protest has resonated so powerfully in American culture and because it invites compelling cross-cultural comparisons, fundamentalism is also an important entryway into understanding the much larger and endlessly complex question of religious belief and behavior in the modern age.

The best introduction to fundamentalism, then, is the ongoing argument about how to define it. Certainly the American variety shares much with militant antimodernism in other religious traditions. Strict opposition to the perceived permissiveness of contemporary society, backed up by the infallible authority of a written word, is more common than not in the 21st-century world. This kind of resistance, moreover, often goes hand in hand with authoritarian family values and a strongly masculine rhetorical tone. But it is a particular kind of antimodernism, not conservative in the traditional Amish sense, that is, of preserving the purity of the past by building barricades against modern technology. The resistance is selective, even a bit ironic, especially when it comes to innovative technology that might aid the cause. Just as early 20th century American Protestant fundamentalists were early adopters of radio, 21st-century Islamicists recruit followers through social media. In that sense, what is often called “fundamentalism” is a creation of modernity; it is not a rearguard effort to turn back progress, but a form of resistance only possible in a secular, technologically advanced world.

Beyond these broad similarities, however, the terrain becomes difficult. There are certainly unmistakable “family resemblances,” as some scholars call them, across cultural and religious lines, but whether or not these can be labeled “fundamentalist” is a different matter. Should a word that originated as a way of describing a relatively small group of white, 19th-century American Protestants apply to other faiths and other cultures, religious movements with their own historical roots, theological concerns, and social agenda? The best alternative, as the religion scholar Simon Wood argues, is precision. If, for example, “in certain Islamic cases fundamentalism effectively means a politicized form of the religion,” he suggests, “why not call it political Islam ?” 1

Another reason for caution is the almost universally pejorative meaning attached to “fundamentalism,” not just in its popular usage but among scholars as well. The word so often invokes an “other”—exotic, foreign, and possibly dangerous—a handy shorthand, as historian David Watt observes, for “things of which I disapprove.” 2 It is all too easy to marginalize fundamentalism as a temporary aberration, a cultural lag by an intolerant few proving the general rule of modern tolerance and rationality. Moreover, defining and then demonizing certain religious groups as inherently militant and hostile to human rights, the religion scholar Mark Juergensmeyer argues, is deeply problematic, obscuring “the fact that religious politics comes in many shapes and forms, especially in the modern world.” Far too easily, the fundamentalist label can give rise to “witch hunts” against imagined enemies, or legitimize the settling of old grudges. 3 Given the potential for misunderstanding and misuse, then, it is not surprising that scholars disagree, sometimes sharply, about employing the term at all.

Given all these qualifications, “fundamentalism” is a word best used sparingly and specifically, a rule particularly apt in regard to the branch of late 20th century Protestantism popularly known as evangelicalism. The two movements, though similar, are not synonymous. Evangelicalism of the 21st century is a diverse movement with roots in Pentecostalism, Wesleyan holiness traditions, and African American Christianity. Its constituency includes conservative Lutherans and Calvinists, and even some Mennonite Anabaptists. Moreover, with the globalization of Christianity, American evangelicalism has taken on an increasingly African and Asian tilt. Without a doubt, fundamentalism factored prominently into the rise and growth of modern-day evangelicalism, but how much and where is debatable—and for many, a sensitive question. One could argue that contemporary evangelicals have inherited from fundamentalism a vocabulary of protest and, to a degree, parameters of doctrinal orthodoxy that still hold true. Yet it was one precursor among many, important but by no means singular.

The movement’s basic concerns were as deceptively simple as its name. Fundamentalists certainly stood for doctrinal orthodoxy, for maintaining what they believed was the original purity of Christian belief—the fundamental doctrines of the faith. But they disagreed constantly about what constituted correct belief and behavior. Moreover, their two core doctrines, the authority of the Bible and the necessity of separation from the sinful world, were ridden with paradoxes and internal complexities. An important key to understanding fundamentalism, then, is tracing the way these two ideological concerns developed over time, and how they helped shape the movement’s complicated relationship with modern American society.

The Authoritative Text

The absolute authority of a divinely inspired text is a central tenet of all the so-called Abrahamic traditions—Judaism, Christianity, and Islam—but it takes on a special urgency as faith radicalizes. Ardent religion often goes hand in hand with literalism, the insistence on obedience to every word of the scriptures, down to the last letter. But the equation is rarely that simple. American Protestant fundamentalists were not, in fact, literalists. As with any other book, they recognized metaphor, poetry, and figurative language in the Bible, and made allowances where appropriate. They often sounded like literalists, however, because they assumed that every word of the Bible was utterly clear and its teachings utterly plain. The difference might seem subtle, but it is an important distinction, an understanding of how exactly the Bible was “inspired” by God. The emphasis was not so much obedience to every single precept in the Bible, but the belief that every single line of scripture was exactly as God intended it to be, down to the last syllable. Every part of the Bible conveyed divine truth—lengthy genealogies, stories of violent warfare, and obscure prophecies were the word of God, just as much as the teachings of Jesus or the letters of Saint Paul.

In a variety of ways, this fundamentalist doctrine of “divine inspiration” was far more demanding than any previous form of traditional Protestant belief. Certainly all Protestants believed the Bible was true. Since the 16th-century Reformation they had upheld it as a completely trustworthy guide in all matters of belief and practice, the unique and undisputed word of God. But that broad standard did not always stand up to criticism, especially with the rise of serious biblical scholarship in the 18th-century Age of Reason. As it first developed, primarily in British and German universities, scholarly study of the Bible was largely aimed at determining the accuracy of texts and translations, known as the “lower criticism.” Yet as scholars delved more deeply into ancient texts—a method known as the “higher criticism”—they unearthed troubling historical discrepancies, and these led to doubts about the Bible’s overall truthfulness. Further research raised more questions about the Bible’s uniqueness. The creation story in Genesis and the account of Noah and the great flood were eerily similar to those found in Assyrian and Babylonian epics. The death and resurrection of Christ tracked uncomfortably close to Egyptian myths about Osiris. Even more problematically, deeper historical understanding of the biblical writers and their cultural world opened questions about the Bible’s contemporary relevance. What did a set of ancient Middle Eastern texts have to say to modern Europeans? Were the biblical writers so wrapped up in myth and miracle, so trusting in supernatural explanations for natural events, as to be all but unintelligible in the age of reason and science?

The higher criticism did not reach seminaries and colleges in the United States until after the Civil War, and it would not filter into church pews and pulpits until much later. But by the 1870s and 1880s, the lines of opposition were forming, led by a generation of scholars in Princeton Seminary, long a bastion of Presbyterian orthodoxy. Charles Hodge and Benjamin Warfield were leading voices in American biblical scholarship for much of the early to mid-19th century, especially regarding the way in which American Protestants read and understood the Bible. The scriptures, the Princeton scholars declared, were not only a completely reliable guide to faith and practice, but were completely accessible to anyone willing to take the “plain meaning” of the text.

This assumption, which played a major role in fundamentalist ideology and persists within contemporary evangelicalism, is worth further explanation. It drew from the 18th-century philosophy of “common sense rationalism,” a system of thought developed in response to the extreme skepticism of Enlightenment figures like David Hume, who questioned not only the existence of miracles but even the ability of human beings to perceive anything beyond what was immediately available to the senses. The common-sense theorists—Scottish thinkers like Frances Hutcheson, Thomas Reid, and Dugald Stewart—argued that it was possible to know true things about the world through an innate capacity of perception. (Even David Hume, after all, ducked to avoid a low doorway.) The common-sense school became centrally important in the United States in the years after the Revolution, serving as a powerful rationale for democracy, a society in which each citizen not only had the same capacity for reason but also the same ability to access self-evident truths.

In the early 19th century the common-sense philosophy taught Americans to read the Bible as equally self-evident, a book of propositions supported by the data of individual scriptural texts. “The Bible is to the theologian,” Charles Hodge wrote, “what nature is to the man of science. It is his store-house of facts; and his method of ascertaining what the Bible teaches, is the same as that which the natural philosopher adopts to ascertain what nature teaches.” The theologian’s method, then, was to “ascertain, collect, and combine all the facts which God has revealed concerning himself and our relation to him. These facts,” Hodge declared, “are all in the Bible.” 4 This confidence fostered a deep trust in science as an intellectual pursuit following the same inductive principles as study of scripture. American Protestant thought, then, took on a deeply rationalistic cast, grounded in a Bible that was clear and logically consistent, with its truths obvious to any reverent and careful thinker.

By the late 19th century, the weaknesses of the common-sense approach were becoming equally obvious, and not just because of questions raised by the higher criticism. In the years leading up to the Civil War, American Protestants found themselves mired in complex arguments about the Bible’s word on slavery, realizing that a strictly factual reading of scripture actually supported an institution which many found morally repugnant. (Not only did the Hebrew patriarchs own slaves, and the Old Testament legal codes and New Testament epistles of Paul provide rules and regulations reinforcing it, but Christ himself had healed slaves without uttering a single word against their subjection.)

Under the rising pressure of scientific and critical scholarship, the Bible’s defenders took on a much stronger standard of truth. They argued that the Bible was not just infallible but “inerrant”—that is, completely accurate in every scientific, historical, or geographical reference. Any remaining flaws, they argued, occurred in the translation or transmission of texts. The “original autographs,” the Bible’s first drafts, in other words, were perfect in every respect.

In effect, conservative defenders of scripture were adopting a new standard of proof, one that rested on the same assumptions underlying the higher criticism. The Bible was not true because of what it taught, the traditional argument used by Protestants since the Reformation, but because it squared with modern scientific and historical scholarship. The proof, therefore, was no longer internal but external. The inerrancy doctrine became the focus of controversy in the 1880s and 1890s, leading to a series of public heresy trials in the Presbyterian church, the most famous of which led to the defrocking of the historian Charles A. Briggs, a professor at New York City’s Union Seminary, in 1893 .

Though the scholarly defenders of inerrancy did not call themselves “fundamentalists”—the Princetonians saw themselves as orthodox Presbyterians defending the Bible from its enemies and detractors and actively disliked the fundamentalist label—the doctrine became a central tenet of the movement, as it was developing in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Hard-nosed biblicism would become fundamentalism’s hallmark, a self-proclaimed dividing line between true and false believers. Indeed, if anything, the inerrancy controversies put to rest any suggestion that fundamentalism was inherently anti-intellectual. More accurately, it took a vigorously rationalistic view of the Bible, which became not so much a mystical revelation as a set of propositions which could be defended by scientific and historical evidence and inductive arguments. The inerrancy doctrine is, in many ways, one of fundamentalism’s most influential legacies within modern evangelicalism. It would remain prominent within the so-called neo-evangelical movement which arose in the 1940s and 1950s, making for decades of controversy over a doctrine which some saw as essential to orthodoxy and others deemed an unwelcome residue of fundamentalism.

Sin and Separation

Fundamentalism’s reputation for “otherworldliness,” for shunning involvement with anything deemed secular, is also misleading. Certainly, in the American Protestant case, separation from both sin and sinners was behind several denominational schisms in the 1920s and the creation of a protective canopy of schools and organizations in the 1930s and 1940s. But fundamentalism also provided an even more powerful rationale for continued engagement with the world, bringing new energy to mass evangelism and overseas missions. In a complex way, believers were to be agents of salvation for a society they deemed morally hopeless.

The source of this dilemma was dispensational premillennialism. This was a form of biblical interpretation that harmonized all the prophecies of scripture into a single narrative, culminating in a cataclysmic “second coming” of Christ. Interest in prophecy was nothing new in the history of Christianity, nor was the belief that Christ would return suddenly to vanquish Satan and establish God’s kingdom on earth. For most of the 19th century, however, the vast majority of American Protestants took a more optimistic view of Christ ’s return, as the final climax in a long history of human progress.

