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TOPIC: Edwards, Jonathan - Rational Biblical Theology (Other Topics in this Collection)
SUBJECT: Chapt 20 Man
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According to Jonathan Edwards, man was created almost fallen. At least, he could have been created fallen, and as it was, without efficient grace, he could not not fall. Almost as soon as he was created upright, he did fall, difficult as it is to understand how he could have fallen at all. Nevertheless and notwithstanding, man, homo sapiens, was made in the image of God about six thousand years ago, and not of the stuff from which animals are made, but emanating from the eternal, immutable, unchangeable, perfect being of God Himself. And from whom he was emanating, he was re-emanating back again.
The universe was created relatively recently, proving how young the earth and how recent is human history. *1* “These footsteps there are of the first peopling of the earth by mankind not long before the days of Abraham; and of the overspreading of villages, towns and cities.” Job’s was the morality and religion of the first ages. This was the religion of Moses and Christianity: love to God and man. Early man believed he was made by one God and kept by Him. Edwards cites Isaac Newton’s chronology and argues that our being able to trace the world’s history means it is as Scripture teaches and man is recent.
So in a sermon on Mat_7:13-14 Edwards moves easily into saying that the strict moral demands of Christ are “easy for man as man.” *2* In “doing good man is acting as man.”
Man as created had an inalienable natural image of God as well as an alienable moral image. In his sermon on Rom_7:14 Edwards insists that the understanding is the major aspect of the natural image of God. *3*
Jonathan Edwards seems to have disagreed with Plato on the immortality of the soul. God’s creatures are not naturally immortal but only the Creator is. We recall that it was 1Ti_1:17 that brought on Edwards’ own conversion. “Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only wise God, be honour and glory forever and ever. Amen.” In the Gen_3:24 sermon it is 1Ti_6:16 which Edwards cites (“Who only hath immortality, dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto; whom no man hath seen, nor can see: to whom be honour and power everlasting. Amen.”). *4*
Man was created by God body and soul. For Edwards, man was bipartite, destined to be so eternally in hell or heaven. Likewise, in his soul man was bipartite, having understanding and will. All of this is traceable to divine creation, quite different from contemporary Existentialism which, denying creation, sees man, by an act of the will, virtually creating himself. Looking backward, Edwards seems to be following John Locke, but allowing no distinction between desire and will, which in turn will lead to the Hopkinsian development which I will trace in the final volume of this work.
Man was not only created with a body but that body will continue natural to man. Speaking of man’s future in heaven following the resurrection, Edwards preached “then shall they be in that state which is natural to human nature which is a state of union with a body. ’Tis natural to the soul to act by a body and to make use of such an organ.” Nevertheless the body is a prison to the righteous soul. “This body is like a prison to the holy soul, it exceedingly clogs, and hinders, and cramps it in its spiritual exercises and comforts. But when a saint dies, the soul is released from this prison. . . .” *5*
Possibly the fullest Edwardsian discussion of the human body is not at its creation but at the saints resurrection. Edwards explains:
4. The dead in Christ shall arise at the sound of the last trumpet with glorified bodies, and the living saints shall see them. The holy and blessed souls of saints that descended from heaven with Christ, shall then be re-united to those bodies that shall be prepared by infinite wisdom and skill to be fit organs for a holy and happy soul. The body shall not rise as it was before; there shall be a vast difference in it. 1Co_15:42-44. “It is sown in corruption, it is raised in incorruption; it is sown in dishonour, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power; it is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body.” The glory of that body that the saints shall rise with is what we now cannot conceive of. It shall not be such a dull and heavy-moulded thing as it is now: it shall be active and vigorous as a flame of fire fit for the use of a glorified soul. It will be no clog or hinderance to the soul as it is now, but an organ every way fit for the use of a glorious spirit. It shall not be weak, infirm, and frail as it is now; for, though it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power. Now the body is in need of food and sleep continually, to recreate it, but it shall not be so then; now the body is subject to weariness, and to diseases, but it shall not be so then; now if God lets in any great matter of divine light into the soul, the body is ready to sink under it, but it shall not be so then. The glorified body of the saints shall not then fail or flag at all by the most powerful exercises of mind. Now no man can see God and live, but the body would immediately sink and be dissolved; but then the body shall not fail at all by the immediate beholding of God. Now the saints can see but little. When God a little reveals himself, as he doth at times, the saints are forced to beseech God either to strengthen them to see it, or to stay his hand; but then the body shall be so vigorous and spiritual, that the constant and everlasting view of the glory of God shall not in any wise overcome it, or cause it in the least to fail.
