Faith in the Fight: Religion and the American Soldier in the Great War

by Jonathan H. Ebel

Overview

Faith in the Fight tells a story of religion, soldiering, suffering, and death in the Great War. Recovering the thoughts and experiences of American troops, nurses, and aid workers through their letters, diaries, and memoirs, Jonathan Ebel describes how religion—primarily Christianity—encouraged these young men and women to fight and die, sustained them through war's chaos, and shaped their responses to the war's aftermath. The book reveals the surprising frequency with which Americans who fought viewed the war as a religious challenge that could lead to individual and national redemption. Believing in a "Christianity of the sword," these Americans responded to the war by reasserting their religious faith and proclaiming America God-chosen and righteous in its mission. And while the war sometimes challenged these beliefs, it did not fundamentally alter them.


Revising the conventional view that the war was universally disillusioning, Faith in the Fight argues that the war in fact strengthened the religious beliefs of the Americans who fought, and that it helped spark a religiously charged revival of many prewar orthodoxies during a postwar period marked by race riots, labor wars, communist witch hunts, and gender struggles. For many Americans, Ebel argues, the postwar period was actually one of "reillusionment."


Demonstrating the deep connections between Christianity and Americans' experience of the First World War, Faith in the Fight encourages us to examine the religious dimensions of America's wars, past and present, and to work toward a deeper understanding of religion and violence in American history.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780691162188
Publisher:	Princeton University Press
Publication date:	02/24/2014
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	272
Product dimensions:	6.10(w) x 9.10(h) x 0.90(d)

About the Author

Jonathan H. Ebel is assistant professor of religion at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments ix

INTRODUCTION 1

CHAPTER ONE: Redemption through War 21

CHAPTER TWO: Chance the Man-Angel and the Combat Numinous 54

CHAPTER THREE: Suffering, Death, and Salvation 76

CHAPTER FOUR: Christ's Cause, Pharaoh's Army 105

CHAPTER FIVE: Ideal Women in an Ideal War 127

CHAPTER SIX: "There Are No Dead" 145

CHAPTER SEVEN: "The Same Cross in Peace": The American Legion, the Ongoing War, and American Reillusionment 168

CONCLUSION 191

Notes 199

Selected Bibliography 235

Index 249

What People are Saying About This

Stout

Employing a wide variety of sources, Jonathan Ebel reconstructs the religious meaning of World War I for American soldiers and civilians, and his findings are highly revisionary. The conventional wisdom has been that the Civil War was the last 'romantic' war and that cynicism and disillusionment have ruled ever since. Yet when Ebel actually looks at the evidence, a very different picture emerges—one of deep-seated faith and an idealistic belief in America as a Christian nation.
— Harry S. Stout, Yale University

Jean Bethke Elshtain

In this book, Jonathan Ebel focuses on the Great War and the jolt it delivered to devout young American Christian soldiers. How were they to interpret this bloodletting and their own role in it? Where was God in the vast and terrible story of war? Where was God in relation to America? With keen sensitivity, Ebel takes up these and other questions. His book adds a fascinating and indispensable chapter to the scholarship on World War I.
— Jean Bethke Elshtain, author of "Sovereignty: God, State, and Self"

From the Publisher

"In this book, Jonathan Ebel focuses on the Great War and the jolt it delivered to devout young American Christian soldiers. How were they to interpret this bloodletting and their own role in it? Where was God in the vast and terrible story of war? Where was God in relation to America? With keen sensitivity, Ebel takes up these and other questions. His book adds a fascinating and indispensable chapter to the scholarship on World War I."—Jean Bethke Elshtain, author of Sovereignty: God, State, and Self

"In this beautiful and poignant book, Jonathan Ebel draws on the letters and diaries of American soldiers of the First World War to illuminate how they understood their service to be a religious calling. Anyone who thinks about the morality of war must read this book."—Stanley Hauerwas, Duke University Divinity School

"Employing a wide variety of sources, Jonathan Ebel reconstructs the religious meaning of World War I for American soldiers and civilians, and his findings are highly revisionary. The conventional wisdom has been that the Civil War was the last 'romantic' war and that cynicism and disillusionment have ruled ever since. Yet when Ebel actually looks at the evidence, a very different picture emerges—one of deep-seated faith and an idealistic belief in America as a Christian nation."—Harry S. Stout, Yale University

Stanley Hauerwas

In this beautiful and poignant book, Jonathan Ebel draws on the letters and diaries of American soldiers of the First World War to illuminate how they understood their service to be a religious calling. Anyone who thinks about the morality of war must read this book.
— Stanley Hauerwas, Duke University Divinity School

Editorial Reviews

"Perhaps no word is more deeply associated with World War I than 'disillusionment.' In the compulsive attempts of the second half of the 20th century to tell secularization narratives, one prominent version had religious faith never recovering from the shell-shock it got in the trenches, 1914-18. Jonathan H. Ebel, in his well-researched and persuasively revisionist study Faith in the Fight, convincingly demonstrates that this loss-of-faith story is wrong, at least for Americans."

