tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1237087217187172116.post1823217432126532868..comments2024-03-28T10:44:30.518-06:00Comments on American Creation: Kidd on Franklin, Whitefield and EducationBrad Harthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17669677047039491864noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1237087217187172116.post-12267504728578791442017-06-06T16:31:35.156-06:002017-06-06T16:31:35.156-06:00Good stuff, Bill. I noticed from the beginning of ...Good stuff, Bill. I noticed from the beginning of my studying this area that without an understanding of Calvinism, too little of the rhetoric and ideas make full sense.<br /><br />Even for those like Franklin who reject it, it's there in everything they write as the wall they push against. For those who can't "feel" Calvinism, they also can't feel the strong rejection of it by Franklin and Jefferson.<br /><br />[Indeed, Peter Lawler calls the tension between the two the Founding theology, an "accidental Thomism," which I think I'll recycle from my other blog, newreformclub.com.]Tom Van Dykehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07121072404143877596noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1237087217187172116.post-51494399885544737052017-06-04T07:23:11.803-06:002017-06-04T07:23:11.803-06:00Kidd's comments exemplify why an in-depth know...Kidd's comments exemplify why an in-depth knowledge of theology should be a prerequisite to studying early American history. The term "conversion" is a very rich theological term that had a much more nuanced understanding in the past than it enjoys today. Kidd seems to understand "conversion" only in the modern sense of changing one's religion, but to Whitefield, "conversion" meant experiencing the resolution of deep psychological pain as one's soul finally yielded to the work of God in bringing about the new birth of Christianity. Whitefield taught that no one could be a Christian without first experiencing this tremendous psychological pain. Franklin denied the need for such "spiritual pangs." This was the source of the contention between the two men and the reason that Whitefield prayed for Franklin's conversion. <br />Bill Fortenberryhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14205053444988720146noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1237087217187172116.post-60225454742355277572017-05-31T02:47:16.561-06:002017-05-31T02:47:16.561-06:00Much is made of Franklin's differences with Ca...Much is made of Franklin's differences with Calvinism as proof of his non-Christianity. However, his affinity for works over ritual or doctrine are in the Bible, which he cites, say James 1:22.<br /><br />This is a good article even if it's in World News Daily ;-)<br /><br />http://www.wnd.com/2015/11/was-benjamin-franklin-a-christian/<br /><br />and cites Franklin in his own words. His beliefs are solidly argued from the Bible, not from homespun theologizing.<br /><br />I hera about him being a deist all the time but seldom see passages like this. Franklin was a prayerful man as well, not merely concerned with works.<br /><br /><br /><i>I am so far from thinking that God is not to be worshipped, that I have composed and wrote a whole book of devotions for my own use; and I imagine there are few if any in the world so weak as to imagine that the little good we can do here can merit so vast a reward hereafter. There are some things in your New England doctrine and worship, which I do not agree with; but I do not therefore condemn them, or desire to shake your belief or practice of them.</i>Tom Van Dykehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07121072404143877596noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1237087217187172116.post-73948264146347470102017-05-30T14:50:27.974-06:002017-05-30T14:50:27.974-06:00Jon - good post, as always.
I recently came acros...Jon - good post, as always.<br /><br />I recently came across Edmund Morgan's Intro essay to the online collection of Franklin's papers. Here's a snippet:<br /><br />"first we should notice his views on a very personal matter, religion. As a boy he was brought up in the Calvinistic religion of New England, but by the time he ran away from his apprenticeship to his brother as a printer, he was ready to run away from Calvinism too. In his first brief trip to England as a young man in 1725-26, he met some of the leading deists and wrote a small treatise showing that moral rules and human free will were meaningless (1:57). He later regretted this and tells much about his religious development in the autobiography. Back in Philadelphia he came to the defense of a Presbyterian minister, Samuel Hemphill, who believed, as Franklin now did, that the only way to honor and obey God was to do good to others. But Hemphill was caught plagiarizing his sermons from other deists and fled the country. Franklin never again engaged in religious controversy. Privately he defended his views briefly and unconvincingly to his sister Jane (2:384). He later explained them more fully in two letters to friends, written thirty-seven years apart, June 6, 1753 and March 9, 1790 (4:503; unpub.). <br />Franklin evidently believed in God as Creator of the universe, but after the Hemphill episode he was much more interested in the world that God created than he was in its inscrutable Creator."<br /><br />http://franklinpapers.org/franklin/framedMorgan.jsp;jsessionid=4A880AADB8B4ED2BC5CFEB73F31BA8FF JMSnoreply@blogger.com