The Great Awakening had a large impact on the slaves and their religious conversion. The Great Awakening gave the slaves a way to enter into a sector of the white community that previously had been off-limits to them -- the church. The Great Awakening, which began in the 1740s, believed that religious conviction was greater than religious knowledge. There were even black preachers who went around on the plantations of the South and even in the North preaching. During the Great Awakening, there were the New Lights and the Old Lights. The New Lights advocated that there was spirtual equality between the blacks and whites as well as the New Lights gave an impetus to a movement to treat slaves more humanely. The Old Lights, however, clung to the older beliefs of religion in which sermons were based off the Bible and that there was order/hierarchy. The Old Lights were also wanted to continue the belief of segregation.
The Great Awakening opened up Christianity to slaves which allowed them “spiritual salvation and public recognition.” (p.121) Many slaves wanted to convert to Christianity because it helped them build relationships with the people they lived and worked with and helped them “assimilate to English ways and negotiate their social identities within the hierarchies and constraints of Christian institutions.” (p.121) Slaves preferred the beliefs of Old Lights which emphasized order and hierarchy which was more similar to African traditions.
The Great Awakening allowed slaves to enter into Christanity more easily. They no longer had to have a degree to be a preacher, they just had to have passion for religion. What surprised me was that they slaves liked the Old Lights because it reminded them of the structure and order they had back on Africa.
What impact did the Great Awakening have on slaves and their religious conversion? The impact of the Great Awakening on the slaves was to give them options. They were able to choose between visionary, emotional and verbal speeches of New Light, or the older standard style of Old Light. Sweet writes some slaves embraced the New Light because it reflected more of their African customs. However, some slaves stayed with the Old Light because they preferred the hierarchy and authority of the church. Through the Great Awakening slaves were able to interact with whites, and give them a voice in their religious beliefs.
The Great Awakening had a huge impact on the slaves. The Great Awakening was started by Evangelical leaders like Johnathan Edwards and George Whitefield. Vaughan on page 114 points out that a story of " a master who overheard his slave imitating Whitefield's preaching and was so moved that he was immediately converted." One of the Great Awakening ideals was that " grace was manifest not in the long practice of civic morality but in the ardent pitch of emotional conviction that signaled a rebirth." Key African American leaders like Sarah Osborne who led prayer groups also had an impact in getting the slaves to join.
Slaves were very effected by the Great Awakening, by giving blacks an opportunity to not only attend church, which before was only something that whites participated in. Blacks were even allowed to become prechers, and many exhibited a very strong faith and passion for the religion and helping the whites to spread Christianity.
Evangelical leaders such as Johnathan Edwards and George Whitefield celebrated the effect of the Awakening on groups previously unmoved by Christianity (p 114). The New Light church brought new opportunities for lay leaders, including slaves, to organize prayer groups and to preach publicly. Blacks were allowed to attend the same churches as whites, but they did have to sit separately from them. Not all of the impacts of the Great Awakening were positive. The more slaves that converted, the more threatened settlers became. They feared that slaves were becoming more like them. This proved that converting slaves to Christianity did nothing to erase racial differences.
The Great Awakening had a large impact on the black community. Before the Awakening, blacks could rarely be seen at church because their masters would not allow them to go. And even if they did attend, they were segregated and not allowed to participate in church activities. During and after the Great Awakening, blacks, along with Indians, were encouraged to participate in religious proceedings. True faith and religious conversion could be had by all if one was willing to give their would over to G-d. This allowed blacks to participate, convert, be accepted into a church community, and even gave them the chance to preach.
The Great Awakening was extremely influential on the black population in the American Colonies. This awakening allowed them to actually participate or even be a REVEREND! of a New Light Church. The New Lights gave the slave population a few freedoms of becoming members of a church and participating without having to be able to read. Because this was an "emotional" denomination within Christianity, slaves were able to pick up on what was going on without having to actually read the Bible. Old Lights considered the New Lights to be ignorant and "illegitimate" so to speak because there was no "structure" and because blacks could become ministers without having a Theology degree.
Before the time known as the Great Awakening, English settlers did not heavily pursue black slaves to convert them to Christianity. Some main reasons they did not are due to guilt of enslaving fellow Christians, among other excuses, to uphold the institution of slavery. However, the revival time revealed ministers and Englishmen who desired to bring the Gospel to all men, excluding no one. The authority and order of the past were no longer characteristics of the evangelical awakening. The conversion and baptism of black slaves was not shied away from, and social distinctions were done away with. This gave black men and women the opportunity to worship and even preach in churches. This was not popular nor widely accepted, but it was a far cry from the old hierarchy of the Christian Church.
The Great Awakening had two very different impacts on the religious conversion of slaves. On one side religion permitted slaves to console themselves with religion. Slaves would resist their hardships because of the hope in a rewarded afterlife. On the other hand other slaves used religion to challenge their situation by quoting Bible scriptures that questioned slavery.