One major difference between these two views of the end times was their overall trajectory. Both held that in some sense, the end times would involve a “millennium,” a thousand-year reign of peace and prosperity. The biblical basis for this idea was a short passage in the book of Revelation (Rev. 20:1–10). The first scheme, known as “premillennialism,” saw human history as a downward spiral always toward chaos and sin. It took a more literal view of the millennium as a thousand-year interval before God ’s final judgment of humanity. In contrast, “postmillennialism” took a more figurative view of biblical prophecy, and held that Christ ’s return would be the culmination of human progress toward a just and peaceful world.

Dispensational premillennialism was a particular interpretation of biblical prophecy that originated in Great Britain, mainly among early 19th century evangelicals associated with a small sect, the Plymouth Brethren. Under the leadership of the Irish Bible scholar John Nelson Darby, the Brethren added two new ideas to traditional premillennialist doctrine. The first, the “secret rapture,” drew upon a passing reference in the book of Revelation, that Christ ’s true followers would be “caught up in the air,” whisked heavenward before the final judgment. (There was disagreement about whether the rapture would take place before or after the “tribulation,” a brief period during the end times in which Satan would be let loose to wreak havoc on the earth.) The Plymouth Brethren also took a “historicist” approach to prophecies in the Bible, insisting that these were not referring to a time to come—what would be a “futurist” interpretation—but had been occurring all along within human history. This meant that students of prophecy could find clues about the second coming in world events as they unfolded. Though dispensational premillennialists were careful not to make any specific predictions about the date or time of Christ’s return, they regularly debated the meaning of events that appeared to coincide with biblical prophecies. Fundamentalists, therefore, read newspapers and followed the evening news with special diligence.

In the years after the Civil War, Darby ’s teachings gathered adherents in the United States, primarily through a network of summer conferences and regional gatherings, the most famous of which was the Niagara Bible Conference, started in 1876 . Another important conduit was the Scofield Reference Bible. This was a fully annotated version of the Bible, compiled by the Congregational pastor Cyrus Scofield and published by Oxford University Press in 1909 . It was in effect a one-volume handbook of dispensational premillennial doctrine, immensely popular among lay people and an easily portable study tool for overseas missionaries.

In many ways dispensational premillennialism was arcane and complicated, requiring a thorough knowledge of the Bible, especially of the dense prophetic texts in books like Daniel and Revelation. The overall scheme, however, was relatively simple. Dispensational teaching divided all of human history into discrete time periods, or “dispensations,” beginning with the original divine decrees in the Garden of Eden and ending with the thousand-year reign of Christ and the final judgment. Each dispensation followed the same narrative: God provided humanity with a set of rules and conditions, humanity disobeyed them, and the result was chaos and destruction, presenting God no choice but to begin anew. Then the same cycle would repeat. Dispensationalists believed they were living in the “age of the church.” This was the last period of time, beginning after the resurrection of Christ and ending with the last judgment, an event which, according to the signs of the times, looked to be happening very soon.

Dispensational premillennialism did not lead to empty cynicism or fatalism, as one might expect of such a negative view of human history. Instead it inspired new efforts for evangelism: the goal was to reach all of the unsaved with the Christian gospel before Christ’s return. Given this urgency, traditional methods would not do. A new movement of independent “faith” missionary societies arose to recruit and quickly send out thousands of young men and women. They skirted slow-moving denominational bureaucracies by relying entirely on individual donations, insisting that it was not necessary to solicit funds because God would provide day by day. The China Inland Mission was the first and most famous. It was formed in 1865 by the British premillennialist J. Hudson Taylor, who arrived in China with “ten pounds and a prayer.” The Sudan Interior Mission and the Africa Inland Mission followed in the 1890s. An entire new denomination, the Christian and Missionary Alliance, was founded by the Canadian Presbyterian A. B. Simpson in 1887 , originally as a faith mission.

Dispensationalists felt special urgency for the Jews, who played a central role in the events of the end times. They believed that the original nation of Israel was still God’s chosen people, and would have the opportunity to accept Christ as savior before the final judgment. More significantly, they regarded the return of the Hebrew people to their ancient homeland as one of the most important signs that the end was near. For reasons entirely different from those of the secular defenders of Israel, dispensational premillennialists were ardent Zionists. “Israel is forever linked to the salvation of the world,” Arno C. Gaebelein, an evangelist to the Jews, wrote in 1894 . “Having been Messiah’s cradle, it will, when once it becomes a Christian nation, form the framework of His future visible kingdom.” 5

Bible schools and institutes also contributed to the missionary cause. By 1945 there were more than a hundred across the United States and Canada, though some only survived for a brief time. The curriculum revolved around exhaustive study of the Bible, without scholarly commentaries or for that matter knowledge of Greek or Hebrew, and based on the firm belief that the scriptures were self-evidently clear in every respect. The Bible teacher James M. Gray (later president of the Moody Bible Institute in Chicago) taught the “facts” of scripture to his students, much as a science teacher would outline a lesson in geology or human anatomy. “If we get the facts,” he declared, “the interpretation will take care of itself, for the Bible is wonderfully self-interpretive.” 6 The Bible school curriculum was also intensely practical, aimed at sending missionaries and “Christian workers” into the field as soon as possible. Students thus received hands-on training in evangelism and introduction to specific skills needed for the mission field—pedagogy, music, first aid. The schools also provided an intense, abbreviated training regimen for young men and women with an ambition to serve but few financial resources. Where the traditional missionary might have both college and seminary degrees, Bible institute required at most only high school and awarded certificates after just a few years of study.

By the early 20th century, biblical inerrancy and premillennial dispensationalism had found common cause, both insisting on a rigorous standard of scriptural truth and resistance to what they decried as bland, lifeless “churchianity.” The two did not entirely overlap: one could hold to inerrancy, as many Princetonian Presbyterians still did, and scorn the prophetic certainties of the Scofield Reference Bible. But they were a potent combination and ultimately became the nub of protest.

In the early 20th century these separate currents coalesced into a movement with both an agenda and a name. In 1921 the Baptist editor Curtis Lee Laws of the Watchman-Examiner dubbed those fighting “a battle royal” for the authority of the Bible “fundamentalists.” 7 He was not the first to use the word. It had already surfaced in a major Presbyterian dispute in 1910 and was also tied to the publication of a twelve-volume series of books, issued between 1910 and 1915 , called The Fundamentals . Funded by the California oil magnates Lyman and Milton Stewart, these volumes were widely distributed but not yet incendiary, full of densely reasoned articles by theologians and biblical scholars. But Laws’s timing was important. Fundamentalism would come into its own in the 1920s, in a series of confrontations that in many ways still reverberate within American Protestantism.

The Fundamentalist-Modernist Controversy

The enemy was theological liberalism. With roots in European academia, and arriving in the United States in the mid to late 19th century, the so-called New Theology was more about ethics than about metaphysics, less concerned with doctrinal formulations about the Trinity or atonement than with refitting Christianity for the modern world. Theological liberalism was incarnational; that is, it found God in human interactions and human institutions. In 19th-century terms—in an era before the world wars and genocides of the 20th century—this meant it was a religion of progress and ethical optimism. Liberals also accepted the Bible’s historical limitations, seeing it as an ancient text bound to its original time and place, when myth and miracle were accepted as true.

At its best 19th-century liberalism was a warm, optimistic faith keyed to the spirit of its day; a growing number of conservative critics, however, saw it as vague and imprecise, making dangerous concessions on the authority of the Bible and the uniqueness of Christ as the only avenue of salvation. In their view it was little more than dry rationalism, bound by the naturalistic presuppositions of science more than the reality of the supernatural. Ultimately, they believed, liberalism threatened the entire missionary enterprise and the vitality of American church life, offering only a set of ethical teachings and a watered-down Christianity.

The anxieties set loose by World War I sharpened fundamentalists’ sense of conflict. Many Americans opposed entry into what they saw as a strictly European dispute, and early on some leading premillennialists veered surprisingly close to pacifism, seeing little to be gained by a pointless secular entanglement. But as the war dragged on, neutrality became impossible, especially on the home front, where ardent patriots demanded “100 percent Americanism” of every citizen. When liberals began to excoriate fundamentalists for lack of patriotism, the response was to insist ever more loudly on their loyalty to American values, forging what would later become a near-unbreakable bond between conservative religion and patriotism.

During the 1920s, a building sense of frustration played out in two large northern denominations, the Baptists and the Presbyterians. Other Protestant bodies—Congregationalists, Methodists, and Lutherans—dealt with fundamentalism, but for reasons of both theology and institutional structure they escaped direct or prolonged conflict.

The Presbyterian conflict led to angry and lasting division. In this case the denomination’s centralized organizational structure provided conservatives both a means of protest and a national stage for doing so. Complaints about the orthodoxy of ministerial candidates or prospective missionaries might start in a local presbytery but could be appealed upward, as in a court system, and ultimately land on the floor of the national body, the General Assembly. This was the case in 1910 , when the New York presbytery’s refusal to ordain three candidates who did not assent to the doctrine of the virgin birth led to a series of reversals and rulings that ended with the General Assembly issuing a list of the five “fundamentals” of the Christian faith: the inerrancy of the Bible, the death of Christ the only atonement for sin, Christ ’s bodily resurrection, the truth of miracles, and the virgin birth of Christ. It took an outsider, however, to raise this simmering conflict into an all-out schismatic contest. In 1922 the Baptist minister Harry Emerson Fosdick preached a sermon in New York City’s First Presbyterian Church entitled “Shall the Fundamentalists Win?” decrying doctrinal conservatism as intolerant and obscurantist. To those long unhappy with the denomination’s liberal leadership, this was an outright provocation (from a Baptist outsider, no less) and a call to arms. The Philadelphia pastor Clarence Macartney’s reply “Shall Unbelief Win?” was the first in a string of efforts to bring the denomination under conservative leadership. A campaign to elect William Jennings Bryan as moderator failed in 1923 , but the following year Macartney won the position himself, though narrowly.

The most important emerging leader in the Presbyterian cause, however, was a professor of New Testament at Princeton Seminary, J. Gresham Machen. A highly respected scholar, and by no means a dispensational premillennialist, Machen was determined to keep Princeton orthodox and to force liberals to take a stand for their beliefs. His book Christianity and Liberalism , published in 1923 , argued that Presbyterians were drifting toward a faith dangerously outside historic Christian orthodoxy, “so entirely different from Christianity as to belong in a distinct category.” 8 His cause would not prevail, however. In 1929 , when moderates gained back control of the General Assembly and Princeton Seminary, which was under its supervision, Machen was ousted from his position. He left the denomination in protest and led in the formation of a new seminary, Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia, and a new denomination, the Orthodox Presbyterian Church.

Baptist conflicts were no less intense, but mitigated by the denomination’s decentralized structure. Airing grievances was difficult in a polity designed to protect the independence of local churches. In 1921 a group calling themselves the Fundamentalist Fellowship demanded a full investigation of doctrinal standards in Baptist colleges and seminaries—only to find that the denomination’s national body, the Northern Baptist Convention, had no institutional authority to carry this out. Undaunted, the dissenters declared that all Baptists should sign a doctrinal creed, a controversial practice in the denomination’s long history of defending the freedom of local churches, though not unknown. But when the Minneapolis pastor William Bell Riley brought the demand to the Convention meeting in 1922 , moderator Cornelius Woelfkin offered a substitute standard that no Baptist could rightfully resist. The New Testament, he declared, was the sole and final authority of belief and practice. Riley’s measure failed, but by then he had lost patience with the denomination and with the moderates in the fundamentalist camp. As founder of the World Christian Fundamentalist Association—the organization that engaged William Jennings Bryan as prosecutor in the Scopes evolution trial—he was already on an outward trajectory, forming an “empire” of fundamentalist schools and churches in the upper Midwest. The Baptist Bible Union became the organizational home for fundamentalists opposed to any forms of compromise with liberals, and ultimately a separate denomination altogether, the General Association of Regular Baptists, formed in 1932 .

