The John Erskine Letterbook, 1742-45

As a postgraduate student at the University of Stirling, I applied for an annual award sponsored by the Scottish History Society. This is the ad for the SHS postgraduate award:

The Scottish History Society is delighted to announce a call for applications for its annual prize of £350 to be awarded for the best transcription with historical introduction by a postgraduate student.

The purpose of the prize is to recognise the excellent, and often unpublished, primary source discovery and transcription undertaken by postgraduate students. The competition is open to anyone registered for any postgraduate degree at any university or anyone within five years of graduation with a postgraduate qualification. Previous prize winners are not entitled to compete for the prize, but previously unsuccessful applicants are warmly encouraged to apply. Entry is not restricted to members of the Scottish History Society.

The submission should be of previously unedited primary material and should have formed part of the postgraduate research project. For example, this might be a substantial transcription, or series of transcriptions, used for a dissertation or might be an appendix from a Ph.D. thesis.

The documents submitted should be directly related to the history of Scotland and/or the Scots. The competition is not restricted to material from Scottish archives. Work submitted should not have been published by the entrant or by another.

The prize winning entry will be considered for publication in a subsequent SHS miscellany volume. Thus, by entering into the competition, the prize winner agrees to his/her entry being read by a referee who may suggest improvements for publication. Applications which are deemed to be of sufficient quality but are not awarded the prize will also be considered for publication under the same conditions. The prize winner agrees, where feasible, to attend the SHS AGM (normally in December) to be awarded with the prize. The prize winner also agrees that their success be publicised by the SHS. The winner will receive membership to the society for one year as part of their prize.

More information about the award, including how to apply, may be found here.

I didn't win the award, but the SHS contacted me about publishing my submission. Five years and three editors later, my transcription of "The John Erskine Letterbook, 1742-45" will be published in the next Miscellany of the Scottish History Society.

In my research on Erskine, I came across a letterbook that is housed in the Massachusetts Historical Society. The manuscript consists of a series of letters to various clergymen, including the Boston minister, Thomas Prince. The first letters relate to the Cambuslang and Kilsyth revivals that took place in western Scotland in 1742. Erskine witnessed both revivals and spoke about his firsthand experience at these Scottish "communion seasons." Erskine no doubt wrote to Thomas Prince with the intent that the American minister publish his accounts of the revivals in The Christian History. Prince, however, did not publish Erskine's letters, probably because the final edition of The Christian History on February 23, 1745 predated the letterbook by a few weeks.

Besides an initial letter to Prince, Erskine also addressed William and Samuel Cooper of Boston, Philip Doddridge of Northampton (England), and four divinity students at Edinburgh University. The letters are between the years 1742 and 1745, but are not separated in the manuscript (Erskine used dotted lines to partition one letter from another). The content either relates to the Scottish revivals at Cambuslang and Kilsyth or advice on the preparation of becoming a minister.

I cite some of the content of the manuscript in my book, Enlightened Evangelicalism: The Life and Thought of John Erskine, but there is a lot of material that I left out. Anyone interested in eighteenth-century revivals should take a look at this piece.

Randall Balmer Comes to Chattanooga

My friend and colleague Bill McClay alerted me to the fact that Randall Balmer is coming to Chattanooga where he will speak at Grace Episcopal Church on October 13 and 14. More information may be found here.

Here is the blurb posted on Grace Episcopal's website:

On Saturday October 13, Grace Episcopal Church, Chattanooga, will host Professor Randall Balmer who will speak on religion and the presidential elections. It promises to be a full day with two lectures, two question-and-answer sessions, lunch and a book signing reception. All events are free (donations are welcomed at the door and reservations for lunch are required). On Sunday, October 14, Dr. Balmer will facilitate the Adult Formation class at 9:30. He will also preach at both services.

