Perusall Annotations Introduction
- branches of the Second Great Awakening Christianity differed greatly in their beliefs and practices
- Second Great Awakening: protestant religious revival in the US from about 1795-1835
- most of them preached:
- salvation was an individual choice
- Millenarianism: the second coming of Christ was quickly coming
- they argued that the US had a divine mission to prepare world for the second coming
- this meant not just saving souls, but remaking the entire society
- different groups of Americans would apply their religious beliefs to solve problems they saw in their country
- they want to make the US as perfect as possible in comparison to other countries
- these problems included, but weren’t limited to:
- alcohol abuse
- poverty
- racial abuse
- gender inequality
- women took on leading roles in the social reform movements
- they overturned the ideal of domesticity
- domesticity: life at home taking care of your house and family
- women were treated as if all women were good for was to cook, clean, and take care of the children at home (as if they had no other purpose)
- women’s equality was made into its own reform movement
- abolition was the most controversial and important reform cause
- trying to end chattel slavery in the US
- chattel slavery: enslaving and owning of human and their children as property that are able to be bought, sold, and forced to work without pay
- Blacks and Whites united to try to convince society that slavery was sinful
- some radical abolitionists used the Second Great Awakening to ideas and theories to inspire the violent overthrow of slavery