DOCSLIB.ORG

Solomon Stoddard's Library at Harvard in 1664.Pdf

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Solomon Stoddard's Library at Harvard in 1664.Pdf Solomon Stoddard's library at Harvard in 1664 The Harvard community has made this article openly available. Please share how this access benefits you. Your story matters Citation Fiering, Norman S. 1972. Solomon Stoddard's library at Harvard in 1664. Harvard Library Bulletin XX (3), July 1972: 255-269. Citable link https://nrs.harvard.edu/URN-3:HUL.INSTREPOS:37364013 Terms of Use This article was downloaded from Harvard University’s DASH repository, and is made available under the terms and conditions applicable to Other Posted Material, as set forth at http:// nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:dash.current.terms-of- use#LAA Solo1non Stoddard's Library at Harvard in 1664~ N or111a11 S. Fieriug N THE PAST forty }rears the detailed picture of intellectual culture in seventeenth-ccnn1ry Nc,v England has been superbly revealed., in partjcular by San1ucl E]iot lv.lorison's great hi~tory of early Harvard and by the £rst volun1e of Perry l\1illcr1s N e•w E11gJa11d ,iiind. It is ,vell to .ren1ember,holvcvcr~ that among the lesser contribu- tions upon ,vhich these n1onun1ents rest \Vere the researches into early Amcrjcan Jibrarics by Julius H. Tuttlc 1 Charles I•. and llobin llob- inson, Alfred C+Potter, and espccially the ren1arkable srudy by Arthur 04 Norton, ~'I-Iarvard Text-Books and Reference Dooks of the Seven- teenth Century."' 1 Lists of avai1ablebooks can never be 1norc than a pre]iminar)r to jntellcctual history, but they· arc an essential pre- lin1inary, for nothing else can provide as plainly· such a \vidc and balanced perspective of the inte1Jectual scene. It fa ,vith this con- sideration in mind th-at I have prepared an annotated list of Solo111on Stoddard\~ Jibrary in 1664, a collection of cight) 7 -odd titles that has been Yirtuallv... overlooked thus fgr/ Solo1non Stoddard ,vas to bccon1c an cxtre1nclv.., influential and dis- tinguishcd pastor in Northampton~ .i\1assachusctts,but he is also of par- t! ~1r. Edwjn \VoUt z nd, of The Library Con1pany of Phjla.delphia1 ,vhosc knov,J- cdgc of early Atnerican libraries is unsurpa~sed, ]dnd]y agreed to read this article in nrnnuscrjpt ~nd i.v:ls:~b]c to jdentifr for n~c dc\Tcu of the rnos.t pu7..zliug cntrfos in Stn d dard 's c~ta] ogu C+ 1 Julius Tun let 'LThe Libraries of tho 1\1:nhcrst Proceedings of t,)e A-n1erir.a11 Anti quar lan Soc ie I y n .s. 1 XX ( 19 r l ) 1 2.69-3 56. Charles F. Robin son and Robin 11 Robinson 1 Thrcc E-arly 1\1assachuscusLiLraricst Publications-of tl:JeColonial So- ciety of Afassacburetts, XX\'1Jl ( 193s). l 07-175. Alfred C. Pottc:s\ 11Catalogae of 1 John Harv~rdis Library/' Jbid.i XXI ( 1910 )t r90--230, Arthur 0. Nonon 1 ' 1-Iarvard Text-Books :and Reference Book~ of th~ Seventeenth Century/' ibid., XA'Vlll ( l 9 35 ) , 36 I --.f3 8, :e Stoddard is Jj brar y catalogue is briefly- ref erred to in the i1npore-ant su ppicment 1 to Alf red C. Potter by Hc.nry J. Oadln1ry, uJohn H-atvard s Library/' l bid, 1 XXXIV ( 1943), 353~3 77• Harvard University - Houghton Library / Harvard University. Harvard Library bulletin. Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Library. Volume XX, Number 3 (July 1972) Harvard J_jbrary BuiJe ti11 ticul~r interest to historisns of Harvard and its Library because his na1ne stands first, chronologically., in the Jong ]ist of Librarians of Harvard College. After graduation fron1 Harv::i.rd,vith a 11.A.in 1662 he fol- lo,vcd the con1n1011practice of young graduates preparing for rhe 1ninistry of rcn1~in1ng at the College for a fc,v years 111orein order to do spccia]ized studies-in divinity, and in 1665, on schedule,. he .received his Iv1astcr'sdegree. 1"hcrcaftcr, in Nove1nber of 1666 he ,vas made a 1--utoror Fello,v· and the follo\ving .spring chosen"Library keeper/' the first such appointment .. Before mo,Tingto Norrha111ptonin 1672 it is probable that he made a visit to Barbados. It js gcncrall)r agreed that for the last thirty years of 11isJifc he ,vas the most influential n1inister in Nc,v England outside of Boston.. T,vo years before his death in 1729, his congregation chose as his successor in the pulpit his gr~ndson, Jonathan Ed,vards. 