The Bible in the Age of Empire: A Cultural History

The nineteenth century was a time of titanic change. At the very heart of that change - driving it, confounding it, complicating it - was a singular book reputed to be utterly unchanging in its true and perfect expression. This book was the Bible. No other book could rival its ubiquity or cultural potency. Neither was any other book quite so divisive. Many revered it. Others deplored it. Still others used it for creative inspiration or borrowed its authority to bring about particular economic or political ends. But whatever status it enjoyed, whatever purpose it served, it was never far from the centre of Victorian discourse.

The essays in this book explore how the Bible shaped and was shaped by the social and cultural forces at work during the nineteenth century -- forces that drove both scientific discovery and the colonial project, provoked unprecedented economic gain and condemned countless workers to urban poverty, gave birth to women’s rights movements and reinforced traditional gender norms. Ultimately, all the essays in this book demonstrate one thing: that the nineteenth century emerges in its greatest clarity only when we approach it as the Victorians themselves approached it: through the lens of the Bible.

Scott McLaren teaches in the Graduate Programme and is Associate Librarian at York University, Canada.