Taking Up Serpents

Description:

"The Holiness serpent handlers, who originated around 1910, are one of the most controversial religious groups in America. Their practices have brought them into conflict with authorities many times, and the often sensationalized media accounts of their services fascinate and horrify us. But as David Kimbrough so ably documents, snake handlers are sincere worshipers who honestly believe that they are protected by God when they take up serpents." "Kimbrough traces the snake handlers' belief system to fundamentalist strains that rejected the kind of "intellectual" faiths associated with educated eastern ministers. They sought a folk religion, and lay preachers arose from their ranks to deliver the emotion-laden sermons they demanded. According to Kimbrough, the practitioners of snake handling find comfort in the certainty of scriptural commands, choosing to set themselves apart from the world through a religious practice that they believe aligns them with God and prepares them for a privileged position in the next life. For Kimbrough, snake handling represents an intensification of the fundamentalist impulse rather than a deviation from it."--Jacket.

subjects: Religious life and customs,  Snake cults (Holiness churches),  Serpents, religious aspects,  Kentucky, social life and customs,  Christian sects,  Cults,  Kentucky

People: Saylor family

Places: Kentucky