Michael J. McClymond – författare

This book offers a broad-based study of Jonathan Edwards as a religious thinker. Much attention has been given to Edwards in relation to his Puritan and Calvinist forebears. McClymond, however, examines Edwards in relation to his eighteenth-century intellectual context. Among the topics considered are spiritual perception, metaphysics, contemplation, ethics and morality, and apologetics.

The Theology of Jonathan Edwards is the first survey of the religious thought of America's theologian--Jonathan Edwards--that draws on all of his writings, now available in a 73-volume online Yale critical edition. In 48 chapters, McClymond and McDermott, two of the world's leading Edwards scholars, treat topics in Edwards's thought that have rarely been analyzed in depth, and never in coordination with a close analysis of the rest of his theology. Such topics include the implications of his doctrine of the Trinity for the divide between Roman Catholicism and Orthodoxy, his enduring appeal among both conservative and liberal Protestants, his ecclesial and sacramental theologies, his conflicted relationship with the history of Calvinism, the cultural-historical and comparative-religious turn he made toward the end of his career (as the leading colonial thinker on the topic of world religions), the appeals to his ideas in nineteenth- and twentieth-century debates over Methodist, Holiness, Pentecostal, and Charismatic revivals, and the reception of his writings in the England, Scotland, continental Europe, and, more recently, in the evangelical communities of Latin America, Africa, Asia, and Oceania. Many of these topics have only been treated in passing in the existing literature, and never in connection with one another and with the whole bulk of Edwards's writings.

Recent scholars of American religion have shown new interest inevangelicalism and pentecostalism. Of particular interest is the subject of revivalism-an enthusiastic or ecstatic form of religion that has affected American religious institutions, ideas, behavior, and adherents throughout the nation's history. In Embodying the Spirit Michael J. McClymond and his fellow contributors offer a new look at this extensive and often puzzling phenomenon. Going beyond institutional history, they examine a wide range of cases, from colonial to contemporary America. The contributors explore the role of gender, church architecture, Latino revivalism, youth groups, radio evangelism, Catholic revivalism, and recent events such as the Toronto Blessing-an outbreak of laughter, crying, and dancing that began at Toronto's Airport Vineyard Church in 1994 and has since spread to other congregations throughout the world. In a thoughtful afterword, church historian Martin Marty admits that while we cannot know for sure why revivals happen, it matters that they do, and books such as this help us deepen our understanding and appreciation of them.This book will appeal to scholars and students of popular religion as well as to general readers interested in the subject. Contributors: Fred W. Beuttler, University of Illinois at Chicago; Candy Gunther Brown, Saint Louis University; Finbarr Curtis, University of California, Santa Barbara; Gaston Espinosa, Northwestern University; Philip Goff, Indiana University-Purdue University at Indianapolis; Philip Harrold, University of Findlay; Jeanne Halgren Kilde, Macalester College; Martin E. Marty, University of Chicago; Michael J. McClymond, Saint Louis University; Walter F. Pitts, Louisiana State University; Philip J. Richter, Southern Theological Education and Training Scheme in Salisbury, England; Douglas James Slawson, National University in San Diego.