Horace Bushnell (1802-1876) is one of the most studied figures innineteenth-century American religious history, but there has beenno major biography of him for almost fifty years. "The Puritan asYankee provides a much-needed -- and provocatively new -- lookat this famous American Christian thinker.
Based on a close reading of Bushnell's writings and unpublishedsources as well as careful attention to how contemporaries saw him, Robert Bruce Mullin's book throws fresh light on its subject. Breakingfrom the long tradition of portraying Bushnell as the father ofAmerican liberal Christianity, Mullin offers a fundamentally new picture ofBushnell as a man deeply concerned with the questions of his age, and a far more interesting figure than previously thought. Bushnellemerges here as an innovator, a Yankee tinkerer in the field of religion, and a profoundly conservative figure.
Expertly researched and enjoyable to read, this volume tells animportant chapter in American religious history.