3 The ''Cata1ogue of Solon1on Stoddnrds books 1664,, is buried in the 1niddle of a little notebook ,vhich Stoddard kept at Ilarvard, un- doubtedly .one an1ong n1any· such notebooks he used. 1"he notebook has been o,vned by Union Theological Se1ninary since r 9 20 and is designated ju their files as a HCornmonplace Book.,, Aside from the date of 1664 ,vhich occurs at the heading of the "Catalogue,n the year "1662 ,, appears on the verso of the first legf, and it is probable fron1 other internal evidence that the notebook docs not span more than t\vo years~ time. Ref ore turning to Stoddard "s library catalogue~ I ,vill describe the notebook in a little more detail. The title of co1nmonplacebook is n1islcading since this manuscript volu1ne is not \vhat is ordinarily--considered a con1monp]accbook. ?\Tear1 y all of it js n1ade up of sum rnar ics or syn opscs of sermons~ s0111c of these sununaries being only· a half page~ others going on for several.. These are all in English. In addition~ there are ~b.out thrrt)-T pages of a Latin discourse on theologicalmatters, possibl)rexcerpted from some 3-Tht::rc is a brief ccou nt of Stoddard in Jo ha L~ Sibley, Bio gr" phi r.t1!Sk etc bes of Gr(lduater of H ar-~ard University (Cc1.1nbridgc-,1881 ), II, 1 I 1-122. Peny i\1iller, 0 So101non Stoddard," "J1be Harvtard Theological Review., XXXIV (1941), 277-310, is: a standard n1or1ograph. See ;\lso, for Studd;1rd's thought 1 1 ..homas A~ Schafer,. ccSolomon Stoddard and the Theo1ogy of the Revh.Talt in Stuart C. l{cnry~ ed.~ A Afistclfon.y of A'JJ1eric1Jn C/JriJtitr1iity. Essayj' in Honor of H~ Shelton S111ith (Dur ham, N .C .,. 1 9 63 ) 1 pp+ ; : 8-3 61. For the cul es goirerni ng the Librari i;11tship at early Hervard 1 see Public~tions of tbe Colonial Society of Af.«ssacbusetts,X\r ( 19i; ), l94-196t and for the ca:r1y Llbr~rfa.ns! see AJfrcd Claghorn Potter and Charles l{no,vles Bolton, 1'The Lihraritnu of I-I arvard CoHcgc~ 1677-1877t Harv~rd University Library Bi blio grapbi tal Contribution t LII ( 1 897 ) . Harvard University - Houghton Library / Harvard University. Harvard Library bulletin. Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Library. Volume XX, Number 3 (July 1972) Solrnnon Stoddard's Library at Harvard in 1664 z 57 place but not identified h3r Stoddard, except for one snippet thnt hns the nan1c of Grottus after it. There is also a page given over to a short elegy ,v hich begins: ~~Sigl1sarc the syn1pton1s .of souls distress,'' and concludes ,vith the lines: ' 1 his active 1nind ()'C 111orcsour ,voe) / like keen s,vord, soon hath cut ye scabbard through ..'' \X/hcthcr Stoddard ,vas the author of this piece I do not kno,v~ but it is likely fron1 the da tc of the notebook that it ,vas n lan1cnt copied or ,vrittcn on the occasion of the death in Ca111bridgcin the Fall of 1664 of t,vcnty·-three- year-old Sarnucl Eliot (son of the fan1ous apostle ro the lndians) 1 ,, ..ho had becon1ea I•'eHo,vonly the year bcfore~ In the ,v hole book of 2 74 pages (there is no numbering) 1 only one has the character of a con1- mon place hook.. It contains thoughts ,v·hich the v?ritcr 1night have occasion to use somctin1e later in his o,vn ,vork.. 1-lcrc one finds a f e\v interesting i tc tns: ''Th c P saln1 s are as it \ v ere th c Ana to 1nic of a holy n1an \\~hich lay not in side as it ,vcrc oun.vard to the vic\v of • + others+ If the scriptures be cornparcd to a bod) 7 the Psalms may· ,vcll be the heart. They are so full of s,veet affections & passions . .. .,, "Never ,vas the Church n1orc fruitfull, yn ,vhen tis ,vatered ,vith its o,vn b]ood ..H "Tygers arc put into a rage by· the smell of spices. So the savour of the graces of the saints ,vill put the tJlgcrs of the ,vor]d into.. a rage ..H But 1nost of the notebook, -asI have said, js n1adc up of .sununa.rics of seventy-tlvo sern1ons~apparently delivered a.t the CoUcgc chapel. 1\1orisonhas described President Charles Cha11ncy'sregime at the Col~ lege as 111ore replete \Vith sern1on s th an an 1- before or after. 