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that true Christians must hold certain fundamen- tal beliefs. One of them is the belief that every word of the BIBLE is verbally inspired by GOD and literally true. Christian fundamentalists still hold to the fundamental beliefs. In the last part of the 20th and early part of the 21st centuries, they also came to be associated with a broader range of moral and political positions, such as opposi- tion to abortion and unions between homosexu- als and support for the Republican Party in the United States.

THE CHALLENGE OF MODERNISM

Developments in Europe during the 19th century presented many challenges to traditional Christian belief. Perhaps the most famous challenge came in 1859. In that year Charles Darwin published his views on natural selection and evolution. His theory explained the origin of the forms of plant, animal, and human life without referring to any divine purpose or guiding hand. Many thought that science had overthrown the traditional Chris- tian account of the creation of the world.

The 19th century presented many other chal- lenges to traditional belief. With the advance of the natural sciences, people began to doubt claims about MIRACLES. Indeed, the Scottish philosopher David Hume (1711–76), had already argued per- suasively in the 18th century for a position that made it almost impossible to accept any claims that miracles had occurred. That included claims that someone had risen from the dead.

Scholars who studied the Bible added other challenges. They treated the books of the Bible like any other human writing and in doing so explained many of their odd characteristics. A good example is the theory that TORAH, the fi rst fi ve books of the Bible, was not written by MOSES but emerged from combining four sources, known as J, E, P, and D

(see SCRIPTURES, HEBREW). In addition, historians seemed to show that the Bible was in error about crucial points. For example, Matthew and Luke seem to differ by at least ten years on the date of JESUS’ birth. Both cannot be right. Furthermore, in showing how various doctrines (see DOGMAAND DOCTRINE) developed over time, critical scholars raised questions about fundamental Christian beliefs, such as the VIRGINBIRTH, divinity, and RES-

URRECTION of Jesus.

Some theologians, who eventually became known as liberals, tried to develop a kind of CHRIS-

TIANITY that was compatible with these develop- ments. Their inspiration came from a German theologian named Friedrich Schleiermacher (1768– 1834). Schleiermacher rejected the literal truth of many traditional Christian teachings. At the same time, he taught that religion was not about beliefs or about morals but about a feeling, which he described at different times as a feeling of being a part of the universe or as a consciousness of God. For him what made Jesus special was not that Jesus was God but that Jesus had the strongest consciousness of God possible.

THE FUNDAMENTALIST RESPONSE

Developments such as those given above, includ- ing the development of liberal theology, alarmed many people. In European Protestantism church leaders tried to keep liberals from spreading their views in churches. In ROMAN CATHOLICISM the Vati- can directly and forcefully rejected modernism. Among a large number of American Protestants the response took the form of FUNDAMENTALISM.

The name fundamentalism came from a Bible conference held in 1895 in Niagara, New York. Par- ticipants adopted what they called fi ve fundamen- tal beliefs that they thought all Christians should hold. These are that the Bible is verbally inspired by God and without error, that Jesus is divine, that Jesus’ mother MARY was a virgin when he was born, that Jesus rose from the dead physically and will return at the end of time, and that his death brought about what is known as a “substitutionary atonement.” This view, fi rst expressed by ANSELM

(c. 1033–1109), bishop of CANTERBURY, in the Mid-

dle Ages, teaches that Christians receive SALVATION

because Jesus, who had no SIN, died as a substitute for ordinary human beings, who are sinners.

Christian fundamentalists have generally held other views besides these fi ve points. For example, many favor a view called “dispensationalism.” This position uses the Bible and its prophecies to interpret history. It identifi es seven “dispensa- tions” or ages, the last of which will be the rule of Jesus for 1000 years (the “millennium”). Fun- damentalists who adopt this position believe that Jesus will return, that Christians will be taken up into the atmosphere to meet him (an event known as the “rapture”), that all Jews will convert to Christianity, and that Jesus will rule the earth from Jerusalem. After these events will come the fi nal judgment.

Christian fundamentalists were quite adamant about their views, and they did not hesitate to spread them vigorously. Perhaps the most famous early confrontation between early fundamental- ists and the advocates of science was the trial of John Scopes (1900–70), a biology teacher in Dayton, Tennessee, in 1925. Under fundamental- ist infl uence, Tennessee had passed a law making the teaching of evolution illegal in public schools. Scopes admittedly violated the law. Some evidence indicates that the whole affair was a publicity stunt to draw attention to the town. In any case, the trial became a national event. Two famous lawyers squared off against each other, William Jennings Bryan (1860–1925) for the prosecution and Clar- ence Darrow (1857–1938) for the defense. Radio stations carried live broadcasts of the trial. There was never any real question that Scopes had vio- lated the law, but the trial brought much ridicule on Christian fundamentalism. Bryan, the advocate of fundamentalism, died immediately after it was over. His death seemed to be a symbol of the fate of fundamentalism among the American public.

