Edwards in Our Time: Jonathan Edwards and the Shaping of American Religion
Reviewed by John H. Adams, October 22, 1999
Because he wrote so well, so brilliantly, so passionately, because he combined the rare gifts of philosopher and theologian, of revivalist and pastor, because he didn’t fear preaching hellfire and brimstone or speaking poetically of the eschaton, the end, as being sheer music, Jonathan Edwards is not an easy act to follow.
Some of the essays in this book show the difficulty of trying to capture the essence of Edwards. Others do better. All attempt to shore up a common theme, that Edwards is a perennial.
There are some fine practical conclusions. Notably, Walter L. Eversley, professor of systematic theology at Virginia Theological Seminary, said today’s ministers might look to Edwards as a model for how to do revival and communion in the same ministry. But Eversley was not reassuring that anyone can do both well.
One of the strongest essays is by Allen C. Guelzo, professor of American history and dean of the Templeton Honors College at Eastern College. His essay reviews Edwards’ writings about free will, made famous (or infamous) by a 1754 treatise with a long title that began, A Careful and Strict Enquiry into the modern prevailing Notions of the Freedom of the Will. Suffice to say that the treatise concluded that the Arminians were wrong and that the Calvinists were right. Cuelzo’s contribution is to bring to the forefront today essential questions that Edwards asked 250 years ago.
Another essay, by Gerald R. McDermott, associate professor of religion and philosophy at Roanoke College, reviews Edwards’ writings on the salvation of non-Christians (possible, but unlikely). McDermott’s analysis demonstrates the excellence of Edwards’ thinking and scholarship.
Other essays are not so enlightening. What may be brilliant thinking translates poorly in cumbersome writing, such as by one essayist, who said, “Edwards articulates the inner-trinitarian exercise of the divine dispositional essence with the help of the analogy of the human self as knowing and loving as well as the Lockean notion of the self’s reflexive knowledge of its internal acts.”
That writer needed a cue from Edwards, who instructed himself about writing: “Let it not look as if I was much read, or was coversant with books, or with the learned world.”