Page 148 - Encyclopedia Of World History Vol IV

pentecostalism 1449

When and Where
World Religions Began

4000–2500 bce Hinduism South Asia
1300–1200 bce Judaism West Asia ern Appalachia and the Ozark Mountains even handle
500–400 bce Buddhism South Asia poisonous serpents.
Confucianism China
Development of
Zoroastrianism West Asia
Pentecostalism in the U.S.
Jainism South Asia
Early sites of the Pentecostal movement included a cen-
400–221 bce Daoism China ter in western North Carolina and eastern Tennessee con-
1st century ce Christianity West Asia, nected with A. J. Tomlinson and the Church of God; a
Europe center in Topeka, Kansas, associated with Reverend
Charles Parham; and the interracial Asuza Street revival
3rd century ce Manichaeism West Asia
of 1906–1909 in Los Angeles. Parham left the Meth-
6th century ce Shinto Japan
odist Episcopal Church to establish Bethel Healing
7th century ce Islam West Asia Home in Topeka, Kansas, in 1898. He had been inspired
11th century Orthodoxy West Asia by the healing ministry of J. A. Dowie of Zion City, Illi-
15th–16th Sikhism South Asia nois, and visited Holiness and healing ministries from
Chicago to New York to Georgia in 1900. In late 1900,
century
Parham established the Bethel Bible College in Topeka.
16th century Protestantism Europe
Some of his students began to speak in tongues in early
19th century Latter-day Saints North
1901 after investigating the doctrine of the “baptism of
America
the Spirit.” Parham closed his school and instructed his
Babi and Baha’i West Asia students to spread the Pentecostal message. He opened
19th–20th Pentecostalism North another Bible college in Houston in 1905 and recruited
century America William Seymour, an African American Holiness preach-
er, who went on to provide the impetus for the famous
revival at the Asuza Street Mission. Particularly poor and
lower-class people from not only many parts of the
(1) the baptism of the Holy Spirit manifested by speak- United States but also other countries attended the
ing in tongues; (2) the imminent return of Jesus Christ; revival. Seymour spread the Pentecostal gospel to both
and (3) the significance of speaking in tongues as an whites and blacks in the Southeast. After attending the
evangelical mechanism. Although Pentecostals take a lit- revival with two compatriots in early 1907, Charles H.
eral interpretation of the Bible and stress a puritanical Mason, one of the two founders of the Church of God in
morality, they are distinguished from other Fundamen- Christ (COGIC), transformed the Holiness sect into a
talists or Evangelicals, such as Southern Baptists and the Pentecostal group. His cofounder, C. P. Jones, rejected
Churches of Christ, by greater exuberance in their reli- Pentecostalism and formed the Church of Christ (Holi-
gious services. Pentecostals also emphasize prophecy, ness) U.S.A. By the early 1910s, the Pentecostal move-
interpretation of tongues, healing, and exorcism of ment had attracted converts in much of the United States,
demons. At the ideological level, Holiness and Pente- Canada, and northern Mexico with estimates ranging
costal sects emphasize the notion of “sanctification.” As from 50,000 to 100,000 followers.
opposed to the relatively subdued tone of Holiness serv- The initial interracial character of the Pentecostal move-
ices, Pentecostalism emphasizes inspirational outbursts ment began to break down in the years following the
of ecstasy such as shouting, gesticulating, twitching, Asuza Street revival. In 1914, COGIC-ordained white
fainting, rolling on the floor, and especially speaking in ministers formed the Assemblies of God. Whereas the
tongues or glossolalia. Some Pentecostal sects in south- COGIC, headquartered in Memphis, Tennessee, today