Jonathan Edwards
(1703-1758) ***
Massachusetts Congregational minister who produced theological writing in the 1700's. Edwards, the son of a Congregational minister, entered the ministry in 1726 after a bachelor's degree at Yale, further independent study, and brief service as a Yale tutor and in the Presbyterian church of New York City. His first charge was Northampton, Massachusetts, where he served until dismissed in 1750 after a controversy with his congregation over standards for church admission. He then labored in frontier Stockbridge, Massachusetts, as minister to congregations of Indians and whites. His death from receiving an inoculation for smallpox, came on March 22, 1758, only a few weeks after he began his work as president of the College of New Jersey.
Edwards's is regarded by
some, as one of America's great evangelical theologians. He was one of the theologians of the First
Great Awakening, and as important in explicating that movement as George
Whitefield had been in promoting it. In
between his active labors as a pastor and his more popular preaching and
writing, he found time to compose works of rarified theological construction
which challenge scholars to this day. The ongoing publication of a definitive
edition of Edwards's works by Yale University Press makes clear how large his
contributions were, not only in several divisions of theology defined more
narrowly, but also in metaphysics, ethics, and psychology.
Theology
Edwards is most often
studied for his description of human sinfulness and divine all-sufficiency. In
such early sermons as "God Glorified in Man's Dependence" (1731),
"A Divine and Supernatural Light" (1733), and "Sinners in the
Hands of an Angry God" (1741), he anticipated in a popular way the themes
that would inform his later theological treatises. The root of human sinfulness
was antagonism toward God; God was justified in condemning sinners who scorned
the work of Christ on their behalf; conversion meant a radical change of the
heart; true Christianity involved not just an understanding of God and the
facts of Scripture but a new "sense" of divine beauty, holiness, and
truth.
In truth, and that in but a
few words, man sins because, in man apart from God, we find NO GOODNESS,
nothing but selfishness, man must abide in Christ (the vine) in order to do
anything good. Man must be born from above and abide in the vine!
Edwards eventually
summarized many of these insights in 1754 when he published “A Careful and
Strict Inquiry into the Modern Prevailing Notions of that Freedom of Will,
Which is Essential to Moral Agency, Virtue and Vice, Reward and Punishment,
Praise and Blame.” In this commanding treatise Edwards argued that the
"will" was not an independent faculty but an expression of more basic
human motivation. To "will" something was to act in accordance with
the strongest motives prevailing within a person. Edwards was here arguing that
human action is always consistent with human character. It is important to
remember, that a moral agent, which all human beings are, are responsible for
their actions. When the Holy Spirit gives light, and we do not walk in that
light, we are sinning. With the help of God's precious Spirit we can walk in
that light.
Uppermost in Edwards's mind were the implications for conversion which this view of human nature entailed. It meant that a sinner by nature would never choose to glorify God unless God himself changed that person's character or, as Edwards phrased it, implanted a new "sense of the heart" to love and serve God. Regeneration, God's act, was the basis for conversion, the human actions.