Theology of Jonathan Edwards (Garden City: Doubleday, 1966), 38. The quotations from
∑≤≤ Notes to Pages 53–59
who had come of age could ''own the covenant'' by renewing the promises made for them at baptism. In churches such as Timothy Edwards' such a renewal was an a≈rmation of a baptized person's status as a half-way member and did not entail that person's becoming a full member who could participate in the Lord's Supper. We do not have any record of when or where Jonathan became a full church member. So being ''received into the communion of the church'' does not necessarily imply anything more than an earlier ''owning of the covenant''—though we can not be sure. In any case, Jonathan was reappropriating these most solemn vows. I am indebted to Kenneth Minkema for this interpretation. On baptismal renewals see, for instance, his ''The Lynn End 'Earthquake' Relations of 1727,'' New England Quarterly 69 (1996): 473–99. On ''owning the covenant,'' see Robert G. Pope, The Half-Way Covenant: Church Membership in Puritan New England (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1969), 38–39; 206–38.
15. ''Personal Narrative,'' Works, 16: 795. 16. This observation is based on the perceptive comments of Conrad Cherry, The Theology of Jonathan Edwards (Garden City: Doubleday, 1966), 38. The quotations from the Life of David Brainerd, Works, 7: 91, 93.
17. Dedication to God (ca. 1723), Works, 10: 553. This sermon seems closely related to his reflections on renewing his baptismal vows on January 12, 1723.
18. Christ the Light of the World (ca. 1723), Works, 10: 540–41. Cf. Kimnach's commentary on this sermon, pp. 247–50, 533–34. Cf. sermon fragment ''Application on Love to Christ'' for impressive imagery, pp., 608–17.
19. Edwards to the Committee of Bolton, Connecticut, December 10, 1722, Works, 16: 41. 20. ''Personal Narrative,'' Works, 16: 797–98. Diary, May 1, 1723, Works, 16: 768. 21. We also do not have the originals of the Diary but only versions copied by his admiring editors. See George S. Claghorn, ''Editing the Texts,'' Works, 16: 750–52.
22. This interpretation essentially follows that of Kimnach, Works, 10: 169–76. However, I do not think Kimnach has su≈cient grounds to read the dispute back into the first accounting of Edwards' experience to his father in spring 1721. Edwards says in the ''Personal Narrative'' that he was ''pretty much a√ected'' by this conversation after which he had one of his most extraordinary experiences of the divine. An upsetting dispute seems an unlikely prelude to such a positive experience, although that is possible.
23. Timothy Edwards, sermon on Acts 16: 29–30 (1695), p. 5, Washington University Library, quoted in Kenneth Minkema, ''The Edwardses: A Ministerial Family in Eighteenth-Century New England'' (Ph.D. diss., University of Connecticut, 1988), 83. ''Personal Narrative,'' Works, 16: 791.
24. Diary, August 12, 1723. In ''Miscellanies'' notebooks from the 1720s Edwards continued to a≈rm the view that humiliation accompanied by fears of hell was a normal preparatory step, even though he saw his experience as an exception to the rule. For a summary of these views, see Thomas A. Schafer, ''Introduction,'' Works, 13: 22–24.
chapter 4. The Harmony of All Knowledge
1. For chronology, see Wallace E. Anderson, ''Editor's Introduction,'' Works, 6: 8–9, 29. For dating of ''Notes on the Apocalypse,'' see the remarkable reconstruction by