The body shall not only be raised in an exceeding strength, but in wonderful beauty, for we are told that their bodies shall be like to Christ’s glorious body. The greatest beauty that ever any human body appeared in in this world, is vile and base in comparison. The beauty of the bodies of the saints shall not only consist in the most lovely proportion of the features of their countenance and parts of their bodies, but in a semblance of the excellencies of their minds, which will appear exceedingly in their countenance; their air and mien will be such as will naturally result from the wisdom, purity, and love of the soul, and shall denote and hold forth an inexpressible sweetness, benevolence, and complacence; and if I may speak what appears to me probable, and what seems to be authorized by the Scriptures, their bodies shall be as it were clothed with garments of light. The prophet Daniel, speaking of the resurrection, says, Dan_12:2-3. “And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt. And they that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament; and they that turn many to righteousness as the stars for ever and ever.” And Christ, speaking of the end of the world, says, Mat_13:43. “Then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father.” And there is nothing to hinder our understanding this literally of their bodies, and especially when this shining of the saints is spoken of from time to time as what shall be at the resurrection, and not of their souls in a separate state. Moses’s face shone when he had been conversing with God in the mount; much more may it be expected that the bodies of the saints shall shine, when they shall converse a thousand times more intimately with God, not in mount Sinai, but in heaven. We read of Christ, that when his body was transfigured, to teach us what the body of Christ should be in its glorified state, we are told that, when his body was transfigured, his face did shine as the sun, and his raiment was white as the light. Mat_17:2. But we are told that the bodies of the saints shall be made like unto Christ’s glorious body; there therefore seems to be much ground to think, that at the resurrection the bodies of the saints shall shine with a glorious light, and that they shall be as it were clothed with light. Thus the departed saints shall arise with glorious bodies, they shall lift up their heads out of their graves with joyful and glorious countenances: and at the same time the bodies of the living shall in a moment be changed into the same strength, and activity, and incorruptibility, and beauty and glo, with which those that were dead shall arise. 1Co_15:51-53. “Behold, I show you a mystery, we shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump; (for the trumpet shall sound;) and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.” *6*
When Edwards comes to show the body in its heavenly state, he remarks that “However bright heaven itself shall shine, the bodies of the saints themselves will shine far brighter, and appear far more beautiful.” *7* However, even the glorified body does not participate in the beatific vision:
As to the faculty that is the subject of this vision. It is no sight of any thing with the bodily eyes; but it is an intellectual view. The beatific vision of God is not a sight with the eyes of the body, but with the eyes of the soul. There is no such thing as seeing God properly with the bodily eyes, because he is a spirit: one of his attributes is, that he is invisible.” *8*
It is not in the body but in the imagination where Satan hides. “Wicked mens bodies are as it were the sepulchres of their souls.” *9* Not unlike Edwards, Richard Sibbes also seemed to see the imagination as the devil’s hiding place.
