Jonathan Edwards
Our church hosted a conference put together by American Indians, I think they called it ‘First Nations’ or something like that. Representatives from several states and Canadian provinces.
At one point a speaker was talking about how missionaries would come to tribes and try to force things like dress, hymns, etc on them - ‘civilization’.
He talked specifically about a missionary in the north east that served among the tribes in that area, but in his diary referred to them as savages and such. The speaker couldn’t remember the guys name, but as a reader of Jonathan Edwards diary I knew who he was talking about and offered up his name.
Got me to thinking about Mr. Edwards. He did call them savages and many other names, yet he loved them so much and basically offered up his health and his life for them. Makes me wonder if he would have been more successful if he would have also offered up respect for them. No doubt Jonathon Edwards was incredible...
sav·age
(chiefly in historical or literary contexts) a member of a people regarded as primitive and uncivilized.
In Jonathan Edwards time it was not an insult to call primitive people savages. It was simply a statement of fact. The Indians may have thought different, but these days it appears that referring to an Indian as an Indian is considered an insult. “Indigenous People” is what they want to be called, suggesting that they prefer to be thought of as “primitive”.
prim·i·tive
Relating to, denoting, or preserving the character of an early stage in the evolutionary or historical development of something.
I’m sure that missionary was David Brainerd.
Should we put modern politically correct expectations on historical figures? That’s a device liberals have used to utterly destroy respect for the Founding Fathers and other great men.
Last fall I was teaching a men’s Bible study about a somewhat controversial topic. I knew it might upset a few, but these men are mostly mature Christians (including retired pastors, elders, deacons, etc.), so I expected them to listen. I know most of them well enough to know they want the truth, even when it hurts. My aim was to foster a discussion, so I wasn’t dogmatic because I was still wrestling with the topic at hand, too. I had pages of Scripture and the writings of any number of dozens of respected Christian figures. I don’t want to delve into the specifics of that topic here, but I will say that 21st century Protestants have mostly abandoned a certain view they once almost universally held. Most today do not even know that view was ever held or why, so I wanted to teach these men what our fathers believed and then discuss it. Before I was even through making my initial presentation a young man in his 20’s, the youngest person in the room by decades, objected to what I was saying and dismissed it out-of-hand because I read from the writings of Jonathan Edwards. This man’s mind has been polluted to the point he totally rejected Jonathan Edwards because he owned slaves, never mind that lots of non-slaveholders held the same view. This man (boy!) derailed the whole Bible study, I never finished even my basic presentation, and he left angry. He’s not a member of our church, so I don’t know him well, but interestingly enough, he still comes to the Bible study every week.