But creeds and doctrines were not the only battleground, or in the long run the most significant one. In fact, denominational battles did little to resolve questions of doctrinal orthodoxy; in both cases, the real winners were the moderates who outlasted the extreme voices on either side. By then the real battle was over evolution, fueled by mounting invective in the public press and a growing taste for sensationalism in 20th-century American society. In many ways the ado was a product of the decade’s media-driven culture, as Darwin ’s theory had been a staple of American scientific and intellectual conversation for half a century or more. Up through the turn of the century it had generated relatively little open opposition, as most Protestants understood Darwinism within a larger framework of faith in upward progress, and they found ways to harmonize both the theory of development and its startlingly long time frame with the book of Genesis. They were willing to accept, as Congregationalist Lyman Abbott put it, that evolution was merely “God’s way of doing things.” Of course, the more troubling, yet rarely articulated, element of Darwinism was its deeply secular notion of natural selection, a system in which God was simply no longer necessary. The public antics of the 1920s, climaxing in the 1925 Scopes trial, did little to add nuance, however, especially with the growing popularity of new and alternative theories of “creationism.” Like biblical inerrancy, creationism was a standard of belief far more intense and demanding than anything previously required in orthodox Protestantism, full of unlikely explanations for a six-day creation and Noah’s ark. And like the defenders of biblical inerrancy, creationists adopted the analytical methods of their opponents—gathering evidence, deducing hypotheses, framing theories—and saw themselves as scientists, just as much as the secular evolutionist in his laboratory.

The Scopes trial has lived in memory as a watershed moment, a resounding defeat for fundamentalists and an inspirational victory for rational thinkers everywhere. In fact, Bryan and the World Christian Fundamentals Association won their case, which was actually a relatively minor infraction of a state law. John Scopes was a substitute teacher in the Dayton, Tennessee, public schools who agreed to spearhead a legal challenge by teaching evolution in his classroom. Despite a spirited defense by Clarence Darrow, who had been engaged by the American Civil Liberties Union, Scopes lost his case and would have paid a small fine if the ruling had not been overturned on a technicality. But the image of a stifling courtroom in a southern town, a Bible-thumping prosecutor and an earnest defender of modern science, has lived on. This was thanks in part to the cynical eye of the journalist H. L. Mencken, editor of the American Mercury , who mercilessly skewered Bryan as “one of the most tragic asses in American history” and his supporters as “gaping primates from the upland valleys of the Cumberland Range.” 9 Not surprisingly, to most observers at the time—and generations of scholars as well—the Scopes trial appeared to be fundamentalism’s last, losing desperate stand.

Popular Piety

But Scopes was far from the end. In fact, fundamentalism proved surprisingly sturdy up through the World War II era, especially as a form of popular piety. It by no means died out after the Scopes debacle, but made a permanent imprint on Protestant hymnody and devotional writing, and fueled a passion for evangelism.

In many ways, fundamentalism was just as current with its times as theological liberals hoped to be. As it took form in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, fundamentalism was a faith for aspiring people, for lower-middle-class or working-class Americans. It resonated most powerfully in industrialized cities, where a continual flow of European immigrants (many of them Jews and Roman Catholics) left native white Protestants a shrinking minority with declining political power. Consequently, fundamentalist churches and Bible institutes flourished in northern cities like Boston, Philadelphia, Minneapolis, and Chicago, in direct contrast to the stereotype of the movement as rural and southern. Certainly biblicism and opposition to theological liberalism resonated in conservative southern churches, and many of fundamentalism’s early leaders—William Bell Riley, J. C. Massee, John Roach Straton—were born and raised in the South. By then, however, southern Protestants already had their own language of alienation, as the defeated but righteous remnant devoted to a “lost cause” uniquely blessed by God.

Fundamentalism’s urban strength owes much to the revivalistic tradition in American religion. By the late 19th century, the art of saving souls had grown far beyond its back-country roots. Evangelism took place in highly organized mass meetings adapted for the urban middle class, with professional musicians and a well-known “headliner” on the platform. D. L. Moody was a major pioneer in this respect. With the hymn writer Ira Sankey he reached thousands with a message that was sentimental, laced with pieties about sainted mothers and wayward children, and emotionally powerful. Moody’s international appeal—some of his most important campaigns were in Canada and Great Britain—testified to his sensitivity to the mood of the times. Yet in an age of rising labor unrest, urban poverty, and mass immigration, Moody did not address social issues from his platform. As he put it, “God has given me a lifeboat, and said to me, ‘Moody save all you can.’” Other evangelists followed in Moody’s wake, each more colorful than the last, as city-wide revivals began to take on the shape that Billy Graham would make famous in the post-World War II era. In the early 20th century, Moody ’s most famous (and controversial) successor was Billy Sunday, who combined intense patriotism, fervent opposition to alcohol, and an aggressive masculinity in his platform presence.

Fundamentalist piety also had an otherworldly streak, however, emphasizing the importance of self-abnegation in the lifelong struggle against sin. This message, like dispensational premillennialism, originated in British circles, in a series of conferences associated with the Keswick movement. The central theme of Keswick spirituality was deliverance from the power of sin, achieved only by total devotion to Christ and “forgetfulness of self,” to use the popular phrase. The language was intensely devout but in its own way empowering to the liberated believer, free from the power of sin. It was also demanding, requiring constant vigilance against the assertion of one’s own will rather than God’s. In contrast to Wesleyan understandings of sanctification, which held out the possibility of perfection, Keswick spirituality offered no such promise. Like biblical inerrancy and dispensational premillennialism, Keswick was an arduous reworking of traditional Protestantism’s belief and practice.

All told, however, fundamentalist piety was a paradox. In one sense it was vigorously situated in the world, in efforts for mission and mass revivalism particularly; in another it yearned for purity, especially as denominational battles raged. The question, as it evolved, became one about cooperation with outsiders, Christian or otherwise. How literally must true believers take the biblical demand to “come out and be ye separate?” Many Presbyterians and Baptists stayed in their original denominational homes and did not take the more radical path toward schism. Many others were content to live within the growing subculture of fundamentalist churches and schools. But others saw both of these as compromise. Their ethic was “second degree separation”—refusing to associate with anyone who had any connection to any form of liberalism. In this spirit, the evangelist Bob Jones II founded Bob Jones College (later University) in 1926 . In 1937 Carl McIntire led a faction out of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church to form the Bible Presbyterian Church, a denomination with a more openly fundamentalist agenda, including premillennialist theology and prohibition on alcohol and tobacco.

The tension between pragmatism and purity was most evident in fundamentalist attitudes toward women. On the one hand, women were indispensable. As in virtually all American churches, they represented some two-thirds of the membership and played an active role in fund raising, personal evangelism, and hymn and devotional writing. Women like Virginia Asher and Frances Miller played prominent roles in the Billy Sunday campaign. But especially by the 1920s, the worst excesses of popular culture—bobbed hair, short skirts, increasing sexual freedom—appeared to be feminine sins. Once deemed far more moral and religious than men, women became in fundamentalist eyes more threat than ally. Thus, in public rhetoric fundamentalist men denounced feminine vice, opposed woman suffrage, and refused to countenance access to any kind of leadership role. In actual practice, however, women taught at Bible institutes, constituted the majority of overseas missionaries, and of course formed a consistent majority of the membership of fundamentalist churches.

Fundamentalism’s Influence

By the 1940s, a good deal of fundamentalism’s original separatist zeal had been channeled into a vigorous infrastructure of schools, churches, and evangelistic organizations. By 1941 , for example, Wheaton College in Illinois—on its way to becoming the “Harvard of the Bible Belt”—had the largest student body in the state. Every summer thousands of ministers and lay people flocked to Bible conferences, the most popular of which was in Winona Lake, Indiana, mixing outdoor fun with inspirational music and addresses by a regular array of fundamentalist celebrities. The separatist impulse remained strong, but it did not limit the movement ’s mainstream appeal. The evangelist Charles Fuller’s radio program, the “Old Fashioned Revival Hour,” was drawing an audience of some 15 to 20 million, making it the most popular prime-time broadcast in the United States. 10

The close of World War II saw a rising generation of younger fundamentalists openly weary of the movement’s narrow separatism. Older dreams of worldwide revival and new aspirations for broader influence on American culture found a powerful spokesman in Billy Graham, who by the early 1950s had gained national preeminence not just as an evangelist, but as an advisor to presidents and ultimately as “America’s pastor.” In a parallel fashion, the National Association of Evangelicals (NAE), formed in 1942 as a conservative alternative to the National Council of Churches, provided a platform for men like Harold John Ockenga of Boston’s Park Street Church, radio evangelist Charles Fuller, and university-educated scholars like Carl F. H. Henry to call for more purposeful engagement with American intellectual culture. Somewhat confusingly—and controversially—they adopted the name “neo-evangelical” or simply “evangelical” to describe themselves, rejecting the old fundamentalist label but also implicitly claiming to represent the mainstream of conservative Protestants everywhere. Certainly present-day evangelicalism is much more than an intellectual refitting of old-line fundamentalism. It is a diverse array incorporating old-line Presbyterian and Baptist fundamentalists as well as Wesleyan and Holiness traditions, Pentecostals, and African Americans.

The desire to move away from old-line, separatist fundamentalism made sense, as by the 1940s the movement was flagging. Old animosities toward denominational officials and modernists in liberal seminaries grew less potent as American society itself grew more socially conservative and spiritually inclined in the postwar years. Some extreme separatists remained—men like Bob Jones II and Carl McIntyre, who railed against Graham and the NAE for the sin of compromise. Jones in fact labeled Billy Graham the most dangerous man in the United States because the evangelist had shared a platform with Roman Catholics and mainline Protestants. Institutions like the Moody Bible Institute and the Dallas Theological Seminary continued to teach dispensational premillennialism, but by the 1950s the doctrine was beginning to feel a bit antique, unnecessarily esoteric in the face of Graham’s undisputed success in gaining a popular mainstream American audience, and as post-World War II cultural values arced toward conservative Protestant beliefs about church and family.

One important element of the “new evangelicalism” was the rising importance of Pentecostalism, a movement which fundamentalists had long abhorred. Some of the reasons were doctrinal—dispensational premillennialism taught that the miracles and supernatural phenomena associated with Christ ’s life on earth and the early Christian church did not belong to the dispensation which succeeded them, their own “age of the church.” Any tongue-speaking or healing, in their view, was false or, worse, instigated by Satan. Beyond the doctrinal disagreements, however, was a vast difference in style. Fundamentalists had no use for the exuberance of Pentecostal worship, especially when associated with flamboyant evangelists like Aimee Semple McPherson, who made a name for herself in the 1920s with some highly public scandals. There is no better example in recent years than the running feud between Jerry Falwell, the fundamentalist pastor of the Thomas Road Baptist Church in Virginia, and Jim and Tammy Fay Bakker, Pentecostal television hosts of the PTL Club . In 1987 , after years of hostility, Falwell managed to take over the Bakker empire, which included Heritage USA, a 2,300-acre theme park. His awkward trip down the park’s water slide, fully clad in suit and tie, spoke volumes about the cultural divide between the two groups and fundamentalist ambivalence toward the modern world they hoped to rescue from destruction.