11 comments:
The Great Awakening had a large impact on the slaves and their religious conversion. The Great Awakening gave the slaves a way to enter into a sector of the white community that previously had been off-limits to them -- the church. The Great Awakening, which began in the 1740s, believed that religious conviction was greater than religious knowledge. There were even black preachers who went around on the plantations of the South and even in the North preaching. During the Great Awakening, there were the New Lights and the Old Lights. The New Lights advocated that there was spirtual equality between the blacks and whites as well as the New Lights gave an impetus to a movement to treat slaves more humanely. The Old Lights, however, clung to the older beliefs of religion in which sermons were based off the Bible and that there was order/hierarchy. The Old Lights were also wanted to continue the belief of segregation.
The Great Awakening opened up Christianity to slaves which allowed them “spiritual salvation and public recognition.” (p.121) Many slaves wanted to convert to Christianity because it helped them build relationships with the people they lived and worked with and helped them “assimilate to English ways and negotiate their social identities within the hierarchies and constraints of Christian institutions.” (p.121) Slaves preferred the beliefs of Old Lights which emphasized order and hierarchy which was more similar to African traditions.
The Great Awakening allowed slaves to enter into Christanity more easily. They no longer had to have a degree to be a preacher, they just had to have passion for religion. What surprised me was that they slaves liked the Old Lights because it reminded them of the structure and order they had back on Africa.
What impact did the Great Awakening have on slaves and their religious conversion?
The impact of the Great Awakening on the slaves was to give them options. They were able to choose between visionary, emotional and verbal speeches of New Light, or the older standard style of Old Light. Sweet writes some slaves embraced the New Light because it reflected more of their African customs. However, some slaves stayed with the Old Light because they preferred the hierarchy and authority of the church. Through the Great Awakening slaves were able to interact with whites, and give them a voice in their religious beliefs.
The Great Awakening had a huge impact on the slaves. The Great Awakening was started by Evangelical leaders like Johnathan Edwards and George Whitefield. Vaughan on page 114 points out that a story of " a master who overheard his slave imitating Whitefield's preaching and was so moved that he was immediately converted." One of the Great Awakening ideals was that " grace was manifest not in the long practice of civic morality but in the ardent pitch of emotional conviction that signaled a rebirth." Key African American leaders like Sarah Osborne who led prayer groups also had an impact in getting the slaves to join.
Slaves were very effected by the Great Awakening, by giving blacks an opportunity to not only attend church, which before was only something that whites participated in. Blacks were even allowed to become prechers, and many exhibited a very strong faith and passion for the religion and helping the whites to spread Christianity.
Evangelical leaders such as Johnathan Edwards and George Whitefield celebrated the effect of the Awakening on groups previously unmoved by Christianity (p 114). The New Light church brought new opportunities for lay leaders, including slaves, to organize prayer groups and to preach publicly. Blacks were allowed to attend the same churches as whites, but they did have to sit separately from them. Not all of the impacts of the Great Awakening were positive. The more slaves that converted, the more threatened settlers became. They feared that slaves were becoming more like them. This proved that converting slaves to Christianity did nothing to erase racial differences.
The Great Awakening had a large impact on the black community. Before the Awakening, blacks could rarely be seen at church because their masters would not allow them to go. And even if they did attend, they were segregated and not allowed to participate in church activities. During and after the Great Awakening, blacks, along with Indians, were encouraged to participate in religious proceedings. True faith and religious conversion could be had by all if one was willing to give their would over to G-d. This allowed blacks to participate, convert, be accepted into a church community, and even gave them the chance to preach.
The Great Awakening was extremely influential on the black population in the American Colonies. This awakening allowed them to actually participate or even be a REVEREND! of a New Light Church. The New Lights gave the slave population a few freedoms of becoming members of a church and participating without having to be able to read. Because this was an "emotional" denomination within Christianity, slaves were able to pick up on what was going on without having to actually read the Bible. Old Lights considered the New Lights to be ignorant and "illegitimate" so to speak because there was no "structure" and because blacks could become ministers without having a Theology degree.
Before the time known as the Great Awakening, English settlers did not heavily pursue black slaves to convert them to Christianity. Some main reasons they did not are due to guilt of enslaving fellow Christians, among other excuses, to uphold the institution of slavery. However, the revival time revealed ministers and Englishmen who desired to bring the Gospel to all men, excluding no one. The authority and order of the past were no longer characteristics of the evangelical awakening. The conversion and baptism of black slaves was not shied away from, and social distinctions were done away with. This gave black men and women the opportunity to worship and even preach in churches. This was not popular nor widely accepted, but it was a far cry from the old hierarchy of the Christian Church.
The Great Awakening had two very different impacts on the religious conversion of slaves. On one side religion permitted slaves to console themselves with religion. Slaves would resist their hardships because of the hope in a rewarded afterlife. On the other hand other slaves used religion to challenge their situation by quoting Bible scriptures that questioned slavery.
Post a Comment