Description
Book SynopsisWhen English colonizers landed in New England in 1630, they constructed a godly commonwealth according to precepts gleaned from Scripture. For these ''Puritan'' Christians, religion both provided the center and defined the margins of existence. While some Puritans were called to exercise power as magistrates and ministers, and many more as husbands and fathers, women were universally called to subject themselves to the authority of others. Their God was a God of order, and out of their religious convictions and experiences Puritan leaders found a divine mandate for a firm, clear hierarchy. Yet not all lives were overwhelmed; other religious voices made themselves heard, and inspired voices that defied that hierarchy. Gifted with an extraordinary mind, an intense spiritual passion, and an awesome charisma, Anne Hutchinson arrived in Massachusetts in 1634 and established herself as a leader of women. She held private religious meetings in her home and later began to deliver her own sermo
Trade ReviewThe most thorough historicization of Hutchinson to date, making this a worthwhile read for students of the colonial US.... Highly Recommended. * CHOICE *
Westerkamp is skilled at tracing connections and pulling the historical frame outward to reveal a fuller picture, and the effects are genuinely enlightening. * Amy M. E. Morris, Early American Literature *
Marilyn Westerkamp's insightful new study of Anne Hutchinson cuts to the marrow of Puritan patriarchy. Though New England Puritanism seemed to allow women to prophesy, Puritan patriarchs repudiated their brilliant rival when her bold, public interpretations of mysticism challenged religious orthodoxy, ministerial authority, and (in their view) social and political stability in the tenuous new Bible Commonwealth. This is an original and masterful retelling of a story nearly four hundred years old. * Elizabeth Reis, author of Damned Women: Sinners and Witches in Puritan New England and Bodies in Doubt: An American History of Intersex *
No other treatment of Hutchinson does a better job of situating this brilliant, accomplished woman in her full transatlantic context: the world of Anglo-American Puritanism, to be sure, but also early modern discussions about medicine, housewifery, sectarian politics, theories of the body, grace and gender. Most importantly, Anne Hutchinson herself never recedes into the background, as she tends to do in other recent retellings of the antinomian crisis. She remains the pivot around which Westerkamp weaves a compelling narrative of the first generation of Puritans to settle the New World. * Susan Juster, Rhys Isaac Collegiate Professor of History, University of Michigan *
This long awaited study by a distinguished scholar of early American religion does not disappoint. Westerkampf provides a vivid portrait of Anne Hutchinson's situation at the intersection of the Puritan aspiration for an Old Testament patriarchal order and the longing for the ecstasy of an individual spiritual communion with the divine. With prose that is lucid even when she is unpacking complex theological disputes, Westerkampf shifts our focus from Hutchinson's demise to the egalitarian legacy of her mystical piety. * Kathleen Brown, David Boies Professor of History, University of Pennsylvania *
Though, this is a lucid and captivating account of the Hutchinsonian controversy which will appeal to new readers as well as those already familiar with these debates. * Rachel Adcock, Baptist Quarterly *
Westerkamp's feminist analysis furthers our understanding of this significant figure in early New England history. * Charles Hambrick-Stowe, Reading Religion *
This is the book on Anne Hutchinson that we have been waiting for...The Passion of Anne Hutchinson is a must read for students of early America, women, gender, or Puritan studies. * Monica D. Fitzgerald, Saint Mary's College Of California, Early Modern Women *
Table of Contents1: Prologue: Anne Hutchinson and the Controversy 2: The Puritan Experiment 3: Helpmeets, Mothers, and Midwives among the Patriarchs 4: Sectarian Mysticism and Spiritual Power 5: Prophesying Women and the Gifts of Spirit 6: Gracious Disciples and Frightened Magistrates 7: A Froward Woman Beloved of God
