The eighteenth-century American evangelist Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758) was one of the two most prominent figures associated with the First Great Awakening of the 1700s (Mormonism is considered to be part of the Second). Edwards was a fascinating personality — a compelling preacher, a missionary, and an insightful theologian, whose thinking and writing engaged head-on the contemporary philosophical Enlightenment (with its challenges to revealed religion). Reading his religious writings, in particular his Religious Affections (an examination of spiritual experience, which concluded, in essence, that it was not the intensity, novelty, or uniqueness of an experience that evidenced its truth, but its effectiveness in motivating a person to Christian life) opens a window on a religious landscape much different from our own, where matters of faith so often seem to be discussed either at a level of megachurch-style Oprahfied oversimplicity, or arcanely, by credentialed specialists working more or less out of sight of the general public.
In 1737, Edwards wrote a “Personal Narrative,” (http://www.graceonlinelibrary.org/articles/full.asp?id=38%7C%7C116) setting forth an account of his conversion and spiritual experiences. It ought to be of interest to Mormons for several reasons, including its more or less superficial resemblance to aspects of Joseph Smith’s conversion narrative, canonized as part of the Pearl of Great Price, but also for its in-depth discussion of personal religious experience — which present Mormon teaching holds to be the critical basis for faith within the Church.
First, a taste of the parallels:
From Edwards’ Personal Narrative:
The first instance that I remember of that sort of inward, sweet delight in God and divine things that I have lived much in since, was on reading those words, I Tim. 1:17. Now unto the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only wise God, be honour and glory for ever and ever, Amen. As I read the words, there came into my soul, and was as it were diffused through it, a sense of the glory of the Divine Being; a new sense, quite different from any thing I ever experienced before. Never any words of scripture seemed to me as these words did.
From Joseph Smith-History, 1:11-12:
“While I was laboring under the extreme difficulties caused by the contests of these parties of religionists, I was one day reading the Epistle of James, first chapter and fifth verse, which reads: If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him. Never did any passage of scripture come with more power to the heart of man than this did at this time to mine. “
Edwards often found it difficult, despite his intellect and education, to find words sufficient to describe the powerful spiritual experiences he recounted. I see parallels with how Latter-day Saints often describe the witness of the Holy Ghost — as something hard to describe. Mormons will often describe a “burning in the bosom,” an unusual clarity of thought, a sense of well-being, unexpected ideas, and so forth. Here is Edwards:
Not long after I first began to experience these things, I gave an account to my father of some things that had passed in my mind. I was pretty much affected by the discourse we had together; and when the discourse was ended, I walked abroad alone, in a solitary place in my father’s pasture, for contemplation. And as I was walking there, and looking up on the sky and clouds, there came into my mind so sweet a sense of the glorious majesty and grace of God, that I know not how to express. I seemed to see them both in a sweet conjunction; majesty and meekness joined together; it was a sweet, and gentle, and holy majesty; and also a majestic meekness; an awful sweetness; a high, and great, and holy gentleness.
I very frequently used to retire into a solitary place, on the banks of Hudson’s River, at some distance from the city, for contemplation on divine things and secret converse with God: and had many sweet hours there. Sometimes Mr. Smith and I walked there together, to converse on the things of God; and our conversation used to turn much on the advancement of Christ’s kingdom in the world, and the glorious things that God would accomplish for his church in the latter days. I had then, and at other times, the greatest delight in the holy scriptures, of any book whatsoever. Oftentimes in reading it, every word seemed to touch my heart. I felt a harmony between something in my heart, and those sweet and powerful words. I seemed often to see so much light exhibited by every sentence, and such a refreshing food communicated, that I could not get along in reading; often dwelling long on one sentence, to see the wonders contained in it; and yet almost every sentence seemed to be full of wonders.
Sometimes, only mentioning a single word caused my heart to burn within me; or only seeing the name of Christ, or the name of some attribute of God. And God has appeared glorious to me, on account of the Trinity. It has made me have exalting thoughts of God, that he subsists in three persons; Father, Son and Holy Ghost. The sweetest joys and delights I have experienced, have not been those that have arisen from a hope of my own good estate; but in a direct view of the glorious things of the gospel. When I enjoy this sweetness, it seems to carry me above the thoughts of my own estate; it seems at such times a loss that I cannot bear, to take off my eye from the glorious, pleasant object I behold without me, to turn my eye in upon myself, and my own good estate.