It is easy, however, to overstate the divide between old-line fundamentalists and neo-evangelicals. While dispensational premillennialism was falling out of favor among upwardly mobile evangelicals after the 1950s, fascination with end times prophecy certainly was not. If anything, with the growing popularity of writers like Hal Lindsay, author of the best-selling Late Great Planet Earth , the sense of urgency grew more intense in the 1960s and beyond. Even more telling, by the 1970s biblical inerrancy was also becoming more important than ever, elevated as the central marker of evangelical orthodoxy. And while neo-evangelicals called for greater engagement with American culture, they remained firmly conservative on important social issues. In regard to the role of women, in fact, they adopted far more explicit and uncompromising standards on “male headship” and “female submission” in the family, and rejected women’s ordination as unbiblical, a direct threat to the doctrine of inerrancy. Recent studies of neo-evangelicalism’s early years also foreground a widespread implicit racism, as separatist schools and academies arose in response to the civil rights movement and new Supreme Court rulings on school desegregation.

It is best to say that fundamentalism persists in a lingering set of attitudes, articulated in a rhetoric of persecution and alienation that has persisted despite the rising cultural power and economic stature of most evangelical believers. It is a language that resonates with immigrants, for example, experiencing the same “in but not of” relationship to American culture. It has been a powerful political tool, mobilizing evangelicals in defense of “family values” and other conservative causes. Fundamentalism is, in other words, far from an aberration in an American narrative of tolerance and progress. It is a story essential to understanding some important disagreements and divisions in the past, which though invisible remain potent in the controversies of the present—and promise to remain so for decades to come.

Review of the Literature

Scholarly analyses of fundamentalism are almost as old as the movement itself, beginning with H. Richard Niebuhr’s Social Sources of Denominationalism , published in 1929 , just as the fundamentalist-modernist controversy was drawing to its ignominious close. Niebuhr’s account proved influential even into the present, drawing a picture of fundamentalism as a predominantly rural backlash against secular modernity, a futile rearguard action by an increasingly marginal set of believers. Important subsequent studies, including Stewart Cole’s History of Fundamentalism and Richard Hofstadter’s Anti-Intellectualism in American Life , probed into psychological and cultural conflicts, adding to the image of a reactionary, maladjusted, and dying cause. 11

Major change came in the 1970s with the publication of Ernest Sandeen’s Roots of Fundamentalism . This study was the first to focus on the theological content of fundamentalist beliefs, identifying dispensational premillennialism and biblical inerrancy as its two core concerns. George Marsden’s still classic volume, Fundamentalism and American Culture: The Shaping of Twentieth-Century Evangelicalism, 1875–1925 , took Sandeen’s analysis further, adding new layers of social and cultural context, and emphasizing the role of Keswick spirituality and the lasting influence of 19th-century revivalism in the movement’s formation. Marsden also defined fundamentalism as “militant antimodernism,” a description that has provided years of conversation among religious historians and scholars of religion. Historians of American religion disagree about the degree to which American fundamentalists were actually militant. Here the core account is Joel Carpenter’s book Revive Us Again: The Reawakening of American Fundamentalism , dealing with the movement in the decades after the Scopes trial. Carpenter not only demonstrated that it was far from dead after Scopes, but also that its message had a powerful mainstream appeal, consistently prioritizing evangelism over doctrinal or moral purity. If anything, fundamentalism’s best years, Carpenter argues, came in the 1930s and 1940s. 12

In the 1990s the Fundamentalism Project, a major collaboration of scholars from across the religious spectrum, brought cross-cultural analysis and a religious studies methodology to bear on a field previously dominated by historians. In five volumes of essays, all thickly researched and carefully crafted, the project participants charted “family resemblances” across contemporary movements in all of the major religions. Each volume also, however, included significant disagreement about the usefulness and validity of the concept “fundamentalism” to describe the rising militancy in disparate religious communities—Islamic, Jewish, Hindu, and Christian. 13 Perhaps the best response to the project, and in addition an able summary of recent scholarship, is the volume of essays edited by David Harrington Watt and Simon Wood, Fundamentalism: Perspectives on a Contested History . 14

Since the 1990s historians have also broadened their approach to include gender and social class, as well as thicker, more nuanced cultural and social context. In regard to the former, the scholarship has burgeoned since the publication of books by Betty DeBerg and Margaret Bendroth. 15 Analysis of social class is much more recent, led by works like Timothy Gloege’s Guaranteed Pure: Moody Bible Institute, Business, and the Making of American Evangelicalism , viewing the movement within the context of 20th-century consumer capitalism. 16

Primary Sources

Fundamentalism’s primary sources reflect its character as a movement. There is no central repository or major archive of fundamentalist documents, since its leaders were by definition wary of such secular places. The exception is the various denominational archives, which hold personal papers of important figures like John Roach Straton and J. C. Massee. The American Baptist archive in Macon, Georgia, and the Presbyterian Historical Society in Philadelphia are well worth visits. For more general purposes, the Billy Graham Center Archive at Wheaton College remains the best single research destination, especially for topics associated with revivals and evangelism. Otherwise, the most useful sources remain close to their original locations, in the records of Bible institutes and colleges, theological seminaries, missionary organizations, and individual churches. Often these institutions contain papers of the men founded or led them—J. Gresham Machen at Westminster Seminary in Philadelphia, William Bell Riley at Northwestern College in Minneapolis, and A. J. Gordon at Gordon College in Boston. The most available and widely useful source is fundamentalist periodicals, relatively few of which are available digitally.

EssayEmpire

Religious fundamentalism essay.

Religious fundamentalism is the strict maintenance of ancient or fundamental doctrines of any religion. The term fundamentalism, though, was originally an Anglo-Saxon Protestant term applied to those who maintained that the Bible must be accepted and interpreted literally.

In popular usage, the term fundamentalism connotes both religious conservatism and traditionalism, and by extension, various strands of thought in politics, economics, government, and also scientific and academic perspectives that advocate strict adherence and maintenance of traditional perspectives in reaction against secularism and modernism. Although the term came into popular usage in the early 20th century, the concept and ideology trace back to early Christian and European history.

Origins and Purpose

As a movement, fundamentalism began in the United States as a Protestant movement to repel liberalism and developments perceived as threats to the purity, integrity, and authority of God’s word as found in the Bible. In 1878, the Niagara Bible conference drew up 14 fundamentals of the faith, later reduced to five central doctrines: the inspiration and inerrancy of the Bible, the virgin birth, the physical resurrection of Jesus, the death of Christ as atonement, and the physical return of Christ to preside on Judgment Day. The resulting controversy ranged across all denominations, but it was most intense among Baptists and Presbyterians.

In the so-called monkey trial of 1925, a Tennessee teacher, J. T. Scopes, was found guilty of teaching evolution in public schools; other attempts to banish modernism and evolution from schools and society were unsuccessful. Unfavorable press reports quickly turned public opinion against fundamentalists, rendering their victory a short-lived one. Many dissociated themselves from the movement, not wanting to be labeled anti-intellectuals and fanatics. Gradually, the movement lost its cohesiveness and degenerated into splinter (independent) groups. From the late 1940s through the 1960s, fundamentalists redefined themselves in a movement known as neo-evangelicalism and sought broader participation within the U.S. political system. Billy Graham epitomized this new trend in evangelicalism.

Since the 1970s fundamentalists have reaffirmed their beliefs and initiated political actions to shape the nation accordingly. They used the ballot box, the airwaves, the mega-churches, and the power of the purse to restore what they saw as the unquestionable role of religion in society. Their position is that most social institutions of today’s secular society and most contemporary social issues—such as abortion, same-sex marriage, family and divorce, the spread of pornography, the ban on school prayer, homosexual lifestyle, feminism, gender equality, priesthood for women, and ordination of gay and lesbian ministers— are incompatible with religion. Consistently, they seek to include the teaching of creationism or “intelligent design” theory in public schools alongside evolution and to defeat politicians they view as liberals contributing to moral decadence in the nation. In their effort to reconstruct society, fundamentalists developed strategies that transcended borders. For example, Jerry Falwell, a fundamentalist Baptist minister, founded the Moral Majority in 1979, which enabled fundamentalist organizations to become a formidable force in U.S. politics. Together with other New Christian Right groups and political conservatives, fundamentalists supported the candidacy of Ronald Reagan and helped elect him president in 1980. Ever since then, they have influenced the U.S. political process.

Fundamentalism has its parallels in Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, and Buddhism in attracting followers reacting against secularization and modernism. Fundamentalism in Islam has a strong political component as Muslims view Islam as a comprehensive way of life, making their religion an integral part of politics, state, law, and society. The most influential fundamentalist movement was the Muslim Brotherhood, founded in 1928 by Hasan al-Banna as a reaction against the collapse of the Ottoman Empire and emergence of European imperialism. Sayyid Qutb was its most prominent thinker. A similar ideology underlines today’s fundamentalist movement Al-Qaeda, headed by Osama bin Laden. Originally established in 1988 in Afghanistan as a resistance movement against Russian occupation, it had the support of Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, and the United States. In recent years Al-Qaeda has expanded globally and seeks to rid Muslim nations of all foreign elements and to reestablish the primacy of Islam.

Global Fundamentalism Today

Although fundamentalism has been a recurrent phenomenon in religious history, its recent characteristics are strident militancy, confrontation, and all too often, violence. Increasingly radicalized, fundamentalist extremists thus pose a serious threat, especially to developing nations and those experimenting with democracy.

The past 2 decades have witnessed continuous but steady growth in religious fundamentalism and revivalist movements. The growing Arab and Islamic presence in Europe, especially in Germany and France, once a bedrock of Christianity, has prompted concern among European Union nations. While seeking understanding of the emergence of fundamentalism, militancy, and extremism among many European Muslim groups, some Western nations also are asking if the time has come to take a defensive position.

Fundamentalism in the 21st century is a complex phenomenon characterized by several factors that combine socioeconomic and religiopolitical dimensions. Many traditionalist and conservative believers, including some of the better educated, deeply believe that they are in danger of losing their identity and culture because of the erosive forces of secularism and modernism. Thus, sparking today’s resurgence in fundamentalism is a reaction against the social upheaval caused by globalization and technology. Fundamentalists view their world and belief system as falling deeper into moral and social decadence and believe that a return to the true religion in its orthodoxy would solve all social problems.

Because fundamentalism offers a simple solution to the complexities of many contemporary moral and social issues, it appeals to certain individuals and has the potential of mobilizing groups for action. As a movement attracting devout adherents, fundamentalism must be recognized as a major social force. Many fundamentalist groups view contemporary problems from a perspective quite different from other observers in their society.

Bibliography:

Armstrong, Karen. 2000. The Battle for God: A History of Fundamentalism. New York: Ballantine.
Marsden, George M. 1991. Understanding Fundamentalism and Evangelicalism. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans.
Marty, Martin E. and R. Scott Appleby, eds. 1994. The Fundamentalism Project. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Watt, W. Montgomery. 1989. Islamic Fundamentalism and Modernity. London: Routledge.

