Dry Bones and Indian Sermons: Praying Indians in Colonial America

Dry Bones and Indian Sermons: Praying Indians in Colonial America Kristina Bross. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2004. The importance of Native converts to the Puritan mission in New England is virtually uncontested, but in the majority of the studies on Praying Indians, scholars have given attention to their identities in relation to the two cultures that surround them: the Natives and the English Puritans. Less consideration has been given to determining how the Praying Indian figure actually affected the evangelical aim of the English occupation of New England. Responsive to this neglect, Kristina Bross, in Dry Bones and Indian Sermons: Praying Indians in Colonial America, seeks to add to the mounting scholarship surrounding Praying Indians by exploring their representation in colonial literature and their subsequent affect on the pious goals of the English missionary endeavor. As scholarship on Native Americans and conversion begins to build upon itself, authors are beginning to produce more nuanced examinations of the Praying Indians' position in New England. Bross's transatlantic treatment of the importance of Native conversion to the colonist's "errand into the wilderness" is no exception. Her book not only redefines the English and Native construction of Native American identity as well by looking at how the representation of Native converts was viewed on both sides of the ocean, it also contributes to the scholarship that suggests the need for a revision of the concept of American exceptionalism. Bross's thesis centers upon the idea that as England endured civil unrest beginning in 1642, "observers on both sides of the Atlantic" began to re-examine the emigration efforts in the New England, with some seeing the colonization as a mistake and others seeing the move as symbolic of England's ability to sustain despite conflict. Praying Indians figure predominantly in this new attention paid to New England, and "for a time," Bross argues, "accounts of Indian evangelism were proffered as records of the true role of New England" (3). With England in a state of crisis, it was crucial for New England to have a clear sense of purpose and identity, for both the encouragement of the struggling mother country as well as for protection from those convinced that the colonization effort was a mistake. Bross contends that this identity "depended on the active presence of Indians" (3), and to support her assertions, she examines the representation of Praying Indians in colonial writings produced between 1643 and 1671, looking at the rhetoric of these texts although literary and historical lenses. It is only then, Bross asserts, that historians and literary scholars alike can get an "understand[ing] of how the mission powerfully affected New England's place in transatlantic Puritanism and created a place for Indians in the Bay Colony" (11). After the introduction, which also serves as chapter one of the text, the next two chapters of Dry Bones and Indians Sermons examine key evangelical representations, New England's First Fruits and Roger Wilhams's A Key into the Language of America, both published in 1643, as well as the various mission tracts that appeared on the heels of both these texts, particularly those by John Eliot. In chapter two, Bross explains that aimed at an English audience, these mission writings used the Praying Indian figure to contribute toward readings of Biblical prophecy, a reading that although was viewed reluctantly by the colonists in New England (who had proximity to the various conflicts over the years in the colonies) was also a reading that was accepted more enthusiastically by those back in (a distant) England. …