Brahmin Prophet

Phillips Brooks and the Path of Liberal Protestantism

By (author) Gillis J. Harp

Not available to order

Publication date:

03 September 2003

Length of book:

256 pages

Publisher

Rowman & Littlefield Publishers

ISBN-13: 9780847699605

The Reverend Phillips Brooks, author of the beloved Christmas Carol, O Little Town of Bethlehem, was undeniably one of the most popular preachers of Gilded Age America. However, very few critical studies of his life and work exist. In this insightful book, Gillis J. Harp places Brooks's religious thought in its proper historical, cultural, and ecclesiastical contexts while clarifying the sources of Brooks's inspiration. The result is a fuller, richer portrait of this luminous figure and of this transitional era in American protestantism.

Chapter 1 Introduction
Chapter 2 Early Years
Chapter 3 Phillips Brooks: Civil Warrior
Chapter 4 Tearing Down and Building Up
Chapter 5 A Prince of the Pulpit: Phillips Brooks and Nineteenth Century Preaching
Chapter 6 Close of the Century
Chapter 7 Conclusion

Gillis Harp's masterful treatment of Phillips Brooks in the intellectual and church context of his time is an instant classic. Dr. Harp's feel, from the inside, for Anglican Evangelicanism makes him an ideal interpreter of Brooks' ambivalent achievement. This is extremely solid scholarship, bearing somewhat devastating implications for the present.