As Henry David Thoreau came of age, the established, Calvinist-descended church in New England lost its favored status and splintered, loosing a cacophony of religious movements—sects people joined by choice, not, as before, by birth—a trend that continues unabated. Out of this tumultuous era Thoreau emerges an original voice in American religion. Like other religious liberals, he sought to divorce the religious sentiment from its institutional context. In doing so, he helped pioneer an eclectic, experiential and non-institutional form of American spirituality that offers inspiration to spiritual seekers today.
Thoreau’s deep religiosity and iconoclastic theological vision have long been obscured, however, by his harsh attacks on “respectable” religion— he called his Calvinist heritage “an ancient and tottering frame with all its boards blown off”—as well as his robust pluralism, nature mysticism and refusal to systemize his religious beliefs. Indeed he continues to be widely seen as spiritual only in some vague, eclectic way grounded entirely in the natural world and unmoored from common understandings of religion.
Such a view omits the palpable, undeniable presence of divine mystery in Thoreau’s writing. Despite his criticism of churches, Thoreau was religious to the bone and had a profound sense of the holy. While not a confirmed theist, he was open to, and sought union with, a divine mystery that was at once immanent in nature and yet not contained by it. Thoreau called this illimitable presence many names, but he often called it God.
As my work shows, Thoreau’s religious sensibility was a central thread in his work as a naturalist, his philosophical thought and his ethical commitments. It is woven through his scalding critiques of slavery, racism, our materialist culture, and our exploitation of natural resources. It grounds his philosophical views on government and on how we relate to the natural world.
Thoreau’s theology is full of paradox. He was ambivalent about the word “God,” which he viewed as an untranslatable symbol tarnished by starchy piety. Yet as a writer, he nevertheless used the term, uppercase, some 250 times in the scholarly edition of his Journal. He also sometimes spoke in diffuse terms about an impersonal divine mind in nature, similar to his mentor Emerson’s conception of God as the universal intelligence. But Thoreau was also indelibly stamped by his own Christian heritage and consistently drew on its theological frameworks to conceive in creative ways of a personal creator God.
Deep religious impulses underlay Thoreau’s harsh invective against institutional religion in his first book, A Week on the Concord and Merrimac Rivers. While certain passages in that work have been forth as evidence of Thoreau’s pantheism, closer examination of them shows that his more consistent position is that nature points beyond itself to a transcendental horizon.
Thoreau's spirituality was grounded in disciplined observation and sensory experience. But he also had a sense of what William James called “the reality of the unseen,” an invisible realm toward which Thoreau said he was drawn by “a continual drift and instinct to all my shores.” He spoke of sounds and mysterious presences in nature that were beyond his hearing and sight.
I also show that Thoreau’s his spiritual quest did not conflict with his empirical work as a natural scientist. Having concluded that matter is holy, studying it became an act of contemplation and veneration. His work as naturalist should be seen as an evolution or fulfillment of, rather than a break with, his youthful Transcendentalism.
Recent books have helpfully show the political dimension of Thoreau’s ascetic religion as a form of resistance. Other major books have tended to emphasize the Eastern influence on Thoreau and the horizontal dimension of his spiritually, such as the sensory quality of his mystical response to nature. My work adds a vertical dimension to Thoreau’s religious thought and explores in greater depth his personal religious sensibility.
Thoreau’s iconoclastic theological vision helped expanded the category of religion in the 19th century in ways that continue to resonate today. His writings and the example of his life helped blaze a trail that many others have sought to travel. Spiritual seekers today are discovering a chord of recognition in Thoreau’s non-institutional spirituality. He appeals to people looking, as the Barry Lopez wrote, for someone “who could speak the language of the god of no particular religion.” This is not because Thoreau’s religious views are being newly discovered but because American culture has come round to embrace them.
In an era of religious tumult, Thoreau was an original voice in American religion. He sought to divorce the religious sentiment from its institutional context and helped pioneer an eclectic, experiential and non-institutional spirituality that has taken on new popularity. His religiosity and iconoclastic theological vision have been obscured, however, by his harsh attacks on churches as well as his pluralism, nature mysticism and refusal to systemize his religious beliefs. Nevertheless, Thoreau was religious to the bone and had a profound sense of the holy. While not a confirmed theist, he was open to and sought union with a divine mystery that was at once immanent in nature and not contained by it. Thoreau called this illimitable presence many names, but he often called it God. His religious sensibility was a central thread in his work as a naturalist, his philosophical thought and his ethical commitments.