I. And amongst all the faculties of the soul, most of the disquiet and unnecessary trouble of our lives arises from the vanity and ill government of that power of the soul which we call imagination and opinion, bordering between the senses and our understanding; which is nothing else but a shallow apprehension of good or evil taken from the senses. Now because outward good or evil things agree or disagree to the senses, and the life of sense is in us before the use of reason, and the delights of sense are present, and pleasing and suitable to our natures, thereupon the imagination setteth a great price upon sensible good things; and the judgment itself since the fall, until it hath a higher light and strength, yieldeth to our imagination. *10*
Generally speaking, body and mind are marvelously adapted to man:
Again, the body and soul of a man are one, in a very different manner, and for different purposes. Considered in themselves, they are exceeding different beings, of a nature as diverse as can be conceived; and yet, by a very peculiar divine constitution or law of nature, which God has been pleased to establish, they are strongly united, and become one, in most important respects; a wonderful mutual communication is established; so that both become different parts of the same man. But the union and mutual communication they have, has existence, and is entirely regulated and limited, according to the sovereign pleasure of God, and the constitution he has been pleased to establish. *11*
Marvelous as is the adaption of body and mind in man, “[t]he main difference between men and beasts is, that men are capable of reflecting upon what passes in their own minds; beasts have nothing but direct consciousness. Men are capable of viewing what is in themselves contemplatively.” *12* This difference between man and animals, being what it is, can make animals become the superior creation. That is, inferior animals are made for man while man is made for God. If, therefore, man’s superior mentality is not used for its “chief end” it becomes a liability. “If man have no other end to seek but to gratify his senses, reason is nothing but an impediment.” *13* The animals are better off.
In fact, it is worse than that; if man does not serve God he is not only inferior to animals but utterly useless. “[I]f men be very useful in temporal things to their families, or greatly promote the temporal interest of the neighbourhood, or of the public; yet if no glory be brought to God by it they are altogether useless.” *14*
Yet inferior as wicked men are to animals and useless to God they are good for somethingto be destroyed. It would disparage divine justice if they did not serve some purpose. “If men bring forth no fruit to God they are wholly useless, unless in their destruction.” *15*
All this is but a reminder that “man by the fall wholly defaced the image of God.” Souls are still alive now but dead as to that to which the proper life of the soul belongs. The life of the soul depends on union of the Spirit of God with it, as the life of the body consists in the union of the spirit of men with that. Souls without the Spirit of God are as dead as the body is without the human spirit. Nevertheless, before the fall the soul was pure and reason ruled.
The sermon on Mat_11:16-19 spells out the chaos that has followed the wicked’s successful rebellion against reason. *16* While the unbelieving pride themselves on intelligence, their behavior proves the absence of it. This sermon is one of Edwards’ most interesting analyses of the human mind and how sin has affected it. I quote a portion of the doctrinal section in full:
Doctrine of Wicked Men Are Very Inconsistent with Themselves.
As discussed above, Edwards understands the soul to have two parts: understanding and will. It is not only Freedom of the Will that is based on this dichotomy, it underlies Religious Affections as well. A major critique has been mounted against Edwards at this point in his anthropology. Jeremiah Day, for one, distinguishes between an “emotion” which “chooses” something and the volition which chooses the action. Thus, “the motion of the hand is ordered by the will, to receive the prize which is offered to its acceptance.” *17* Edwards is charged with confusing these two under one volition. Edwards would probably have pled guilty to not confusing a distinction with a difference, but Enoch Pond would not let him off so easily. He contended that
President Edwards followed Locke in referring all our mental phenomena to the understanding and the will, ignoring entirely the great central department of the sensibility. In consequence of this we find him referring, sometimes to the understanding, sometimes to the will what clearly belongs to the sensibility. In this mistake he was followed by most of the early Hopkinsian writers. *18*
I think it has been clear throughout my volumes that Edwards does not ignore the sensibility. Rather, he identifies it with the affections, which he tends to identify with the will, which he does distinguish, but not separate, from the notional judgment.
Consciousness, more in the philosophical and psychological eye now than in Edwards’ day, was for him the “mind’s perceiving what is in itself - its ideas, actions, passions, and everything that is there perceivable.” *19* Edwards did not develop this definition, perhaps because it was more generally accepted in his day than in ours.
