Protestants: A History from Wittenberg to Pennsylvania 1517 – 1740

Protestants: A History from Wittenberg to Pennsylvania 1517–1740 presents a comprehensive historiography of the rise, reception, and ongoing global influence of the branches of Christianity that emerged out of the Protestant Reformation. Offering more than a chronological recounting of historic events, renowned religious scholar C. Scott Dixon reveals the role of Protestantism as a creative force in history. Dixon draws on new cultural history to explore the social and cultural dimension of the Reformation as he follows the path of the movement′s unfolding from its humble origins in a town in Saxony in sixteenth–century Germany to its bold re–fashioning and reconstitution during the dawn of the Enlightenment in Europe and colonial America. In a break from traditional scholarship, Dixon demonstrates how the formative phase of early modern Protestantism stretched far beyond the age of Luther and Calvin –– that the social, cultural, and political problematic created by the breach with Roman Catholicism was not historically resolved until it had become a transatlantic phenomenon. We are shown how the central dynamic of the Protestant movement was not, in fact, its struggle with Catholicism, but rather its own inner conflict; namely, the tension between established forms of Protestantism such as Lutheranism, Calvinism, and Anglicanism and the radical elements that had been suppressed and marginalised at the beginning of the Reformation. Protestants: A History from Wittenberg to Pennsylvania 1517–1740 offers a startling new perspective on the complex strands of a 16th–century religious upheaval whose repercussions remain with us to the present day.

Acknowledgments. Introduction: Law and Gospel. 1. Foundations. Wittenberg and Rome. Swiss Protestants. Reformations. Geneva and Europe. 2. Kingdoms. Kings, Priests, and Prophets. Civic Protestantism. The Politics of Faith. 3. Communities. Biblical Utopias. The Pursuit of Purity. New World Protestants. 4. Dominions. Bonds of Communion. Christian Subjects. Protestant Environments. The Missionary Turn. 5. Revivals. Signs of the Times. True Christianity. The End of Reformation. Epilogue: Modern Protestants. Endnotes. Index.

C. Scott Dixon is Senior Lecturer at Queen’s University of Belfast, UK. He is the author of numerous books and articles on early modern religious history, including The Reformation and Rural Society (1996) and The Reformation in Germany (2002). Dixon has been the recipient of Alexander von Humboldt research fellowships in association with the Herzog August Bibliothek, Wolfenbüttel and the Freie Universität Berlin.

“In this thoughtful and highly original book, Scott Dixon takes a thematic approach to the process of building the new Christian communities … Scott Dixon has done an admirable job, given the constraints of space and the breadth of his coverage, in painting a broad–ranging and sophisticated picture of a complex and expansive movement.”  ( EHR Oxford Journal Clippings , 6 June 2012) "Dixon′s contribution lies, rather, in his fascinating and highly original thesis that the formative phase of Protestantism, as a creative social force, must be viewed as extending to the revivalist impulses of the 18th–century Great Awakening in the New World...Dixon′s writing here is detailed, solid, and compelling. Summing Up: Highly recommended." (Choice, 1 May 2011) "This is a remarkable work, for its striking originality, its powerful and independent–minded synthesis, its sensitivity to the primary and secondary material, its deployment of really gripping examples and case studies, and its conjoining of the European and North American Protestant experience….”—Mark Greengrass, University of Sheffield