166 William Gibson, Peter Forsaith, and Martin Wellings, Eds. The

166 book reviews

William Gibson, Peter Forsaith, and Martin Wellings, eds. The Ashgate Research Companion to World Methodism (Surrey, uk: Ashgate, 2013). xiv + 537 pp. $149.95 hardback.

The Ashgate Research Companion to World Methodism provides a helpful guide to Methodism and generally succeeds in broadening the conversation to a larger geographic and cultural scope. Because this review is written for read- ers of Pneuma, it focuses on the places where the authors make connections between Methodism, the Holiness movement and the beginnings of Pente- costalism. The primary significance of this volume for scholars of Pentecostal- ism is the advancement of the research trajectory begun by Donald W. Dayton, Henry H. Knight iii and others that sees Methodism, the Holiness movement and Pentecostalism as coming from the same branch of the Christian family tree. In the introductory essay, William Gibson argues that a reason for the suc- cess of Methodism itself has come from “the forms and movements in which it has popularly spread across the developing world, particularly holiness and Pentecostalism” (5). And, when Gibson asks “what constitutes Methodism,” he finds that, at least in the nineteenth century, one cannot understand the essence of Methodism without understanding the ways in which it contributed to the beginnings of the Holiness movement and Pentecostalism. A strong case can also be made that Pentecostalism cannot be adequately under- stood without considering the ways it was influenced by the Wesleyan tradition. The second part of the volume, which focused on the historical context of world Methodism, did a better job of telling the story of British and Ameri- can Methodism than it did of providing a more global history. Morris L. Davis’s chapter, which covered 1865–1939, noted the difficulty of “finding a way to con- ceptualize global Methodism coherently and with enough precision” because it is “almost incomprehensibly complex and multivalent” (53). Davis more clearly noted complexity than he explored or surveyed it. Rather than engaging the Holiness movement, for example, he wrote, “space does not allow us to fol- low that part of the global Methodist story” (54). On one hand, this is entirely understandable in a fourteen page survey of such a broad and eventful period. On the other hand, leaving the Holiness movement out of nineteenth-century Methodism results in a history that is more one-dimensional than Methodism was during this period. Particularly in the section on consolidation and reunion in Methodism, the voices of the many Methodists who comprised the Holiness movement and could not reunite with a church that did not clearly proclaim holiness are muted.

The most significant chapter for historians of Pentecostalism is Priscilla Pope-Levison’s “Holiness and Pentecostal Movements Within Methodism.” Pope-Levison identifies and develops two research trajectories in her essay: “the centrality of women and the global interconnectedness of the Holiness and Pentecostal movements within Methodism” (142). Pope-Levison demon- strates the centrality of women in these movements in describing the roles of Phoebe Palmer (1807–1874), Mary Lee Cagle (1864–1955), Sarah Smith, (1822– 1908), Amanda Berry Smith (1837–1915) and Catherine Booth (1829–1890) in the Holiness movement. She highlights Aimee Semple McPherson’s (1890–1944) significance in the Keswick movement. Pope-Levison also shows the significance of Emma Ray (1859–1930), Maria Woodworth-Etter (1844–1924), Pan- dita Ramabai (1858–1922), Agnes Ozman and Ida Robinson (1891–1946) for the beginnings of Pentecostalism. And while she notes continued advances in the scholarly study of these women and others, she calls for work that “fully inte- grates” women with men as “co-creators of these movements” (155). Though she doesn’t interact with her work, Estrelda Alexander’s The Women of Azusa Street is an excellent example of the kind of scholarship Pope-Levison calls for, as Alexander shows that these women were, to use Pope-Levison’s phrase, co- creators of the Azusa Street revival. This chapter is a helpful guide for historians seeking to understand the connections between these traditions, and the ways that the lines between them are blurred. While historians of early Pentecostalism may be familiar with Pandita Ramabai, the founder of the Mukti Mission in India that expe- rienced a major revival in 1905, this history is likely less familiar to historians of nineteenth-century Methodism. Conversely, historians of Pentecostal- ism are introduced to key figures for nineteenth-century Methodism and the Holiness movement. Pope-Levison also shows the ways in which people like Phoebe Palmer and Pandita Ramabai are key personalities in one broad stream. Pope-Levison’s discussion of Maria Woodworth-Etter’s ministry is an espe- cially convincing example of the ways in which the Wesleyan tradition influenced the beginnings of Pentecostalism. Woodworth-Etter was a faith healer, whose theological vocabulary displayed a shift from holiness vocabulary that focused on Christian perfection or entire sanctification to an emphasis on power. Pope-Levison shows that two decades before the Azusa Street revival, Pentecostal-like signs and wonders occurred in Woodworth-Etter’s meetings, including physical healings, trances, and even tongues. Her ministry is of fur- ther importance because she consciously connected the revivals of which she was a partwith John Wesley, George Whitefield and nineteenth century Methodist preacher Peter Cartwright.

PNEUMA 37 (2015) 111–171