At death the soul leaves the body until the resurrection: “when a man dies his soul goes to God who gave it.” *20*
The seventeenth century Puritan, John Preston, once wrote, concerning the duty to turn from evil, “When therefore the illumination is perfect and full, that these ways wherein he [the evil man] walks will bring him to misery, and the contrary to happiness, then a man turns with his whole heart.” *21* Edwards agreed with Preston that the mind comes first and the heart second. “Such is the nature of man, that no object can come at the heart but through the door of the understanding: and there can be no spiritual knowledge of that of which there is not first a rational knowledge.” *22* But he differed by insisting that the fallen heart of man certainly does not follow the enlightened dictates of the understanding. If the heart is good it will respond favorably to the truth. If the heart is evil it will respond unfavorably to the truth.
Says Edwards, speaking of fallen man, “Natural men have no higher principle in their hearts than self-love. And herein they do not excel the devils. The devils love themselves. . . . And as there is no good principle in the hearts of natural men, so there are never any good exercises of heart, never one good thought, or motion of heart in them. Particularly, there is no love to God in them.” *23*
So the wicked man’s soul is “Satan’s house.” Nevertheless, “when a man dies his soul goes to God who gave it.” *24* Then, however, God gives the wicked soul to Satan forever. The wicked soul goes first to God because the soul is from God by a noble manner of communication (“breathed”). That the soul definitely does not die with the body Edwards proves by a number of arguments, along with the statement that the soul is taken care of by God and must go first to Him. In another sermon he tells us that “the souls of men they are spiritual and rational substances. . . .” *25*
This doctrine, to Edwards’ mind, was the crucial issue between the Arminians and Pelagians against the Reformed. In Original Sin, the work going through the press when he died, Edwards wrote:
Here I would observe in general, that the forementioned notion of freedom of will, as essential to moral agency, and necessary to the very existence of virtue and sin, seems to be a grand favorite point with Pelagians and Arminians, and all divines of such characters, in their controversies with the orthodox. There is no one thing more fundamental in their schemes of religion: on the determination of this one leading point depends the issue of almost all controversies we have with such divines. *26*
Edwards put it all in a sentence a little earlier: “If will determines its own acts, that determination is an act of the will.” *27* Cherry cites Murphy approvingly that for Edwards acts of the will are effects which have causes. *28*
Determinist that he is, Edwards sees a real difference “between forced compliance and a free willingness.” *29* Evangelistically speaking, he preaches that Christ “seeks not that you should receive him against your will, but with a free will.” *30* Yet, I add, the convicted sinner wants Christ in his heart because of his fear of hell. He does not choose Christ because he loves Him, but he does fully choose Christ. The “compliance” isn’t really forced but he freely chooses to have Christ motivated by his fear and self-love. The saint freely chooses Christ because he loves Christ for the sinner’s sake. There is a different motivation but motivation equally freely chosen by sinner and saint. It is the nature of the choice, not the motivation that makes one good and the other evil but there is no difference between free and “forced” wills. It is surprising that Edwards does not notice what he so strongly stresses in Freedom of the Will Part IV chapter 1.
Edwards goes deeper. “How is it possible,” he asks the unconverted, “that you should be willing to accept of Christ as a Saviour from the desert of a punishment that you are not sensible you have deserved.” *31* The sinner could well answer that he does not deserve the punishment but he is convinced that he is going to get it if Christ does not save him.
Early in his reflections, Edwards was insisting that free will did not imply contingency. It was not incompatible with necessity. Of Christ, he said, “as free as his will was, it was impossible that he should will sin.” *32* It was necessary that Christ freely will against sin (and, presumably, for virtue). Isaac Crook’s criticism is as interesting as it is common. The will, as Edwards “conceived it, was subjected to extraneous influences and determined from without. It was charged up with what did not belong to it, but to the emotions.” *33* Crook sees the necessity but not the freedom, because he did not see the will as Edwards saw it. In “The Mind” Edwards insists that it was not the greatest good apprehended but the greatest apprehension of the good apprehended. *34*
According to Conrad Wright, even the Calvinists came to disagree with Jonathan Edwards. Warfield thought that Edwards stopped the triumph of Arminianism for a hundred years, but Wright wrote: “Stephen West and Samuel Hopkins adopted Edwards position, but even the Edwardsians rapidly worked around to reassertion of the freedom of the will. Timothy Dwight, for example declared that ‘men are internally conscious of their own free agency, being irresistibly sensible, that they act spontaneously, and without any coercion or constraint.’ No Arminian could say more.” *35* And no Calvinist or Edwardsian could say anything other, as I have shown throughout. Wright does not seem to recognize the difference between free agency (according to what seems good to the agent, actor, chooser) and “contrary choice” of a will without any reason for willing.
