There are few experiences more devastating than discovering the dark side of someone you love and respect. While this experience is most painful when it is someone that you know personally, it can still be disorienting even if you only know that person from afar. Discovering the darker side of a parent or spouse can be earthshattering; discovering the darker side of a pastor or leader you’ve spent years listening to can throw you into a state of disequilibrium. So what happens when you discover the sins of historical figures who’ve shaped your theology in significant ways?
Interest in Jonathan Edwards had been growing at a tremendous pace over the last several decades. Yet, despite enjoying years of prominence, in the last half decade or so a growing number of voices have pointed to the fact that Edwards was an unapologetic slaveowner. In his latest book, Ownership: The Evangelical Legacy of Slavery in Edwards, Wesley, and Whitefield, Sean McGever joins this chorus of voices. While his book deftly covers the practices of Whitefield and Wesley, I believe that given Edwards’s influence on evangelicalism it is worthwhile to pause and reflect on McGever’s treatment of the Sage from Northampton.
Edwards the Slaveowner
Wesley, Whitfield, and Edwards were all Englishmen. Understanding their relationship to slavery requires an understanding of what English Christians would have thought about the practice. In one of his early chapters, McGever—who was trained as a historical theologian—explains that 18th century English Christians tended to hold six beliefs regarding slavery. They believed that:
- Slavery is ordained by God.
- Slavery is a result of sin.
- Slave acquisition is allowed within limits.
- Slaves must obey and masters must be temperate.
Furthermore, there were two additional beliefs that were held but increasingly were debated:
- Slaves deserve spiritual freedom.
- Slave conversion does not emancipate.
Given these six common beliefs it is unsurprising that Edwards had no issues with the institution of slavery. In 1731, Edwards paid eighty pounds—over half of his annual salary—to buy a teenage slave girl named Venus (98). McGever writes that Edwards also owned a woman named Rose, his first slave while serving as a missionary-pastor in Stockbridge. Rose “is said to [originally] have been stolen from Africa when a child, as she was getting water at a spring” (103). Eventually Rose married a free Black man named Joab Benny. Whether she was manumitted or not is unknown. What is known, however, is that eventually she became a full member of Edwards’s church in Stockbridge. The Edwards family went on to own other slaves including, Joseph and Su. Most shockingly, however, is that in 1756 the Edwards family purchased a three-year-old boy named Titus. Even upon his death Edwards did not offer Titus his freedom, rather, his will provided instructions for how to keep Titus within the family’s ownership.
While Edwards’s slave owning practices are not a new revelation, we have continued to learn more about what Edwards thought about slavery. In fact, just as recently as 1997 Ken Minkema discovered and published some already used scraps of paper which contain the only writings where Edwards himself explains his own views on slavery. In this document Edwards writes—quite surprisingly—defending an Arminian minister. Benjamin Doolittle owned a man named Abijah Prince and his congregation had taken an issue with it. In his defense of Doolittle, Edwards writes that even though it was a necessary evil, slavery served “some positive good in the natural order that God had decreed” (100) and that if slavery was unjust, then Doolittle’s congregation is guilty of receiving benefits from this unjust practice. Nevertheless, Edwards believed that “there is no hurt in partaking of the benefits of slavery, in part because of the overall benefits of slavery for society at large” (100). Edwards, as his own words and practices demonstrate, had no qualms with slavery. However, the same could not be said about his disciples.
McGever does a fine job of chronicling the move from acceptance of slavery to abolitionism in the careers of Samuel Hopkins and Jonathan Edwards Jr. Though both accepted, and even promoted, slavery as an institution initially, they eventually changed their views, primarily because of Edwards’s own theological system. In his Dissertation Concerning the Nature of True Virtue, Edwards articulated a concept of “disinterested benevolence.” The idea is to seek the ultimate good of another without consideration of how that good benefits or does not benefit yourself (154). It’s no small point that his disciples recognized Edwards’s failures, yet found within Edwards’s theology the conceptual seed of what would eventually undermine the very slavery Edwards had no qualms about.
