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The ‘True Remedy’: Jonathan Edwards' Soteriological Perspective as Observed in his Revival Treatises

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 January 2009

Michael Jinkins
Michael Jinkins
Affiliation:
Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary Austin Texas 78705–5797
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Extract

The revival treatises represent one of the most fruitful and provocative portions of the Jonathan Edwards corpus. The purpose of the treatises, considered as a whole, was (1) to provide a cogent account of the revivals which cropped up in New England in 1734–35 and agin in 1740–1743; (2) to defend the revivals to those, like Charles Chauncy, who objected to their emotional excesses or were skeptical of their validity; and (3) to encourage to moderation and humility those who were taking part in the revivals. In the course of accomplishing these objectives Edwards presents a morphology of the conversion experience, provides a basic description of his anthropology/psychology and gives an indication of the pneumatological side of his doctrine of God. We will consider each of these streams of thought briefly in terms of how they relate to Edwards' soteriology.

Type
Research Article
Information
Scottish Journal of Theology , Volume 48 , Issue 2 , May 1995 , pp. 185 - 210
Copyright
Copyright © Scottish Journal of Theology Ltd 1995

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References

1 The edition used for Edwards' Revival treatises is Edwards, Jonathan, The Great Awakening, Goen, C. C., ed. (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1972).Google Scholar

2 The first awakening in which Edwards was directly involved was concentrated in the Connecticut River Valley. Edwards reported this revival originally to Rev. Dr. Benjamin Colman in a letter (May 30, 1735) and later in the Faithful Narrative. The second awakening had wider Colonial repercussions. It began in 1740 with the arrival of the itinerant evangelist George Whitefield (1714–1771) and ended in the bitter polarization of the Colonial Churches between the Old and New Lights.

3 Chauncy's, Seasonable Thoughts on the State of Religion in New England (September, 1743)Google Scholar was perhaps the most notable among many of the Old Light counter-attacks against those in favor of the New England revivals. Chauncy offered little that Edwards had not already anticipated in his Some Thoughts Concerning Revival (March, 1743).

4 Goen, ‘Ed. Intro.’, J. E., Great Awakening (GA), p. 27.

5 Cf. Ibid., p. 28–29 for similar description. Also note Morgan, Edmund S., Visible Saints: The History of the Puritan Idea (Ithaca, New York, 1965), p. 66Google Scholar for a general description of the Puritan morphology of conversion.

6 The frame of mind, which Edwards describes as ‘humiliation,’ is characterized in that persons comes to see ‘that Cod may damn them if he pleases.’ In this, as Laurence explains, Edwards was in agreement with his grandfather and predecessor, Solomon Stoddard. But Edwards went on to say that under humiliation in preparation for salvation, persons may also suppose ‘that God may show them mercy if he pleases.’ The fundamental sense of insecurity implicit in this understanding was seen to be an ‘antithetical manifestation of Christ – the manifestation in which the rule was, the more Christ was thought to be absent, the more he was present.’ Laurence, David, ‘Jonathan Edwards, Solomon Stoddard, and the Preparationist Model of Conversion,’ Harvard Theological Review, 72 (July-October, 1979) 3/4, pp. 272–273.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

7 J. E., , A Faithful Narrative, GA, p. 166Google Scholar. Goen, ‘Ed. Intro.’, CA, p. 12. Cf. Cherry, Conrad, The Theology of J. E., p. 115Google Scholar; Also: Pettit, Norman, The Heart Prepared: Grace and Conversion in Puritan Spiritual Life (New Haven, 1966), p. 20Google Scholar and chapter 6.

8 Ibid., p. 148, 175–176, 186–187.

9 Goen, ‘Ed. Intro.’, GA, p. I. Cf. Stoeffler, F. Ernest, The Rise of Evangelical Pietism (Leiden, 1965), chapter 1.Google Scholar

10 J. E., , A Faithful Narrative, CA, pp. 162–163.Google Scholar

11 Ibid., pp. 163–164.

12 J. E., , The Distinguishing Marks of a Work of the Spirit of God, Ga, pp. 246–248Google Scholar. The treatise was first presented as a Commencement Day address, Yale College, 10 September 1741.x

13 J. E., , Some Thoughts Concerning the Present Revival in New England, CA, pp. 390–391.Google Scholar

14 Ibid., pp. 393–394.

15 J. E., , Distinguishing Marks, GA, p. 231.Google Scholar

16 Ibid., pp. 231–232.

17 Ibid., p. 248.

18 J. E., , Some Thoughts, CA, p. 464.Google Scholar

19 Ibid., p. 165.

20 Ibid., pp. 165–166.

21 J. E., , Faithful Narrative, GA, p. 148.Google Scholar

22 Letter to Rev. Dr. Benjamin Colman, dated May 30, 1735, GA, p. 100.

23 J. E., , Faithful Narrative, GA,. 160.Google Scholar

24 Ibid., pp. 206–207.

25 J. E., , Faithful Narrative, GA, p. 207.Google Scholar

26 J. E., , Some Thoughts, GA, pp. 391–393.Google Scholar

27 J. E., , Faithful Narrative, GA, p. 169.Google Scholar

28 Ibid, p. 172.

29 Ibid., p. 175, cf. p. 176.

30 Ibid., p. 186.

31 J. E., , Distinguishing Marks, CA, p. 226.Google Scholar

32 Ibid., pp. 226–227. The contrast between Edwards and Calvin is especially marked here. Calvin refused to allow examination of the person's life for signs of the Spirit's work to be used in terms of a syllogismus practicus. See: John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, III. 1. inclusive.

