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The Nature of English Puritanism: Three Interpretations*

I. Reflections on the Nature of English Puritanism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 July 2009

Jerald C. Brauer
Jerald C. Brauer
Affiliation:
University of Chicago
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Extract

Several recent scholars appalled by the seemingly impossible task of defining Puritanism have contented themselves with the supposedly easier task of describing the movement. But, a really accurate description is actually a good definition. To the extent that a description enables one to identify and thus partially to understand a man or a movement, it serves as a definition. Thus, whether one wishes to engage in a definition of or a description of the nature of Puritanism makes little difference. The basic problem is that of so delineating the Puritan movement that its differences from other contemporary movements are clearly discernible. Only in that way can one assess its role in its own epoch and its contributions to the ongoing stream of history.

Type
Research Article
Information
Church History , Volume 23 , Issue 2 , June 1954 , pp. 99 - 108
Copyright
Copyright © American Society of Church History 1954

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References

1. Woodhouse, A. S. P., Puritanism and Liberty (London: J. M. Dent & Sons Ltd., 1950), p. 35 ff.Google Scholar

2. Quoted in Nuttall, Geoffrey F., The Holy Spirit in Puritan Faith and Experience (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1946), p. 8.Google Scholar

3. Rechard Sibbes, preface to Prasten, John, The Breastplate of Faith and Love. Reprinted in John, Wesley, A Christian Library (Bristol: Felix Farley, 1751), IX, 223–224.Google Scholar

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5. Haller, William, “The Word of God in the Westminster Assembly,” Church History, XVIII (12, 1949), 203 f.Google Scholar“The Word of God in the New Model Army,” Church History, XIX (03, 1950), 15 ff.Google Scholar

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8. G. Nuttall, op. cit., p. 6 ff.

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10. B. Sibbes, op cit., V, 399.

11. Ibid., 368.

12. Trinterud, Leonard J., “The Origins of Puritanism,” Church History, XX (03 1951), 37 ff.CrossRefGoogle ScholarMiller, Perry, “The Marrow of Puritan Divinity,” Publications of the Colonial Society of Massachusetts, XXXII (02, 1935).Google Scholar

13. A. S. P. Woodhouse, op. cit., pp. 1–100. Lindsay, A. D., The Essentials of Democracy (Oxford: University Press, 1945)Google Scholar, passim.

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15. A. S. P. Woodhouse, op. cit., p. 37.

16. I was first struck with the necessity of understanding the complexity of Puritan piety and theology in terms of types while attempting to understand both the origin and the content of Puritan mysticism. The very fact that there were genuine Puritan mystics was in itself at first a shock. Cf., Brauer, Jerald C., Francis Rous, Puritan Mystic, 1579–1659: An Introduction to the Study of the Mystical Element in Puritanism (Microfilmed Ph.D. Dissertation, The Divinity School, The University of Chicago, 1948), pp. 4 ff., 29 ff., 282 ff., 296 ff.Google Scholar