4 Th ere ,vcre t,vo scrn1ons evcr)r Sabbath at least, Chauncy himself giving one e,Tcryother ,vcek. Thus it probably djd not take Stoddard a very long ti1ne to fill up his book .. Of the sern1ons abstracted by StoddardJ ten arc by Chauncy hin1sclf 2nd thirty-three by Jonathan j\1itche1l~minister at the church in Can1bridge and the subject of a famous chapter jn Cotton !\lather's A-1agualia.Jan1cs Allen, of the First Church in Bos- ton"'"js the only other minister ,vho ga,rc n1orc than a handfuL Allen preach~d on eleven occasions. Judging from Stoddardts abbreviated transcription alone, !v1itche1Pssermons ,vere often ontsninding for force of Ianguage and in tel lcct'i and Stoddard's longc st abstracts seem to he of j\litcheJl~ssermons.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • By Alan D. Strange
    MJT 14 (2003) 57-97 JONATHAN EDWARDS AND THE COMMUNION CONTROVERSY IN NORTHAMPTON by Alan D. Strange JONATHAN EDWARDS CAME to Northampton, Massachusetts in 1727 to serve as assistant pastor to his renowned maternal grandfather, Solomon Stoddard. He and his grandfather agreed on most things, including what it meant to be a true Christian. Stoddard taught that a saving work of the Holy Spirit was necessary for one to be a true Christian and to be admitted to heaven.1 Edwards agreed with this and taught the same throughout his life.2 Stoddard also taught that whether or not someone had experienced such a saving work of the Holy Spirit was not necessarily discernable by others. Because the saving work of the Holy Spirit remained ultimately undetectable, Stoddard taught that anyone who agreed with the doctrines of Christianity and was moral in life could partake of Holy Communion, whether they professed such a saving work or not.3 Edwards came to disagree with this and argued that 1Many examples of this from Stoddard’s preaching and writing might be adduced. See his Safety of Appearing in the Righteousness of Christ (Northampton: S. & E. Butler, 1804; rpt., Morgan, PA: Soli Deo Gloria, 1995), 161-261, and The Tryal of Assurance (a lecture-day sermon preached by Stoddard in Boston on July 7, 1698, published there by B. Green and J. Allen), 6-7. 2Edwards’s emphasis on the necessity of a saving work of the Holy Spirit is such a pervasive theme that the entirety of his corpus demonstrates his unshakeable conviction of the necessity of “A Divine and Supernatural Light Immediately Imparted to the Soul by the Spirit of God …” as seen in Wilson M.
    [Show full text]
  • Jonathan Edwards' Life: More Than a Sermon
    Jonathan Edwards 1 Running Head: JONATHAN EDWARDS Jonathan Edwards' Life: More Than a Sermon Matthew Ryan Martin A Senior Thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for graduation in the Honors Program Liberty University Spring 2003 Jonathan Edwards 2 Acceptance of Senior Honors Thesis This Senior Honors Thesis is accepted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for graduation from the Honors Program of Liberty University. Chairman of Thesis ~~Ha.rVeY man, Th.D. .. Committee Member Branson Woodard Jr., D.A. Committee Member JrJdy,/, ,.IS ndlin, Ph.D. ASSIstant Honors Program Director Jonathan Edwards 3 Abstract Jonathan Edwards, born, (1703-1758), was a great man. He is often known only for a sermon, "Sinners in the Aands of an Angry God." This is unfortunate because followers of Christ should know this man's life. This paper focuses on Jonathan Edwards as a godly family man and on his missiological work. An emphasis is not carefully analyzed by many. The research for this essay originated from the author's desire to know more about Mr. Edwards. The texts studied are The works ofJonathan Edwards, along with many scholarly books and essays. The main modern books used are from Perry Miller and Elizabeth Dodds. All in all, the following research adds clarity and context to Edwards' legacy and to its enduring value to Christians. Jonathan Edwards 4 Jonathan Edwards' Life: More Than a Sermon Introduction Even after growing up in the church as a child, the writer did not discover the name of Jonathan Edwards until the beginning of his high school freshman year.
