Focuses on the religious dimensions of the South's response to slavery, the Civil War, and emancipation. This book shows how southern pro slavery theorists, both clergy and lay, struggled with the intellectual and theological quandaries posed by slavery.

This book presents insight into religion and slavery from a leading southern scholar. “A Consuming Fire” focuses on the religious dimensions of the South's response to slavery, the Civil War, and emancipation. Eugene D. Genovese looks at how southern proslavery theorists, both clergy and lay, struggled with the intellectual and theological quandaries posed by slavery. To many, defeat in the Civil War was God's punishment not for slavery itself but for the failure to reform it into a 'scripturally sanctioned' system. Although the reform spirit carried over into the postwar years, it was eventually overwhelmed by open racism and segregationist ideology.

Review
“Genovese has again essayed important questions that scholars need to address in more depth as they probe the many effects of the Civil War upon the South.”—“Journal of Southern History”

Eugene D. Genovese is a retired professor of history. He served as chair of the Department of History at the University of Rochester and taught at other institutions. He also served as president of the Organization of American Historians and of The Historical Society and he was a member of the Executive Council of the American Historical Society. He is the author of nine other books, most recently Miss Betsey: A Memoir of Marriage.