Text : Françoise Rochet
Illustration : Gratianne Garcia
... "Like mirages, the peaks rose above valleys lost in the mist and seemed to float on the clouds, passing from dark green to blue and then purple; the farthest peak formed only a black needle gushing into a crystal sky. »...
Autumn Drums
Diana Gabaldon
Ch 16 "The principles of thermodynamics"
We are in full Restoration. The Stuarts, once again in power, are indebted to all those who supported them during their exile and to those who financially, militarily and politically helped them regain their crown.
Eight aristocrats obtained, in 1663 and 1665, a first and then a second charter for a territory located between the northern limits of Spanish Florida and Virginia.
These Owners are English noble elites. This fact is essential because it reveals a growing interest in North America in the upper echelons of society. In fact, five of them were among the most powerful men in the kingdom.
The eight Lords Proprietors named in the charter were:
· Hyde, Duke of Clarendon, was Prime Minister to Charles II and father-in-law to James, Duke of York;
· Monck, Duke of Albemarle, was one of the military leaders who allowed the Stuarts to regain their throne during the First Revolution (1642-1651);
· Duke Craven, very close to the royal family and endowed with an immense fortune;
· Sir John Berkeley, close to the Duke of York, member of the King's Privy Council, co-owner of the colony of New Jersey from 1664 to 1674, but he finally decided to sell part of his shares to a group of Quakers.
· Sir William Berkeley, governor of Virginia and wealthy tobacco planter.
· Shaftesbury, younger, was a politician who was promised to play a leading role in the opposition to the Stuarts in the 1680s;
· Colleton, is the representative of a prestigious family from Barbados;
· William Berkeley, governor of Virginia from 1644 to 1651 and again from 1660 to 1677.
The latter two are men on the ground, so to speak, those who know the colonial reality best.
The task will be enormous, especially since the wealth was very important.
Once the valuable charter is obtained, the owners must
· send an expedition to explore, map the coastline of their domain;
· decide on a place conducive to the foundation of a first establishment;
· finance a fleet, the founding fleet, which will bring the first settlers;
· promote the colony in Europe through the publication of propaganda prints in order to recruit new migrants.
In the early years or even decades, the settlers had to be helped materially until they found an export product that could secure the commercial future of the colony.
In the case of the Carolinas, it takes more than twenty years to carry out all these operations.
Indeed, without a European presence since the departure of the Spaniards in 1587, everything remains to be done.
The Lords of the Carolinas first decide to recruit settlers
in Virginia, then under the administration of one of their own, Sir William Berkeley;
New England, then one of the most populous regions of English North America;
and in Barbados where they benefited from the influence of the Colleton family and where the sugar revolution caused a concentration of land ownership to the detriment of small planters then ready to leave the island.
In the 1660s, Barbadians and Virginians (no Puritan leader in New England had shown interest in the offers of the lords of Caroline) founded two settlements:
one near Cape Fear, in the northern part of the colony;
and the other in Port-Royal, in the southern part.
However, both were quickly abandoned.
Under shaftesbury's leadership, the Owners decided to finance the cost of settlement by investing £500 each, rather than attracting the intervention of Barbadian and Virginian planters and merchants.
In August 1669, the Owners chartered three ships – the Carolina (the only one that reached its destination), the Port-Royal and the Albemarle. After a stopover in Ireland and Barbados where the owners hoped to recruit other settlers, free and committed, they wanted to reach Port Royal.
They landed north, upstream of the Kiawah River, which would later be called Ashley in honor of Shaftesbury (Lord Ashley Cooper), where they founded Charleston.
The story goes that a Kiawah chief, one of the small nations on the coast, invited the English to settle on his territory in order to protect them from the Spanish and more powerful Native American groups.
Charleston remained the only true city south of Philadelphia until savannah, Georgia was founded in 1732. This city became the great main commercial center of the South of the English Colony.
Shaftesbury, with the help of John Locke, wrote in 1669 a text called the Fundamental Constitution which set up a complex project of society based on land ownership with the nobility at its peak.
The colony is divided into two regions.
These are the nuclei of the future South and North Carolina: Albemarle to the north and Clarendon to the south, each subdivided into counties.
