Swords and Plowshares: American Evangelicals on War, 1937-1973

by Timothy D. Padgett

Overview

Evangelicals are warmongering nationalists-right?

Many assume that evangelicals have always shared the ideology and approach of the Moral Majority. But the truth is much more complex. Historically, evangelical rank and file have not held to one position about war; instead, they are strewn across the spectrum from love of peace to glorying in war.

Timothy Padgett presents evangelicals in their own words. And in so doing he complicates our common perceptions of evangelical attitudes towards war and peace. Evangelical leaders regularly wrote about the temporal and eternal implications of war from World War II to the Vietnam War. Padgett allows us to see firsthand how these evangelicals actually spoke about war and love of country.

Instead of blind ideologues we meet concerned people of conviction struggling to reconcile the demands of a world in turmoil with the rule of the Prince of Peace.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781683591061
Publisher:	Lexham Press
Publication date:	11/07/2018
Series:	Studies in Historical and Systematic Theology
Pages:	440
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 8.90(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

Timothy D. Padgett (PhD, Trinity Evangelical Divinity School) is the Resident Theologian of BreakPoint.org with the Colson Center for Christian Worldview. His research interests focus on the way Christians argue for diverse viewpoints while sharing a common biblical foundation-particularly regarding the relationship between church and state, Christ and culture, and war and peace.

Table of Contents

Abbreviations xi

Acknowledgments xiii

1 Introduction 1

Historical Overview 4

Literature Review 8

Contribution and Methodology 13

Source Material 16

Structure 19

2 The Road to War, 1937-1941 20

Overview 20

Enemies 21

America 34

War 40

End Times 47

3 The Conflagration, 1942-1945 55

Overview 55

Enemies 56

America 66

War 77

End Times 92

4 Plowshares into Swords, 1946-1949 100

Overview 100

Enemies 101

America 111

War 121

End Times 132

5 Turning East, 1950-1953 142

Overview 142

Enemies 143

America 153

War 165

End Times 176

6 A Tense Peace, 1954-1958 184

Overview 184

Enemies 186

America 200

War 215

End Times 222

7 Battles Near and Far, 1959-1963 232

Overview 232

Enemies 233

America 247

War 264

End Times 272

8 Almost Armageddon, 1964-1968 281

Overview 281

Enemies 281

America 293

War 306

End Times 317

9 The End of War, 1969-1973 326

Overview 326

Enemies 327

America 337

War 352

End Times 359

10 Conclusions 375

Overview 375

Enemies 376

America 380

War 383

End Times 386

Conclusion 389

Bibliography 392

Author Index 422

Subject Index 424

Editorial Reviews

Swords and Plowshares is full of surprises, overturning the standard conceptions and misconceptions about Evangelicals and war. Focusing on World War II, Korea, and Vietnam, author Timothy Padgett explores what Evangelical writers during these years said about America, America's enemies, war, and the end times. Highly recommended for Evangelicals and critics of Evangelicals.

Bruce Riley Ashford

In many corners of the world, white American evangelicals are viewed as God-and-country hawks, blind supporters of their nation's military-industrial complex. But in this thought-provoking book, historian Timothy Padgett demonstrates that, from the time of World War II to Vietnam, the reality was rather more complicated. At their best, the most insightful evangelicals he features thought carefully and critically about their nation's wars and related foreign policy. They published support for the United States government. But they also criticized it—time and time again—based on teachings in the Bible. In their best-known magazines, they claimed allegiance more to God than to country.

Douglas A. Sweeney

Historians who correct false and damaging perceptions of individuals or groups engage in commendable acts of generosity. Timothy Padgett is one such historian. In the present work he successfully corrects the wide-spread historiography that Evangelical Christians from 1937 to 1973 were quite simply mindless military hawks. According to this claim Evangelicals uncritically accepted any military policy or action of the American government. With clear prose and a very impressive use of primary sources, Padgett demonstrates this contention is simply without merit. Padgett's well-crafted study, therefore, constitutes a marvelous contribution to any fair-minded quest to understand Twentieth-Century American Evangelicalism. For this reason as well as others the volume deserves a wide-readership.

John D. Woodbridge