    [Show full text]
  • Eschatological Minority Report: Transcendent Heaven Patrick Ford Abilene Christian University, [email protected]
    Conversations: A Graduate Student Journal of the Humanities, Social Sciences, and Theology Volume 1 | Number 1 Article 2 January 2013 Eschatological Minority Report: Transcendent Heaven Patrick Ford Abilene Christian University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.acu.edu/conversations Part of the Religion Commons Recommended Citation Ford, Patrick (2013) "Eschatological Minority Report: Transcendent Heaven," Conversations: A Graduate Student Journal of the Humanities, Social Sciences, and Theology: Vol. 1 : No. 1 , Article 2. Available at: https://digitalcommons.acu.edu/conversations/vol1/iss1/2 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Journals at Digital Commons @ ACU. It has been accepted for inclusion in Conversations: A Graduate Student Journal of the Humanities, Social Sciences, and Theology by an authorized editor of Digital Commons @ ACU. Conversations Vol. 1 No. 1 May 2013 Eschatological Minority Report: Transcendent Heaven Patrick J. Ford Abilene Christian University Graduate School of Theology, Master of Divinity Abstract Far from a mere historical or theological curiosity, eschatology has a profound formative impact on the way adherents view life, purpose and their relationship to Creation. Typical contemporary conceptualizations of heaven in American evangelicalism describe an otherworldly, intangible and wholly spiritual realm in which God’s reign is complete and all the faithful reside in total peace and comfort after a final judgment. Such “transcendent-heaven” eschatology is vastly different from historically orthodox eschatology recorded through the eighteenth century and still maintained by the Roman Catholic and Orthodox Churches, among others. This historical-theological survey suggests that transcendent-heaven eschatology was first-articulated by Jonathan Edwards as a result of his experiences in the First Great Awakening and his departure from prevailing Puritan doctrines.
    [Show full text]
  • The Great Awakening Study
    INTRODUCTION The Great Awakening Introduction people have experienced periods of renewal and revival since Bible times. The Old Testament records for us periods when God’s Israel would awake from its spiritual lethargy and sin, repent and begin once again to walk with their God.1 Since the time of Christ this pattern has continued, with revivals breaking out in a myriad of locations, among Christians of vastly differing backgrounds and theological convictions. These seasons of renewal may be relatively brief in duration or last scores of years. Historians and theologians have grappled with what to call these seasons of the Spirit. They have been referred to as revivals, renewals, and awakenings. The common denominator in these movements seems to be a move of God in the lives of his people bringing them out of a time of spiritual depression, apathy, nominal faith or gross sin. In 1712 Solomon Stoddard preached a sermon in Northhampton Massachusetts entitled, On the Outpouring of the Spirit of God. The sermon set the stage for the revivals that would follow some years later. Here is the outline of Stoddard’s sermon. Doctrine: There are some special Seasons wherein God doth in a remarkable Manner revive Religion among his People. Question: How is it with a People when Religion is revived? § Saints are quickened. § Sinners are converted. § Many that are not Converted do become more Religious Observation: This reviving is sometimes longer, and sometimes of shorter Continuance. Sometimes Religion flourishes in a Country for a great many years together. So it did for twenty-nine Years in the days of Hezekiah, 2 Chronicles 29:1 .
