Heaven Below: Early Pentecostals and American Culture [Hardcover]

Grant Wacker (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 30, 2001

In this lively history of the rise of pentecostalism in the United States, Grant Wacker gives an in-depth account of the religious practices of pentecostal churches as well as an engaging picture of the way these beliefs played out in daily life.

The core tenets of pentecostal belief--personal salvation, Holy Ghost baptism, divine healing, and anticipation of the Lord's imminent return--took root in the first quarter of the twentieth century. Wacker examines the various aspects of pentecostal culture, including rituals, speaking in tongues, the authority of the Bible, the central role of Jesus in everyday life, the gifts of prophecy and healing, ideas about personal appearance, women's roles, race relations, attitudes toward politics and the government. Tracking the daily lives of pentecostals, and paying close attention to the voices of individual men and women, Wacker is able to identify the reason for the movement's spectacular success: a demonstrated ability to balance idealistic and pragmatic impulses, to adapt distinct religious convictions in order to meet the expectations of modern life.

More than twenty million American adults today consider themselves pentecostal. Given the movement's major place in American religious life, the history of its early years--so artfully told here--is of central importance.

(20010423)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Pentecostalsfundamentalist Christians who identify speaking in tongues and miraculous healing as divine giftshave long been ridiculed as poor, ignorant, violent and licentious. In this remarkable study, Wacker, raised a pentecostal and now a respected historian at Duke University, devastates the standard stereotypes. But he also departs from the Edenic model of denominational historiography, which imagines, for example, that the Azusa Street mission was a model of interracial harmony before the fatal break between its black and white founders. What emerges instead is a remarkably rich account of the inner lives of ordinary men and women who felt themselves filled with the power of the Holy Ghost. In 15 tightly organized chapters, Wacker offers a comprehensive ethnography of the first generation of pentecostalstheir faith, their social attitudes and their politics. He leads the reader through enchanted landscapes populated by angels and demons, pauses to assess reports of xenolalia (speaking in a human language allegedly unknown to the speaker) and surveys the gulfs that have divided charismatics from their detractors. It is difficult to imagine a more judicious treatment of the subject; meticulously researched, lyrically written and continuously illuminating, Wacker's book is essential reading for anyone who wishes to understand the origins of this influential current in American culture.

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

Pentecostals, or "radical," "primitive" evangelicals, have not only survived but have flourished while embracing beliefs that include personal salvation, Holy Ghost baptism, divine healing, and the anticipation of the imminent return of Christ. They are prospering today, as evidenced by the Brownsville Assembly of God Church in Pensacola, FL, where millions have flocked to a nonstop revival begun in the 1990s. Wacker (history of religion, Duke Univ.), who himself has Pentecostal roots, gives an in-depth, well-researched look at the history, beliefs, and everyday lives of early Pentecostals (1900-25). He discusses their culture, temperament, taboos, use of time, organizational skills, and leadership. While exploring the boundaries that separate the Pentecostals from mainstream U.S. society, he also shows how only a minority fit the stereotype of poor and alienated folk. The genius of the Pentecostal movement, Wacker states, lies in its ability to hold two seemingly incompatible impulses the primitive and the pragmatic in productive tension. Recommended for cultural and theological collections. George Westerlund, formerly with Providence P.L., Palmyra, VA
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 384 pages
• Publisher: Harvard University Press (June 30, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 067400499X
• ISBN-13: 978-0674004993
• Product Dimensions: 9.6 x 6.5 x 1.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.7 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #775,424 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

18 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A MUST Read!, July 13, 2001

By 

Marc A. Jolley (Macon, Georgia USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Heaven Below: Early Pentecostals and American Culture (Hardcover)

Grant Wacker has written a wonderful book. His scholarly treatment of early pentecostalism (1900-1925) is matched by his ability to write for a general audience with insight, sympathy for his subject, and a tremendous wit and appreciation. His views are balanced, his anecdotes are well-selected, and his writing is first-rate. He covers all aspects, races, and gender issues in early American pentecostalism. Anyone interested in American religion in general or penetcostalism in particular MUST read this book. A professor told me in grad school that the explosion of new books would only get worse. He advised me to buy only those books that would either change or advance my life: this is such a book.

