DESCRIPTION
This sixth volume of Hughes Oliphant Old's monumental, acclaimed study of preaching throughout history,
The Modern Age, tells the story of preaching and worship from the French Revolution to the fall of the Berlin Wall (1789–1989). During this period preaching continued to support the historic Christian faith while the church undertook to resist secularization, come to grips with biblical criticism, and initiate bold overseas missions.
Opening with the revived Catholic Order of Preachers, continental Protestants such as Abraham Kuyper, and the self-consciously modern preaching of Friedrich Schleiermacher, Old moves on to consider Victorian figures such as John Henry Newman and Charles Haddon Spurgeon. He carefully lays out the tensions between Old and New School Calvinism as well as the beginnings of black preaching and the great American tradition of Charles Finney, Dwight L. Moody, Harry Emerson Fosdick, and many more. In the twentieth century Old's focus falls on the crises of the two world wars, especially the courageous ministries of German, Dutch, and Hungarian preachers during the Third Reich.
REVIEWS
Preaching
"When Hughes Oliphant Old launched his monumental, multi-volume history of preaching and worship, he set the bar of quality high. . . Old's achievement is prodigious from every standpoint. By any criterion, Old continues to give us epochal work in his amazing history of preaching. He cheers us and thrills us and saddens us and puzzles us. This book is nearly 1,000 pages long; but if you love preaching, you can hardly put it down."
William Edgar
— Westminster Theological Seminary
"Studying these volumes is like walking around a great cathedral: every section, however distinctive, unites in a grand design whose aim is to restore preaching to its rightful place. This multivolume work is easily the best history of preaching ever written, one that will serve generations of those whose faith comes by hearing."
James F. Kay
— Princeton Theological Seminary
"Ecumenical in breadth, magisterial in authority, and pastoral in intentionality, Old's multivolume history of preaching is a landmark in American intellectual history. Old views preaching as an act of worship, and his own prodigious scholarship likewise stands in service to God. He has bequeathed to the church of the twenty-first century the definitive history of preaching, a spiritual feast for scholars and preachers alike for years and years to come."