In each of the counties, the Lords Owners owned 12,000 acres and the nobles, called landgraves and caciques, held 48,000 and 24,000 respectively. This was followed by the manor lords – who were not strictly speaking members of the nobility – with between 3,000 and 12,000 acres each depending on the size of their concessions, and finally the rest of the free settlers.
A parliament, which has the power to pass laws and appoint officials, brings together in the same chamber the Lords Owners (if they are present in the colony), the nobles and the representatives of the settlers who
did not exceed 400 in 1671.
South Carolina
The Lords of Carolina wanted newcomers to found towns like in New England. But at the beginning of colonization, they greedy for land, scattered along the rivers as in Virginia.
South Carolina will not be a colony of villages but at least it will have its port metropolis, unlike Virginia.
Twenty years after attempting to recruit Barbadians, Virginians and Puritans from New England in the 1660s, the Caroline Owners launched a new propaganda campaign aimed at English and Scottish dissidents, mainly Presbyterians and Huguenots, who had left France at the time of the revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685.
Some 500 Huguenots settled in South Carolina from 1680 to 1687. Coming mainly from the western provinces of France, including the La Rochelle region, they first settled in Charleston and then founded three communities outside the city: Goose Creek, Orange Quarter and French Santee.
This migration was an essential demographic contribution at a time when the colony was struggling to survive.
It gives the region a strong Francophone and Calvinist coloration.
Following the publication in Glasgow of a print on South Carolina and the notice of departure of a ship for Charleston, one hundred and fifty Scottish dissidents, the Covenanters, founded in 1684 the community of Stuart Town, in Port Royal Bay.
This handful of settlers must be the vanguard of a much larger group.
The Lords of South Carolina hoped for much from these Scots.
In negotiations with Scottish nobles, they agreed to give them control of an entire county and reworked the religious clauses of the basic constitutions to make their colony more attractive.
Once settled, conflicts began with the Spanish and Amerindians, their allies but also with the English who wanted to assert their hegemony over the territory and their monopoly on trade.
The Scots accustomed to raids began to excite the Spaniards who in 1686 sent 3 boats with 150 men and Native Americans. The weakened Scots had only 25 men in a position to defend themselves.
They looted and burned the houses. They destroyed the plantations and killed the betail.
The survivors were prisoners, sent to Spain and tried and condemned by the Inquisition.
The hope of creating a Scottish colony in South Carolina thus disappeared with Stuart Town.
The promotional campaign nevertheless bore fruit, leading to the arrival of hundreds of settlers.
While in 1680 the white population of the colony was 800 inhabitants, it increased to 2,400 ten years later.
South Carolina's real problem is its subtropical climate, with its very hot summer weather, hurricanes, and unhealthy environment conducive to malaria and yellow fever epidemics that regularly decimate settlers.
Under these conditions, over a century, between 1670 and 1770, the population grew very slowly.
The Lords Owners want to take advantage of this subtropical climate and decide to favor the production of Mediterranean such as silk, wine and olive oil.
They counted on the Huguenots but these settlers immediately began breeding cattle.
Livestock cost little. Animals graze freely and do not need to be slaughtered in the winter.
Livestock allowed the settlers to maintain a supply trade with the West Indies, especially Barbados.
But South Carolina's number one source of wealth is elsewhere!
The most enterprising settlers, merchants and planters, made their fortunes in the trade of suede skins and that of native slaves.
Large-scale Native American slavery is sadly one of the specificities of South Carolina.
Sacagawea (c. 1788–1812), a Lemhi shoshone captive of the Hidatsas and sold to Toussaint Charbonneau
On the other hand, they imported slaves after the creation in 1672 of the Royal African Company, for their vast tobacco plantations.
Finally, the introduction, in the 1690s, of a variety of rice, perhaps from Madagascar, will make a lasting fortune for South Carolina, the coast, with its marshes, lending itself to the extension of rice fields.
The main consequence of the development of rice cultivation was the rapid increase in the proportion of blacks, one of the demographic peculiarities of South Carolina.
From 1708, African slaves became the majority among the population of the colony.
In 1700, they represented 44% of the population,
In 1710, they constituted 53%.
In 1730, they were 66%, the highest percentage of the Thirteen Colonies for the entire period.