Randall Balmer is an Episcopal priest, Mandel Family Professor of Arts & Sciences and Chair of the Department of Religion at Dartmouth College. Previously, Balmer was Professor of American Religious History at Barnard College, Columbia University, and a Visiting Professor at Yale Divinity School. He is the author of a dozen books, including Thy Kingdom Come: How the Religious Right Distorts the Faith and Threatens America and The Making of Evangelicalism: From Revivalism to Politics and Beyond. Dr. Balmer is known for his well-received book God in the White House: How Faith Shaped the Presidency from John F. Kennedy to George W. Bush. Dr. Balmer was nominated for an Emmy for script-writing and hosting the three-part PBS documentary Mine Eyes Have Seen the Glory, based on his book with the same title. He also wrote and hosted two other PBS documentaries: Crusade: The Life of Billy Graham and In the Beginning: The Creationist Controversy.

Balmer is on my list of potential speakers for the LeRoy Martin Lecture Series, and so I hope to make it out to Brainerd, TN to hear his talk.

Teaching Modern Christian Thought

I have several research projects that I want to finish. I would like to write an article in the next few months on the religion of an eighteenth-century Scottish minister, and this summer I am planning on writing an article on early evangelicals and their relationships with printers, publishers, and booksellers. This last article will require a lot of research that I have only begun to assemble. I also am close to finishing my second book project, an anthology of transatlantic eighteenth-century evangelicals. I am about halfway done with the final editing and have collected nearly all the images and permission rights for the book. But I have put all these writing projects aside the last week or so in order to prepare for my spring 2013 courses, "The Faiths of the Founding Fathers" and "Modern Christian Thought."

Most recently, I have been working on "Modern Christian Thought." This is a course that I taught in the fall of 2011. When I looked for a textbook, I had difficulty choosing among the available options. There is a very good two-volume series on Modern Christian Thought, published by Fortress Press. But these books are massive (the first volume is over 400 pages, and the second is over 500 pages) and cover lots of thinkers who I have no intention of going over in the course. I came to the same conclusion with regard to Gareth Jones's Blackwell Companion to Modern Theology and David Ford's The Modern Theologians. These are very helpful resources for teachers, but not concise enough for undergraduate courses. I almost convinced myself to use John E. Wilson's excellent Introduction to Modern Theology as a textbook, but about one-third of the way through, I realized that it would be more suitable for graduate students due to the complexity of the arguments discussed.

While I appreciate Roger Olson's and Stan Grenz's award-winning 20th-Century Theology, I don't feel comfortable using it at a state university. Since this book is clearly written from an evangelical perspective, it seems more fitting for Christian colleges and seminaries. But if Olson and Grenz show a bias towards traditional Christian theology, the opposite may be said of Duane Olson and his Issues in Contemporary Christian Thought. I commend the author for writing a textbook on modern theology designed for undergraduates. If only he had treated traditional Christianity fairly, perhaps his book would have wider appeal. The latest book I considered was Kelly Kapic's and Bruce McCormack's edited volume, Mapping Modern Theology: A Thematic and Historical Interpretation. The problem here had to do with its methodology. As opposed to a thematic approach, I prefer having the students study each theologian individually and chronologically.

In the end, I decided to use the Fortress Press readers on leading 19th- and 20th-century thinkers. I plan on requiring the students to read several sections by five modern theologians. Last year I had them analyze excerpts from Schleiermacher, Hegel, Bultmann, Barth, and Bonhoeffer (Bonhoeffer was the overwhelming favorite). If Mark Noll's The Princeton Theology: 1812-1921 was not out of print, I would have included excerpts from Charles Hodge and B. B. Warfield. This year I am replacing Hegel with the German church historian, Adolf von Harnack. As important as Hegel is to modern Christian thought, the students in my previous class bemoaned reading sections in his Phenomenology of Spirit and his Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion. As they read these primary sources, I have them answer questions on aspects of a particular author's theology, writing half-page responses in an essay format.

