The Glory and the Power

The Fundamentalist Challenge to the Modern World

Photographs by Micah Marty

"Something rare: a fair-minded assessment of religious fundamentalism. In this companion volume to a three-part PBS series, Marty and Appleby aim to dissipate the fog of ignorance that surrounds the average understanding of fundamentalism.. . . A useful guide to what is proving to be . . . a historical movement at least as important as Marxist-Leninism."
-Kirkus Reviews

Publishers Weekly

Fundamentalist religious movements, assert the authors, are ``innovative . . . usually dynamic'' and ``constructive in spirit.'' In this evenhanded study, which is the basis of a PBS series, Marty, professor of Christianity at the University of Chicago, and Appleby ( Church and Age Unite! ) attempt to steer a middle course by refusing to portray fundamentalists as paragons of unreason. In their definition, fundamentalists, whether Christian, Jewish or Muslim, seek to remake the world by selectively retrieving doctrines and practices from a presumed sacred past. Yet the authors concede that fundamentalists ``need enemies'' and ``demonize opponents.'' After discussing Bob Jones University, an evangelical school in South Carolina, and Operation Rescue, the U.S. anti-abortion movement, they move on to examine Gush Emunim, the Jewish settler movement active in Israel's West Bank, Egypt's Islamic militants bent on aligning government with religious orthodoxy, and resurgent fundamentalist groups from Iran to India and Africa. Photos. (Dec.)