As early as 1691, the Lords Proprietors appointed an assistant governor for North Carolina, and when, in the same year, the representatives of Albemarle County could not attend the Charleston assembly because of too much distance, they decided to meet there.
In 1712, the institutional separation was definitively endorsed by the Owners who appointed a governor specifically for North Carolina.
In 1729, the British government retook possession of the Carolinas.
The country was divided into two states, North Carolina and South Carolina.
North Carolina
Because North Carolina was too far from Charleston to be administered effectively and for planters to sit in the assembly, North Carolina was officially detached from its southern neighbor.
It now has its own governor and assembly.
Politically, North Carolina has a history of instability and isolation.
As a result, it follows a radically different economic and demographic path. The colony had to face a major problem, the impossibility of trading directly by sea. It was too far from the port of Charleston to hope to turn to export at the beginning of its creation.
Indeed, the inhospitable contours of the coast prevent the emergence of a port because no ship of large size, necessary for Atlantic trade, can enter the bays. Despite abundant exports, a major seaport never developed in North Carolina. The majority of trade was carried out by land.
On the other hand, the hundreds of coves facilitated the entry of small boats and smuggling. The well-known colonial-era pirates Stede Bonnet and Blackbeard are famous for scouring the coasts of North Carolina.
The vast majority of the population is made up of modest farmers, who arrived from Virginia.
North Carolina's hot and humid climate was perfect for growing tobacco and rice.
The Virginians brought with them the different techniques inherent in these plants and their management.
Gradually, they will adapt to the topography. On a thin strip of land along the coast, settlers began rice production convinced of the market value of this product.
By 1700, rice had overtaken tobacco as the state's main export.
Due to a lack of means and manpower, farmers are developing a subsistence economy based on tobacco, wine and olive oil, corn, wheat, to which they will add indigo.
With the Virginians also came the tradition of using indentured servants to work on the farm.
Gradually, these workers were replaced by African slaves, but to a lesser extent than in the other southern states because these poor farmers lacked financial means.
Pig farming developed in North Carolina, and by the mid-eighteenth century, tens of thousands of pigs were transported overland each year to northern markets.
Pine trees were abundant and easy to mine. Tar, rosin, turpentine and tree trunks that served as masts were invaluable materials for shipbuilding.
The tar so abundant is at the origin of a sobriquet: the Carolinians of the North are known as "tar heels".
Very quickly, the mountainous hinterland was colonized by those who sought more freedom of conscience, an open-mindedness other than that of the Puritans. They found a favorable asylum there far from the coast and the English.
Soon, the interior was dotted with small prosperous farms but also large land holdings, such as that of Peter Jefferson, father of Thomas Jefferson, 3rd President of the United States.
But most were small pioneers, settled on the edge of the regions inhabited by the Indians, their huts were real small fortresses.
They became by necessity robust people.
Around 1730, North Carolina experienced a strong immigration of modest Scottish families who settled at the foot of the Appalachian Mountains.
A second wave followed after the fall of the Stuarts.
These small communities loved life, parties, we danced, we drank... whole oxen were cooked... the famous barbecue was born. The English, when they arrived in America after the Spaniards, observed the customs of the Indians.
Most of these Indians cooked their food on a kind of grill called barbacoa in Arawak, one of the Amerindian languages, spoken especially in the West Indies. And the English adopted the word, and adapted it to their pronunciation, hence barbecue
Other communities will arrive.
There are, of course, Anglicans who come from Virginia.
Quakers, Baptists, Episcopalians, Lutherans, ..., co-religionists of the New Light.
See the glossary at the end of the document.
And there we also meet the Moravian Brothers.
* A sect from Protestantism that fled religious persecution in Moravia (on the current Czech Republic and Slovakia).
* They founded Salem, a city reserved only for their members.
* They did not mix and did not allow others to live with them.
* They were good craftsmen and traders and their products were in high demand.
* They lived from trade with the pioneers who went west.
To be close to this source of production, other settlers came to settle nearby and also founded a city, Winston. Tobacco production and trade made Winston a much richer and larger city than Salem.
This Church develops its own doctrine, wanting to regain the brotherhood of the first Christians. They elected their clergy and, retaining their own bishops, rejected the local religious hierarchy. They translate the Bible into vulgar language. In this movement, the importance of education is advocated and religious intolerance is denounced.
