Retaining the Old Episcopal Divinity: John Edwards of Cambridge and Reformed Orthodoxy in the Later Stuart Church(Oxford Studies in Historical Theology)

John Edwards of Cambridge (1637-1716) has typically been portrayed as a marginalized 'Calvinist' in an overwhelmingly 'Arminian' later Stuart Church of England. In Retaining the Old Episcopal Divinity, Jake Griesel challenges this depiction of Edwards and the theological climate of his contemporary Church. Griesel demonstrates that Edwards was recognized in his own day and the immediately following generations as one of the preeminent conforming divines of the period, who featured prominently in notable theological controversies involving contemporaries such as John Locke, Gilbert Burnet, Daniel Whitby, William Whiston, and Samuel Clarke. Despite some Arminian opposition, Edwards' theological works are shown to have enjoyed a warm reception among sizable segments of the established Church's clergy, many of whom shared his Reformed convictions. The analysis shows that, instead of a theological misfit, the anti-Arminian Edwards was a decidedly mainstream churchman. Griesel's reassessment has ramifications far beyond the figure of Edwards and ultimately serves as a prism through which to visualize with much greater clarity the broader theological landscape of the later Stuart Church of England, and particularly the place of Reformed orthodoxy within it. Retaining the Old Episcopal Divinity develops recent research on the persisting vitality of Reformed theology within the post-Restoration Church, demonstrating the strength and numbers of conforming Reformed divines between the Restoration and the evangelical revivals.

About the Author :
Jake Griesel is Lecturer in Church History and Anglican Studies at George Whitefield College, Cape Town, and Research Associate in the Faculty of Theology at North-West University, South Africa.

Review :
Griesel makes a convincing case that Edwards' work was part of a wider body of Calvinist theology in England in this period. Moreover, and perhaps significantly for those interested in Methodism, he shows that Edward' publications were well received by many Anglican parish clergy, especially evangelicals, as well as scholars...Griesel also has a more circumspect sense of theological definitions, and is alert to the slippery nature of some theological and ecclesiological terms. By adopting a broadly chronological approach, within which he identifies clear themes, Griesel is able to show the development and change in Edwards' thinking. This excellent book not only helps scholars better understand late Stuart England, but it illustrates well what questions to ask and what evidence to look for in doing sound historical research. The era between the Glorious Revolution and the Evangelical Revival used to be seen as a 'tunnel period' in English church history, little known and little studied. Recent scholarship has shed much light on these decades, and Jake Griesel's account of the Calvinist theologian John Edwards provides further illumination. By analysing networks, controversies, and reception, it shows that Edwards was neither eccentric nor isolated, but a respected (if controversial) divine. The later Stuart Church is famed for its daring Arminians and Arians, but it also had room for the Reformed orthodox. Retaining the Old Episcopal Divinity makes a convincing case that John Edwards was not the lone Calvinist voice crying out in an Arminian wilderness as he has been portrayed by some scholars, nor an irrelevant throwback to the Puritan commonwealth as portrayed by others. In colorful, vigorous prose Jake Griesel shows that Edwards was a significant figure within a broader stream of Reformed thought that persisted in the Church of England long after it is generally assumed to have expired. Griesel's research makes clear: the Church of England was at the end of the 17th and the beginning of the 18th century multicolored, and the reformed belief did not occupy a marginal position. This has its consequences for our vision of the 18th century 'evangelical revival': the reformed ideas in it were still emphatically present in the state church. ...very-well-written book.