Besides readings from these primary sources, I have the students do research on an additional theologian or movement of their choice and then present their findings to the class. The last time I taught Modern Christian Thought, I had them choose from among the following: Karl Rahner, Albrecht Ritschl, Paul Tillich, Reinhold Niebuhr, Jurgen Moltmann, Liberation Theology, Feminist Theology, John Hick, and Joseph Ratzinger. Next spring, however, I may expand this list to include Charles Hodge, Soren Kierkegaard, and Walter Rauschenbusch.

Conference on Faith and History Meeting

The biennial meeting of the Conference on Faith and History at Wenham, MA (October 3-6) is fast approaching.

The student conference is first, and I'm proud to say that a UTC student, Jenny Edwards, will be presenting a paper on Thursday, October 4 entitled, "Miracles in the Modern World: A Case Study of Bethel Church." Jenny is a superstar honors student at UTC who is writing a thesis under my supervision on Bethel Church.

At the professional conference, I look forward to hearing papers from Carlos Eire, Mike Kugler, Ken Minkema, and Mark Noll (among others).

On Saturday, October 6 at 10:30am, I will be participating in Session #32 on "Print Culture in Early America." The panel will be chaired by Adrian Chastain Weimer of Providence College. Here is the lineup of papers:

• Jonathan Yeager, University of Tennessee, Chattanooga: “Eighteenth-Century Evangelical Progression through the Dissemination of Books”

• Samuel Smith, Liberty University: “Charleston’s Holy Club”

• T.J. Tomlin, University of Northern Colorado: “Popular Culture and Religious Authority in Early America”

In participating in this panel, I wanted to support my friend Sam Smith, who has a book coming out in February with the University of South Carolina Press entitled, A Cautious Enthusiasm: Mystical Piety and Evangelicalism in Colonial South Carolina. I'm really excited for Sam and his first book, and I hope that it is well received.

Unfortunately, I won't be able hear Andy Tooley's talk on “Reimagining Religion: The Romantic Flowering of Transatlantic Evangelicalism” since his session meets at the same time as mine.

D. G. Hart at UTC

Today (September 27), D. G. Hart will be speaking at UTC on the topic: "What Makes the Religious Right Different from Political Islam?" Daryl is Visiting Professor of History at Hillsdale College, and is the first LeRoy Martin Distinguished Lecturer of the academic year. His talk today comes out of his new book, From Billy Graham to Sarah Palin: Evangelicals and the Betrayal of  American Conservativism. His lecture should spark some interesting discussion. The public is invited, and so if you are nearby please feel free to join us. More information on the lecture series, including times and parking can be found here.

The overall theme for the fall's lecture series is religion and politics. After Daryl, John Fea will be speaking on October 9 on "Was America Founded as a Christian Nation?," which is based on his recent book. After Fea, Amanda Porterfield will be speaking on "Conceived in Doubt: Religion and Politics in the New American Nation," which is also a topic stemming from a recent book. I'm excited that UTC will be hosting these distinguished scholars.

Books on the Founding Fathers

Next semester (spring 2013), I will be teaching a course entitled, "The Faiths of the Founding Fathers." I have in mind to use Frank Lambert's book, The Founding Fathers and the Place of Religion in America as well as Thomas Kidd's and Matthew Harris's The Founding Fathers and the Debate over Religion in America (I came back around on this documentary reader. As I finished up Lambert's book, I noticed that many of the readings in Kidd and Harris coincided nicely). I am also fairly sure that I will use Brooke Allen's Moral Minority: Our Skeptical Founding Fathers. What I am not sure about is what other books I should use.

I am considering having the whole class read the three books listed above, and then three other books on the religion of George Washington (Mary Thompson's "In the Hands of Good Providence"), Benjamin Franklin (Kerry Walter's Benjamin Franklin and His Gods), and Thomas Jefferson (Edwin Gaustad's Sworn on the Altar of God). Each student would then choose one other book on a Founding Father to write a book review. At the end of the course, students would write a comparative paper on the religions of the three Founding Fathers above plus the additional book that they read.

I was surprised that there are not all that many current books on the Founding Fathers beyond Washington, Franklin, Adams, Jefferson, and Madison. The list below are the books that I have found. Would anyone be willing to weigh in on the books below? Are there other books I should consider for students to read? Can anyone recommend some journal articles to consult?