The Moravian Brothers settled in the United States, Pennsylvania and North Carolina, where they created villages (Bethlehem, Nazareth) in the image of the villages of Bohemia and Moravia.
Two excerpts taken from the Gathering section that talk about the New Light.
T5-1 Ch13
"I'm sorry, Ms. Fraser, but it's the law. Any member of the clergy who does not belong to the Church of England may not legally remain in the colony unless he has signed this oath. Most people accept it. Do you know reverend Urmstone, the itinerant Methodist priest? He signed, just like Mr. Calvert, the pastor of the New Light who lives near Wadesboro. »
"He refuses to be treated by Murray MacLeod because he considers him a heretic. Murray belongs to the New Light. You yourself, Ms. Fraser, being a papist — not to mention that you already had a lot to do with the birth of the two little ones"
T5-1 Ch23
The Moravian Brothers
"Tell me... Mr. Fraser would not have spoken to you — about his interviews in the villages... he didn't say anything about possible... arson? I straightened up, the euphoric effect of the cider immediately dissipating. "What, there have been others? He nodded, ran a weary hand over his face, and then rubbed the thatch on his cheeks. "Yes, two... but in one case it was just a barn in Salem. It belonged to a Moravian. From what little I have learned, Irish-Scots living in Surry County would probably be responsible. Their stingy preacher keeps setting them up against the Moravians... this band of pagans! »
T6 Ch19
"I went out on the porch, just in time to greet the two men who were pulling their mules on the last steep stretch of road that led to the court: Richard Brown and his brother Lionel, coming from the colony that bore their name, Brownsville.
I was amazed to see them. It took at least three days by horse to connect Brownsville to Fraser's Ridge, and the two communities rarely traded together. In the opposite direction, Salem was also far away, but the people of Fraser's Ridge went there more often. The Moravians were both hardworking and excellent barters, exchanging our honey, oil, salted fish and skins for cheeses, pottery, chickens and other small farm animals. As far as I know, the people of Brownsville produced nothing but junk for the Indians, and a mediocre beer that wasn't worth the trip. »
Text on the qualities of moravian traders, the only ones to use money or barter for exchanges; this is of great interest to Jamie who needs money to buy weapons for example.
T6 Ch 09
Indentured and deportees
T5 Ch94
"Christie had been deported to the colonies with the other prisoners, but he was fortunate to have his serfdom contract bought by a South Carolina planter. The latter, discovering his knowledge of the letters, had made him the tutor of his six children, and then made the neighboring families pay for the privilege of sending their offspring to be educated by Christie. His contract having expired, he had agreed to stay in exchange for wages. — Really? Roger's interest in the visitor had increased considerably. A schoolmaster! This would make Brianna a great pleasure who was just waiting to return her mistress apron. In addition, Christie seemed perfectly capable of subduing the most restive students. "What brings you to our region, Mr. Christie?" We are a long way from South Carolina. Christie shrugged his broad shoulders. He was tired from his long road, covered in dust, but his clothes were cut from a good quality sheet and he was well shod. "My wife was swept away by the flu," he said in a gruff tone. Just like Mr. Everett, my employer. His heir didn't need my services, and I didn't want to stay there without a stable job. »
"Daddy! Lizzie screamed. She threw herself into his arms. Jamie put his little finger in his ear and waved it, looking stunned. "I didn't think she could make that noise so much," he said. He laughed and handed me two pieces of paper that had once been a single sheet torn in half. "This is Mr. Wemyss's contract," he told me. Volume 4 Ch70 and the following: "As Mr. Wemyss explained the case to us, everything became clearer. Jamie had promised Lizzie to give him a dowry, a prime piece of land. For his part, Mr. Wemyss being released from his serfdom contract, he had been granted a concession of twenty-five hectares, which Lizzie would one day inherit. However, this land adjoined the McGillivrays' land and the two together would form a very respectable agricultural estate. »
T5 Ch76
...« Jamie remained leaning against a sycamore, his eyes half-closed.
"What do you think of this place, Sassenach?"
"I think it's beautiful, don't you?" He nodded and scanned a point between the trees from which one could see a gentle slope, covered with hay and wild halibut. At the very bottom, a row of willows lined the distant river.
