Revival
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
the act of reviving; the state of being revived; most commonly used in a religious sense. Revivals occur in all religions. When one takes place a large number of persons who have been comparatively dead or indifferent to spiritual considerations, simulalive to their importance, alter spiritually and morally, and act with exceeding zeal in converting others to their views. A Mohammedan revival takes the form of a return to the strict doctrines of the Koran, and a desire to propagate them by the sword. A Christian minority living in the place is in danger of being massacred by the revivalists. Christian Revivals. - Pentecostal effusion of the Holy Spirit (Acts ii) prorevival within the infant duced a Church, followed by numerous conversions from outside. Revivals, though not called by that name, occurred at intervals from apostolic times till the Reformation, the revivalists being sometimes so unsympathetically treated that they left the Church and formed sects, while in other cases, and notably in those of the founders of the monastic orders, they were retained and acted on the Church as a whole. The spiritual impulse which led to the Reformation, and the antagonistic one which produced or attended the rise of the Society of Jesus, were both revivalist. It is, however, to sudden increase of spiritual activity within the Protestant churches of the English-speaking peoples that the term revival is chiefly confined. The enterprise of the Wesleys and of Whitefield in this country and England from 1738 onward was thoroughly revivalist. There were revivals at Northampton, in Massachusetts, in 1734, and throughout New England in 1740-1741, the Rev. Jonathan Edwards being the chief instrument in their production. A great one arose in America in 1857, after the financial crisis of that year. It spread in 1859 to Ireland, and in 1864 to Scotland and to parts of England. Since then various revivals have from time to time occurred, and nearly all denominations aim at their production. One of the most remarkable movements of modern times, properly coming under the head of a revival, is that of the SALVA- TION ARMY (q. v.), founded by the Rev. William Booth, a Methodist minister of Nottingham, England. This movement has been recognized since 1880 as a distinct sect, and with its essential military organization has become an immense power among the poorer classes both in this country and in Europe. In the United States the commander, Ballington Booth, withdrew from the Salvation Army and organized the Volunteers of America. Modern rn revivalists include J. Wilbur Chapman, "Gypsy" Smith and William A. Sunday. See also MOODY.
What Has Changed in the Last Century
Collier's in 1921 listed the leading revivalists of the day as J. Wilbur Chapman, "Gypsy" Smith and William A. "Billy" Sunday; all were dead within two decades, and the mantle passed to Billy Graham, whose crusades from 1949 until 2005 reached audiences on every continent and were carried by radio, television and satellite rather than the tent and the sawdust trail. The account's roll of revivals stops just short of the one with the largest consequences: the Pentecostal outbreak associated with the Azusa Street mission in Los Angeles from 1906, which grew into Pentecostal and charismatic Christianity now counted in the hundreds of millions worldwide, with its centre of gravity in Africa, Latin America and Asia rather than the English-speaking world the entry treats as the natural home of revival. The claim that a "Mohammedan revival" necessarily means propagating the Koran "by the sword" and massacring local Christians reflects the assumptions of 1921 rather than later scholarship, which treats Islamic revival as a broad set of reform movements ranging from scholarly and pietistic to political and militant. The Salvation Army, described here as newly "an immense power among the poorer classes," survives as a worldwide church and relief agency, and the Volunteers of America founded by the seceding Ballington Booth continues as a secular-facing social service organisation.
Written for this edition, 2026.