Thesis (M.A.) -- Central Connecticut State University, 2009. / Thesis advisor: Katherine A. Hermes. "... in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in History." Includes bibliographical references (leaves 72-80). Abstract available via the World Wide Web.

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Thesis (Th. M.)--Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia, 1998. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 142-154).

Thesis (Th. M.)--Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia, 1998. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 142-154).

Thesis (Th. M.)--Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia, 1998. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 142-154).

This dissertation contributes to the study of American Christianity by tracing the apocalyptic thought of New England evangelical Calvinism from Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758) to Lyman Beecher (1775-1863). Covering the period of the First Great Awakening in the eighteenth century to the dawn of the Second Great Awakening in the nineteenth century, the study identifies Edwards as the progenitor of a distinctive tradition of Calvinist apocalyptic thought. Edwardsean historical-redemptive apocalypticism highlights the “work of redemption” as the unfolding spiritual drama of conversion enacted in various historical stages. Its three-fold emphasis is on revivalism, the afflictive nature of church history, and the cosmic dimensions of an overarching redemptive narrative culminating in Christ’s Second Coming. Edwards’s immediate disciples, Joseph Bellamy (1719-1790) and Samuel Hopkins (1721-1803), reinterpreted their mentor’s insights to create an Edwardsean school of New England “New Divinity” thought. Beneath the veneer of New Divinity theology was a strong undercurrent of Edwardsean apocalypticism, which the second generation Edwardseans adapted to reflect the young nation’s call to social action. The revivals of the Second Great Awakening were driven in large part by the millennial spirit of this New Divinity apocalyptic tradition. Due to rapid societal changes at the turn of the century, Edwardseans of the third generation led the efforts in institutionalizing religious and moral reform activities. Along with this Protestant “kingdom building” came a shift in Edwardsean eschatological priorities. It moved away from the central Edwardsean motif of conversion/redemption to moralism—from a theology centered upon otherworldly apocalypticism toward a greater focus on societal reform. This transition from subsuming the grand narrative of redemption under the overall rubric of God’s sovereignty to one that viewed the millennium in relation to humanistic moral reform was led by Lyman Beecher (1775-1863), who serves as the representative of the “millennial turn” in Edwardsean apocalypticism during the Second Great Awakening. An overview of Edwardsean apocalyptic thought between the two Great Awakenings provides historians an important window to connect and interpret the development of New England Calvinist eschatology that few have explored in depth. These ideas continue to enlighten our understanding of modern-day iterations of evangelical eschatology.

Edwards Amasa Park (1808-1900) of Andover championed Edwardsean Calvinism in the United States from the Jacksonian era until the very close of the nineteenth century by employing rhetorical strategies that lent his New England theology fresh apologetic usefulness. The thesis demonstrates that Park has been incorrectly identified as a Taylorite but, extending the argument of Joseph Conforti, ought to be viewed as re-casting his inherited Hopkinsian exercise scheme into a fresh historical synthesis influenced by contemporary patterns of thought. Park’s own training at Andover in the irenic divinity of Moses Stuart and Leonard Woods, his application as rhetorician of the work of Hugh Blair and George Campbell and his exposure in Germany to the Vermittlungstheologie of Friedrich Tholuck and Julius Müller gave specific definition to his own theological project. Additionally, the thesis argues that Park ought not to be viewed as a romantic idealist in the line of Horace Bushnell or as a proto-liberal in advance of the Andover liberals who succeeded him. Park retained a life-long commitment to a commingled epistemology and methodology derived from Lockean empiricism, Baconian induction, natural theology and Scottish common sense realism. As a formidable apologist for his revivalist inheritance identified with Jonathan Edwards and Samuel Hopkins, Edwards Amasa Park conserved the substance and prolonged the influence of his beloved New England theology by securing for it modes of expression well fitted to his nineteenth-century audience.