Lynching crowds voiced religious ecstasy, merging mob murder with worship.
Evidence
With Wilkes in agony but alive, he was doused with kerosene, and the pyre was lit. At that point, he screamed his last words: “Sweet Jesus!” Wilkes struggled against the flames, breaking the chain and lunging forward, at which point several whites pushed him back into the flames with large pieces of lumber and pinned him down until he died. While the intensity of the violence and suffering caused some in the crowd to look away, it also inspired expressions of religious ecstasy reminiscent of revival meetings. “Glory!” an old man in the crowd was recorded as saying. “Glory be to God!” — Robert P. Jones, White Too Long, 97
Categorization
- ADDENDUM: Relevant to the ‘On Sacrifice’ essay — the religious ecstasy and collective participation in this lynching mirror the ritual dynamics of state sacrifice described there.
- SHARE: Worth sharing with anyone studying the psychology of collective violence or white Christian nationalism — the revival-meeting imagery is startlingly specific.
- XREF: connects to: Lynching crowds voiced praise to God at the moment of death — Robert P. Jones, White Too Long: The Legacy of White…, 97; Lynch mobs justify murder by merging contemporary Muslims with mythic demons — Nadim N. Rouhana and Nadera Shalhoub-Kevorkian, When Politics Are Sacralized:…, 1204; Churchgoing white citizens streamed directly from morning worship to participate in a lynching — Robert P. Jones, White Too Long: The Legacy of White…, 91 (+3 more)
Broader Connections
- Churchgoing white citizens streamed directly from morning worship to participate in a lynching
#corroborates(0.90) — Robert P. Jones, White Too Long, 91 - White churchgoers streamed directly from Sunday worship to a mass lynching
#corroborates(0.90) — Robert P. Jones, White Too Long, 91 - Lynching crowds voiced praise to God at the moment of death
#corroborates(0.85) — Robert P. Jones, White Too Long, 97 - Lynch mobs killed festively with meals, Sunday clothes, mutilation, and souvenir photos
#expands(0.85) — Sherene Razack, Casting Out, 164 - Lynch mobs justify murder by merging contemporary Muslims with mythic demons
#expands(0.75) — Nadim N. Rouhana and Nadera Shalhoub-Kevorkian, When Politics Are Sacralized, 1204 - Ritual participation plus perceived threat converts disputed preferences into sacred values.
#qualifies(0.70) — Hammad Sheikh and Jeremy Ginges and Alin Coman and Scott Atran, Religion, group threat and sacred values, 58