JONATHAN EDWARDS'S "HERMENEUTIC": A CASE STUDY OF THE SERMON "CHRISTIAN KNOWLEDGE"

Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society, Jun 2006 by Rivera, Ted

While biblical interpretation is as old as the Bible itself, the term "hermeneutics" did not appear in prominent theological usage until 1654, when the Lutheran theologian Johann Konrad Dannhauer published his Hermeneutica sacra sive methodus exponendarum sacrarum litterarum. Since that time, the term has come to represent an entire field of often technical theological study, exploring a wide range of concepts related to the understanding and interpretation of Scripture. To speak of Jonathan Edwards's hermeneutic, then, is essentially an anachronism. At the same time, Edwards has much to say about the Bible, about how to understand it, and most particularly, what to do with that understanding.

There is the danger in every age to esteem current intellectual achievement as the pinnacle of thinking, as representing the summit of accomplishment in a given field of endeavor merely because the ink is still wet. With the sophistication of much ongoing hermeneutical dialogue it would be easy to discount the value of past thinkers, including Edwards, as far removed from the present conversation, but also as decidedly out of step with many prevailing conclusions. On the contrary, though, Edwards employs a threedimensional interpretive method that merits reevaluation and reflection.

While many approaches could be taken to consider his method of interpretation, a case study will perhaps prove to be both succinct and illustrative. One important sermon will be considered that will provide the kernel of Edwards's teaching on the understanding of Scripture and serve as a framework by which to consider his larger "hermeneutical" program. That sermon is "Christian Knowledge."1

It bears notice that the subtitle given to Edwards's sermon "Christian Knowledge" is "The Importance and Advantage of a Thorough Knowledge of Divine Truth." This emphasis on an individual Christian's need for a thorough knowledge of Scripture, while clearly present in this particular sermon, is by no means unique for Edwards. Rather, it is a regular point of emphasis in many of his works, and an especially frequent point of application in his sermons. This emphasis did not rise accidentally from the ether of the eighteenth century. There was in Edwards himself a resolute personal habit of life, a fixed disposition, a determined and deliberate study of Scripture, grinding at intellectual and spiritual work in his study, work that revolved around Scripture thirteen hours a day for years on end.2 His celebrated "Resolutions," penned for the most part in his late teen years, reveal this drive in even his early Christian experience: "Resolved, to study the Scriptures so steadily, constantly and frequently, as that I may find, and plainly perceive myself to grow in the knowledge of the same."3

This same orientation persists through the whole of his life and is seen even in the approach used in his last work, Original Sin, completed in 1757 shortly before his death. Nearly half of the work is its second part, "Containing Observations on Particular Parts of the Holy Scripture, Which Prove the Doctrine of Original Sin."4 Scripture was for Edwards never extraneous, never secondary; its consideration represented nothing less than a lifelong obsession. Ola Winslow wrote, "This young man had a genius for finding Scripture to his purpose, and finding it in unexplored and scriptural corners."5 And John Gerstner observed, "In a sense Edwards was dealing with the interpretation of Scripture almost every day of his life. All his notes in all his writings were directly or indirectly involved in this enterprise. We have never encountered a sermon which did not begin with a text of Scripture and expound and apply it throughout."6

At the outset, then, it must be observed that Edwards maintains a decidedly high view of Scripture and that "his strongest and most explicit commitments were to the Calvinist-Protestant cause."7 George Marsden summarizes this position well:

Edwards, like his Reformed and Puritan predecessors was "biblicist" in the sense of rigorously attempting to follow the Reformation principle of "the Bible alone" as an authority, particularly in matters pertaining to theology and the church. Many of their beliefs and practices were determined because, according to their scholarship, such were taught in Scripture. At the same time, every bibliciet interprets the Bible through a tradition of interpretation, and Edwards' biblicism was refracted through the scholarship of his Calvinistic heritage.8

Correspondingly, Edwards's sermon construction follows a conventional Puritan formulation, but not slavishly so. In "Christian Knowledge," we see the familiar Puritan pattern of Text, Doctrine, and Application as its three primary heads.9

Before moving to consider these three elements of Text, Doctrine, and Application in "Christian Knowledge," one further dimension must be considered that dramatically underscores Edwards's singular focus on Scripture. It is just as important to observe what is missing from his sermons (and writings) as it is to take notice of what is present, as evidence of what he sought to accentuate. In this respect, his preaching is in no way "modern." His most famous sermon "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" is a deceptive point of contact in this regard; it is in some ways not at all representative of his preaching.10 "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" contains a number of potent images that we might call illustrations. In this respect, the number, vivacity, and frequency of these illustrations is perhaps atypical. Edwards does often use metaphorical language and illustrations, but they are most typically drawn directly from Scripture rather than from other sources, and are not at all like contemporary sermon illustrations. In many of Edwards's sermons, one will be hard pressed to find illustrations of any kind. In addition, Edwards only very rarely quotes other preachers or authors in the course of a sermon. And last, "humor" is not a notion that Edwards is at all familiar with, so far as his preaching is concerned.