Editors' Introduction

Abstract

Welcome to the fall 2021 issue of Jonathan Edwards Studies. This issue presents three important articles that speak to ongoing issues in the appraisal of Edwards' thought by applying current categories in philosophy and exegesis.

In our lead article, Ken Miyagi utilizes Abram Van Engen's Sympathetic Puritans to see how that rubric, as enunciated in Edwards' view of the affections, helps us to understand his social ethics.

Next, continuing his fruitful engagement with Edwards' End in Creation, Walter Schultz qualifies assertions about Edwards being a determinist by demonstrating three senses of contingency that appear in the late dissertation.

And finally, Cameron Schweitzer enters the rich discussion of Edwards as a biblical expositor, countering a previous argument, advanced by a contributor to this journal, about Edwards' "feminine ecclesiology" as found in the "Blank Bible."

Two reviews of recent important monographs in the field round out the issue.

But before you move on, gentle reader, your humble editors bid you take a moment to pause over the tribute below and remember that scholarship is an endeavor in which we stand on the shoulders of previous generations.