33 Ibid., p. 249.

34 Ibid., p. 249.

35 Ibid., p. 249–250. Edwards continues on in this context to critique what he considers that religious experience of the Quakers which he sees as wholly subjective, ungrounded in the historical reality of Christ Jesus. He says that if one is led by a spirit to believe in a ‘Christ’ other than ‘that Jesus that appeared in the flesh’ then the spirit is not of God and the spiritual experience is not valid.

36 Ibid., pp. 250–251.

37 Ibid., pp. 251–253.

38 This is especially apparent in Edwards' ‘Application’ section of the treatise in which he details what it means to live a life marked by the Spirit. Ibid., pp. 260–288. It also becomes apparent in the ‘covenant’ which he drew up for the Northampton community, 16 March 1741/2. See: letter to Rev. Thomas Prince of Boston, dated 12 December 1743, GA, pp. 550–556.

39 J. E., , Distinguishing Math, pp. 253–255.Google Scholar

40 Ibid., pp. 255–256.

41 J. E., , Some Thoughts, GA, pp. 328–329.Google Scholar

42 J. E., Letter dated 1 July 1751, GA, pp. 561–566.

43 J. E., preface dated 4 August 1750, GA, pp. 569–572.

44 J. E., , Some Thoughts, GA, p. 316.Google Scholar

45 J. E., , ‘Christian Knowledge’ Select Works, II., p. 13.Google Scholar

46 J. E., , Some Thoughts, GA, p. 296.Google Scholar

47 Ibid., pp. 296–297.

48 Ibid., p. 297.

49 His own philosophy is resonant not only with Lockean but with Platonic elements as well.

50 J. E., , Some Thoughts, GA, p. 297.Google Scholar

51 Ibid., pp. 297–298.

52 Hopkins, , Memoirs, Works of President Edwards, I., pp. 28–30.Google Scholar

53 J. E., , Some Thoughts, GA, pp. 331–341.Google Scholar

54 Edwards' attempt to bring this practice back into fashion in Northampton (a practice which had been discontinued under his predecessor's, Solomon Stoddard, leadership) was a factor precipitating Edwards' discharge from the Northampton pulpit.

55 J. E., , Distinguishing Marks, GA, p. 235.Google Scholar

56 Ibid., p. 236.

57 Ibid., p. 236.

58 Ibid., p. 237.

59 In particular the troublesome preacher James Davenport who had left town only days before Edwards delivered his Commencement address at Yale. See Goen, , ‘Editorial Introduction’, GA, pp. 51–53.Google Scholar

60 J. E., , Some Thoughts, GA, p. 341.Google Scholar

61 J. E., , Distinguishing Marks, GA, p. 244.Google Scholar

62 Ibid., pp. 255–256.

63 Ibid., pp. 228ff.

64 Ibid., pp. 228–229.

65 Ibid., pp. 230–233.

66 Ibid., pp. 234–235.

67 Ibid., pp. 235–237.

68 Ibid., pp. 238–240.

69 Ibid., pp. 241–243. In this context Edwards pens one of his most memorable and delightful aphorisms: ‘We are to consider that the end for which God pours out his Spirit, is to make men holy, and not to make them politicians.’ p. 241.

70 Ibid., pp. 243–244.

71 Ibid., p. 244.

72 Ibid., pp. 246–248.

73 Ibid., p. 249.

74 Ibid., p. 250.

75 Ibid., p. 251.

76 Ibid., p. 253.

77 Ibid., pp. 254–255.

78 Ibid., p. 255.

79 Ibid., p. 256.

80 Ibid., pp. 255–256.

81 Ibid., p. 280.

82 Ibid., p. 280.

83 Jenson, Robert W., America's Theologian: A Recommendation of Jonathan Edwards (New York/Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988), 73.Google Scholar

84 ‘Treatises on Volition, Determinancy and Virtue.’

85 Cf. Edwards, discussion of false principles in Some Thoughts, GA, pp. 442ffGoogle Scholar. This Spirit of God is a great and perfect power and a power which moves people to do what is holy. But, Edwards warn readers to temper their obedience with a due consideration of ‘intermediary causes.’ While one ought always to obey the Spirit when the Spirit ‘inclines us directly and immediately without the intervention of any other cause’ to do a thing, yet one must be mindful that there may be other causes interposed which will lead one to do something which ‘although the disposition in general ought to be allowed and promoted… yet the particular ill direction or determination of that disposition, which is from another cause ought not to be followed.’

86 J. E., , Distinguishing Marks, GA, p. 260.Google Scholar

87 Ibid., p. 270.

88 Ibid., p. 270.

89 Ibid., p. 271.

90 Ibid., p. 275.

91 Ibid., pp. 275–276.

92 J. F., , Some Thoughts, GA, pp. 348ffGoogle Scholar.