Haroutunian puts his axe at the root of Wright’s tree (and some other trees as well):
Strictly, there is no such thing as the “will.” There is perception of motives, volition, and action. . . .
Edwards will not say that “the will is determined by the greatest apparent good, or ‘by what seems most agreeable’; because an appearing most agreeable to the mind, and the mind’s preferring, seem scarcely distinct.” . . .
There is no such thing as the “self-determination of the will,” because there is no “will.” *36*
“There is no ‘will,’” that is, as a separate faculty!
Edwards’ own way of anticipating the Wrights and the Haroutunians to come was by showing that there is true choice but never “contrary choice.” “Present choice can’t at present choose to be otherwise: for that would be at present to choose something diverse from what is at present chosen.” *37* So to Haroutunian he is saying there is indeed will or choice or inclination and to Wright that he, Edwards, is denying constrained “coerced” will but that choices cannot be willy-nilly. As Faust and others have properly observed, Edwards did not deny even free will but limited it to liberty of action. While there may be a semantic debate whether Edwards had even one will, he himself speaks of two wills the rational will and the will of the appetite. *38* The will of appetite is from the liveliness and intensiveness of the idea or sensibleness of the good. This can be against the rational will and can overpower it. With respect to the combination, man is a “free agent.” With respect to the rational will he is not a free agent but a slave of his appetite. “Thus our first parents were not, but were perfectly free agents with respect to their rational will - the inclinations, which we call appetites, were not above, did not keep in subjection.” *39* As we have seen, the rational will had “sufficient” but not “efficient” grace.
Jonathan Edwards distinguishes emphatically between the power of will and the inclination of will but not enough, apparently, to head off a host of scholars from confusing them. Even in his own day Edwards had his confusers:
’Tis entirely in man’s power to submit to Jesus Christ as a Saviour if he will but the thing is, it never will be he should will it, except that God works it in him: It depends on will not on power. Many things are in our power that are impossible because of our disposition. I mean this, that that is in our power which we can do if we please. . . . The world has got into an exceeding wrong and confused way of talking about will and power . . . notion that a man could heartily and truly desire to will it but could not will it truly willed it but could not will it so that he that wills real religion it is his own act and yet every tithe is wrought by the spirit of God. **
Perry Miller finds Edwards’ determinism essentially the same as that of Augustine, Luther, Leibniz and Turretin, and “almost all the Calvinistic writers of Geneva and Holland, during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries,” and in Hobbes and Anthony Collins as well. *41*
The late B. F. Skinner, on the other hand, according to the following statement, must never have read Edwards’ Freedom of the Will or any of those philosophers mentioned above: “Prevailing philosophy of human nature recognizes an internal ‘will’ which has the power of interfering with causal relationships and which makes the predictions and control of behavior impossible. To suggest that we abandon this view is to threaten many cherished beliefs - to undermine what appears to be a stimulating and productive conception of human nature.” *42*
Rational as man by nature is, it is the affections that move him. He can know what he ought to do but it is his feelings that produce action good or evil. *43*
A disposition is the inclination of the soul. It tends, in Edwards, to equate with the will. We have seen more than once, especially in Freedom of the Will, that to will and to incline are the same thing.
A disposition by its very nature is a created (or re-created) entity or faculty of the soul. Following Aristotle Edwards argues that the soul’s generating a disposition is an absurd notion. “The very supposition of a disposition to right action being first obtained by repeated right action, is grossly inconsistent with itself: for it supposes a course of right action, before there is a disposition to perform any right action.” *44*
“When God first made man he had a principle of holiness.” *45* But now “man is born with no other principle but self-love to direct his powers.” *46* In the application, Edwards says that Adam, too, had the self-love principle but it was subject to the love of God and, therefore, good.