Once, as I rode out into the woods for my health, in 1737, having alighted from my horse in a retired place, as my manner commonly has been, to walk for divine contemplation and prayer, I had a view that for me was extraordinary, of the glory of the Son of God, as Mediator between God and man, and his wonderful, great, full, pure and sweet grace and love, and meek and gentle condescension. This grace that appeared so calm and sweet, appeared also great above the heavens. The person of Christ appeared ineffably excellent with an excellency great enough to swallow up all thought and conception … which continued as near as I can judge, about an hour; which kept me the greater part of the time in a flood of tears, and weeping aloud. I felt an ardency of soul to be, what I know not otherwise how to express, emptied and annihilated; to lie in the dust, and to be full of Christ alone; to love him with a holy and pure love; to trust in him; to live upon him; to serve and follow him; and to be perfectly sanctified and made pure, with a divine and heavenly purity. I have, several other times, had views very much of the same nature, and which have had the same effects.
How do Mormons’ spiritual experiences differ, if they do, from Edwards?
Before an answer comes that God may inspire non-Mormons to embrace the true aspects of their traditions, one aspect of Edwards’ conversion account particularly stands out:
From my childhood up, my mind had been full of objections against the doctrine of God’s sovereignty, in choosing whom he would to eternal life, and rejecting whom he pleased; leaving them eternally to perish, and be everlastingly tormented in hell. It used to appear like a horrible doctrine to me. But I remember the time very well, when I seemed to be convinced, and fully satisfied, as to this sovereignty of God, and his justice in thus eternally disposing of men, according to his sovereign pleasure. But never could give an account, how, or by what means, I was thus convinced, not in the least imagining at the time, nor a long time after, that there was any extraordinary influence of God’s Spirit in it; but only that now I saw further, and my reason apprehended the justice and reasonableness of it. However, my mind rested in it; and it put an end to all those cavils and objections. And there has been a wonderful alteration in my mind, in respect to the doctrine of God’s sovereignty, from that day to this; so that I scarce ever have found so much as the rising of an objection against it, in the most absolute sense, in God’s strewing mercy to whom he will shew mercy, and hardening whom he will.
Edwards’ basic sense of justice rebelled at the strict predestinarianism of his Calvinist background, just as many Mormons’ sense of justice may have rebelled at the past doctrines involving racial restrictions on Priesthood. Something happened, though, to reconcile Edwards’ mind with a doctrine that he once felt was unjust (and which Mormons probably still do). What was it? How could Edwards have had his mind changed by inspiration, if the doctrine he was inspired to accept is fundamentally untrue?
So what was it that Edwards was perceiving as inspiration, when it led him to embrace doctrines counter to the Church’s doctrine? And how does a Mormon know that what inspires him to embrace his own beliefs, is more real or more true than what Edwards experienced?
Wheat & Tares 
If you read either Rough Stone Rolling or Richard Bushmans earlier book from 1984 on the origins of Mormonisn you will note how he points out that the First Vision Religous Experience of Joseph Smith in which he had a vision of Jesus Christ and experienced a forgivness of sins was very similar to the conversion narrartives of many persons during the second great awakening period.
I would like to think that Joseph Smith and Jonathan Edwards experience were all from the same source. The difference between the two is that Joseph Smith went further than Edwards with that expereience and had many other experiences , visons and revelations afterwards.
“I would like to think that Joseph Smith and Jonathan Edwards experience were all from the same source.”
That’s a possibility, except for the fact that one of the things Edwards came to believe, by means of what he took to be the same sort of religious experience that led him to his other beliefs, was hard Calvinist predestinarianism, which can’t be reconciled with the restored gospel.
So the options are (1) Edwards was wrong on that one single point — unlike his other inspirations, that one wasn’t really inspired; (2) God may inspire people to accept false doctrine; or (3) — ?
Thomas:
Option (3) –?
Perhaps Joseph Smith and Jonathan Edwards were BOTH right.
There are many genuine and sincere spiritual experiences and conversion stories out there. There are miraculous LDS conversion stories, as well as Baptist, Catholic and Methodist. There are miraculous Muslim conversion stories and Buddhist experiences. There are Hindu miracles. Perhaps these are all facets of Man touching God, and God confirms ALL of them as true.
Some faiths accept these facts, that perhaps all people having these experiences are getting closer to God and having “their” path confirmed for them. Other faiths, including ours, Muslims, and many others, teach that theirs is the “one true Church”. The “faith-experience” for people in these faiths therefore “confirms” that theirs is the “one true Church” and all other faiths are wrong.
That is how we essentially teach it in the LDS Church – that all people will eventually have to accept “our” Church, either in this life or the next. But for every Mormon who believes this, there are hundreds who have equally strong and valid experiences that their path is the “true” church and that ours is wrong. It seems a bit egocentric to me to discount everyone else as “false doctrine”.
Erp, I thought this was going to compare John Edwards, the politician who cheated on his long-suffering wife, and JS.
hawkgrrrl,
that’ll be Thomas’s next post, see.
