Paine, Scripture, and Authority: The Age of Reason as Religious and Political Idea"This study discloses the intellectual context and the personal pretext of Thomas Paine's assault on religion in The Age of Reason. It uncovers adumbrations of Paine's correlation of religion and politics in his earliest work, the ways in which his controversy with Edmund Burke served as a transitional stage to his writings on Scripture, and the biblical criticism available to him as the main features of the contextual background of his struggle to assert authority. Although the "spectacle" of Paine's literary performance derives from intellectual conviction, it also arises from personal conflict - particularly as expressed in his lifelong opposition to various established patriarchal figures. Paine's achievement of authoritative voice, however, remains precarious and paradoxical in nature. His authority is always grounded in the very authority he deposes, with the result that his voice is little more than a theatrical performance that unwittingly re-enacts the rhetorical maneuvers of deposed father figures." "Paine never quite creates himself in any definitive sense. His identity, ever negotiating its authority through a linguistic performance of opposition, is necessarily left as incomplete as is the argument and text of the paratactic Age of Reason. In this pattern, Paine's work resembles a number of early American conversion narratives, which reveal a similar lack of completion in structure and resolution. In effect, The Age of Reason is a spiritual relation with a counter-religious design. It conveys Paine's desire to convert an audience of popular readers - even more than an audience of educated readers - to his "inspired" political insight: the need to depose all religious and political patriarchal forces to prevent the continuation of generational filicide and to regain paradise on earth." "Paine's spiritual relation instructs his readers to engage in an ongoing revisionism within themselves and in their world. His confession exhorts his readers to "write a better book" through their personal realization of heretofore repressed human potentialities. His work implicitly exhorts his readers to give - in their thoughts and in their actions - a scriptural testimony of the latent capacities of the human mind and society, capacities far beyond anything suggested in the Bible as it is used by church and state in the subjugation of humanity. For Paine, a "spiritual" descent, such as his in The Age of Reason, into the interior of the mind reveals that a discredited external authority can be inverted and that a credited internal autonomy can be asserted in its stead. Such descent/dissent creates the possibility for conversion, for the transformation of outmoded religious beliefs into a political paradise regained."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved |
Contents
| 26 | |
The BurkePaine Controversy As Prelude | 37 |
The Context of Paines Biblical Learning | 54 |
Paine Reads the Bible | 70 |
Paine is Answered | 88 |
I Can Write a Better Book Myself | 98 |
The Composition of The Age of Reason | 105 |
A Representative Alphabetical List of Contemporary Responses to The Age of Reason 179498 | 108 |
Notes | 117 |
| 132 | |
| 141 | |
Common terms and phrases
Age of Reason Alexander Geddes American Analytical Review Annual Register Answer Anthony Collins argument asserted atheism audience authenticity Babylonian Captivity belief Bible biblical biblical criticism Blake British Critic Burke's Cambridge chapter Christian chronology church claims commentary Common Sense concerning contemporary controversy Conyers Middleton corrupt Crisis papers Critical Review declared Deism Deist deposes divine early edition Edmund Burke eighteenth century England evidence father France French Revolution Geddes Geddes's Gentleman's Magazine Gospels human Infidelity Israelite Jesus John kings language later Letters London Middleton miracles monarchical Monthly Review Moses narratives nature Old Testament original Oxford Paine's Age Paine's book Paine's voice pamphlet paradise paradox Pentateuch performance political Priestley Princeton principles printed prophecy prophets Quaker Radical readers religion religious revelation revolutionary Richard Rights scriptural authority self-authorization skepticism social Spinoza spiritual relation strategies suggested theatrical Thomas Paine tion Tom Paine tradition translation University Press Watson William Word writings York
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