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Other factors which explain the rise of religious fundamentalism:

Bruce argues that the following factors make it more likely that Fundamentalism will emerge:

Where there is ‘ideological cohesion’ – around a single God and/ or sacred text for example. Fundamentalism seems to be stronger in Christianity and Islam, not so strong in Hinduism and Buddhism.
When there is a common enemy to unite against – Bruce notes that Islamic Fundamentalism is often united against the USA.
Lack of centralised control (ironically) – It might be that Catholicism has not developed fundamentalist strains because the Pope and the Vatican tightly control dissenters. However in Protestant Christianity and Islam, there is more freedom for individuals on the fringes to claim to have found a ‘more authentic’ and fundamentalist interpretation of those religions.
The existence of marginalised individuals facing oppression – Fundamentalism needs recruits, and if a Fundamentalist group emerges with claims that it can provide a better life for people if they just adhere to the faith, it is more likely to grow
Bruce further argues that the nature of Fundamentalism is shaped by how the political institutions deal with Fundamentalist movements: where they are blocked access to political representation, movements are more likely to turn to violence.

Further Analysis

Bruce argues that both the external factors above and religious beliefs themselves are important in explaining the rise of Fundamentalism.

He also points out that the specific histories of Christianity and Islam have affected the way the see politics. Christianity spent much of its early life as an obscure sect, on the political fringes, so is more concerned with ‘day to day’ (non-political) life, whereas Islam quickly came to dominate states in its early history – thus Islam is more concerned with politics than Christianity.

Bruce also argues that the nature of religion affects the way Fundamentalism is expressed – Christianity tends to emphasise the importance of belief, while Islam emphasises the importance of actions, thus Islam is more likely to develop violent forms of fundamentalism compared to Christianity.

Finally, Bruce argues that Fundamentalism has no chance of succeeding in the West, but it might in the less developed regions of the world.

Haralamabos and Holborn: Sociology Themes and Perspectives edition 8.

2 thoughts on “The causes of Fundamentalism”

Since the US has freedom of religion guaranteed under the constitution, if some want to stick to the Christian fundamentals so be it. If some want to be liberal in their Christian beliefs their free to do so and I wouldn’t have it any other way. However, if someone’s religious beliefs regardless of their faith tradition try to restrict my life, my freedom and my happiness without my consent then they show their profound ignorance by failing to realize that we live in a free society.

The argument that greater religious freedom leads to fundamentalism seems to make some sense and the example of the Catholic church upholds that view.

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The Fundamentals

The Fundamentals is a twelve volume set of essays outlining orthodox Christian doctrine that was influential in the early U.S. fundamentalist movement circa 1910. The books contain ninety essays, many by recognized Christian scholars of the day, on topics such as basic doctrine , inerrancy of Scripture, and errors in unorthodox groups such as Mormons and Christian Science . From 1910 to 1916 they were distributed free of charge, primarily to churches in the United States, due to a grant from Milton and Lyman Stewart of Union Oil Company. In 1917 the Bible Institute of Los Angeles reprinted the set in four volumes under the editorship of evangelist R. A. Torrey .

Although these books are strongly associated with the fundamentalist movement, to which they gave their name, they are for the most part not guilty of the extremism that has come to mark that movement. Evangelical Christians can read them nearly 100 years later and see in them a moderate and rational statement of the basics of the faith.

Historical Context

The Fundamentals was written in the years leading up to World War I, when Germany was unquestionably the intellectual hot-spot of the planet. Modern physics was emerging in the hands of Germans such as Einstein and Heisenberg and a new science of psychology was being promoted by Sigmund Freud. Before the final volume of The Fundamentals was complete, Germany would be the villain in a desperate war with Europe.

And out of Germany was coming a steady stream of very influential liberal theological thought, much of it under the banner of " Higher Criticism ," that brought into question the core doctrine on which the church has stood for millenia. And it was doing so in the name of science.

This was seen as a very real threat, a "clear and present danger" to the souls of the faithful. As Franklin Johnson concludes in one of the essays:

The natural view of the Scriptures is a sea which has been rising higher for three-quarters of a century. Many Christians bid it welcome to pour lightly over the walls which the faith of the church has always set up against it, in the expectation that it will prove a healthful and helpful stream. It is already a cataract, uprooting, destroying, and slaying.

"The Fundamentals" thus came out of a very strong sense of danger. The main danger, of course, was from the (German) liberal theology, but it was made more frightening by the growing sense of danger from Germany in general. Canon Dyson Hague , a Canadian Anglican, reveals both of these in the first essay of The Fundamentals :

"The term Higher Criticism, then, means nothing more than the study of the literary structure of the various books of the Bible, and more especially of the Old Testament. Now this in itself is most laudable. It is indispensable...\ "How is it, then, that the Higher Criticism has become identified in the popular mind with attacks upon the Bible and the supernatural character of the Holy Scriptures?\ "In the first place, the critics who were the leaders, the men who have given name and force to the whole movement, have been men who have based their theories largely upon their own subjective conclusions.\ "In the second place, some of the most powerful exponents of the modern Higher Critical theories have been Germans, and it is notorious to what length the German fancy can go in the direction of the subjective and of the conjectural. For hypothesis-weaving and speculation, the German theological professor is unsurpassed. One of the foremost thinkers used to lay it down as a fundamental truth in philosophical and scientific enquiries that no regard whatever should be paid to the conjectures or hypotheses of thinkers, and quoted as an axiom the great Newton himself and his famous words, "Non fingo hypotheses": I do not frame hypotheses. It is notorious that some of the most learned German thinkers are men who lack in a singular degree the faculty of common sense and knowledge of human nature..."

The Fundamentals remains, however, as far more than a reactionary document from a difficult point in history. It is, as its subtitle says, a "testimony to the truth."

Contents and Authorship

The ninety essays were written by a wide range of authors, mainly from the United States, but also a large contingent from Canada and Britain. Most are theologians, most have higher degrees, and most are men (there is at least one woman author).

Many of the author's names are still recognized for their foundational influences.

The essays are not strictly arranged, in part because of the way that they were issued as a series of tracts. They cover the following topics:

an overview of the bible
the inspiration and inerrancy of the bible
arguments against liberalism and higher criticism
basics of the Christian faith (sin, atonement, justification, grace)
denunciations of false churches
personal testimonies

Editorial differences in pre/post 1917 compilations

The original 1910 to 1916 printings divided the articles into 12 paper bound volumes. Printed on each of these covers was "Volume [Roman Numerals I to XII] Compliments of Two Christian Laymen." Printings after 1917 divided the articles into 4 hard bound books. Somewhat confusingly, these four books are called volumes I to IV, re-dividing the original twelve volumes into four and thus have a different volume structure but retain the same article structure. Printed on the first page of each of the four post 1917 books is [Roman Numberals I to IV] and the new-to-the-1917-edition is the statement "published by THE BIBLE INSTITUTE of LOS ANGELES."

Preface and Dedication
The History of the Higher Criticism , Dyson Hague
The Mosaic Authorship of the Pentateuch , George Frederick Wright
The Fallacies of the Higher Criticism , Franklin Johnson
The Bible and Modern Criticism , F. Bettex
Holy Scripture and Modern Negations , James Orr
Christ and Criticism , Robert Anderson
Old Testament Criticism and New Testament Christianity , W. H. Griffith Thomas
The Tabernacle in the Wilderness: Did it Exist? , David Heagle
The Internal Evidence of the Fourth Gospel , G. Osborne Troop
The Testimony of Christ to the Old Testament , William Caven
The Early Narratives of Genesis , James Orr
One Isaiah , George L. Robinson
The Book of Daniel , Joseph D. Wilson
The Doctrinal Value of the First Chapters of Genesis , Dyson Hague
Three Peculiarities of the Pentateuch , Which Are Incompatible with the Graf Wellhausen Theories of Its Composition , Andrew Craig Robinson
The Testimony of the Monuments to the Truth of the Scriptures , George Frederick Wright
The Recent Testimony of Archaeology to the Scriptures , M. G. Kyle
Science and Christian Faith , James Orr
My Personal Experience with the Higher Criticism , J. J. Reeve
The Inspiration of the Bible--Definition, Extent and Proof , James M. Gray
Inspiration , L. W. Munhall
The Moral Glory of Jesus Christ a Proof of Inspiration , William G. Moorehead
The Testimony of the Scriptures to Themselves , George S. Bishop
The Testimony of the Organic Unity of the Bible to its Inspiration , Arthur T. Pierson
Fulfilled Prophecy a Potent Argument for the Bible , Arno C. Gaebelein
Life in the Word , Philip Mauro
Is There a God? , Thomas Whitelaw
God in Christ the Only Revelation of the Fatherhood of God , Robert E. Speer
The Deity of Christ , Benjamin B. Warfield
The Virgin Birth of Christ , James Orr
The God-Man , John Stock (posthumously)
The Person and Work of Jesus Christ , John L. Nuelsen
The Certainty and Importance of the Physical Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the Dead , R. A. Torrey
The Personality and Deity of the Holy Spirit , R. A. Torrey
The Holy Spirit and the Sons of God , W. J. Erdman
Observations on the Conversion and Apostleship of Paul , Lord Lyttelton and J. L. Campbell
Christianity Is No Fable , Thomas Whitelaw
The Biblical Conception of Sin , Thomas Whitelaw
Paul's Testimony to the Doctrine of Sin , Charles B. Williams
Sin and Judgment to Come , Robert Anderson
What Christ Teaches Concerning Future Retribution , William C. Procter
The Atonement , Franklin Johnson
At-One-Ment By Propitiation , Dyson Hague
The Grace of God , C. I. Scofield
Salvation By Grace , Thomas Spurgeon
The Nature of Regeneration , Thomas Boston (posthumously)
Regeneration--Conversion--Reformation , George W. Lasher
Justification by Faith , H. C. G. Moule
The Doctrines That Must Be Emphasized in Successful Evangelism By Evangelist , L. W. Munhall
Preach the Word , Howard Crosby (posthumously)
Pastoral and Personal Evangelism, or, Winning Men to Christ One by One , John Timothy Stone
The Sunday School's True Evangelism , Charles Gallaudet Trumbull
The Place of Prayer in Evangelism , R. A. Torrey
Foreign Missions Or World-Wide Evangelism , Robert E. Speer
A Message from Missions to the Modern Ministry , Charles A. Bowen
What Missionary Motives Should Prevail? , Henry W. Frost
Consecration (Exodus 28:40-43) , Henry W. Frost
Is Romanism Christianity? , T. W. Medhurst
Rome, The Antagonist of the Nation , J. M. Foster
The True Church , Bishop Ryle (posthumously)
The Testimony of Foreign Missions to the Superintending Providence of God , Arthur T. Pierson (posthumously)
The Purposes of the Incarnation , G. Campbell Morgan
Tributes to Christ and the Bible by Intelligent Men Who Were Not Known as Active Christians , Anonymous
Modern Philosophy , Philip Mauro
The Knowledge of God , David James Burrell
The Wisdom of this World , A. W. Pitzer
The Science of Conversion , H. M. Sydenstricker
The Decadence of Darwinism , Henry H. Beach
The Passing of Evolution , George Frederick Wright
Evolutionism in the Pulpit , An Occupant of the Pew
The Church and Socialism , Charles R. Erdman
Millennial Dawn: A Counterfeit of Christianity , William G. Moorehead
Mormonism : Its Origin, Characteristics, and Doctrines , R. G. McNiece
Eddyism, Commonly Called " Christian Science " , Maurice E. Wilson
Modern Spiritualism Briefly Tested by Scripture , Algernon J. Pollock
Satan and His Kingdom , Jessie Penn-Lewis
Why Save the Lord's Day? , Daniel Hoffman Martin
The Apologetic Value of Paul's Epistles , E. J. Stobo
Divine Efficacy of Prayer , Arthur T. Pierson
The Proof of the Living God as Found in the Prayer Life of George Muller, of Bristol , Arthur T. Pierson
Our Lord's Teachings about Money Arthur T. Pierson
The Scriptures A. C. Dixon
What the Bible Contains for the Believer George F. Pentecost
The Hope of the Church John McNicol
The Coming of Christ Charles R. Erdman
The Testimony of Christian Experience E. Y. Mullins
A Personal Testimony Howard A. Kelly
A Personal Testimony H. W. Webb-Peploe
The Personal Testimony Charles T. Studd
A Personal Testimony Philip Mauro

R.A. Torrey, A.C. Dixon (eds) The Fundamentals: A Testimony to the Truth Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House Co., Baker Books, 1917

Available in eText at Blue Letter Bible

Daniel G. Reid , Robert D. Linder , Bruce L. Shelley and Harry S. Stout, eds Dictionary of Christianity in America , Inter Varsity Press, 1991. ISBN 0-8308-1776-X.

