Life & Ministry of William Booth: Founder of the Salvation Army, The

Trinity Journal, Fall 2007 by Carlson, Thomas

Roger J. Green. The Life & Ministry of William Booth: Founder of the Salvation Army. Nashville, Tenn.: Abingdon, 2005. xvi 287 pp. 8 plates. $11.00.

This helpful biography of William Booth was written by a theologian and "Salvationist" scholar. Roger Green, having previously written a biography of Catherine Booth, aims to present a comprehensive one-volume biography of William Booth, setting him firmly within a Methodist context. The result is readable and useful to both the general reader and the historian.

The first two chapters give Booth's family background and earliest street ministry in Nottingham, as well as his move to London seeking employment, and they end with a brief overview of Methodist history and theology up to Booth's time. The next three chapters introduce us to Catherine, William's future wife, and their relationship, while focusing on William's training, ordained ministry, and successive decisions to leave Wesleyan Methodism, Congregationalism, and New Connection Methodism in the context of denominational conflicts. The sixth and seventh chapters describe the beginnings of independent ministry for William and for Catherine, and how William's ministry in London's Mile End Waste grew into the Christian Mission in the late 1860s. Green also attempts to explain why Booth's ministry in this neighborhood grew and endured where other Christian ministries failed. The early characteristics of the Salvation Army, and how it grew out of the Christian Mission in the 1870s, are explored in the eighth chapter, while the ninth shows varied public responses to the Salvation Army in the 1880s and explains early Salvationist views on the sacraments. Two subsequent chapters discuss in greater detail the involvement of the Booths' children in the Salvation Army, including the stories of William's three children who left and their strained relations witii their father. It is in this context, after describing Catherine's final illness, that Green discusses in greater depth William's move to include social ministry in the mission of the Salvation Army. The twelfth chapter explains some of Booth's final ministry ideas, including a "World University" and motor car campaigns, and also reassesses the question why the Salvation Army was successful. The final two chapters list Booth's honors and awards, as well as his reactions to them, and his failing health up to his "promotion to glory."

Green identifies three aims for this book: to set Booth in a Methodist context, to explain how Booth's theology is Wesleyan, and to understand Booth's personal relationships. The third goal is strongly pursued throughout. The first, which dominates the first five chapters, could be strengthened later by showing the continuing ties between the Booths and Methodists. Similarly, the Wesleyan matrix for Booth's theology is clear, but the author's frequent comparisons between William Booth and John Wesley should be tempered by some acknowledgement of their differences in theology and context. The biography's organization could also be clarified: die chronology and protracted enumerated lists are occasionally hard to follow.

On the other hand, this biography has several strengths. The extensive endnotes engage with earlier biographies and correct their inaccuracies, although the historian would sometimes desire greater documentation for certain corrections. Green openly discusses Booth's weaknesses as well as his strengths, and how these affected his family and his organization; this is no stained-glass hagiography. Lastly, the author, who has himself been deeply affected by Booth's service, augments the historical account with brief reflections on God's providence from his Salvationist perspective. This biography will appeal to a wide non-Salvationist audience as well, however, and it will be helpful to scholars for its readable engagement witii earlier scholarship.

Thomas Carlson

Wolfson College, Oxford

United Kingdom