1.0 Introduction

1.1 Research Question & Thesis

1.1.1 Preliminary Remarks

Jonathan Edwards’ trinitarian theology forms the bedrock of his theological endeavors.¹ This has not always been recognized, as Amy Plantinga Pauw states,

…these estimates of the centrality and originality of Edwards’ trinitarian thought have not won universal acceptance. Edwards A. Park insists that Edwards ‘paid a general, occasional, incidental attention to [trinitarian theories], but never made them the theme of his minute, thorough, prolonged investigation.’ Harvey Townsend claims to find nothing extraordinary about Edwards’ views on the subject. And John Gerstner declares that anyone ‘familiar with the history of the doctrine of the Trinity will see nothing aberrant in the Edwardsean formulation’.²

We would have to generally agree with Pauw. Having examined the materials that touch upon the subject of the Trinity, we believe Edwards might not be “extraordinary” or “aberrant” in his formulation of trinitarian doctrine. However, he does offer a unique expression of Reformed trinitarianism nonetheless.³ Given the wealth of material on Edwards in general and on his trinitarianism in particular, our goal in this series is to concentrate on one, albeit major, aspect of his trinitarian theology.
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1. This assessment is confirmed by the amount of secondary literature that is currently available on Edwards’ trinitarianism. Among the vast literature, see George P. Fisher’s introduction to An Unpublished Essay of Edwards on the Trinity (New York, NY: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1903), 3 - 74. See also Amy Plantinga Pauw, The Supreme Harmony of All: The Trinitarian Theology of Jonathan Edwards (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2002) and her “Heaven is a World of Love: Edwards on Heaven and the Trinity” (Calvin Theological Journal 35 1995): 392 - 401; Herbert Warren Richardson, The Glory of God in the Theology of Jonathan Edwards: A Study in the Doctrine of the Trinity (Ph. D. diss. Harvard University, 1962); Krister Sairsingh, Jonathan Edwards and the Idea of Divine Glory: His Foundational Trinitarianism and Its Ecclesial Import (Ph. D. diss. Harvard University, 1986); Steve Studebaker, Jonathan Edwards’ Social Augustinian Trinitarianism: A Criticism of and an Alternative to Recent Interpretations (Ph.D. diss., Marquette University, 2003); Stephen R. Holmes’ God of Grace & God of Glory: An Account of the Theology of Jonathan Edwards (Grand Rapids, Ml: Eerdmans, 2001) and Sang Hyun Lee, ed. The Works of Jonathan Edwards, Vol. 21: Writings on the Trinity, Grace and Faith (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2002).↩
2. Pauw, Supreme Harmony, 15.↩
3. Pauw, Supreme Harmony, 15-21. It is interesting to note that Edwards had an essay on the Trinity that did not get published until 1903 and that his “Miscellanies” which dealt with the subject were not published until the last few years. Interestingly there was much conjecture in the nineteenth century about the orthodoxy of Edwards’ trinitarian views.↩