Autobiographical Reflections on Southern Religious History.

Edited by John B. Boles. (Athens, Ga., and London: University of Georgia Press, c. 2001. Pp. [x], 272. $34.95, ISBN 0-8203-2297-0.)

When one studies the South, dealing with religion may be as obvious as climbing the mountain "because it is there," as Donald G. Mathews, one of the sixteen contributors to this collection of personal musings, has put it (p. 5). Yet southern history, because it confronts a past so "haunted by God," attracts scholars with an affinity for religious concerns. And, as this volume confirms, the field also offers the opportunity for greater spiritual self-awareness.

Samuel S. Hill, whose essay fittingly opens the volume, sets the tone by noting an autobiographical impetus and a need to confront a contemporary issue by examining its historical roots. Hill also notes the changes in his perspective over time, and in so doing also traces the trajectory of the field. Rebelling against the hagiographic works of most earlier scholars, Hill's generation and their students took a more critical, sociological approach. Once their points were made, however, historians were able to move beyond the "cultural captivity" thesis and examine the region's soul more empathetically. Meanwhile, a greater appreciation for the variety of the region's religious traditions has carded the field far beyond its earlier focus on the "mainline" denominations, a trend also evident in this collection.

There are intimate elements in all of these essays, but the most personal and painful are those of Donald G. Mathews and Albert J. Raboteau. Readers of Mathews's more recent work will be fascinated by his acknowledgment that it was not until he was asked to write about his choice of subject matter that he "realized that it was because my grandfather had been lynched" (p. 18). This revelation leads him to paint a very intimate family portrait of sorrow, shame, guilt, and healing, and to examine these influences on his understanding of the dark comers of southern life. Raboteau's contribution is a meditation on race and spirituality woven around the killing of his father just before Raboteau's birth, the rituals of Roman Catholicism, the power of former slaves' narratives, the joy that shared sorrow can bring, and the healing power of family.

David Edwin Harrell Jr. provides a case study in the possibilities of an insider studying his faith both lovingly and objectively. Born and reared in the Churches of Christ, he set himself the task of rectifying the scholarly neglect of that tradition. Establishing a reputation as a sympathetic scholar, he won the trust of Oral Roberts; but Harrell's biography of the Pentecostal leader, while it pulled few punches, was seen by some as too generous to its subject. Robert M. Calhoon manages to weave together his intellectual history and a convincing interpretation of the roles of Calvinists and Lutherans in early southern history. His essay, and those of Charles Reagan Wilson and Mitchell Snay, focus more than the rest on their debts to other scholars and how they built upon those foundations. In Snay's essay, the theme is the improbable choice of proslavery Christianity as a subject for a Chicago Jew's attention, and the self-analysis is fascinating. All three, in their reserved ways, trace their own spiritual paths as well.

The essays by Wayne Flynt, John B. Boles, and Jean E. Friedman are the most autobiographical and place-based. Flynt describes how Anniston, Alabama, and the religious communities there pointed him toward his studies of the religion of the plain folk. Boles does much the same for his rural East Texas roots and his interest in revivals and biracial Christianity. Friedman relates how her experiences in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, and her feminist perspective led to her studies of the religious context of the southern women's movement and, later, of a Jewish family in the early national South, and why themes of conversion and community are present in both.

E. Brooks Holifield examines his reasons for studying the "gentlemen theologians" of the antebellum South and the intriguing mix of repulsion and admiration that he developed for them. John Shelton Reed provides the light touch for which he is known in an essay on the sometimes surprising things one can learn about oneself by analyzing an aspect of one's ecclesiastical (in his case, Episcopalian) roots. Thomas E. Buckley, S.J., examines a Catholic's fascination with church-state issues in Virginia from Jefferson to Falwell. Andrew M. Manis relates his story of racial ambivalence, spiritual conversion, and liberal guilt, all leading to his biography of Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth. Lynn Lyerly tells a story of how Lutheran roots, a high-school race riot, and feminist politics led to her study of eighteenth-century Methodist women. For any devotee of the field, these rare peeks into the minds and souls of respected colleagues are a treat indeed.

JAMES O. FARMER
University of South Carolina-Aiken