Curtis Freeman begins this fascinating, textured narrative by recounting his 2005 visit to Bunhill Fields on the north end of London. A burial ground for those who did not conform with the teaching and practices of the established Church of England, it became the final resting place for an estimated 123,000 “undomesticated dissenters.” The poet's corner includes three prominent monuments to Paul Bunyan, Daniel Defoe, and William Blake. Through a number of lectures and conference talks, Freeman meticulously researched the contributions of each of these figures, weaving together a cogent, nuanced account of the particular sort of dissent represented in their work and drawing out the theological and ecclesial implications. He finds that Blake's dark but hopeful vision of the New Jerusalem represents a blend of Bunyan's inward focus on conversion in The Pilgrim's Progress and Defoe's outwardly oriented attention to conscientious pursuit of Christian responsibilities in the world in The Life and Strange Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, pointing to “the apocalyptic redemption of soul and society” in and through the incarnation of God in Jesus (174–75).
Deeply committed to the integrity of conscience and the concept of religious liberty, Defoe perceived the real division in English society to be the chasm between nonconformists, often socioeconomically marginalized and legally constrained from pursuing higher education, and the established church, with encoded social, economic, and intellectual privileges secured for “high church Royalists” (179). Drawing on Foucault, Freeman portrays attempts to domesticate dissent as protection of the tacit ideological agreement between church and state to maintain power, violently enforced through imprisonment, the political theater of public execution, and war. Thus, William Blake's nonconformist poem Jerusalem became, through Hubert Parry's 1916 wartime musical setting, a sort of soundtrack of empire, “a defining hymn for the Church of England, and an unofficial national anthem sung lustily at political meetings, civic gatherings, social affairs, and sporting events” (178).
Bookending the volume, Freeman invites the reader to consider the significance of the apocalyptic imagination grounding undomesticated dissent for democracy, gesturing to the current political and ecclesial realities in the United States. How might dissent function as a tradition, in Alasdair MacIntyre's sense, extending through time as an inquiry regarding the good and particular accompanying values? Freeman turns to Martin Luther King Jr. and Clarence Jordan as exemplars of nonconformity guided by “an eschatological vision that was both apocalyptically full and ethically rich” (211).
Greater development of this strand of thought would be welcome, as Freeman himself surely has more to say about the shape of communities of resistance appropriate for the current time. He briefly draws parallels to more contemporary Christian nonconformists such as Daniel and Philip Berrigan, John Howard Yoder, A. J. Muste, Jim Forest, and Thomas Merton, all of whom met together in 1964 to consider ways of challenging American empire through Christian witness. The crosscutting, ecumenical nature of that gathering speaks to the guiding values of dissent as a living tradition, running deeper than denomination and grounding Freeman's provocative concluding challenge: “If the current heirs of religious dissent seem to have little to say that is truthful for the wider culture or fail to exemplify a way of life that is threatening to the powers that be, perhaps it is because their dissent has become domesticated” (223).
Well written and rigorously researched, this text would be a trusted and engaging companion to Reformation and early modern primary sources in seminary and graduate theology programs, particularly those that cultivate interdisciplinary ties with the fields of history, literature, and political science.
