REL306C

Hero or traitor? Freedom fighter or terrorist? Few historical figures are more polarizing than John Brown (1800-1859). A white radical abolitionist, Brown dedicated most of his adult life to the abolition of slavery by any means, including the 1859 plot to seize over 100,000 weapons from the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Virginia (now West Virginia). This course contextualizes Brown's life, legacy, and abolitionist principles in its proper nineteenth-century cultural, religious, theological, and political milieu. As an evangelical Calvinist Christian, Brown's faith guided his values and gave him strength in the abolitionist cause, and his piety fertilized his deeply held call to destroy the institution of slavery.