Prominent historian Mark Noll considers the Civil War as a major turning point in American religious thought, as both Northerners and Southerners generally agreed on the authority of the Bible but disagreed about what it taught about slavery. He also surveys the observations of foreign Protestants and Catholics, who saw clearly that regardless of how much voluntary reliance on scriptural authority had contributed to the construction of national civilization, if there were no higher religious authority than the personal interpretation of scripture, public deadlock over conflicting interpretations would amount to a full-blown theological crisis.
- ISBN13 9781469621814
- Publish Date 1 February 2015 (first published 24 April 2006)
- Publish Status Active
- Out of Print 12 March 2021
- Publish Country US
- Imprint The University of North Carolina Press
- Format Paperback
- Pages 216
- Language English