Abigail Adams

            Holton, Woody. Abigail Adams. Free Press, 2009.

Levin, Phyllis Lee. Abigail Adams: A Biography. St. Martin’s Griffin, 2001.

Withey, Lynne. Dearest Friend: A Life of Abigail Adams. Touchstone, 2002.

John Adams

            Ferling, John. John Adams: A Life. Oxford, 2010.

McCullough, David. John Adams. Simon & Schuster, 2001.

Samuel Adams

            Alexander, John. Samuel Adams: The Life of an American Revolutionary. Rowman &

                        Littlefield, 2011

Fowler, William M., Jr. Samuel Adams: Radical Puritan. Longman, 1997.

            Stoll, Ira. Samuel Adams: A Life. Free Press, 2008.

Ethan Allen

            Randall, Willard Sterne. Ethan Allen: His Life and Times. W. W. Norton, 2011.

Aaron Burr, Jr.

Isenberg, Nancy. Fallen Founder: The Life of Aaron Burr. Penguin, 2008.

Stewart, David O. American Emperor: Aaron Burr’s Challenge to Jefferson’s America.

            Simon and Schuster, 2011.

Charles Carroll

            Birzer, Bradley J. American Cicero: The Life of Charles Carroll. Intercollegiate Studies,

                        2010.

            McDermott, Scott. Charles Carroll of Carrollton: Faithful Revolutionary. Scepter, 2001.

John Dickinson

            Flower, Milton E. John Dickinson: Conservative Revolutionary. University of Virginia,

                        1983.

Benjamin Franklin

            Isaacson, Walter. Benjamin Franklin: An American Life. Simon & Schuster, 2003.

            Wood, Gordon. The Americanization of Benjamin Franklin. Penguin, 2004.

Alexander Hamilton

            Chernow, Ron. Alexander Hamilton. Penguin, 2005.

            McDonald, Forrest. Alexander Hamilton: A Biography. W. W. Norton, 1982.

            Randall, Willard Sterne. Alexander Hamilton: A Life. Harper, 2003.

Patrick Henry

            Kidd, Thomas S. Patrick Henry: First Among Patriots. Basic Books, 2011.

John Jay

            Stahr, Walter. John Jay, Founding Father. Hambledon and London, 2005.

Thomas Jefferson

            Bernstein, R. B. Thomas Jefferson. Oxford, 2005.

Ellis, Joseph J. American Sphinx: The Character of Thomas Jefferson. Vintage, 1998.

           

Dolley Madison

            Allgor, Catherine. A Perfect Union: Dolley Madison and the Creation of the American

                        Nation. Holt, 2007.           

            Cote, Richard N. Strength and Honor: The Life of Dolley Maison. Corinthian, 2004.

James Madison

            Broadwater, Jeff. James Madison: A Son of Virginia and a Founder of the Nation. UNC,                          2012.

Brookhiser, Richard. James Madison. Basic Books, 2011.

            Gutzman, Kevin R. C. James Madison and the Making of America. St. Martin’s Press,

                        2012.

            Labunski, Richard. James Madison and the Struggle for the Bill of Rights. Oxford, 2008.

            McCoy, Drew R. The Last of the Fathers: James Madison and the Republic Legacy.

                        Cambridge, 1991.

Gouverneur Morris

            Adams, William Howard. Gouverneur Morris: An Independent Life. Yale, 2003.

Thomas Paine

            Kaye, Harvey J. Thomas Paine and the Promise of America. Hill and Wang, 2006.

Nelson, Craig. Thomas Paine: Enlightenment, Revolution, and the Birth of Modern                                     Nations. Penguin, 2007.          

Benjamin Rush

            Brodsky, Alyn. Benjamin Rush: Patriot and Physician. Truman Talley, 2004.

            Hawke, David Freeman. Benjamin Rush: Revolutionary Gadfly. Bobbs Merrill, 1971.

