Resources Discussing Ellen White

Voorhees offers new scholarship on a broad array of topics related to Christian Science identity focusing on reception history. With attention to fully resourced details and modern scholarship, Voorhees outlines the reception history of Christian Science in fields of religion, women studies, American history, politics, medicine, and metaphysics. She probes Mary Baker Eddy’s relationships with contemporary scholars, religion leaders, and students.

In a time when science and medicine were intent on removing religion from their midst, both Eddy and White actively integrated physical and spiritual concerns in their theology and practice. Although Eddy named her religion Christian Science, logically claiming that its principles could be demonstrated with mathematical certainty, White’s claim to authority was validated by her public visions with signs following.

…yet her text was also a product of 45 years of constant revision. Science and Health would gain the official office of Pastor alongside the Bible as primary—the Church’s first…

Hansen examines the formative period of the Christian Science movement and discovers not only restorations of health but also healing as a religious act. From this, Hansen distinguishes Christian Science from the women metaphysical healers of the same period who eventually formed the New Thought movement. Eddy’s declaration, “This is woman’s hour” conveys the female contribution to Christian Science.