17 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Exhiliarating Romp Through Early American Pentecostalism, November 14, 2001

By 

Todd Hudnall (Colorado Springs, CO) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Heaven Below: Early Pentecostals and American Culture (Hardcover)

In "Heaven Below," Grant Wacker takes the reader on an exhilarating and informative romp through the early years (1900-1925) of American Pentecostalism. Through extensive research and superior storytelling, he demonstrates how these religious pioneers brought together the clashing impulses of the "primitive" and the "pragmatic" to "capture lightening in a bottle" and launch an explosive movement. Potential readers need to be warned in advance that the author is a social historian and academician. If you are looking for stories of romanticized heroes of the faith or glowing partisan historiography, you'll be disappointed. What you will get is a consistently fair, sometimes surprising, and always interesting account of the early Pentecostals.

In the book's fifteen chapters we get a glimpse into the character, temperament, and daily lives of these adventurous and hearty souls. You'll discover the keys to their effectiveness and the areas where they stumbled. Included among many subjects covered are the movement's leaders, the theology and practicality behind the prominence of women, their changing views on war, the persecutions they faced, and even the "gift of tongues" that helped make their faith distinctive. The stereotype of the poor, illiterate, and disinherited Pentecostals is dismantled. Instead you will meet a representative slice of early 20th century America. They were a people genuinely sincere, deeply committed to their beliefs, and fully convinced that they were instruments in the hands of Almighty God, empowered by the Holy Spirit for the purpose of fulfilling the Great Commission of Jesus Christ.

"Heaven Below" is made up of 269 pages of fascinating reading, followed by an appendix, and 82 pages of footnotes. It also includes a valuable index. I had some difference of opinion with Wacker's conclusions and occasional qualms with his assumptions, but as a social history, I highly recommend "Heaven Below." Grant Wacker is Associate Professor of the History of Religion in America, Duke University.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars insider account, January 17, 2007

By 

Daniel B. Clendenin (www.journeywithjesus.net) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Heaven Below: Early Pentecostals and American Culture (Hardcover)

My sister speaks in tongues and so does her husband; they make me nervous. I have vague recollections as an immature teenage Christian of being schooled to speak in tongues, failing the test, and then feeling guilty that I was not as spiritual, as closely in tune with God as my tutors. But considered globally, as a non tongue-speaker, I will soon be in the Christian minority, if I am not already.

From obscure beginnings at Bethel Bible School in Topeka, Kansas in 1901, and at 312 Azusa Street in an industrial section of downtown Los Angeles in 1905, what is broadly known as charismatic or pentecostal Christianity has grown today to include some 525 million believers from virtually every denomination and country the world over. Apart from Catholics (and many Catholics are charismatic), they constitute the single largest distinct group of Christians, and they are getting larger. Social scientists predict that in fifty years they will number one billion believers.

Grant Wacker, professor of history at Duke University, grew up in a Pentecostal family and so brings to this volume the critical detachment of a scholar but also the empathy of the consummate insider. Heaven Below focuses on the earliest years of the movement, from 1900 to 1925. Wacker's goal? "To rescue Pentecostals from the shadowy fate that EP Thompson once called (in another context), `the enormous condescension of posterity'" (p. 266).

Scholars have struggled to explain how such a wildly enthusiast, anti-intellectual, counter cultural and divisive movement could not only survive and flourish but explode. Wacker offers a very specific twofold thesis. Early Pentecostals did two things extremely well. They encouraged the primitive impulse of a deeply felt and experienced relationship with God, and then devised pragmatic ways to "bottle the lightening" without "stilling the fire or cracking the vessel." They held emotional prayer meetings and built hospitals. They begged God for healing and founded colleges. They could be both credulous and shrewd.

The pentecostal movement now enjoys a burgeoning scholarly literature. Charismatics have been good for the church, and this new literature should be good for the movement.