Fundamentalism

External links

The Fundamentals; a testimony to the truth (Volumes 1-7) (1910)
Microfilmed version of The Fundamentals; a testimony to the truth (Volumes 1-12) (1910-1915)
The Princeton Theological Review , 1912, page 122, Review of Volume III ?

RELIGIOUS FUNDAMENTALISM IN SOUTH AFRICA

David Chidester Department of Religious Studies University of Cape Town

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Religious Fundamentalism in Islam and Christianity

The religious fundamentalism is best defined as people’s tendency to idealize their sense of religiosity to such an extent that they begin to pose danger to themselves and to society. Traditionally, such fundamentalism is being closely associated with the Semitic religions of Islam and Christianity, which can be explained by the fact that the Semitic concept of divinity, apart from being monotheistic in its essence, implies the existence of “chosen people”, who are in favour with God, and “infidels”, who deserve to be exterminated. However, whereas Christian fundamentalists, such as Southern “snake handlers”, Jehovah Witnesses, or Seventh Day Adventists can be best described as simply a bunch of clowns, consisting mostly of senile people, quite incapable of causing harm to anybody but to themselves, Islamic fundamentalists represent a clear and immediate danger to Western civilization, as we know it, because their extremist religious beliefs are actually being given an official status in many Arab countries.

The reason for this is very simple – religion is nothing but one among many aspects of people striving to gain a higher state of consciousness, which in its turn, indicates these people being the subjects of biological evolution. It is important to understand that homo sapiens is actually an intermediary link between the ape and the super-man. Therefore, we can say that whereas, apes do not need religion “yet”, super-men do not religious “already”. This is the reason why, when a particular religion becomes dogmatized and institutionalized, within a particular group of people, this means that these people had simply stopped revolutionising, in biological sense of this word. For example, the overwhelming majority of Arabs has been living by the “word of Allah” for more then 1500 years and continues to do so now, without even trying to adjust Koran to modern realities, unlike White people, who have been continuously trying to interpret Bible, so that the “good book” would make more sense in their eyes. It will not be an exaggeration to suggest that fundamentalist Christianity is very much dead among Whites, as legitimate religion (only a senile White folks can seriously believe in Christian nonsense). On the other hand, fundamentalist Islam gains more and more followers, as time goes by. Even in comparatively secular Islamic countries, such as Egypt of Turkey, people get down on their knees to pray Allah five times a day, regardless of where the “time for prayer” finds them.

Moreover, the rising popularity of Islamic fundamentalism and Islam, in general, corresponds to the fact that White people, actually stand on the brink of extinction, as a race, despite the fact that it is namely these people who actually qualify for the next “evolutionary jump” more then representatives of any other races. Whereas, in 1900, White people accounted for 30% of world’s population, today they only account for 5%. This is the innermost reason why religious fundamentalism has grown to represent a potent political force in today’s world, as if we were living in time of Dark Ages. Apparently, the course of cultural and scientific progress among people, closely associated with the process of evolution, can be stopped and even reversed backwards. The fact that Islamic fundamentalists are now actually being allowed to immigrate to Western countries, such as Britain (Northern Pakistan), where they explore their “ethnic and religious uniqueness” by setting bombs in subways, in order to kill as many “infidels” as possible, signifies the fact that these countries may soon cease to exist as the centres of culture and progress. Therefore, it is whether White people take their destiny back into their hands and produce a heavy blow on Islamic fundamentalism, as they have done many times, throughout the history, or Islamic fundamentalists will turn decadent Whites into sacrificial lambs in their own countries, with world being plunged back into the state of primeval barbarism, as a result.

Bibliography

Blumenfeld, S. Civilizations at War. 2001. World Net Daily. Web.

Christianity Dying In The West?. 2005. Christian Agression.Org. Web.

Ramendra, S. Fundamentalism and Social Progress. 1999. Buddhiwadi Foundation. Web.

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David French

The Line Between Good and Evil Cuts Through Evangelical America

By David French

Opinion Columnist

I’m afraid that an exit poll question has confused America.

Every four years, voters are asked, “Are you a white evangelical or born-again Christian?” And every time, voters from a broad range of Protestant Christian traditions say yes, compressing a diverse religious community into a single, unified mass.

It’s not that the question is misleading. People who answer yes do represent a coherent political movement. Not only do they vote overwhelmingly for Republicans; they’re also quite distinct from other American political groups in their views on a host of issues, including on disputes regarding race, immigration and the Covid vaccines.

But in other ways, this exit poll identity misleads us about the nature and character of American evangelicalism as a whole. It’s far more diverse and divided than the exit poll results imply. There are the rather crucial facts that not all evangelicals are white and evangelicals of color vote substantially differently from their white brothers and sisters. Evangelicals of color are far more likely to vote Democratic, and their positions on many issues are more closely aligned with the American political mainstream. But the differences go well beyond race.

In reality, American evangelicalism is best understood as a combination of three religious traditions: fundamentalism, evangelicalism and Pentecostalism. These different traditions have different beliefs, different cultures and different effects on our nation.

The distinction between fundamentalism and evangelicalism can be the hardest to parse, especially since we now use the term “evangelical” to describe both branches of the movement. The conflict between evangelicalism and fundamentalism emerged most sharply in the years following World War II, when so-called neo-evangelicals arose as a biblically conservative response to traditional fundamentalism’s separatism and fighting spirit. I say “biblically conservative” because neo-evangelicals had the same high view of Scripture as the inerrant word of God that fundamentalists did, but their temperament and approach were quite different.

The difference between fundamentalism and neo-evangelicalism can be summed up in two men, Bob Jones and Billy Graham. In a 2011 piece about the relationship between Jones and Graham, the Gospel Coalition’s Justin Taylor called them the “exemplars of fundamentalism and neo-evangelicalism.” Jones was the founder of the university that bears his name in Greenville, S.C., one of the most influential fundamentalist colleges in America.

Bob Jones University barred Black students from attending until 1971, then banned interracial dating until 2000 . The racism that plagued Southern American fundamentalism is a key reason for the segregation of American religious life. It’s also one reason the historically Black Protestant church is distinct from the evangelical tradition, despite its similar views of the authority of Scripture.

Graham attended Bob Jones University for a semester, but soon left and took a different path. He went on to become known as “America’s pastor,” the man who ministered to presidents of both parties and led gigantic evangelistic crusades in stadiums across the nation and the world. While Jones segregated his school, Graham removed the red segregation rope dividing white and Black attendees at his crusades in the South — before Brown v. Board of Education — and shared a stage with Martin Luther King Jr. at Madison Square Garden in 1957.

But since that keen Jones/Graham divide, the lines between evangelicalism and fundamentalism have blurred. Now the two camps often go to the same churches, attend the same colleges, listen to the same Christian musicians and read the same books. To compound the confusion, they’re both quite likely to call themselves evangelical. While the theological differences between fundamentalists and evangelicals can be difficult to describe, the temperamental differences are not.

“Fundamentalism,” Richard Land, the former head of the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, once told me, “is far more a psychology than a theology.” That psychology is defined by an extreme sense of certainty, along with extreme ferocity.

Roughly speaking, fundamentalists are intolerant of dissent. Evangelicals are much more accepting of theological differences. Fundamentalists place a greater emphasis on confrontation and domination. Evangelicals are more interested in pluralism and persuasion. Fundamentalists focus more on God’s law. Evangelicals tend to emphasize God’s grace. While many evangelicals are certainly enthusiastic Trump supporters, they are more likely to be reluctant (and even embarrassed) Trump voters, or Never Trumpers, or Democrats. Fundamentalists tend to march much more in lock step with the MAGA movement. Donald Trump’s combative psychology in many ways merges with their own.

A Christian politics dominated by fundamentalism is going to look very different from a Christian politics dominated by evangelicalism. Think of the difference between Trump and George W. Bush. Bush is conservative. He’s anti-abortion. He’s committed to religious liberty. These are all values that millions of MAGA Republicans would claim to uphold, but there’s a yawning character gap between the two presidents, and their cultural influence is profoundly different.

While the difference between evangelicalism and fundamentalism can be difficult to discern, Pentecostalism is something else entirely. American evangelicals can trace their roots to the Reformation; the Pentecostal movement began a little over 100 years ago, during the Azusa Street revival in Los Angeles in 1906. The movement was started by a Black pastor named William Seymour, and it is far more supernatural in its focus than, say, the Southern Baptist or Presbyterian church down the street.

At its heart, Pentecostalism believes that all of the gifts and miracles you read about in the Bible can and do happen today. That means prophecy, speaking in tongues and gifts of healing. Pentecostalism is more working class than the rest of the evangelical world, and Pentecostal churches are often more diverse — far more diverse — than older American denominations. Hispanics in particular have embraced the Pentecostal faith, both in the United States and in Latin America, and Pentecostalism has exploded in the global south .

When I lived in Manhattan, my wife and I attended Times Square Church, a Pentecostal congregation in the heart of the city, and every Sunday felt like a scene from the book of Revelation , with people “from every nation, tribe, people and language” gathered together to worship with great joy.

Pentecostalism is arguably the most promising and the most perilous religious movement in America. At its best, the sheer exuberance and radical love of a good Pentecostal church is transformative. At its worst, the quest for miraculous experience can lead to a kind of frenzied superstition, where carnival barker pastors and faux apostles con their congregations with false prophecies and fake miracles, milking them for donations and then wielding their abundant wealth as proof of God’s favor.

The Pentecostal church, for example, is the primary home of one of the most toxic and dangerous Christian nationalist ideas in America — the Seven Mountain Mandate , which holds that God has ordained Christians to dominate the seven “mountains” of cultural influence: the family, the church, education, media, arts, the economy and government. This is an extreme form of Christian supremacy, one that would relegate all other Americans to second-class status.

Pentecostalism is also the primary source for the surge in prophecies about Trump that I’ve described before . It’s mostly Pentecostal pastors and leaders who have told their flocks that God has ordained Trump to rule — and to rule again. Combine the Seven Mountain Mandate with Trump prophecies, and you can see the potential for a kind of fervent radicalism that is immune to rational argument. After all, how can you argue a person out of the idea that God told him to vote for Trump? Or that God told him that Christians are destined to reign over the United States?

When I look at the divisions in American evangelicalism, I’m reminded of the Homer Simpson toast : “To alcohol! The cause of, and solution to, all of life’s problems.” The American church has been the cause of much heartache and division. It is also the source of tremendous healing and love. We saw both the love and the division most vividly in the civil rights movement, when Black Christians and their allies faced the dogs and hoses all too often unleashed by members of the white Southern church. We saw this on Jan. 6, when violent Christians attacked the Capitol, only to see their plans foiled by an evangelical vice president who broke with Trump at long last to uphold his constitutional oath and spare the nation a far worse catastrophe.