Roger Sherman

            Hall, Mark David. Roger Sherman and the Creation of the American Republic. Oxford,

                        2012.

George Washington

            Ellis, Joseph J. His Excellency: George Washington. Vintage, 2005.

            Longman, Paul K. The Invention of George Washington. University of Virginia, 1999.

            Novak, Michael and Jana. Washington’s God: Religion, Liberty, and the Father of Our

                        Country. Basic Books, 2006.

John Witherspoon

            Tait, Gordon L. The Piety of John Witherspoon: Pew, Pulpit, and Public Forum. Geneva

                        Press, 2001.

Bemjamin Rush

For the past several weeks I have been finishing up a journal article. In writing the article, I did some research on Benjamin Rush, soon discovering that there is not much scholarship on him.

I was surprised to see so few books on Rush. Besides being a signer of the Declaration of Independence, and the person who helped reconcile John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, he had an interesting career as a physician and patriot. He was instrumental in securing John Witherspoon as the president of the College of New Jersey and Charles Nisbet as the principal of Dickinson College. David Barton and Alyn Brodsky,  have written books about Rush, but the standard biography is by David F. Hawke.

In terms of his religion, Rush at first associated with the evangelicals. He was the nephew of Samuel Finley and seemed to have been influenced by the preaching of revivalists during the Great Awakening. Later in life, however, Rush adhered to a more liberal faith, at one time claiming to be a Unitarian.

I hope that Rush receives the scholarly attention that he deserves in the near future. It would be great if someone thoroughly analyzes his faith.

New Review of Enlightened Evangelicalism in the Journal of Ecclesiastical History

Isabel Rivers of the University of London has written a nice (brief) review of Enlightened Evangelicalism in the Journal of Ecclesiastical History.

Here it is:

This is the first full length study for almost 200 years of the Scottish evangelical Calvinist minister John Erskine (1721–1803). There are recent accounts of the Popular party in the Church of Scotland, including Erskine, by John R. McIntosh and Ned C. Landsman (who also wrote the ODNB article), but this is an original and well researched intellectual biography of Erskine that adds considerably to our knowledge and that will appeal to a range of readers with interests in eighteenth-century Scottish theology and religious culture, evangelicalism, transatlantic relations, and the circulation of books. Yeager provides chapters on Erskine's decision to train for the ministry, influenced by the Cambuslang and Kilsyth revivals and the impact of George Whitefield in Scotland; his methods as preacher, in comparison with those of William Robertson and Hugh Blair; his orthodox Calvinist theology, modified by evangelical emphasis on the need to preach the gospel to all; his controversial writings against both John Wesley's anti-Calvinism and Roman Catholicism; his American friendships, notably (by correspondence) with Jonathan Edwards, and his support of the American side in the Revolution; and his role as disseminator of books. Yeager is clear that Erskine's importance is not as preacher, theologian, or controversialist (though he has interesting things to say about all these roles) but as propagator of evangelical Calvinist books and ideas. Through the study of booksellers' catalogues, Erskine's manuscript correspondence, and his editions and published recommendations of other writers' works, Yeager spells out in fascinating detail Erskine's responsibility for publishing Edwards's works in Scotland, supplying thousands of English and Scottish books to American ministers and colleges, recommending reading to English Baptists, sending American and British books to Holland, attempting (unsuccessfully) to get English and American readers to study Dutch theology, and urging others to write in defence of evangelical Calvinist principles. Like his bête noire Wesley (though Yeager does not make this comparison) Erskine saw that to be widely read books had to be affordable. The main weakness of this study is Yeager's tendency to repeat the claim that Erskine's life's work is a manifestation of the Enlightenment, a term that is in danger of losing all meaning. The account of Erskine's attack on Wesley, though it shows convincingly why Methodism failed in Scotland, does not properly explain why Wesley thought the doctrine of predestination was poisonous. 

 I'll be sweating Tommy Kidd's review of the book, which is scheduled to be published in the Scottish Journal of Theology sometime in the future.