"I was thinking... he hesitated. There is a spring here in the wood, and then there, a meadow... In the early days, we could get by with a few beasts. Once deforested, the riverside part would be perfect for crops. Nothing like an inclined ground for good irrigation. And there... Carried away by his vision, he stood up, pointing me to various places. I followed his explanations. The place did not seem to me so different from the other wooded slopes and green meadows that we had crossed, but his farmer's eyes already saw the emergence of barns, chicken coops and fields from the land. He radiated happiness. My heart squeezed.
"Are you considering moving here, so you've decided to accept the governor's offer?" »...
Autumn Drums
Diana Gabaldon Ch.16.
Asheville, a small and very dynamic mountain town
By way of conclusion
Here we are at the end of this long journey.
We started it in the North of the New World.
With these Thirteen Colonies scattered along the coast of the Atlantic Ocean, England built, in less than a century and a half, an empire.
The motivations were multiple... fleeing religious persecution, a desire to enrich oneself, a desire to glorify God, attempting social and religious experiences, a growing affirmation of a political presence, territorial extension, geopolitical hegemony...
The price to pay was enormous: the extermination of the Natives, the enslavement of the black people, fratricidal wars, religious rivalries.
It is difficult for us today to understand what happened.
We do not judge.
We see.
Thousands of settlers set sail, faced the dangers of a months-long crossing, the risks of a brutal transplant, the fear of the Aboriginals, the uncertainties of a harsh climate in the hope of a new life.
This human adventure is the expression of a foolproof voluntarism.
The history of the United States is one of growth: that of a small distant colony that has become a huge "nation of immigrants" and the first contemporary power.
It was then that of a flagship nation, the first colony that "liberated itself", proclaimed the first "republic" of the modern world and won its war to establish itself definitively as a sovereign nation.
It is that of a diffuse, heterogeneous, improbable dream that consists of equality and prosperity, virtue and progress, individual freedom and the worship of law, puritanism and aspiration to happiness, conformism and respect for differences, national unity and the rights of States.
It is also the cruel reality of slavery, discrimination, poverty and a freedom that remains an inaccessible star.
A land of contradictions, it fascinates with its Constitution, its founding principles, its technology and its popular culture made of barbecue, gospel, rock and roll and blues...
We started this journey with this beautiful text... it allows us to finish this beautiful journey.
"So the world is watching America — the only great power in history made up of people from all over the world, including all races, religions, and cultural practices — to see if our experience of democracy can work. (...)
To see if we can rise to the height of our convictions."
"A Promised Land", Barack Obama, August 2020
Glossary
Anabaptist in the sixteenth century Current from the Reformation, and developed especially in the Germanic and Anglo-Saxon world, which does not admit the baptism of children and replaces it with that of adults.
Its followers advocated the baptism of adult believers and thus renamed those who had been baptized children, hence the term "Anabaptist", that is, rebaptizer. They also refuse to carry the sword, hold public office and take the oath. This pacifist tendency is considered seditious. The Anabaptists are ruthlessly hunted down and persecuted. At the end of the sixteenth century, repression calmed down and Anabaptist doctrine spread.
Anglicanism: 70 million people. Anglicanism dates back to the sixteenth century.
The Church of England is a state church, with the sovereign being the supreme head of the Church and Parliament having veto power over measures taken by the synod. But the Church is gradually distancing herself from the State. The Anglican Churches operate in an Episcopalian type (governed by the assembly of bishops) and they claim apostolic succession. Anglicanism spread throughout the world especially in the former British possessions. The Anglican Communion brings together all the Anglican Churches around the Archbishop of Canterbury. Each church has its own government. All bishops meet every ten years at the Lambeth Conference. And the presiding bishops of each Church meet regularly at the Committee of Primates to dialogue and exchange on the issues encountered in their Church.
Baptism: The Baptist Church is a Protestant Church that practices only adult baptism.
Since its origins, Baptism combines three major characteristics:
· A rather Reformed theology: the Bible as the foundation of faith.
· A specific conception of baptism, which is practiced by immersion of the believer in adulthood following his public witness; this immersion is considered a new birth, a necessary condition for becoming a member of the Church; it is a Church of "professants". One is not born a Christian, one becomes one.
