The Puritans: A Transatlantic History

by David D. Hall

Publisher:

Princeton University Press

, 2019

Overview

This book is a sweeping transatlantic history of Puritanism from its emergence out of the religious tumult of Elizabethan England to its founding role in the story of America. Shedding critical new light on the diverse forms of Puritan belief and practice in England, Scotland, and New England, David Hall provides a multifaceted account of a cultural movement that judged the Protestant reforms of Elizabeth’s reign to be unfinished. Hall’s vivid and wide-ranging narrative describes the movement’s deeply ambiguous triumph under Oliver Cromwell, its political demise with the Restoration of the English monarchy in 1660, and its perilous migration across the Atlantic to establish a “perfect reformation” in the New World.

A breathtaking work of scholarship by an eminent historian, The Puritans examines the tribulations and doctrinal dilemmas that led to the fragmentation and eventual decline of Puritanism. It presents a compelling portrait of a religious and political movement that was divided virtually from the start. In England, some wanted to dismantle the Church of England entirely and others were more cautious, while Puritans in Scotland were divided between those willing to work with a troublesome king and others insisting on the independence of the state church. This monumental book traces how Puritanism was a catalyst for profound cultural changes in the early modern Atlantic world, opening the door for other dissenter groups such as the Baptists and the Quakers, and leaving its enduring mark on what counted as true religion in America.

Key Features

• Provides a multifaceted account of the Puritan movement
• Presents a compelling portrait of a religious and political movement that was divided virtually from the start
• Examines the tribulations and doctrinal dilemmas that led to the fragmentation and eventual decline of Puritanism

Praise for The Puritans: A Transatlantic History

Mr. Hall’s magisterial work provides a ground-breaking international history of this controversial religious movement as it emerged in the Old World and evolved to shape the New. . . . His voluminous endnotes compress many decades of wide reading into what will become one of the definitive histories of its subject.

—Crawford Gribben, Wall Street Journal

This book is thoughtful, thorough, accessible, and immensely learned. . . . If you were looking for an authoritative, sympathetic, and absorbing theological history to while away this strange year, you have found it.

—Dr Alec Ryrie, Church Times

In short, Hall's volume surely ought to be considered the best scholarly history of Puritanism available today.

—Matthew Payne, The Global Anglican

Product Details

• Title: The Puritans: A Transatlantic History
• Author: David D. Hall
• Publisher: Princeton University Press
• Print Publication Date: 2019
• Pages: 520
• Language: English
• Resources: 1
• Format: Digital › Logos Reader Edition
• Resource ID: LLS:PRTNSTRNSTLNHST
• Resource Type: Monograph
• Metadata Last Updated: 2024-05-17T15:05:58Z

About David D. Hall

David D. Hall has taught at HDS since 1989, and was Bartlett Professor of New England Church History until 2008, when he became Bartlett Research Professor. He writes extensively on religion and society in seventeenth-century New England and England; his books include The Faithful Shepherd: A History of the New England Ministry in the Seventeenth Century; Worlds of Wonder, Days of Judgment: Popular Religious Belief in Early New England; and Puritans in the New World: A Critical Anthology. He has edited two key collections of documents: The Antinomian Controversy of 1636-1638: A Documentary History and Witch-Hunting in Seventeenth-Century New England: A Documentary History, 1638-1693. Another interest is the “history of the book,” especially the history of literacy and reading in early America. He edited, with Hugh Amory, The Colonial Book in the Atlantic World, the first of a five-volume series of which he is the general editor. He continues to study and write about religion and culture in early America, with particular attention to “lived religion” and, in a book nearing completion, to the political culture of the early colonists in the context of English movements and disruptions of the seventeenth century.