Mike S said it better than I could
Mike S,
“Perhaps these are all facets of Man touching God, and God confirms ALL of them as true.”
What God would be “confirming,” therefore, would be the existence of some divine truth within the tradition or path being confirmed, and possibly the truth that that path is an acceptable or useful means for the person to approach God.
In other words, God is confirming something narrower than what the mystic frequently understands as having been confirmed — namely, the comprehensive truth of the whole belief system, or at least its central foundations.
However, the person experiencing a spiritual witness frequently does understand it to have been the sectarian tradition, or aspects of it that conflict with the doctrines of other traditions, that is positively confirmed by the experience. That’s why I included Jonathan Edwards’ account of having received a specific confirmation of the truth of hard predestinarianism — which many Mormons would presumably, by virtue of similar-sounding spiritual experiences, know with every fiber of their beings to be false.
It may well be that Comprehensive Belief System A and Comprehensive Belief System B both contain enough non-exclusive Truth that a God of truth could endorse both systems with a spiritual confirmation, indicating that each tradition is good enough for (divine) government work.
But how do you deal with people allegedly getting spiritual confirmations of conflicting specific doctrines?
Let’s say that Religion A contains Doctrines T, U, V, and W. Religion B contains Doctrines W, X, Y, and Z. They have
in common. So maybe God could bear witness to the truth of (W), if it is true, and if the people in each tradition who received that witness were to mistake that limited witness for an endorsement of the whole package, that’s their problem.
But what if the believers feel themselves to have received confirmation, not just of
or of the whole comprehensive traditions, but specifically of (T) and (Z)? And what if (T) and (Z) are irreconcileable?
One way around that might be to say that even though those doctrines are irreconcileable, there may be a kernel of divine truths in each doctrine, and that’s what’s being confirmed, and the mystic is mistakenly taking it as endorsement of the entire doctrine, just as a person might mistake a spiritual experience had in connection with a comprehensive belief system for an endorsement of the whole system.
Maybe when Jonathan Edwards thought God was endorsing predestinarianism, He was really endorsing Edwards’ reverence for the more general principle of God’s sovereignty. Or something like that.
Joseph Smith’s first vision/conversion narrative(s) more closely resemble the evangelical conversion narratives of the early 19th century (particularly those of the theologically-Arminian Methodists) than they do those of 18th century Calvinists, though all evangelical conversion narratives in the early modern period contain some essential features/basic points of emphasis. It seems clear that JS borrowed (whether intentionally or not) from these tropes when he described his experiences. As to the question of whether or not JS and JE were both inspired/correct, I’m not sure that the historical record can answer that. In fact, I’m quite sure that it can’t.
… but we can always speculate, can’t we? That’s what bloggers are for. Personally, I think it is likely that each of them experienced a connection with the Divine. The problem comes when a person tries to interpret the experience, as Mike S and Thomas detail above. Thus we see people later in life reinterpreting their narratives.
Thomas:
Regarding Religions A & B and Doctrines. Isn’t that what we do? Someone gets a good feeling about one thing in the Book of Mormon (ie. W). We teach that that therefore means the entire BofM is true, so therefore JS was a prophet, so therefore this is the only true Church, so therefore our modern prophet is God’s spokesman, so therefore having two pairs of earrings is bad. Using this logic, perhaps God was only confirming
and we have completely inflated the logic chain.
I know that there are other people who I have talked to, and who I have read about/from, who are equally positive and sincere about their faith system. Perhaps it is based on a single experience like some people in the LDS Church. Perhaps it is based on an ongoing confirmation like other people in the LDS Church.
Maybe my mind is strange, but I don’t see things are black and white or exclusionary/ irreconcilable. I can accept the premise that the LDS Church is a true path back to God (which assumes that it is the ONLY true path back to God) while simultaneously accepting that Islam is true (which also teaches that that is the ONLY true path back to God/Allah). According to their individual teachings, they cannot BOTH be true. Many LDS members feel that Muslims are well-meaning but mislead. Many Muslims feel the same about Mormons. And there are about 100x more Muslims than Mormons.
I don’t think it’s black and white. I think God leads each of us into what we need for our journey through earthlife. And if being a member of the LDS Church was so essential for EVERYONE, then I think missionary work would be much more effective, as the Spirit would resonate so profoundly within each person that they wouldn’t be able to stay away.
I’m not sure how long suffering Elizabeth Edwards was. She suffered right up until she knew the white house was out of reach.
In this vein, an interesting article in Givens & Neilson’s edited collection of JS compares his narrative with that of Emerson and Nat Turner. There is something to this approach but it runs the risk of parallelomania.
Thomas,
Mér líkaði tala Elder Holland um öryggi fyrir sálina. Það dispels sum goðsögnum á Mormónsbók
beg pardon?
It’s Icelandic.
