Guaranteed Pure: The Moody Bible Institute, Business, and the Making of Modern Evangelicalism

by Timothy Gloege

Overview

American evangelicalism has long walked hand in hand with modern consumer capitalism. Timothy Gloege shows us why, through an engaging story about God and big business at the Moody Bible Institute. Founded in Chicago by shoe-salesman-turned-revivalist Dwight Lyman Moody in 1889, the institute became a center of fundamentalism under the guidance of the innovative promoter and president of Quaker Oats, Henry Crowell. Gloege explores the framework for understanding humanity shared by these business and evangelical leaders, whose perspectives clearly differed from those underlying modern scientific theories. At the core of their "corporate evangelical" framework was a modern individualism understood primarily in terms of economic relations.

Conservative evangelicalism and modern business grew symbiotically, transforming the ways that Americans worshipped, worked, and consumed. Gilded Age evangelicals initially understood themselves primarily as new "Christian workers—employees of God guided by their divine contract, the Bible. But when these ideas were put to revolutionary ends by Populists, corporate evangelicals reimagined themselves as savvy religious consumers and reformulated their beliefs. Their consumer-oriented "orthodoxy" displaced traditional creeds and undermined denominational authority, forever altering the American religious landscape. Guaranteed pure of both liberal theology and Populist excesses, this was a new form of old-time religion not simply compatible with modern consumer capitalism but uniquely dependent on it.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781469633435
Publisher:	The University of North Carolina Press
Publication date:	02/01/2017
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	328
Product dimensions:	6.10(w) x 9.10(h) x 0.80(d)

About the Author

Timothy Gloege is an independent scholar living in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

What People are Saying About This

Kathryn Lofton

The single most important work on Protestant fundamentalism written in the past decade, Timothy Gloege's learned, far-reaching text is phenomenally researched and beautifully written, providing a Gilded Age history that links powerfully to the present story of American religions. It will inspire debate and admiration.

Matthew Avery Sutton

A smart, innovative, and engaging book that will transform what we think we know about American Christian fundamentalism. Not only will this book be important to historians of religion--whether they are interested in evangelicalism, liberal Protestantism, or alternative faiths--it will also be necessary reading for those working on the evolution of modern business and the growth of consumer capitalism. Beautifully written, thoroughly researched, and carefully argued, Guaranteed Pure offers a powerful new interpretation of the origins of American fundamentalism as well as a compelling explanation for the long-term significance of evangelicals' close ties to the free market.

From the Publisher

The single most important work on Protestant fundamentalism written in the past decade, Timothy Gloege's learned, far-reaching text is phenomenally researched and beautifully written, providing a Gilded Age history that links powerfully to the present story of American religions. It will inspire debate and admiration.—Kathryn Lofton, author of Oprah: The Gospel of an Icon



A smart, innovative, and engaging book that will transform what we think we know about American Christian fundamentalism. Not only will this book be important to historians of religion—whether they are interested in evangelicalism, liberal Protestantism, or alternative faiths—but it will also be necessary reading for those working on the evolution of modern business and the growth of consumer capitalism. Beautifully written, thoroughly researched, and carefully argued, Guaranteed Pure offers a powerful new interpretation of the origins of American fundamentalism as well as a compelling explanation for the long-term significance of evangelicals' close ties to the free market.—Matthew Avery Sutton, author of American Apocalypse: A History of Modern Evangelicalism

Editorial Reviews

Eminently readable and frequently brilliant.—Christianity Today



A significant contribution to the historiographical wrangling over the character of American evangelism.—American Historical Review



A first-rate book that deserves close scholarly attention.—Review and Expositor



Draws fascinating connections between business and religion throughout.—Business History Review



American church history fans will relish this work.—Library Journal



In this significant, thought-provoking work, Gloege traces the rise of Evangelicalism after the Civil War.—CHOICE



Deftly argued, extensively researched, and with brilliant insight, Guaranteed Pure offers a major contribution to our understanding of American religion.—Church History and Religious Culture



May spark a new trend in American religious studies. . . . Add[s] significantly to our understanding and also speak[s] to our present situation.—The Annals of Iowa



A valuable contribution to the story of the interactions between Protestant evangelicalism and capitalism in the United States.—Journal of American History



Offers [insights] on the social and economic contexts that shaped both institutional and personal religious identity since the end of the nineteenth century.—Religious Studies Review

From the Publisher

03/01/2015
Independent scholar Gloeg's guiding thesis regarding a "corporate evangelical framework" suggests that post-Civil War capitalism and the plain-folk evangelicalism of Dwight Moody's correspondence school, the Moody Bible Institute (MBI), came of age together. There, metaphors of the business world were joined to God's miraculous intervention, promising spiritual and material success to believers. Tied to a profound sense of one's personal salvation, MBI provided a single point of identification for a varied group of conservative Protestants from biblical fundamentalists, so-called extreme Pentecostals such as Aimee Semple McPherson, followers of the Keswick holiness movement, and premillenialists such as John Nelson Darby and C.I. Scofield. Despite its liberal use of business language, MBI's form of practical revivalist religion smacks of certain uniquely American antiintellectualism, where the Bible serves as a "spiritual success manual," eventually prioritizing individual interpretation over and against the teaching authority of both church and tradition. Well footnoted and with an extensive bibliography, Gloege's book completes the historical loop to MBI started by the Left Behind books, coauthored by Jerry Jenkins, former editor of Moody magazine and now chairman of MBI's board of trustees. VERDICT American church history fans will relish this work.—Sandra Collins, Byzantine Catholic Seminary Lib., Pittsburgh

Library Journal