Taking Up Serpents: Snake Handlers of Eastern KentuckyKimbrough traces the snake handlers' belief system to fundamentalist strains that rejected the kind of "intellectual" faiths associated with educated eastern ministers. They sought a folk religion, and lay preachers arose from their ranks to deliver the emotion-laden sermons they demanded. According to Kimbrough, the practitioners of snake handling find comfort in the certainty of scriptural commands, choosing to set themselves apart from the world through a religious practice that they believe aligns them with God and prepares them for a privileged position in the next life. For Kimbrough, snake handling represents an intensification of the fundamentalist impulse rather than a deviation from it. |
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