Roughly: “I liked Elder Holland’s talk about “Safety for the Soul“. It dispels some myths about the Book of Mormon”
The comments about lumping all confirmation into a logic chain (if W is true, so are X, Y, Z, and T) remind me of a post Andrew Ainsworth did a long while back on Mormon Matters. He talked about a fictional faith journey of someone praying to the Grand Korm of Mufti (something like that), and getting a strong feeling that indicated all sorts of things. Aside from sounding a bit Dr. Seussian, I think the point was valid – we tend to create these logic chains when maybe the original question was bad. For example, if you ask, “Is the church true?” and you’re pretty clear that if it’s not, you’re going to go off the deep end of riotous living, maybe the “yes” answer you get is more of a “not that way, this way.”
Another view that I like to consider (maybe this was an AdamF post – can’t remember now) is the idea that religions are like software. Some software runs better on certain computers based on what other software you have loaded, etc. Maybe Edwards could only really make his God software work with the safety net of predestination. Maybe JS could only really make his God software work with ordinances and free will.
I thought the “speaking in tongues” post was BiV’s Sunday post.
Ah, Thomas, you like to ask the hard questions don’t you! Can’t you just leave us all in our happy place?
Seriously, though, here are some thoughts:
1. Option 3 – ? Going somewhat along the lines of what Mike S said, it seems to me that God works with individuals. As a result, Edwards conversion story was God’s confirmation that his behavior (the most important aspect of our spiritual journey) was now in accordance with what is necessary for entrance to heaven (or whatever). My point is, perhaps God is more interested in whether or not we’re on a good path than the details of our beliefs. For me, this is why Christ, in multiple places in scripture, boils his doctrine down to one or two points – which focus on behavior, not nuanced doctrinal beliefs. This view means that Edwards was right, Joseph was right, Muhammed was right, but not in the way they thought they were.
2. Option 3 – ? They’re both wrong, they’re all wrong. That is, our conversion stories are elaborate mental games and creations of the mind in conjunction with emotions, situations, and the environment to make us happy (release endorphins) when we’re down. That’s why most spiritual conversion stories affirm many cultural teachings – because that’s what the brain knows. I know this option won’t be popular, but it is an option, and does go some distance in explaining many of the theological problems that arise from the alternate view.
Will, sakfelling hans öldungs Hollands er ekki til efs. En ég veit ekki hvort talan “Öryggi fyrir sálina” var alveg rökrétt i öllum háttum.
The argumentam ad martyrdom, in particular, has never gotten much traction with me. Far too many martyrs have willingly gone to their deaths for too many inconsistent causes, for me to be convinced that dying for your cause says anything about its objective truth.
I’m inclined in this direction myself.
Wow.
P.S., I’m mortified that I used the word “sakfelling” for “conviction,” in the sense of assurance. Any impression erroneously left that Elder Holland has sustained a criminal conviction is solely the result of exceedingly rusty Icelandic, and too-quick reference to an online dictionary.
Thomas,
I’m mortified that I used the word “sakfelling” for “conviction,” in the sense of assurance
Exactly my thoughts; I, will however, say “Góð umræða”.
I will add the argument how could an un-educated boy have written this has always bugged me. I will admit, however, Elder Holland’s quote ‘No wicked man could write such a book as this; and no good man would write it, unless it were true and he were commanded of God to do so”
This is a variant on “Ye shall know them by their fruits…A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit.” (Matthew 7:16-18.)
My experience is that good trees and good men do sometimes bring forth evil fruit, and evil men good fruit. For instance, I just learned that the composer of “Far, Far Away On Judea’s Plains” — a very nice Christmas carol, and the only one of LDS origin to become generally popular — was very likely (according to multiple contemporary sources) a participant in the Mountain Meadows massacre. I have a hard time understanding how someone who wrote sweet songs for the St. George primary children could have shot unarmed pioneers (or watched it done, and stayed quiet about it), but it probably happened.
I look at my own self, and my own family. I like to think we’re basically good people — and yet there are certainly things I’m not proud of.
Conversely, there are men who, on balance, are bad men, who were loyal to their wives, gentle to their children, and kind to small animals. There may be some people who are just bad to the bone, but it’s rare for anyone to have absolutely no redeeming good-fruit features.
This could be a subject for a whole post. I wonder what the Savior meant by that passage.
Mike S – I really enjoyed your comments.
Option 3(?) The contradictions in the different religions are placed there by God himself. I believe that it is all too grand and incomprehensible for any one set of beliefs to fully explain so the different religions and belief structures may all have the divine even the parts that appear to be contradictory.
I also believe in reincarnation and in this life I may have needed the Mormon religion to help me grow in the ways I needed to in this life while in past lives it may have been Hinduism.