· The Baptists insist on the missionary vocation: every believer, every community is called to make the Gospel known.
Baptist statistics only take into account the faithful baptized by immersion, not counting adolescents and children socialized in the churches; it is therefore necessary to multiply the number of members by two or three to evaluate the Baptist population. Under these conditions, in 2005, the world population would be between 125 and 150 million, with a very unequal distribution: especially implanted in the north of the United States, baptism is also strongly present in Russia, where it constitutes the second confessional group after the Orthodox, and is experiencing a spectacular growth in Ukraine.
In Western Europe, England has the most Baptists (200,000).
Calvinism: Refers to one of the main forms of historical Protestantism, stemming from the thought of John Calvin. In France, the term reformed is used instead.
Last Supper or Lord's Supper: Sharing bread and wine in memory of Jesus' last supper with his disciples, which takes place during worship. It is also called communion. Calvin kept two sacraments: baptism and the Last Supper. He separated from Luther on the doctrine of the Last Supper. Both reject the Catholic doctrine of transubstantiation. But for Luther, Christ is present in the bread and wine of communion. For Calvin, Christ is spiritually present during the celebration of the Last Supper. As the believer's body is nourished by bread and wine, his soul is spiritually nourished by the Body of Christ. These two events take place jointly. See transubstantiation and sacrament.
Congregationalism: Structure of a Church where authority is assumed autonomously by each parish or congregation.
Since the Church is the community of believers, each local assembly is autonomous and sovereign. In this so-called Congregationalist system, the local Churches collaborate with each other - in federations, for example - but have no link of hierarchy or authority. The pastor is elected by the faithful.
Evangelical churches: 500 million people
Evangelical churches have their origins in various Protestant reform movements of the sixteenth century, especially Anabaptist and Baptist.
Generally speaking, these Churches have the particularity of recognizing as members only those who profess faith in Jesus Christ and who, in asking for baptism, make a voluntary and personal act of repentance and faith.
From the beginning of their history, evangelicals have strongly affirmed the principle of the separation of Church and State.
They also attach as much importance to evangelization as to social action.
Evangelical churches can be organized according to different principles (Congregational, Presbyterian-Synodal, etc.).
Episcopal: Structure of a Church where authority is assumed by bishops.
Evangelism: Doctrine of reformers in the sixteenth century for whom the Gospels are the basis of faith.
At the end of the eighteenth century, spiritual awakening movements took this name.
Lutheranism: goes back to the very origins of the Reformation and claims the three central affirmations of Luther's message:
· sovereign authority of the Bible;
· salvation by grace (and its corollary, justification by faith);
· universal priesthood of believers.
65 million people
Methodism: The Methodist Church is a Protestant church that emerged from john Wesley's Revival; it insists on personal conversion to Jesus Christ, called "new birth".
Moravians: The Moravian Brothers are a religious movement inspired by the pre-reformer Jan Hus (1369-1415) preaching individual piety. This movement rallied to Protestantism has a strong missionary activity.
By the Treaty of Westphalia in 1648 which ended the Thirty Years' War, the Czech countries were forced to become part of the southern, Catholic and Habsburg zone. This was the beginning of the Counter-Reformation and forced "re-Catholicization".
This period, known as the "period of darkness", lasted 150 years, until the Edict of Tolerance of 1781.
However, a clandestine Church is being formed. Celebrations take place in private homes or in clandestine assemblies.
The exile continued throughout the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.
They are establishing new communities in many countries, Caribbean, South Africa, North America, Greenland.
The Moravian Brothers influenced other Protestant communities, including the founders of Methodism.
New Light: The religions of the New Light are called the religions that emerged during the Great Spiritual Awakening. See Alarm Clock
Pietism: Revival movement born at the end of the seventeenth century in Germany, Pietism highlighted conversion, biblical piety and the importance of small groups of prayer and spiritual edification.
Predestination: Calvin writes, in the Institution of the Christian Religion, (III, XXI, 5): "We call predestination, the eternal counsel of God, by which he determined what he wanted to do with each man. For he does not create them all in such conditions, but commands some to eternal life, others to eternal damnation. So depending on the end for which man is created, we say that he is predestined for death or life."
Puritan: A movement that appeared in England during the reign of Elizabeth I that aimed to "purify" the English Church of the elements of Catholicism that still remained in its ritual.
