This study traces the forming process of Christian Reconstructionism that has been an ideological basis of American Christian nationalism. It also tries to understand the relationship between the political right and the Christian right, and the politi...
This study traces the forming process of Christian Reconstructionism that has been an ideological basis of American Christian nationalism. It also tries to understand the relationship between the political right and the Christian right, and the politicalization of evangelicalism. For this, first it seeks the socio-political implications of Reconstructionism, and pursues its forming process of meaning centered on R. J. Rushdoony, the founder of it. Tragic family history during the World War I, socio-political cultural identity of Armenian immigrant community, his academic conflicts at UC Berkeley and Pacific School of Religion, and his rugged and hard ministry experience in an Indian reservation have exerted influences on his construction of Reconstructionism.
Meanwhile, Rushdoony’s biblical philosophy of history played a decisive role in the mix of evangelicalism and American nationalism. Based on creation mandate, God’s sovereignty, and Biblical literalism, he made severe critics on liberal theology, and secular evolutionism, humanism, socialism, positivism, and statism. Reconstructionism has been blamed by, and distanced from some conservative theologians due to its excessive violence such as physical punishment and death penalty. However, it has penetrated into the minds o