ABSTRACT
This chapter explores how various operational definitions of blasphemy developed around the discursive acts that led to three trials for blasphemy in England between 1729 and 1761. Blasphemy takes place in the symbolic realm, including the realm of language. In March 1729 the highly controversial blasphemy trial of Thomas Woolston took place before the King's Bench in London. Eighteenth-century blasphemy trials highlighted dynamic changes in the arena of religious speech, and thus in religious attitudes. Blasphemy trials exhibit a parallel variety they were a means of controlling public religious language, maintaining control of textual interpretation and restraining the theological imagination. Blasphemy trials, risky endeavours in their own right, revealed where the Church perceived a linguistic or theological threat substantial enough to justify a controversial legal action. In 1743 Annet lost his teaching position for challenging Bishop Sherlock and other Church leaders.
