Forgotten Transitions, Forgotten Books

It is amazing how a book can be sitting right on your bookshelf and you never see it or look at it. It is equally amazing how that book, if you are forunate enough to pick it up can enlighten you in many ways. C. Gregg Singer's A Theological Interpretation of American History has been that way for me for a few weeks now. I ran across it thinking I had to have something that dealt with American Transcendentalism from a quasi-biblical perspective. Little did I know how helpful the book would be.
Singer (1910-1999), a former professor at Greenville Presbyterian Theological Seminary makes a direct connection between the Deism of the founding fathers, the Unitarianism of their successors and the Transcendentalism of the early 19th century. In Singer's opinion, Transcendentalism was only the most recent option in terms of having a fully modern, intellectual faith. In order to exist in a world bent on modernity, people suckled on the Enlightenment had to have an intellectually defensible faith.
Deism was one step in that direction, but still held on to the distinctively Christian tradition of the Trinity. Unitarianism did away with that, but still insisted that Christ was divine. Transcendentalism finally exorcised that demon by presenting to us a faith "like Christ's" instead of a faith "in Christ." You see Christ was not divine, he was just the first person in a very long time to understand that we are all made in the image of God. Understanding this allowed him to act like God and be fully human, as God intended.
Transcendentalism, in turn, led to the reform movements of the nineteenth century, including women's suffrage and abolitionism among others. Once man was perfectible, it was not a long walk to the reform position on many social ills of the nineteenth century. We are still Transcendentalists at heart, bent on removing the last vestiges of orthodox Christian doctrine from our social lives. Unlike the Transcendentalists though, we no longer appear to believe that we are created in the image of God. Thank you Mr. Darwin.
If you want a good read on American history, pick up Singer's book. I'm not sure it is still in print, but I'll bet you can find a good used one. It is not a history textbook. It assumes a casual knowledge of the basic events in our history, as well as Europe.