Owning Their Failures
“You can’t divide a human. You can’t discard the parts you dislike and keep the parts you enjoy.” (168)
McGever’s chapter addressing how to respond to the failures of our theological predecessors is by far the highlight of this book. Rather than thinking about the topic abstractly he takes readers to Scripture. He reminds them that even in Matthew’s presentation of Jesus’s genealogy Matthew includes figures with checkered pasts. Matthew doesn’t hide the sin in Jesus’s genealogy. He owns it as part of Jesus’s story. Jesus’s genealogy includes both “saints and sinners.” McGever explains that “We need not hide or ignore the facts. We need the courage and wisdom of the same God who inspired Matthew’s strategic genealogical honesty” (170).
Two Impulses: Erase or Ignore
As an Edwards scholar, an elder in a church that identifies with the theology of the Reformed stream, and as someone who is active on social media, I’ve come across a variety of reactions to Edwards’s slaveholding. On one hand there are those who are quick to erase Edwards’s place in Evangelicalism’s history. I recall an exchange where I announced that I was launching a podcast on behalf of Gateway Seminary interacting with scholars who do research on “America’s Theologian.” Someone commented, “Please don’t call him America’s theologian.” I can only assume they rejected this moniker for Edwards because he was a slave owner.
Both impulses—to erase and ignore—are wrong.
On the other hand I’ve come across others who are so eager to adopt the theology of Edwards that they either ignore, or just brush aside, this blemish in Edwards’s life. “He was just a man of his times,” the ignorers say. “We shouldn’t get hung up on this, because it was such a common practice.” Both impulses—to erase and ignore—are wrong. Both impulses betray an anemic doctrine of sin and grace. Once we come to see the failures of our heroes, “we cannot unsee what we’ve seen” (171). A robust doctrine of sin and grace leads us to acknowledge the wrong that legacy figures like Edwards committed because we know that no one is without the risk of falling into sin. Additionally, a robust doctrine of sin reminds us that each of us is especially prone to fall into sins that are common to our culture.[1] Learning the context—i.e. understanding the times of the “man of his times”—in which sin is committed helps us to understand why a particular sin was committed. What it does not do is lead us to excuse that sin. At the same time, a robust doctrine of grace reminds us that God can take fallen humans—like Edwards—to accomplish his redemptive purposes. In fact, the history of redemption demonstrates that God often uses those with blemishes on their track record to bring about his ends. This is a difficult, but important, truth we need to remember when reckoning with the sins of those whom God has used to shape us in important ways; whether it be relatives, pastors, or historical figures. Through his reflections on this truth—and the stories of Wesley, Whitefield, and Edwards—McGever demonstrates the sort of response the gospel leads us to. He writes,
“Owning the failures of our heroes requires us to acknowledge the wrong they’ve done, holding them fully accountable for their actions and any underlying false beliefs—they are without excuse. We must also learn from their mistake We are called to love them as fellow fallen sinners in need of God’s forgiveness—and if this is difficult, which is likely, we remember Jesus urges us to forgive others as we have been forgiven ourselves.” (171)
While much more could be said about McGever’s book—from its careful historical research to its popular and enjoyable tone to the thoughtful self-reflective questions in the final chapter—to say that this historical study which was written for a wide audience points us back to the truths of God’s redemptive ways is the highest praise I can give to this book.
[1] Martin Luther King Jr. wrote, “Slavery in America was perpetuated not merely by human badness, but also by human blindness… the whole of slavery was perpetuated by sincere though spiritually ignorant persons.” This quote demonstrates that ignorance—often brought about because of cultural context—does not diminish the reality of sin, but it does help us understand why people commit certain sins. [MLK, Strength to Love (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2010), 37 – 38. Quoted on page 171).