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Book SynopsisBoth reason and religion have been acknowledged by scholars to have had a profound impacton the foundation and formation of the American regime. But the significance, pervasiveness,and depth of that impact have also been disputed. While many have approached the Americanfounding period with an interest in the influence of Enlightenment reason or Biblical religion,they have often assumed such influences to be exclusive, irreconcilable, or contradictory. Fewscholarly works have sought to study the mutual influence of reason and religion as intertwinedstrands shaping the American historical and political experience at its founding. The purpose ofthe chapters in this volume, authored by a distinguished group of scholars in political science,intellectual history, literature, and philosophy, is to examine how this mutual influence wasmade manifest in the American Foundingespecially in the writings, speeches, and thought ofcritical figures (Thomas Paine, Benjamin Franklin, George Washington, T
Trade ReviewWas America a city upon a hill, or was it just a skirmish in the larger battle between Ancients and Moderns? The essays in this volume reject these familiar alternatives and propose a third way. In so doing, they contribute to our growing understanding of the Enlightenment while at the same time forcing us to consider early American political thought in its own terms. Gish and Klinghard have put together a volume that should be essential reading for students of the early republic and for students of the Enlightenment. -- Jeremy D. Bailey, professor of political science, University of Houston
Table of ContentsAcknowledgments Introduction Chapter 1The Mutual Influence of Biblical Religion and Enlightenment Reason at the American Founding Dustin Gish and Daniel Klinghard Part I — Reason and Fait Chapter 2: Faiths of Our Modern Fathers: Bacon’s Progressive Hope and Locke’s Liberal Christianity Robert Faulkner Chapter 3: The Radical Enlightenment’s Critique of the American Revolution Jonathan Israel Chapter 4: “Nature’s God” as Deus sive Natura: Spinoza, Jefferson, and the Historical Transmission of the Theological-Political Question Jeffrey Bernstein Part II — Biblical Rhetoric and Republicanism Chapter 5: Benjamin Franklin, Virtue’s Ethics, and “Political Truth” Carla Mulford Chapter 6: Evil Counselors, Corrupt Traitors, and Bad Kings: The Hebrew Bible and Political Critique in Revolutionary America and Beyond Eran Shalev Chapter 7: Biblical Narratives and Enlightenment Methodology: Religion, Reason, and Republicanism in Jefferson’s Notes on the State of Virginia Dustin Gish and Daniel Klinghard Part III — Religion and Politics Chapter 8: Charles Carroll, the American Revolution, and Catholic Identity: Constitutional Discourses in Revolutionary Maryland Maura Farrelly Chapter 9: The Founding Founders’ Disagreements about Church and State Vincent Philip Muñoz Chapter 10: Alexander Hamilton, Religion, and American Conservatism Peter McNamara Part IV — Legacies Chapter 11: In the Valley of the Dry Bones: Lincoln’s Biblical Oratory and the Coming of the Civil War Danilo Petranovich and Matthew Holbreich Chapter 12: Enlightenment Philosophy, Biblical Religion, and Tocqueville’s New Science of Politics Aristide Tessitore Contributors Index
