A LIBRARIAN’S ORIENTATION
What this book explores
An evangelical historian’s influential critique of the movement’s weakened intellectual life and institutional habits.
EDITORIAL NOTE
Why it’s in the Library
It names intellectual formation as a spiritual and institutional issue rather than a matter of individual intelligence. The book helps travelers understand how a movement's habits can constrain the questions its members are able to ask.
Good starting place if…
You want an insider's historical explanation for why parts of American evangelical culture became suspicious of scholarship, science, institutions, and sustained intellectual work.
Know before you begin…
Noll wrote about American evangelicalism in the early 1990s, so the institutional landscape has changed even as many patterns persist. His critique comes from evangelical commitment and does not describe every congregation, tradition, or later development.