    [Show full text]
  • The Foundation of the Brattle Street Church in Boston and Transformations in Colonial Congregationalism Cara Elliott
    Volume 10 Article 4 2011 This House which I have built: The oundF ation of the Brattle trS eet Church in Boston and Transformations in Colonial Congregationalism Cara Elliott Gettysburg College Class of 2011 Follow this and additional works at: https://cupola.gettysburg.edu/ghj Part of the American Studies Commons, History Commons, and the Religion Commons Share feedback about the accessibility of this item. Elliott, Cara (2011) "This House which I have built: The oundF ation of the Brattle trS eet Church in Boston and Transformations in Colonial Congregationalism," The Gettysburg Historical Journal: Vol. 10 , Article 4. Available at: https://cupola.gettysburg.edu/ghj/vol10/iss1/4 This open access article is brought to you by The uC pola: Scholarship at Gettysburg College. It has been accepted for inclusion by an authorized administrator of The uC pola. For more information, please contact [email protected]. This House which I have built: The oundF ation of the Brattle trS eet Church in Boston and Transformations in Colonial Congregationalism Abstract On December 24, 1699, a small gathering of men and women met "for public Worship in [their] pleasant new- built house," a simple wooden structure in Brattle losC e, a section of Boston near the town dock. The newly appointed Reverend Benjamin Colman preached from Chronicles 2, chapter vi, verse 18, "But will God in very deed dwell with men on the earth? Behold, heaven, and the heaven of heavens, cannot contain thee; how much less this house which I have built." This first public meeting of the Brattle trS eet Church occurred amidst a heated theological debate among New England Congregational clergymen, which began a year earlier when the foundation of the church had first been conceived.
    [Show full text]
  • An Earnest Exhortation to the Inhabitants of New-England (1676)
    University of Nebraska - Lincoln DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln Electronic Texts in American Studies Libraries at University of Nebraska-Lincoln 1676 An Earnest Exhortation To the Inhabitants of New-England (1676) Increase Mather Second (North) Church, Boston Reiner Smolinski , Editor Georgia State University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/etas Part of the American Studies Commons Mather, Increase and Smolinski, Reiner , Editor, "An Earnest Exhortation To the Inhabitants of New-England (1676)" (1676). Electronic Texts in American Studies. 31. https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/etas/31 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Libraries at University of Nebraska-Lincoln at DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln. It has been accepted for inclusion in Electronic Texts in American Studies by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln. INCREASE MATH ER (1639-1723). land (1676) fosters an American mythology born out of crises and rooted An Earnest Exhortation To the Inhabitants of New-England in the Old Testament language of Israel. He bewails New England’s de- parture form its original Errand, for which apostasy God employs the (1676) Indians as a punishing rod to chastise his backsliding children. The spe- cific events are cast in analogous patterns of the past, the Old Testa- Even more than his illustrious son Cotton, Increase Mather, is repre- ment type foreshadowing its latter-day antitype, and God’s dealings sentative of American Puritanism in seventeenth-century New England. with ancient Israel becoming a blueprint for how He would deal with his As a leader of Boston’s ministry, he became the defender of Puritan or- new English Israel.
    [Show full text]
  • Seth Storrs, Congregationalism, and the Founding of Middlebury College
    Seth Storrs, Congregationalism, and the Founding of Middlebury College The role of Seth Storrs in the founding of Middlebury College has not been given much attention; it is time to give him his long-due recognition. By Robert L. Ferm n November 1, 2000, Middlebury College celebrated the two hundredth anniversary of its charter. During its history OMiddlebury College has suffered through some dark times, yet it has survived and become a thriving institution in American higher education. Debts are owed to those who had the vision for this college in Vermont’s wilderness, and to those benefactors during its his- tory who supported its existence and made survival possible.1 The recent year-long celebration of the college’s bicentennial gave primary attention to the roles of the local entrepreneur, Gamaliel Painter (1742–1819), and Timothy Dwight (1752–1817), the president of Yale College. Painter was described as the founder of the college and recognition of that is evidenced in the bestowal of a replica of Painter’s walking stick to every graduate of the college at commencement and to alumni who return for their class reunions. The importance of Dwight’s visit to Middlebury to confer with town officials and give his blessing to the hopes for a college in the village was noted by a group of runners who retraced Dwight’s journey from New Haven, Connecticut, to Mid- dlebury. This further look at the period of the founding has led to a dif- ferent perspective on the college’s origin. This essay addresses three themes that supplement the previous his- toriography and focus on material not covered in earlier accounts.
