Provoking Southern Christianity: Baptists, Methodists, Schisms and Slavery

This thesis examines the schisms in the antebellum Baptist and Methodist Churches regarding slavery. It was these internal ruptures in both denominations that helped influence life in the slave community. The slave narratives of Henry Bibb, William Wells Brown, Frederick Douglass and Harriet Jacobs reveal the impact the schisms had on master-slave relations and slave religious instruction. Moreover, the internal rupture in both denominations over the South‟s peculiar institution was instrumental in spawning a pro-slavery Christianity. This pro-slavery Christianity proved crucial in extending and strengthening white hegemony.