Books & Culture

"With a dizzying array of interesting points, Ebel provides a list of new avenues of study. . . . Faith in the Fight is an impressive book that all scholars of twentieth-century American religious history should read and that should be incorporated in all subsequent studies of WWI."—-Paul Harvey, Religion in American History blog

From the Publisher

[T]he book is an important contribution to the growing literature on war and American religion.

Religious Studies Review - Jennifer Graber

Faith in the Fight contributes a well researched and written addition to the understanding of a war that many Americans relegate to secondary or tertiary status. . . . As we approach the World War I centennial, this is a masterful work that should reignite historiographical interest in this vital event in the nation's history.

Lutheran Quarterly - David E. Settje

Faith in the Fight raises interesting questions about American culture and life, and it offers some valid insights into that culture.

Anglican and Episcopal History Reviews - Fred R. van Hartesveldt

Faith in the Fight represents a valuable addition to the growing body of literature on the American experience of the Great War.

Religion, State and Society - Edward Madigan

Ebel has written an excellent book that deserves a wide readership. . . . [T]he book is an excellent fit for graduate seminars and should interest scholars looking at the specific period or religion and war in general.

Journal of American History - Steve Longenecker

Ebel's first book, which helps fill the vast empty spaces of American religious historiography, is a truly fine work that displays expert research and storytelling abilities. . . . We should look forward to more of Ebel's work. His book on 'trench religion' will become the standard book on religious faith of the forgotten men and women during the forgotten war.

Journal of Church History - Matthew Lewis Sutton

[W]ith his well-written and well-researched book . . . Jonathan H. Ebel . . . has made a stellar contribution to the interdisciplinary study of religion in American history.

American History Review - Malcolm D. Magee

Faith in the Fight illustrates the benefit of revisiting our current tidy categories of religion's decline in the face of modernity and secularism, and its readers are rewarded with a well written and fascinating glimpse of American soldiers and war workers' religious romanticism.

Journal of Church and State - Sarah Miglio

One of Faith in the Fight's great strengths is its attention to the voices of the men and women on the front lines. . . . Faith in the Fight helps us better understand the relationship between religion and war in the not-so-distant American past. It is also a book that illustrates the dangers inherent in the American penchant for sanctifying state violence. As Ebel masterfully demonstrates, Americans would do well to abandon a little of their faith in the fight.

Christian Century - Matthew Avery Sutton

With a dizzying array of interesting points, Ebel provides a list of new avenues of study. . . . Faith in the Fight is an impressive book that all scholars of twentieth-century American religious history should read and that should be incorporated in all subsequent studies of WWI.

Religion in American History blog - Paul Harvey

Ebel has written an excellent book that deserves a wide readership. . . . [T]he book is an excellent fit for graduate seminars and should interest scholars looking at the specific period or religion and war in general.
— Steve Longenecker

Journal of American History

Ebel's first book, which helps fill the vast empty spaces of American religious historiography, is a truly fine work that displays expert research and storytelling abilities. . . . We should look forward to more of Ebel's work. His book on 'trench religion' will become the standard book on religious faith of the forgotten men and women during the forgotten war.
— Matthew Lewis Sutton

Journal of Church History

[W]ith his well-written and well-researched book . . . Jonathan H. Ebel . . . has made a stellar contribution to the interdisciplinary study of religion in American history.
— Malcolm D. Magee

American History Review

Faith in the Fight illustrates the benefit of revisiting our current tidy categories of religion's decline in the face of modernity and secularism, and its readers are rewarded with a well written and fascinating glimpse of American soldiers and war workers' religious romanticism.
— Sarah Miglio

Journal of Church and State

One of Faith in the Fight's great strengths is its attention to the voices of the men and women on the front lines. . . . Faith in the Fight helps us better understand the relationship between religion and war in the not-so-distant American past. It is also a book that illustrates the dangers inherent in the American penchant for sanctifying state violence. As Ebel masterfully demonstrates, Americans would do well to abandon a little of their faith in the fight.
— Matthew Avery Sutton

Christian Century

With a dizzying array of interesting points, Ebel provides a list of new avenues of study. . . . Faith in the Fight is an impressive book that all scholars of twentieth-century American religious history should read and that should be incorporated in all subsequent studies of WWI.
— Paul Harvey

Religion in American History blog