Works 02: Religious Affections

This volume contains Edwards' most mature and persistent attempt to judge
the validity of the religious development in eighteenth-century America known
as the Great Awakening. In developing criteria for such judgment he attacked at
the same time one of the fundamental questions facing all religion: how to
distinguish genuine from spurious piety? The Awakening created much bitter
controversy; on the one side stood the emotionalists and enthusiasts, and on
the other the rationalists, for whom religion was essentially a matter of
morality or good conduct and the acceptance of properly formulated doctrine.
Edwards, with great analytical skill and enormous biblical learning, showed
that both sides were in the wrong. He attacked both a 'lifeless morality' as
too pale as to be the essence of religion, and he rejected the excesses of a
purely emotional religion more concerned for sensational effects than for the
inner transformation of the self, which was, for him, the center of genuine
Christianity.This edition contains a 83-page introduction from the
editor.Editor: John E. Smith.Series: The Works of Jonathan
Edwards, volume 2.Recommended € 24,90