William Taylor and the Mapping of the Methodist Missionary Tradition

The World His Parish

Douglas D. Tzan

This book is the first critical biography of William Taylor, a nineteenth-century American missionary who worked on six continents. Following Taylor’s global odyssey, the volume maps the contours of the Methodist missionary tradition and illumines key historical foundations of contemporary world Christianity. A work of social history that places a leading Methodist missionary in the foreground, this narrative illustrates distinctive aspects and tensions within Methodist missions such as the importance of doctrines like universal atonement and entire sanctification, a deeply pragmatic orientation rooted in God’s providence, an embrace of both entrepreneurial initiatives and networked connection, and the use of revivalism for missionary outreach and leadership development.

A Virginia native, Taylor became a Methodist preacher and missionary in California. This volume provides an important narrative account of Taylor’s career as an itinerant revivalist and popular author, in which he toured the eastern United States, the British Isles, and Australasia. Taylor’s participation in the South African revival made him an evangelical celebrity. The author also follows Taylor’s important visits to India and South America, where he initiated new Methodist missions in those contexts and pioneered the concept of “tentmaking” missions. In 1884, Taylor was elected missionary bishop of Africa by his church. By the end of his life, Taylor had recruited or inspired hundreds of Methodists to become foreign missionaries.

Lexington Books

Pages: 280 • Trim: 6¼ x 9⅜

978-1-4985-5908-9 • Hardback • October 2019 • $117.00 • (£90.00)

978-1-4985-5909-6 • eBook • October 2019 • $111.00 • (£85.00)

Subjects: Religion / Christianity / Methodist, Religion / Christian Ministry / Missions

William Taylor and the Mapping of the Methodist Missionary Tradition

The World His Parish

Hardback

eBook

Summary

This book is the first critical biography of William Taylor, a nineteenth-century American missionary who worked on six continents. Following Taylor’s global odyssey, the volume maps the contours of the Methodist missionary tradition and illumines key historical foundations of contemporary world Christianity. A work of social history that places a leading Methodist missionary in the foreground, this narrative illustrates distinctive aspects and tensions within Methodist missions such as the importance of doctrines like universal atonement and entire sanctification, a deeply pragmatic orientation rooted in God’s providence, an embrace of both entrepreneurial initiatives and networked connection, and the use of revivalism for missionary outreach and leadership development.

A Virginia native, Taylor became a Methodist preacher and missionary in California. This volume provides an important narrative account of Taylor’s career as an itinerant revivalist and popular author, in which he toured the eastern United States, the British Isles, and Australasia. Taylor’s participation in the South African revival made him an evangelical celebrity. The author also follows Taylor’s important visits to India and South America, where he initiated new Methodist missions in those contexts and pioneered the concept of “tentmaking” missions. In 1884, Taylor was elected missionary bishop of Africa by his church. By the end of his life, Taylor had recruited or inspired hundreds of Methodists to become foreign missionaries.

Details

Lexington Books

Pages: 280 • Trim: 6¼ x 9⅜

978-1-4985-5908-9 • Hardback • October 2019 • $117.00 • (£90.00)

978-1-4985-5909-6 • eBook • October 2019 • $111.00 • (£85.00)

Subjects: Religion / Christianity / Methodist, Religion / Christian Ministry / Missions

Author

Douglas D. Tzan is the director of the Doctor of Ministry and Course of Study programs and assistant professor of church history and mission at Wesley Theological Seminary. He is also an ordained elder in the Baltimore-Washington Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church and the senior pastor at the Sykesville Parish (St. Paul’s and Gaither United Methodist Churches).

Table of Contents

Introduction

Chapter 1 Birth and New Birth

Chapter 2 California and Bust

Chapter 3 Dominions of the Divine Sovereign

Chapter 4 An “Evangelical Sherman” Crosses the Seas

Chapter 5 The “Flaming Torch” Burns

Conclusion

Bibliography

About the Author

Reviews

In addition to covering the trajectory of Taylor’s life and missionary travels, the book has ample footnotes for the scholar who likes to follow the sources for further reading. . . . In this detailed and well-researched work, Tzan has written a complete biography spanning from Taylor’s childhood in Virginia to his final days as a bishop for Africa. The book contains helpful insights into a missionary who was representative of the modern missionary movement. It is ideal for mission scholars and church historians. . . Tzan answers many unanswered questions about William Taylor for mission historians, and corrects some misperceptions, while also opening new areas for future research.

— Wesley and Methodist Studies

Methodism’s rise to globalism in the nineteenth century is a progenitor of Pentecostalism’s worldwide expansion in the twentieth century, and no single figure is more central to the former than the rugged, revivalist missionary, William Taylor. Part independent actor and part Methodist connectional super-hero, Taylor relentlessly traveled the Methodist, imperial, and transportation networks of the world in search of converts. Tzan tells Taylor’s controversial story of transcontinental mission and revivalism with unprecedented thoroughness and clarity, and successfully locates his extraordinary life in a bewildering range of national and international contexts.
— David N. Hempton, Harvard Divinity School

This book is the first full scholarly biography of William Taylor, the entrepreneurial evangelist who planted Methodism on six continents. Doug Tzan captures the breadth and depth of the adventurous father of self-supporting missions, and thereby restores Taylor to his rightful place at the center of nineteenth-century evangelicalism. A combination of exciting narrative and meticulous social history, this book will be the authoritative source on William Taylor for decades to come. I recommend it very highly.
— Dana L. Robert, Truman Collins Professor of World Christianity and History of Mission, Boston University

William Taylor, a fascinating and complex figure, comes to life in this first comprehensive, scholarly consideration of his six continent ministry. Along with the substantive biographical work, Tzan illustrates through Taylor’s missiology the “texture of the Methodist missionary tradition.” A grand accomplishment!
— Priscilla Pope-Levison, Southern Methodist University