    [Show full text]
  • The 1690S: the War, the Witch, and the Lord's Table
    The 1690s: The War, the Witch, and the Lord’s Table Ashley Warden and Eli Kwong REL 319: Eighteenth Century Theology Professor Don Westblade 15 February 2021 Warden and Kwong 1 Coming into the third generation after the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth, the Puritans had formed their own colonies of their Mother country of England. Their area of Massachusetts grew into the surrounding areas, forming the Massachusetts Bay Colony, and spread into New Hampshire, Connecticut, New York, and Pennsylvania. With ever-expanding territory, and with more people arriving in every ship, the once-small group of Puritans needed a system of government according to their religious beliefs. The Puritans sought to live, simply, as God would have called the nation of Israel, and by conjunction themselves, to live. Amidst two polarizing opinions on both sides of the Atlantic, they sailed between the cliffs of the English Church and the whirlpools of European government. In doing so, their attempt to create a pure theocracy yielded positive results for a while. However, as always comes with that which is new, growing pains threatened to fracture their system at its core. Amidst the Puritan difficulties on the west side of the Atlantic, the kings adjacent to the ​ ​ Puritan “downtown” London had concerns of their own. William III of Orange watched as Charles II of the Hapsburg empire grew senile with each passing epilectic seizure. Charles II’s most threatening problem was not his epilepsy however -- he did not have a son to succeed his throne. Louis XIV, from his palace outside Paris, had his eyes on the same threat.
    [Show full text]
  • Stoddard, Solomon (Bap. 1 Oct. 1643-11 Feb. 1729
    Stoddard, Solomon (bap. 1 Oct. 1643-11 Feb. 1729), Congregational pastor and theologian, was born in Boston, Massachusetts, the son of Anthony Stoddard, a prominent merchant, and Mary Downing, a niece of Governor John Winthrop (1588- 1649) and sister of the wife of Governor Simon Bradstreet. Solomon graduated from Harvard College in 1662, was appointed a fellow or tutor at the college in 1666, and served as its first librarian. He then spent two years as a chaplain in Barbados. He was allegedly about to embark for England in 1669 when a delegation from Northampton, Massachusetts, persuaded him to succeed their recently deceased young pastor, Eleazar Mather. Perhaps lacking the conversion experience that was a necessary condition of full church membership for ministers as well as laymen, he was not officially installed as pastor until September 1672. In March 1670 he married his predecessor's widow, Esther, a daughter of the eminent Reverend John Warham of Windsor, Connecticut. They reared twelve children, three of them Eleazar Mather's, in the parsonage. During the sixty years of Stoddard's pastorate, Northampton grew from a frontier outpost to a prosperous agricultural community and county seat. The town was blessed with excellent farmland in the Connecticut River floodplain and a strategic location at the crossroads of New England's major inland travel routes. Delegates from Northampton became spokesmen for the western region in the Massachusetts General Court, and Solomon Stoddard's son John (b. 1682, Harvard 1701) became the region's most prominent land speculator, magistrate, and military commander. Northampton's greatest claim to fame from the 1670s to the 1730s, however, was Solomon Stoddard's success as a preacher.
    [Show full text]
  • JONATHAN EDWARDS, SINNERS in the HANDS of an ANGRY GOD (8 July 1741)
    Voices of Democracy 1 (2006): 187‐207 Edwards 187 JONATHAN EDWARDS, SINNERS IN THE HANDS OF AN ANGRY GOD (8 July 1741) Jonathan J. Edwards Northwestern University Abstract: Jonathan Edwards's notorious 1741 sermon to the congregation at Enfield is more than an exercise in audience manipulation or rhetorical cruelty. Edwards integrated his own concerns and the concerns of his time into his message, exploring relationships between freedom and sovereignty, change and authority, and the proper role of religion in community life. Through this sermon we can better understand the tensions surrounding a significant transitional period in American life— commonly called the "Great Awakening." Key Words: Jonathan Edwards, George Whitefield, Solomon Stoddard, Great Awakening, Revival, Northampton, Faithful Narrative, Enfield, Puritan, Itinerant, Authority of Ministers, Hell For many readers, the first exposure to Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God1 is like taking a trip to a different world, a different planet, a set of norms and values very alien to our own. At the same time, in an age fraught with religious controversy, the text may seem all too familiar, like the rhetoric of extremist religious dogmas that force themselves, from time to time, upon the modern consciousness. Certainly, to modern readers, Jonathan Edwards's sermon may well appear the work of a skillful but sadistic fear‐mongerer, a wide‐eyed radical. Many of us might instinctively sympathize with the attitude of the famous American lawyer Clarence Darrow when he said of Edwards, "Nothing but a distorted or diseased mind could have produced his 'Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God.' Nothing but the puritanical, cruel generation in which he lived could have tolerated it."2 And yet there is much more going on in this infamous sermon than is immediately apparent to the modern reader.