Presbyterian: a church of Scottish origin that is attached to the Synodal Presbyterian system, under which power rises upwards, from local Churches that delegate it to regional or national assemblies.
Revival: A spiritual movement within Protestantism aimed at awakening a dormant faith and revitalizing the Churches. The preachers of the Revival seek to provoke emotion and individual conversion. The Revival movements of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries were at the origin of many charitable works, evangelization and missions.
Historians have seen in it the beginnings of the War of Independence. A people who wake up yearning for freedom.
Revivalist: Relating to a Protestant revival movement, which appeared at the end of the eighteenth century in Europe and North America. This is the New Light.
Sacrament: Ritual act aimed at the sanctification of the one who is the object of it. (The Catholic Church and the Orthodox Churches recognize seven sacraments: baptism, confirmation, the Eucharist, marriage, penance, order and anointing of the sick. The Protestant Churches retain only two: baptism and the Eucharist or Holy Communion.)
Sacred sign instituted by Jesus Christ that gives divine sanctification.
Catholics recognize transubstantiation.
John Smyth (c. 1570 – 28 August 1612) was the first English Baptist minister and an advocate of the principle of religious freedom. John Smyth is considered one of the main founders of Baptism.
Synod: Representative Assembly of the Protestant Churches. Among the Reformed, we distinguish the national synod from regional synods (called provincial in the seventeenth century). The national synod brings together delegates from all over the country. It is he who makes the decisions on doctrine.
Transubstantiation: Catholic doctrine that, at the time of the Last Supper, the substance of bread and wine is changed into the whole substance of the body and blood of Jesus Christ.
Quakers: The Religious Society of Friends is a religious movement founded in England in the seventeenth century by dissidents of the Anglican Church. They call each other "Friends" and "Friends". George Fox is its founder.
· They believe in the presence in every man of a "divine seed or light" that he must find in silent meditation.
· Worship is therefore at home, in principle, entirely spontaneous.
· The exhortations that each of the participants is free to make must be the fruit of successful communion with the Light above, in silence. Inner light.
· The same Spirit who inspired the Bible can inspire all believers.
· They reject all the sacraments, even baptism and the Last Supper.
· Every act of the Christian must be a sign of God's grace for himself and for other men.
· To these conceptions it is necessary to relate the practice of the conduct of the affairs of the Society in the monthly, quarterly or annual meetings ,in which the authority in matters of faith and administration resides.
· All Quakers, male or female, participate equally. The "Elders" do not enjoy any particular power, except the moral authority they may have acquired.
· Decisions are not taken by a majority of votes, but by unanimity. It is a question of getting to clear the sense of the meeting. We elaborate at length in the chapter on Pennsylvania.
John Wesley (1703-1791), founder of Methodism, is undoubtedly one of the most prominent figures of Protestantism. An Anglican pastor, he comes from this singular mixture of Anglicanism and Puritanism. After graduating from Oxford, he and his brother created the Holy Club (1729-1735), a student society dedicated to reading ancient texts and the Bible. Its members scrupulously observe the Scripture, which earned them the name "Methodists."
In 1735, John Wesley, ordained an Anglican priest, went to evangelize the Indians of Georgia.
He considers this America a "land of mission", with the avowed aim of reducing the influence of the Quakers. But he was disappointed that he could not carry out missionary work with the Indians. Thus, he returned to Europe, shaken in his Anglican faith and inspired by the attendance of the Moravians.
Back in London, John Wesley frequented the Moravian community.
He has the intimate certainty of the remission of his sins. He discovers that his salvation depends on Christ alone.
This kind of conversion became a feature of Methodism.
In preaching the God who reveals Himself, Wesley fought the deism of the Enlightenment all his life. His sermons are directed towards the practical Christian life.
Williams Roger (c. 1603 – January–March 1684) was an American theologian and Baptist minister.
In the 1640s, he developed a political theology whose innovative intuitions would prove decisive in
Anabaptism was born in Europe during the Calvinist and Lutheran Reformation in the sixteenth century as a social group known as the "Swiss Brothers".
Baptism begins with English Puritanism and is influenced by Anabaptism.
Main branch of the evangelical galaxy within Protestantism.