RECENT DEVELOPMENTS

After World War II fundamentalism was not very visible in American life. Fundamentalists remained in their own churches, but they had little broader infl uence.

That changed in the late 1970s with the back- lash against the liberalism of the 1960s. The efforts of some popular fundamentalist preachers, such as Jack Hyles (1926–2001) in Hammond, Indi- ana, and Jerry Falwell (b. 1933) in Lynchburg, Virginia, had created mega-churches, with mem- bership numbering in the thousands and even the tens of thousands. Fundamentalists also began to spread their message effectively through the media of radio and especially television (see TELEVANGE-

LISM). Indeed, leading fundamentalists, such as Falwell, Pat Robertson (b. 1930), Jimmy Swaggart (b. 1935), and Jim (b. 1939) and Tammy Faye (b. 1942) Bakker, became public fi gures. Fundamental- ists organized their own groups for public action, such as Falwell’s Moral Majority, founded in 1979. In addition, they began to oppose liberals in vari- ous church bodies. Perhaps the most successful example is the Southern Baptist Convention. Start- ing about 1980, fundamentalists have dominated the formulation of Southern Baptist teachings and policies and have managed to take control of its educational institutions.

Christian fundamentalists have also made the teaching of evolution in public schools an issue once again (see EVOLUTION AND RELIGION). Instead of seeking to outlaw evolution, they have gener- ally preferred to insist on equal time for views of the origin and development of life that they claim are equally scientifi c. At fi rst they focused on “cre- ation science,” a set of views developed by Henry M. Morris (b. 1918) and advocated by his Insti- tute for Creation Research, founded in 1970. More recently, some have concentrated on views known as “intelligent design,” developed by Phillip John- son (b. 1940), Michael Behe (b. 1952), and Wil- liam Dembski (b. 1960), among others. According to this view, the order of nature is too complex to have arisen by chance.

As the name of the Moral Majority indicates, fundamentalists also became widely critical of what they saw as the moral degeneracy of American society. Many of their concerns centered around sexuality, an area in which conventional morality had been abandoned in the 1960s. Legalized ABOR-

TION became a contentious issue; some extreme

fundamentalists went so far as to bomb abortion clinics and kill doctors who performed legal abor- tions. Fundamentalists have also tended to see

HOMOSEXUALITY as voluntary behavior and have condemned it as sinful. They strongly opposed the sanctioning of unions between homosexuals, whether they be marriages or “civil unions.” More broadly, fundamentalists saw the American family as threatened by a variety of movements, includ- ing FEMINISM. They sought to protect it by empha- sizing what they saw as the biblically mandated roles for men and women. They also produced literature espousing their views, such as Hal Lind- sey’s (b. 1929) The Late Great Planet Earth (1970) and, more recently, Tim LaHaye’s (b. 1928) “left behind” series. Such books were extremely popu- lar in fundamentalist circles.

Finally, at the end of the 20th and the begin- ning of the 21st centuries Christian fundamentalists were also active in American politics. Like evangel- icals more broadly, they tended to believe that the state should be subservient to God. These political views show strong parallels to similar interests in Islamic and Hindu fundamentalism (see FUNDAMEN-

TALISM, HINDU; FUNDAMENTALISM, ISLAMIC). Some fun- damentalists sought to have the United States rec- ognized as a Christian nation. Many became active in the Republican Party.

By the beginning of the 21st century the center of gravity in the Christian world had shifted away from North America and Europe to the southern hemisphere, that is, to churches in Africa, Latin America, and some parts of Asia. Christians in these areas tend to be doctrinally and morally con- servative. In many respects, their views resemble Christian fundamentalism.

See also EVANGELICAL CHRISTIANITY.

Further reading: Richard T. Antoun, Understanding Fundamentalism: Christian, Islamic, and Jewish Movements (Walnut Creek, Calif.: Altamira Press, 2001); Karen Armstrong, The Battle for God (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2000); Martin E. Marty and R. Scott Appleby, eds., Fundamentalisms Comprehended (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995); Ralph W. Hood, Peter C. Hill, and

W. Paul Williamson, The Psychology of Religious Fundamentalism (New York: Guilford Press, 2005).

fundamentalism, Hindu