I came across this excellent preface in a book I am reading for my MA thesis that captures the main reasons why I invest so much of my free time in studying the history and theology of the English Puritans. As an Evangelical Baptist in the Reformed tradition, reading Puritan theology is a bit like having a chat with my grandfather or learning from the wisdom of one of the older members of my congregation. Generally speaking, my studies in Church History over the past ten years or so since I first began to read biographies of my heroes of faith, have helped me to grow in my walk with the Lord and understanding of the Christian faith in ways that I find difficult to express - so I'll let Ligon Duncan help me out and hope that you catch the bug too!:
"Perhaps never before as much as now, the evangelical church needs to learn from the Puritans. We live in a time of tremendous change and upheaval in Christendom. Things once taken for granted as true and right and good, are being questioned - in both theory and practice - and there are disturbing signs that the spiritual health of the Western church is in a serious state. In such a time as this we need 'light from old times' to guide us into the future. The Puritans offer us that kind of light and we have, apparently, forgotten their wisdom. What are some of the practical benefits of studying the Puritans?
First, the Puritan movement bequeathed to us a tradition of pastoral theology unsurpassed in the history of Christianity in the English-speaking world. We need to hear them because a significant proportion of the church of our day has decided that its ministry should be carried out pragmatically rather than theologically. 'What works' is more important to some today than 'What is Biblical'. The Puritans were not tempted by such modern folly and in their history, lives and writings they offer to us a pattern of minsitry that was both theologically informed and pastorally effective. If we truly want to minister Biblically and effectively in the twenty-first century, then was are wise to sit at the feet of the Puritans.
Second, Puritan theology (simply defined as Biblical, evangelical, and Reformed theology) has served for more than three centuries as the basic doctrinal framework for evangelicalism. It has been influential throughout the Protestant world in the English speaking churches and especially in the Baptist, Congregational, Independent, Anglican and Presbyterian traditions. However, in the turmoil of post-modernity, the old doctrinal distinctives of evangelicalism are breaking down. We hear of Protestants returning to Rome or converting to Eastern Orthodoxy. We shudder when acclaimed evangelical scholars suggest that we need to rethink and redefine the doctrine of 'justification by faith alone'. We are numbered by the widespread lack of knowledge of Protestant first principles in the various evangelical churches. In this light, knowledge and appreciation of the times and teachings of the Puritans can serve to inoculate us against the false teachings and faddish Christianity of our own age. And perhaps the glory and biblical fidelity of their teaching can reclaim a hold on our hearts, saving us from slavery to the spirit of the times or from an irrational reactionary search for spirituality in mysticism or ritualism.
Third, the modern church seems allergic to theology and doctrine. And yet truth is essential for healthy Christian experience and service. The Apostle Paul himself argued throughout his letters that the saving knowledge of God is essential to Christian living. This entails knowing God personally and learning about Him through His word. Because of this, all Christians are called to be theologians - the question is whether we are going to be good ones or bad ones! - and that is where the study of the Puritans comes in. The mastering of the theology of the Puritans will provide the Christian with a wholesome and comprehensive grasp of biblical truth. That truth, in turn, is crucial for Christian living becasue what we believe affects how we live. Bad theology leads to bad practice. As Stephen Charnock said so long ago: 'It is impossible to honour God as we ought, unless we know His as He is.' The study of the Puritan's work will give us a surer knowledge of God as He has revealed Himself in the Scripture. For these reasons, and more, we need to become reacquainted with the lives and times and teachings of the Puritans."
To this, all I can add is a hearty 'Amen'! If you'd like to join me in rediscovering our heritage as Evangelicals through our Puritan grandparents here is a good place to start:
1) Joel Beeke, Meet the Puritans: Click Here
2) John Brown, The English Puritans: Click Here
3) Leland Ryken, Worldly Saints: Click Here
3) Banner of Truth Reprints/ Abridgments - go to http://www.amazon.ca/ and type in 'Puritan Paperbacks'
Is this a joke? possibly the worst idea i have ever read about the future of religion.
