Scholars often use descriptors such as ‘individualistic’ and ‘democratic’ to describe Baptists in early national America. But as Jacob Hicks demonstrates, these terms don't offer much help in understanding how Baptist luminaries including Isaac Backus and John Leland organizationally transformed their movement from a persecuted sect into a respected denomination. Hicks breaks new ground by locating Baptists in the era’s vibrant milieu of politicking, publishing, and partisanship.
—Thomas S. Kidd, Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary — -
Jacob Hicks’s To Contest the Powers of Darkness maps out how New England Baptists wedded their individualistic instincts to savvy organizational strategies in order to obtain their religious and political goals in the early American republic. Through regional church networks, book and newspaper publications, and partisan activism, leaders like Isaac Backus and John Leland helped establish the once scattered and harassed Baptists on a firm footing in the young nation.
– Eric C. Smith, The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, Author of John Leland: A Jeffersonian Baptist in Early America
— -
Jacob Hicks rightfully points readers to important developments among New England Baptists across the long Revolutionary era. He situates famous Baptists like Isaac Backus, John Leland, and Adoniram Judson in larger frames of Baptist church life and institutional development and demonstrates that Baptists both shaped and were shaped by their political contexts. To Contest with All the Powers of Darkness helpfully contributes to the growing scholarly interest in, and understanding of, Baptist history in the new nation.
– Jonathan Den Hartog, Samford University
— -