I’ve lived and worshiped in every major branch of American evangelicalism. I was raised in a more fundamentalist church, left it for evangelicalism and spent a decade of my life worshiping in Pentecostal churches. Now I attend a multiethnic church that is rooted in both evangelicalism and the Black church tradition. I’ve seen great good , and I’ve seen terrible evil .

That long experience has taught me that the future of our nation isn’t just decided in the halls of secular power; it’s also decided in the pulpits and sanctuaries of American churches. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn wrote that the line between good and evil “cuts through the heart of every human being.” That same line also cuts through the heart of the church.

The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips . And here’s our email: [email protected] .

Follow the New York Times Opinion section on Facebook , Instagram , TikTok , WhatsApp , X and Threads .

David French is an Opinion columnist, writing about law, culture, religion and armed conflict. He is a veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom and a former constitutional litigator. His most recent book is “Divided We Fall: America’s Secession Threat and How to Restore Our Nation .” You can follow him on Threads ( @davidfrenchjag ).

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Fundamentalism: useful essay on fundamentalism.

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Fundamentalism: Useful Essay on Fundamentalism!

The term ‘fundamentalism’ refers to adherence to earlier accepted religious doctrines and is often accompanied by a literal application of historical beliefs and scriptures to today’s world (Schaefer and Lamm, 1992). It is also defined as a movement or belief called for a return to the basic texts or ‘fundamentals’ of revealed religion. It encourages ‘fixed identities’ where ‘slippages are suppressed’ and ‘sameness is prized’.

It is commonly associated with the attempt to revive archaic modes of conduct and belief from the past. It is usually contrasted with modernism and liberalism in religion. It emphasizes the absolute truth of essential or ‘fundamental’ aspects of faith, especially those rooted in sacred texts such as the Christian Bible or the Islamic Koran or Vedas of Hindus.

The term has been applied to Protestant trends within Christianity since the 1920s, recently in Hinduism after the demolition of Babri Masjid. These new trends in religion are sometimes termed as ‘resurgent fundamentalism’, meaning the revival of a conservative approach to religion.

Christian fundamentalism believes the Bible to be word of God, who is responsible for all creation. Although humanity has sinned and therefore fallen from grace, salvation from punishment has been made possibly by God’s mercy in sending a saviour—Jesus Christ.

Biblical religion introduced the conception of God as transcendent—as a ‘Thou’ utterly above the world—and of the world as ‘desacralized’, i.e., no longer a sacred entity to be responded to with emotional involvement.

In Islam, however, it is believed that its holy texts are the Koran (the word of God as revealed to Prophet Muhammad by an angel) and the Hadith or sayings of the Prophet. It is the sacred duty of every believer to accept and practice the principles enshrined in the Koran and Hadith.

Fundamentalism is sociologically important not only because of its unique place among religions, but because it easily extends itself into political realm. There is an increasing entanglement of religion in politics around the globe. Despite its theological character, it is usually linked to projects of social reform and the acquisition of political power.

In Middle East (Iran), Iraq, Afghanistan and more recently Egypt, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Pakistan, many countries of Europe and even the most modernized the United States of America and to some extent India, religious fundamentalism has affected the political process and has given rise to conservative political movements and blind faith in nationalism.

Religious fundamentalists oppose secularization of society on one or the other basis. They sometimes even question about the removal of certain chapters from educational books. In recent years, there has been increasing efforts by fundamentalists and others to censor books used in school curricula.

In Islam, fundamentalists issue fatwa against those who go against the principles of Islam (e.g., Ayatollha Khomeini of Iran issued one such fatwa against Salman Rushdie, the writer of The Satanic Verses in 1989.) There have been several deaths apparently related to the fatwa at many places. In Britain and in some European countries, male Sikhs had come into conflict for wearing turban in public. Recently, in France, girls were banned to wear burka in the school premises.

Fundamentalism is associated with a militant and sometimes violent attitude to enforcing ‘moral purity’ as defined by the fundamentalists. Frequently, fundamentalists seek to use the state to establish and enforce what they see as morality as we had seen in Taliban and Al Queda (fundamentalist organizations) controlled Afghanistan a few years back. Recently, some fundamentalist organizations banned yoga exercises in Far East countries like Indonesia.

In Pakistan, its north-east part where a girl of sixteen years Malala was attacked by the fundamentalists for attending school (Swat) is under the full control of the fundamentalist organizations which compel the people to act according to Shariat law rather than the state laws.

It is very interesting and striking that fundamentalists are using latest modern communication technology—TV, radio, Internet, etc., to disseminate their ideas. While religious leaders directly attack many core values of the secular world, they are nevertheless willing to use its artifacts in their spiritual campaigns. Sociologist James Hunter (1983) argues that fundamentalists see ‘technology as either neutral and thus not challenging to their faith or positive—as a gift of God to further his work on earth—and thus, an enhancement to faith’.

Why is religious fundamentalism on the rise all over the world, even in modern societies of Europe and America? Is religiosity (intensity of religious feelings) is increasing? So far as ‘religiosity” is concerned, it is a qualitative factor which is difficult to measure accurately.

Some studies have been made in western countries to assess church attendance which may provide some indication of religiosity. But this measurement cannot be regarded as a true measurement of religiosity because people go to church (or religious places) for many reasons—to worship, meet friends and relatives, participate in weddings, and sometimes even with an objective of thieving or pick-pocketing, and so on. Although a few people go regularly to church or temple or mosque, the vast majority believe in ‘something’ even if no more than a vague force behind the universe.

An important development in religious life has been the dramatic rise of religious programming (performance of many religious ceremonies, delivering religious discourse or sermons, prayers, chanting mantras, playing religious music, performing dance and drama on religious theme, etc.) in the electronic media.

Organizing religious rallies and performing religious functions in public have increased tremendously. Religious personalities and groups have realized that the mass media represents an effective means of spreading religions values.

Technological advances, such as TV, cable television and satellite transmission, have facilitated the rise of ‘e-religion’. People who do not or cannot attend places of worship or listen discourses of religious personalities, regularly watch such programmes on TV and sometimes chant mantras and recite prayers with the preacher relayed on TV.

Many people are seen kneeling to the images of God shown on TV. Aastha and Samaskar are the two most popular TV channels which relay such religious programmes regularly at appointed times. These channels are most popular among Hindus. Besides these, there are many other TV channels which relay religious programmes of different faiths.

The audience for these religious programmes is increasing day by day. Besides elderly people, many adults have also included watching and listening to these programmes in their daily routine. Increasing this type of religions consciousness may be said to be the by-product of modern life which is full of stress and strains, pulls and pressures, great competitiveness and uncertainty.

Modern religious activities and observances give some solace to the people torn by the exigencies of modern life. People visit temples for getting fast blessings like fast food. To use the phrase of Thorstein Veblen ‘conspicuous consumption’, we may call the modern religiousness as ‘conspicuous religiosity’.

Secularization Essay: Useful Essay on Secularization
Religion as an Institution

Fundamentalism

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Definition and History of Fundamentalism Essay

Introduction.

Fundamentalism refers to a set of beliefs and values that require strict observance of certain theological doctrines. It is a reaction to the demands of modern theology in an effort to promote accuracy and continuity of certain theological teachings.

The word fundamentalism originally referred to certain theological beliefs that developed into a movement among the Protestant groups in the United States during the 20 th century. It was developed from the beliefs and values of the Fundamentalist-Modernist Controversy that was common during that period. Today, the term fundamentalism is widely used to refer to a set of theological beliefs that are recommended by certain religious groups.

History of fundamentalism

Historians have described three phases that explain the origin and development of fundamentalism. The first phase lasted from 1890 to 1925. During this period, fundamentalism began as a rebellion against the doctrines of American Protestantism, which is considered as one of the constituents of Evangelicalism.

The second phase was characterized by minimal recognition of Fundamentalism by the public. Even though, its fame declined during this phase, it did not disappear completely. The third phase was in the 1970s when it regained its fame and grew massively. Since then, different people have embraced it.

Critical aspects of Fundamentalism

The interpretation of the bible and the concept of faith formed the basis for fundamentalism. Fundamentalists believe that the original biblical transcripts comprised words that were inspired by God. They believe that people who were inspired and commanded by God to present his will to humanity wrote the Bible.

The inspiration of the Bible is cited as the main foundation of Fundamentalism. However, the doctrine on the Godly nature of Christ existed before the doctrine on the inspiration of the Bible. Fundamentalists believe that Jesus was God. They base their belief on the authority of the bible and their interpretation of the actions of Christ as Godly.

According to Fundamentalism, believing in the divinity of Christ is important for transformation of both life and the human heart. However, its teachings have been shown to be ineffective in times of trials. During such moments, people lose faith in God because of the problems and suffering they encounter. This has been a major cause of defection from Fundamentalism to Secularism and agnosticism.

Another core belief of Fundamentalism is the Virgin birth of Christ. This doctrine is highly recognized because it strengthens the doctrine of Christ’s deity. It claims that Mary was a virgin only before the birth of Jesus because it teaches that she had other children apart from Jesus.

Some critics of Fundamentalism claim that Jesus only gave a moral example for people to follow. In reaction to this criticism, fundamentalists claim that Jesus’ death was substitutionary. This means that he took away our sins and suffered on behalf of humanity. God punished him for the sake of the redemption of humanity.

Belief in Christ’s resurrection is another defining doctrine of Fundamentalism. Fundamentalists believe that the resurrection of Christ was a real occurrence and not a falsehood by ancient writers and believers as claimed by atheists and religious critics. Fundamentalism teaches that to reject or deny resurrection is to deny the validity of the scripture as the inspired word of God.

There is disagreement among fundamentalists on the doctrine of Christ’s second coming. They all believe that Christ will come back to earth one day in the future. However, they differ on the exact day that he will come back. Some claim that he will come after two thousand years. Others assert that there is no evidence of such claims in the Bible. These five doctrines define fundamentalism and were the foundation for its development. These doctrines are still in existence but not as strong as they were when the movement emerged.

Fundamentalism today

Fundamentalism has undergone several changes in the last century. The main doctrines of fundamentalism in today’s society include a belief in the Bible, belief in Christ as the savior and belief in heaven and hell. They believe that accepting Christ as savior does not require an individual to belong to any church.

Their success in advancing their doctrines is founded on their discipline. Their teachings govern all aspects of their life. For example, they have strict rules on certain behaviors such as drinking, gambling, and sex. Fundamentalists have been criticized for being excessively focused on church matters that they dedicate little time to other things. Despite this criticism, they hold on to their teachings and disregard other people’s opinions.

Originally, fundamentalism originated as a rebellion against Protestant doctrines. However, the concept has evolved over time and encompassed many people and faiths. It involves strict adherence to beliefs and values that have been passed through generations. There are four main teachings or beliefs of fundamentalism. They include a belief in the Bible as the word of God, resurrection of Christ, the birth of Jesus by a virgin mother, and the second coming of Christ.

Even though these are the common doctrines of fundamentalism, their degree of observance and variation differ among different groups of people. The binding nature of these doctrines has cultivated a sense of discipline in fundamentalists. This discipline has been the main reason why fundamentalism has survived through the decades and is still present in today’s society. Even though fundamentalism has evolved tremendously, these doctrines are still its governing principles.

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Essay on “Religious Fundamentalism ” Complete Essay for Class 10, Class 12 and Graduation and other classes.

Religious fundamentalism .

