While Jonathan Edwards has been crowned “America’s Theologian,” his successors in the early republic can rightly be called American theologians. Known pejoratively as “The New Divinity,” the Edwardsean tradition was a socially-oriented Calvinism, confronting the most controversial and even volatile issues in their infant nation. With the ideas of Edwards and some of the mostContinue reading “Call for Papers: Jonathan Edwards and the Early American Republic: Patriotism, Exceptionalism, and the Pursuit of Happiness”
Category Archives: Jonathan Edwards
Call for Papers: The Jonathan Edwards Miscellanies Companion, Volume 2
Call for Papers: The Miscellanies Companion, Volume 2 Call for Submissions Students and scholars are now invited to contribute essays for publication in The Miscellanies Companion, Volume 2, Foreword by Kenneth P. Minkema, Executive Director of the Jonathan Edwards Center at Yale University. Click here for details about the previous Miscellanies Companion. Participants in this project must have at minimumContinue reading “Call for Papers: The Jonathan Edwards Miscellanies Companion, Volume 2”
New Podcast Interview: “Why I am Not (Yet) A Conditionalist”
About a month ago I joined Chris Date at the Rethinking Hell 2019 Far West Chapter Symposium to discuss my theological reservations about conditionalism and my convictions which prevent him from embracing a conditionalist doctrine of hell. In case you aren’t familiar with the term conditionalism or annihilationism, this is the view of hell where “in theContinue reading “New Podcast Interview: “Why I am Not (Yet) A Conditionalist””
The “Other” True Meaning of Christmas
The cross is the focal point of the gospel. Paul says as much when he tells the church in Corinth that he “decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified” (1 Cor 2:2). But just because the cross is the focus of the saving work of Christ, that doesn’t mean that theContinue reading “The “Other” True Meaning of Christmas”
Jonathan Edwards Center Inaugural Conference
In less than two weeks Gateway Seminary will be hosting the first conference at their new Jonathan Edwards Center. The lineup looks great. You can register here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/regeneration-revival-and-creation-the-jonathan-edwards-center-conference-tickets-48045672901 If you are on the fence about going, here are the plenary speakers’ paper titles: Plenary Speakers Douglas Sweeney – Distinguished professor of church history and the historyContinue reading “Jonathan Edwards Center Inaugural Conference”
Jonathan Edwards on Penal Substitution
Penal substitutionary atonement, the doctrine according to which Christ died to pay the penalty for our sins, is crucial to good news of the gospel. It is so central to the good news that Christians around the world proclaim it weekly by singing hymns like Stuart Townend and Keith Getty’s “In Christ Alone My HopeContinue reading “Jonathan Edwards on Penal Substitution”
Jonathan Edwards’s Argument Against Unitarianism in Miscellany 96
Today I’m finally putting pen to paper for a short introduction to two of Edwards’s miscellanies for a reader being published by Jonathan Edwards Press. In the reader I will be introducing Miscellany 96 which is on the Trinity and Miscellany 279 which is on the torments of hell. The plan is basically to introduceContinue reading “Jonathan Edwards’s Argument Against Unitarianism in Miscellany 96”
Edwards and an Argument for the Eternity of Hell (Miscellany 279)
Assuming you believe in the eternity of hell, how would you go about arguing for this position? Would you go to Scripture? Would you look back at what some historical theologians have said about the matter? Would you try to make some argument based upon your intuitions about justice and the heinousness of sin beforeContinue reading “Edwards and an Argument for the Eternity of Hell (Miscellany 279)”
Redeeming Edwards’s Doctrine of Hell: An “Edwardsean” Account
This month an article I wrote defending the traditional doctrine of hell was published in Themelios 42.2. In this article I argue that despite being subject to a serious philosophical objection, an Edwardsean doctrine of hell is defensible. In order to defend this version of the doctrine of hell I suggest we start by thinkingContinue reading “Redeeming Edwards’s Doctrine of Hell: An “Edwardsean” Account”
Jonathan Edwards on the Atonement (Review)
It is well known that some of Edward’s followers, sometimes known as the New Divinity, advocated for a view of atonement known as the “governmental theory” or according to Oliver Crisp, penal non-substitution. This view (in its orthodox form) was first proposed by Hugo Grotius. He suggested that Christ acted as a penal example, demonstratingContinue reading “Jonathan Edwards on the Atonement (Review)”