Pastor John Smyth (c. 1570-1612)
A leading example is Pastor Roger Williams, founder of the American colony of Rhode Island (1637), whose Constitution proclaims for the first time absolute religious freedom and will inspire that of the United States.
Only faith in Jesus counts.
One is not born a Christian, one becomes one.
Faith in Jesus is not enough.
They do not recognize the Baptist status of justification by faith alone.
They focus on
· a life of good works
· demonstrations of grace
Discipleship: Jesus' disciples learn to resemble their master, helped by the Holy Spirit, who dwells in their hearts, to withstand the trials of life.
Only faith counts to be saved.
Hi: Anabaptists insist on good works to be saved, using the New Testament as a specific standard.
Rejection of infant baptism
Adult baptism only.
The new convert pronounces a public confession of faith, before being immersed in water.
Only converts form the Church. When counting their numbers, Baptists do not take into account children, adolescents and other unbaptized people.
Reformed Baptists believe that babies can be baptized.
Anabaptists teach that a man must first trust the gospel before being baptized.
Rejection of infant baptism
Adult baptism only.
"anabaptist", evokes "the one who cleans again through water"
This is in light of the biblical lessons of Jesus Christ. In this way, they do not baptize babies.
They propelled their confidence in total and absolute pacifism
Less pacifist, they accept to fulfill their duties as citizens, accept military life.
No political activities
Political activities
Old and New Testament.
sola scriptura, authority comes from God through his word, the Bible, which some Baptists make a very literal reading.
It is traditional to offer the Bible to every newly baptized person.
New Testament
Rejection of the outside world
They are centered on simplicity based on the teachings of Christ
Fit perfectly into the modern world;
They evolve with the times.
Individual property
Anabaptists believe that all properties should be shared
Anabaptism - Le Baptism
Community control of the individual
Freedom of action of the individual
From their inception, Baptists have campaigned for Separation of Church and State.
Separation of church and state
They pleaded for respect for freedom of conscience and worship.
Nobel Peace Prize minister Martin Luther King.
Paradoxically, tens of thousands of American Baptists also belonged to the Ku Klux Klan in the 1920s and 1930s.
In 2004, the Southern Baptist Convention (16 million faithful), the first Protestant Church in the United States, left the Baptist World Alliance, considered too liberal on issues of homosexuality, women's ministry and bible interpretation.
Evangelical Church: every believer has a vocation to proclaim the Gospel. Among the most famous, the American preacher Billy Graham, who in 1995 - an unprecedented fact in history - preached to millions of television viewers in 185 countries through satellite broadcasting.
Bibliography
· BOURGET, Jean-Loup, MARTIN, Jean-Pierre and ROYOT Daniel, Histoire de la culture américaine, Paris, Presses universitaires de France, 1993.
· BUTEL, Paul, Histoire de l'Atlantique de l'Antiquité à nos jours, Paris, Perrin, 1997.
· COMBESQUE Marie-Agnès, Martin Luther King Jr. Un homme et son rêve, Le Félin, Paris, 2009
· COTTRET Bernard, Histoire de la Réforme protestante, Perrin, Paris, 2001KASPI, André, Les Américains, vol. 1 : Naissance et essor des États-Unis, 1607-1945, Paris, Le Seuil, 1986. LACROIX, Jean-Michel, Histoire des États-Unis, Paris, Presses universitaires de France, 2010.
· COTTRET, Bernard, HENNETON, Lauric, POTHIER, Jacques and VAN RUYMBEKE, Bertrand (dir.), Naissance de l'Amérique du Nord. Les Actes fondateurs, 1607-1776, Paris, Les Indes savantes, 2008.
· HENNETON, Lauric, Histoire religieuse des Etats-Unis, Paris, Flammarion, 2012.
· RATABOUL Louis, John Wesley, un anglican sans frontières, PUF, Nancy, 1991
· SCHARF Simon, The Doctrine of Sanctification according to John Wesley, A Calvinist Approach to the Question of Christian Perfection
· STREIFF Patrick, John Wesley, the preacher and his theological thought from his sermons, Collection The Church in History, Excelsis
· VAN RUYMBEKE BERTRAND, "America before the United States. Une histoire de l'Amérique anglaise, 1497-1776", Flammarion, Paris, 2016