Religious fundamentalism is increasing in the entire world including India. It is rampant in Islamic countries like Egypt, Algeria, and Pakistan. Even China is not bereft of it. Pakistan was created on the basis of religion. Hostilities between two major communities in India is not a new thing. In recent years since the demolition of Babri Mosque feeling of mistrust has increased between Hindus and Muslims. Hindu fundamentalism has also increased due to the aggressive policies and postures practiced by Vishwa Hindu Parishad, Bajrang Dal, Shiv Sena and Bhartiya Janta Party (BJP).

Fundamentalism is basically going back to the fundamentals of religion which is really good because all the religions preach noble ideas like universal brotherhood, peace and compassion. But the different religions follow different doctrines. i.e ., their paths are different which make the real difference. When historically seen, two world religions, i.e., Christianity and Islam fought crusades for domination having serious doctrinaire differences. Islam was referred as conquering religion. It conquered even India and ruled for five centuries. Mahmood Gazni attacked India seventeen times, destroyed temples and looted the wealth of India. Similar has been the case with Arabs and Israel. They had serious difference. Even the basis of creation of Israel was separate land for Jews based on the religion of Judaism. Whenever the main religion has been in minority in a country, the religious fundamentalism had increased in that country to assert its identity, culture and language.

Religious fundamentalism is very dangerous. It propagates the use of violence. It is involved in terrorist violent almost all over the world. Middle East countries are mostly affected by religious fundamentalism. The countries practice the rigid religious practices of purda system. It is the women who suffer the most. They are very particular about the Allah or God. If anyone does not follow the true teachings of Islam, he/she is forced to do. If he/she refuses to do, he might be killed also. People are forced to live life in strict accordance with religious fundamentals. There are lot of restrictions on liberty in this sense. Religious fundamentalists take extreme step of issuing Fatwa if somebody says blasphemous against God. They issued Fatwa against Salman Rushdie and tried to kill him for blasphemy. Iran is a leading country in pursuing the policies of religious fundamentalism. Other countries are Algeria, Saudi Arabia, Bangladesh, Egypt, Pakistan, etc. Sometimes the great secular leaders or those who oppose these policies become the easy target of fundamentalists. Turkey used to be very progressive and secular nation but effort have been made towards driving it under the influence of fundamentalist leaders.

Ethnicity has also contributed towards religious fundamentalism. Every nation has differences on the basis of race, language, culture. Different identities coexist in various countries. They are heterogenous in nature. If differences start cropping up, it immediately leads to violence. Bosnia, Lebanon are the worst victims. Sometimes it takes such an extreme step that ethnic cleansing takes place. Ethnic cleansing is not a good sign of civilized society. Natural respect for other’s religious differences is missing which needs to be taken care of. The countries of Commonwealty of Independent States (CIS) are no exception. Ethnicity has been on increase and ethnic tensions are quite old. But the religious fundamentalism can be seen in Turkhenistan. Uzbekistan, Kazkistan, etc. due to its proximity with Iran and Afghanistan. In Iran and Afghanistan religious fundamentalism and related terrorist activities are already there which can spread to these neighbouring CIS states. This can disturb the security conditions in south and south west Asia. Thaat is why even Unites States also consider religious fundamentalism to be a threat to security. Its security can be in danger if religious fundamentalism and related violence and terrorist activites increase in third world countries. So it has become a serious security threat for the developed countries. They have started on strategic lines to contain this threat in the post cold war era.

India too cannot be left out from its influences if disturbances keep on cropping on either side of border, that is Pakistan and Bangladesh. Both the countries are theocratic states but India is a secular state. Muslims in India constitute 12% of Indian population. Indian Muslims are influenced by what is happening in Pakistan and Bangladesh. Kashmir is still an unresolved issue. Serious disturbances are there on the border. Pakistan keeps on flaring the issue. It helps in training the militants to fight in Kashmir and create conditions which weaken India. ISI is often involved in subversive activities like bomb blasts and terrorist activities. Religious fundamentalism is growing in India. Muslims are very conscious of their religion and identity. In Shah Bano case, the Supreme Court gave judgment for giving maintenance to divorces women. But fundamentalists made hue and cry and pressurised the Rajiv Gandhi government to change the decision by legislation. Hindu fundamentalism have also grown in recent years due to Hindutva politics which is again very pernicious for the country.

In order to overcome religious fundamentalism, we have to give a lot of emphasis on education. Education among Muslims is very low. Education can broaden the outlook and can look for change in orthodoxies prevalent in Islamic religion. Efforts should be made towards giving due recognition to religious identities so that problems do not crop up. Anything should not be imposed on their culture, language and religion and feeling should be created in such a positive way that they are fully integrated into the mainstream.

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What is religious fundamentalism?
Essay. Religious fundamentalism is a focus on differences between members of society on the basis of their subscription or non subscription to a particular faith. It leads to discrimination and divides people into righteous and unrighteous dichotomies. Furthermore, non believers are often the target of blame when problems arise in society.
Religious Fundamentalism Concept in the Johnstone Text Essay
The most important concept in the Johnstone text is that on religious fundamentalism. This can be defined as a style of religion that applies an uncompromising attachment to certain "fundamental" tenets of a faith. Fundamentalists generally are reactionary in nature, seeking to restore the aspects of traditional religious life that have ...
What is religious fundamentalism? A literature review
Religious fundamentalism (RF) is a relevant topic in the world today. Over the past two decades there is an increase in definitions, theories, and measures of RF in the social sciences. The present publication reviews and integrates this information into an overarching definition and provides suggestions for future research.
Christian Fundamentalism in America
Religion in America. "Fundamentalism" is a complicated word. It has a very specific meaning in the history of American Christianity, as the name taken by a coalition of mostly white, mostly northern Protestants who, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, united in opposition to theological liberalism. Scholars also use it in a broader ...
The Great Revival: Understanding Religious "Fundamentalism"
The Great Revival: Understanding Religious "Fundamentalism". Within hours of the attack on the World Trade Center towers on September 11, 2001, the final letters of hijacker Muhammad Atta, discovered in the trunk of a rental car parked at Dulles International Airport outside Washington D.C., were being dissected by journalists and TV pundits.
What is Religious Fundamentalism?
The early 21st Century has seen the rise of various Fundamentalist groups, for example: The increasing influence of the New Religious Right in the United States The rise of Zionism in Israel The rise of Islamic Fundamentalism in Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq and Afghanistan. Steve Bruce: Communal and Individual Fundamentalism Communal individualism is that usually
Christian fundamentalism
Christian fundamentalism, also known as fundamental Christianity or fundamentalist Christianity, is a religious movement emphasizing biblical literalism. In its modern form, it began in the late 19th and early 20th centuries among British and American Protestants as a reaction to theological liberalism and cultural modernism. Fundamentalists argued that 19th-century modernist theologians had ...
What is religious fundamentalism? A literature review
A literature review. Religious fundamentalism (RF) is a relevant topic in the world today. Over the past two decades there is an increase in definitions, theories, and measures of RF in the social sciences. The present publication reviews and integrates this information into an overarching definition and provides suggestions for future research.
Religious Fundamentalism Essay
Religious Fundamentalism Essay Religious fundamentalism is the strict maintenance of ancient or fundamental doctrines of any religion. The term fundamentalism, though, was originally an Anglo-Saxon Protestant term applied to those who maintained that the Bible must be accepted and interpreted literally.
Religious Fundamentalism' and Democracy' Comparison Essay
Religious fundamentalism and democracy. The field of political science has developed various definitions of the concept of religious fundamentalism. Its definition is greatly influenced by its application, area of the application, and the role intended to accomplish. In this case, the definition provided is related to the groups' ideology and ...
A Political Science Perspective on Religious Fundamentalism
Religious fundamentalism is a phenomenon still understudied in political science: both analytical perspectives and definitions are indeed crafted mostly for sociological, theological and philosophical analyses. ... Throughout the essay, examples belonging to different religious fundamentalisms are proposed, in order to clarify the theoretical ...
The causes of Fundamentalism
Steve Bruce argues that the main causes of Fundamentalism are modernisation and secularisation, but we also need to consider the nature of the religions themselves and a range of 'external factors' to fully explain the growth of fundamentalist movements. Modernisation has undermined religion in at least three ways: Social life has become separated from religious
The Fundamentals
The Fundamentals is a twelve volume set of essays outlining orthodox Christian doctrine that was influential in the early U.S. fundamentalist movement circa 1910. The books contain ninety essays, many by recognized Christian scholars of the day, on topics such as basic doctrine, inerrancy of Scripture, and errors in unorthodox groups such as ...
The Day Christian Fundamentalism Was Born
Mr. Sutton, a professor of history at Washington State University, is the author of the forthcoming "Double Crossed: The Missionaries Who Spied for the United States During the Second World War ...
The Untold Story of The Fundamentals
The 12-volume series of book-length journals contained 90 essays commissioned from leading theologians and religious leaders broadly representing conservative and evangelical Protestantism. Over 3 million volumes were published, distributed free of charge to several hundred thousand pastors, seminary professors and students, missionaries and ...
RELIGIOUS FUNDAMENTALISM IN SOUTH AFRICA
Against the background of defining, theorizing, humanizing, nationalizing, and globalizing religion in South Africa, this essay recalls the diverse ways in which religious fundamentalism has registered in South Africa as an 'inauthentic' claim on religious authenticity. Tracking academic and media attention to religious fundamentalism at ten-year intervals, we find Christian fundamentalism ...
PDF Religious Fundamentalism in India and Beyond
Although the Sikh Fundamentalist Movement led to tragic events in the 1980s and 1990s, its impact has largely been contained, as its contours of influence were limited to the state of Punjab alone.21. However, the rise inpopularity ofthe othertwo religious movements and theirad-. 20 Parameters.
Impact of the Religious Fundamentalism on Society Term Paper
Fundamentalism is a pejorative concept used in a sacred context, which can be defined as firm adherence to certain theological beliefs due to a literal understanding of the scriptures and opposes the popular beliefs (Bruce 9). Fundamentalism is a concept that can be traced in the early twentieth century and is used in today's world to refer ...
Religious Fundamentalism in Islam and Christianity
The religious fundamentalism is best defined as people's tendency to idealize their sense of religiosity to such an extent that they begin to pose danger to themselves and to society. Traditionally, such fundamentalism is being closely associated with the Semitic religions of Islam and Christianity, which can be explained by the fact that the ...
Opinion
Donald Trump's combative psychology in many ways merges with their own. A Christian politics dominated by fundamentalism is going to look very different from a Christian politics dominated by ...
PDF Homeschooling and religious fundamentalism
This essay explores the relationship between homeschooling and religious fundamentalism, and suggests four ways in which homeschooling provides ... Homeschooling and religious fundamentalism / Kunzman 21 2008). But other scholars have suggested that, in practice, women as homeschool mothers wield significant influence. While these mothers would
Fundamentalism: Useful Essay on Fundamentalism
Fundamentalism: Useful Essay on Fundamentalism! The term 'fundamentalism' refers to adherence to earlier accepted religious doctrines and is often accompanied by a literal application of historical beliefs and scriptures to today's world (Schaefer and Lamm, 1992). It is also defined as a movement or belief called for a return to the basic ...
Definition and History of Fundamentalism
The word fundamentalism originally referred to certain theological beliefs that developed into a movement among the Protestant groups in the United States during the 20 th century. It was developed from the beliefs and values of the Fundamentalist-Modernist Controversy that was common during that period. Today, the term fundamentalism is widely ...
Essay on "Religious Fundamentalism " Complete Essay for Class 10, Class
Religious Fundamentalism Religious fundamentalism is increasing in the entire world including India. It is rampant in Islamic countries like Egypt, Algeria, and Pakistan. Even China is not bereft of it. Pakistan was created on the basis of religion. Hostilities between two major communities in India is not a new thing.