    [Show full text]
  • Jonathan Edwards, Pastor: Minister and Congregation in the Eighteenth-Century Connecticut Valley
    University of Massachusetts Amherst ScholarWorks@UMass Amherst Doctoral Dissertations 1896 - February 2014 1-1-1977 Jonathan Edwards, pastor: minister and congregation in the eighteenth-century Connecticut Valley. Patricia J. Tracy University of Massachusetts Amherst Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.umass.edu/dissertations_1 Recommended Citation Tracy, Patricia J., "Jonathan Edwards, pastor: minister and congregation in the eighteenth-century Connecticut Valley." (1977). Doctoral Dissertations 1896 - February 2014. 1358. https://scholarworks.umass.edu/dissertations_1/1358 This Open Access Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by ScholarWorks@UMass Amherst. It has been accepted for inclusion in Doctoral Dissertations 1896 - February 2014 by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks@UMass Amherst. For more information, please contact [email protected]. JONATHAN EDWARDS, PASTOR: MINISTER AND CONGREGATION IN THE EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY CONNECTICUT VALLEY A Dissertation Presented by PATRICIA JUNEAU TRACY Submitted to the Graduate School of the University of Massachusetts in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY August 1977 History JONATHAN EDWARDS, PASTOR: MINISTER AND CONGREGATION IN THE EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY CONNECTICUT VALLEY A Dissertation Presented by PATRICIA JUNEAU TRACY Approved as to style and content by: Stephen Nissenbaum, Chairperson of Committee Gerald McFarland, Chairman Department of History i v ABSTRACT Jonathan Edwards, Pastor: Minister and Congregation in the Eighteenth-Century Connecticut Valley (September, 1977) Patricia Juneau Tracy, A.B., Smith College M.A., Ph.D., University of Massachusetts Directed by: Professor Stephen Nissenbaum Although renowned as a theologian, Jonathan Edwards was nevertheless a failure in the most essential task of the mini stry--persuading his congregation to share his vision.
    [Show full text]
  • Jonathan Edwards, Pastor: Minister and Congregation in the Eighteenth-Century Connecticut Valley. Patricia J
    University of Massachusetts Amherst ScholarWorks@UMass Amherst Doctoral Dissertations 1896 - February 2014 1-1-1977 Jonathan Edwards, pastor: minister and congregation in the eighteenth-century Connecticut Valley. Patricia J. Tracy University of Massachusetts Amherst Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.umass.edu/dissertations_1 Recommended Citation Tracy, Patricia J., "Jonathan Edwards, pastor: minister and congregation in the eighteenth-century Connecticut Valley." (1977). Doctoral Dissertations 1896 - February 2014. 1358. https://scholarworks.umass.edu/dissertations_1/1358 This Open Access Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by ScholarWorks@UMass Amherst. It has been accepted for inclusion in Doctoral Dissertations 1896 - February 2014 by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks@UMass Amherst. For more information, please contact [email protected]. JONATHAN EDWARDS, PASTOR: MINISTER AND CONGREGATION IN THE EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY CONNECTICUT VALLEY A Dissertation Presented by PATRICIA JUNEAU TRACY Submitted to the Graduate School of the University of Massachusetts in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY August 1977 History JONATHAN EDWARDS, PASTOR: MINISTER AND CONGREGATION IN THE EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY CONNECTICUT VALLEY A Dissertation Presented by PATRICIA JUNEAU TRACY Approved as to style and content by: Stephen Nissenbaum, Chairperson of Committee Gerald McFarland, Chairman Department of History i v ABSTRACT Jonathan Edwards, Pastor: Minister and Congregation in the Eighteenth-Century Connecticut Valley (September, 1977) Patricia Juneau Tracy, A.B., Smith College M.A., Ph.D., University of Massachusetts Directed by: Professor Stephen Nissenbaum Although renowned as a theologian, Jonathan Edwards was nevertheless a failure in the most essential task of the mini stry--persuading his congregation to share his vision.
    [Show full text]