ReplyDeleteWe should really go back to the gold old days when we stoned people and made rape victims marry the rapist huh?
Dear Anonymous - sounds to me like you need to read something other than Hawthorne's 'Scarlet Letter' and anti-Puritan propaganda that is still hanging around from 200 years ago! Your comment is reminiscent of a few Fundamentalist rednecks who paint all Muslims as terrorist extremists. The best way to counter ignorance is through education, which is why I suggest you read some primary source documents rather than parroting things you have heard second or third hand. There is over 100 years of modern Puritan historiography, beginning with Perry Miller in the early 20th c. (an atheist!) who challenge the kind of false stereotype that you have raised. It is now almost universally recognized by scholars (Christian or otherwise) that the Puritans were not a bunch of ignorant bigots and witch burning fanatics (although you can probably find a few unstable extremists in any group of people that have ever existed in significant numbers).
ReplyDeleteBy and large, they were a movement of learned scholars, most of whom studied and taught at Cambridge University and to a lesser extent at Oxford. From the 1560s to the 1630s, Puritans were terribly persecuted by the State Church - many of them could not get official positions within the churches because they refused to violate their consciences in order to appease the Bishops. Puritans did more than any single group within the Reformed camp to foster education, and many of the Ivy League schools in the States have Puritan roots - Puritan New England was perhaps the most literate, well educated society that has ever existed! Puritans were also responsible for forging the way toward the Separation of Church and State which we enjoy today. The Puritan Protectorate attempted (under the leadership of Oliver Cromwell) to extend toleration to the Jewish people who had been expelled from Britain by the intolerance of Edward I. Cromwell (an Independent Puritan) also contended for religious tolerance among Protestants during the 1640s and ended the persecution and State sanctioned oppression of many sects previously deemed heretical or schismatic by the State Church.
Were there examples of intolerance among the Puritans? Absolutely! The witch burnings at Salem are usually the image that we have of Puritans, but this was by far the exception to the rule. In England, most of these excesses were curbed by the mid-seventeenth century as the Enlightenment began to make inroads into Christian belief and practice. To make sweeping generalizations and sterotypes of this nature is like saying that all American 'Christians' are members of the Klu Klux Klan!
You must always interpret historical figures in the light of their own times and contexts. The Puritans were not post-enlightenment rationalists - they lived in a time when religious uniformity was universally perceived as being critically important to the stability of the State. All Christian groups (and almost all other religions/ philosophies/ ideologies) were responsible for terrible acts of intolerance and hatred - the Puritans were certainly not exceptional in this regard when you compare them with other Protestants (including Calvin and Zwingli), and especially with the violence and intolerance of medieval Roman Catholicism. The Puritan viewpoint on witchcraft also begins to make sense when you read the Old Testament and realize that they were working within the context of a State Church and a Country which viewed itself as intrinsically 'Christian'. Since we are no longer working in these paradigms in the 21st century, there is no reason to fear the Puritans! They were theologians par excellence who have been wrongly stereotyped and slandered over the years by misinformed individuals who did not read their writings firsthand.
Totally convinced me John. I've been reading 'The Bruised Reed' by Richard Sibbes. It is incredible
ReplyDeleteHere's a quotation from Carl R. Trueman (Westminster) I just came across tonight in a recent and scholarly book published on John Owen (2007) which outlines the way in which Puritans have been slandered: "They thus suffered the fate of all those who lose: as they did not control the writing of history, so they were either written out of that history of demonized by that history, dismissed variously as fundamentalists, pietists obscurantists, and moralizing kill-joys of no intellectual merit whatsoever - an image sadly reinforced by some of the republishing projects and cultural attitudes of well-meaning followers who, because they had no real access to the avenues of higher education available to the pre-1662 English Reformed, were incapable of really understanding the sophistication of the theology they produced."
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