The Religious Affections

The Religious Affections
Name	The Religious Affections
Author	Jonathan Edwards
Country	United States
Language	English language
Subject	Christianity; Puritanism; Revivalism
Genre	Religious text; Theology
Publisher	Thomas and John Fleet (first edition)
Pub date	1746
Pages	492 (varies by edition)
Preceded by	A Faithful Narrative of the Surprising Work of God
Followed by	Miscellanies

The Religious Affections

The Religious Affections is a major two-volume theological work by Jonathan Edwards published in 1746 that analyzes the nature of religious experience during the First Great Awakening and offers criteria for discerning genuine spiritual renewal. Edwards, a Congregationalist pastor from Northampton, Massachusetts, addresses ministers, laypeople, and skeptics about distinguishing authentic conversion from superficial emotionalism. The work engaged contemporaries across New England, influenced later evangelicalism, and remains central to debates in American religious history and systematic theology.

Background and Context

Edwards wrote in the milieu of the First Great Awakening alongside figures like George Whitefield, John Wesley, Charles Wesley, and Gilbert Tennent, responding to revival events in Massachusetts Bay Colony, Connecticut Colony, and New Jersey. His pastoral career intersected with institutions such as Harvard College and the Presbyterian Church debates, and he corresponded with contemporaries including Benjamin Franklin, Cotton Mather, and William Law. The work builds on Edwards's earlier writings, including A Faithful Narrative of the Surprising Work of God and sermons like "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God," and reflects intellectual influences from John Owen, Thomas Boston, Richard Baxter, John Locke, and Isaac Newton's empirical method. The political and ecclesial context included controversies involving Massachusetts General Court, Yale College alumni, and transatlantic pamphlet exchanges with Scottish Enlightenment thinkers such as Francis Hutcheson. Edwards situates his analysis amid the pastoral concerns voiced by Jonathan Mayhew, Samuel Hopkins, and ministers in the Presbyterian Synod of New York and Philadelphia.

Summary of Contents

Edwards organizes the text into sections that examine affections, signs of true religion, and the fruits of conversion, drawing on scriptural authorities like the Book of Romans, Gospel of John, and Epistle to the Galatians. He defines affections with reference to theologians such as John Calvin, Martin Luther, and Philip Doddridge, and contrasts genuine affections with forms critiqued by Socinianism, Arminianism, and Deism. Edwards catalogs marks of authenticity including moral transformation exemplified by figures like Augustine of Hippo, Thomas Aquinas, and Jonathan Edwards's interpretations of biblical characters such as Paul the Apostle and David. He incorporates pastoral case studies similar to those in works by Samuel Davies, John Cotton, and Nicholas Temperley and uses examples from revival meetings led by George Whitefield, James Davenport, and Philip Embury. The book closes with practical admonitions for clergy in parishes like Northampton, Massachusetts and relates to later pastoral manuals used in institutions like Princeton Theological Seminary and Andover Theological Seminary.

Theological Themes and Arguments

Central themes include the nature of affections, the role of conversion, and the interplay of reason and emotion, invoking authorities such as Augustine, William Perkins, Jonathan Edwards's contemporaries Samuel Miller and John Flavel, and commentators like Matthew Henry. Edwards argues for objective marks of regeneration rooted in sanctification and perseverance as discussed later by John Wesley and Charles Finney and anticipates critiques from figures associated with Unitarianism and Transcendentalism such as Ralph Waldo Emerson. He engages doctrines from the Westminster Confession of Faith, debates over predestination involving Jacobus Arminius and John Calvin, and pastoral concerns echoed by Charles Haddon Spurgeon. Edwards synthesizes biblical exegesis from Matthew, Luke, and the Psalms with philosophical considerations found in René Descartes and David Hume's empiricism, while maintaining continuity with Reformed theology and the Puritan tradition represented by Richard Sibbes and John Owen.

Reception and Influence

The Religious Affections was read widely by ministers, theologians, and lay leaders across New England, Great Britain, and the British Empire, shaping revival practices of leaders like Charles Finney, Dwight L. Moody, and Billy Graham. It influenced institutions including Princeton University, Harvard Divinity School, and Yale Divinity School, and informed movements such as American evangelicalism, Calvinist revivalism, and nineteenth-century revival circuits exemplified by C. H. Spurgeon and Edwards's descendants. Scholars in religious studies and historians like Sydney Ahlstrom, Nathan O. Hatch, and Mark Noll have cited it in studies of the Second Great Awakening and American religiosity. The work affected missionary strategies of organizations like the London Missionary Society, American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, and denominational bodies including the Congregationalist Church, Presbyterian Church (USA), and Methodist Episcopal Church.

Criticism and Controversy

Critics accused Edwards of over-intellectualizing affections and of aligning with strictures similar to those in debates involving Arminian opponents such as John Wesley and revivalists like George Whitefield, leading to polemics with figures like James Davenport and Ethan Allen's later critics. Enlightenment critics including Voltaire and David Hume indirectly challenged Edwards's premises about experience and reason, while nineteenth-century liberal theologians like Friedrich Schleiermacher and Albrecht Ritschl offered alternative emphases on feeling and community. Debates over authenticity echoed in controversies involving Unitarians at Harvard and the later Auburn Declaration and legal-religious disputes in the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court. Modern scholars such as Mark A. Noll and Sydney E. Ahlstrom have both defended and critiqued Edwards's methodology.

Manuscript History and Editions

The original 1746 publication by Thomas and John Fleet circulated in colonial print culture alongside contemporaneous pamphlets by Cotton Mather and William Tennent Jr. Manuscripts and notebooks by Edwards are held in archives including Yale University Beinecke Library, Harvard University Houghton Library, the Library of Congress, and the American Antiquarian Society. Later editions were edited by scholars such as Edward Hickman and Harry S. Stout and published in collections by Yale University Press and Eerdmans Publishing Company. Critical editions appeared in the twentieth century in series like the Works of Jonathan Edwards edited by Sergeant Jonathan Edwards scholars and influenced translations in German and French scholarly traditions tied to libraries such as the British Library and the Bibliothèque nationale de France.

Category:1746 books Category:Works by Jonathan Edwards Category:Books about Christianity