Edwards’ sermon on 1Jn_4:12 tells us that holiness was a supernatural principle in Adam and did not properly belong to human nature. *47* Human nature as such exists apart from a principle of holiness. The unregenerate are true, though utterly evil men.
The sermon, “Jesus Christ the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever” leads to an oblique reference to the changeability of mere man.
We learn from the truth taught in the text, how fit Christ was to be appointed as the surety of fallen man. Adam, the first surety of mankind, failed in his work, because he was a mere creature, and so a mutable being. Though he had so great a trust committed to him, as the care of the eternal welfare of all his posterity, yet, not being unchangeable, he failed, and transgressed God’s holy covenant. He was led aside, and drawn away by the subtle temptation of the devil. He being a changeable being, his subtle adversary found means to turn him aside, and so he fell, and all his posterity fell with him. It appeared, therefore, that we stood in need of a surety that was unchangeable, and could not fail in his work. Christ, whom God appointed to this work, to be to us a second Adam, is such an one that is the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever, and therefore was not liable to fail in his undertaking. He was sufficient to be depended on as one that would certainly stand all trials, and go through all difficulties, until he had finished the work that he had undertaken, and actually wrought out eternal redemption for us. *48*
The Holy Spirit originally dwelt in the originally righteous man. The medievalists had an originally non-righteous man who would be pulled apart by the tension between body and soul were it not for the super-added gift (donum superadditum) to hold him in harmony. When man failed to control the tension by failing to use this special gift, he fell into sin. Why man as created did not use this gift was the scholastics’ problem as it was Augustine’s before them. He called it the aidiutorium.
Edwards’ problem is far more difficult. His super-added gift was none other than the Spirit of God. The Holy Spirit could not fail to keep changeable man from changing from good to evil, and man could not overpower Him if he were tempted to do so. Though never spelled out, this divine super-added gift must have been a mere offer. If the Holy Spirit were resident in the first man man would never have fallen (as will be the case later in heaven where he never can fall for that reason). If the Spirit were not resident, but merely offering to reside within man, it still remains difficult to understand why such a man would ever reject such a Gift.
Man was made with a holiness principle but this was not essential to human nature. It was lost by the Fall without humanity ceasing to be. As a matter of fact, all the motivation that is necessary to human nature is self-interest, not God-interest. Yet man would know from his rational nature that it is to man’s self-interest to be controlled by God-interest. He was at first aided toward this by the “supernatural” principle of holiness and the presence of the Holy Spirit Himself in Adam, but being deceived by the devil he let his self-interest overthrow God-interest.
Edwards’ view that Adam was placed on probation for his entire posterity *49* and consequently was “constituted” one with that posterity *50* will be discussed more fully in the chapter on Imputation.
Concerning true religion in the life of man, Edwards teaches “that no religion is acceptable to God but that which is done from a true respect to him.” *51* This is because that is not “true” which springs from self-love. That only is true which has its foundation in the high esteem of God and a sense of His “excellency.” Consequently, true worship “aims” at the glory of God and pleasing Him and enjoying Him and His promises by faith. The rationale against self-interest and in favor of the divine is that there is no goodness in anything not for the glory of God. God does not command anything for need of it, but only as occasion to respect Him. Other-motivated needs have no “suitableness” to the nature of God and are essentially lies. *52*
We do not have a published sermon or treatise of Edwards’ doctrine of man. It can be put together as I have done here, and as many dissertations and books have done. *53* The sermon with which I close this chapter is Edwards’ description of the godly man (not the wicked man), but then for Edwards, that is true man. The wicked, unredeemed, impenitent man is no true man anymore. He is good only for the burning, as the sermon on Eze_15:2-4 so poignantly describes. *54*
Psa_73:25. Whom have I in heaven but thee? and there is none upon earth that I desire besides thee.