A Great and Remarkable Analogy: The Onto-Typology of Jonathan Edwards [1 ed.] 9783666517013, 9783525517017

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Jonathan Edwards proposed that types in nature are a communication of God, pointing to the antitypes of divine truths. These types are shown to exist all the way down to the cellular and molecular levels of nature. In this way, nature is the triune God communicating the divine Self to the beloved creatures: the Father willing into being, Christ communicating, and the Spirit revealing. God’s Trinitarian beauty and magnificent glory are not merely displayed by what has been made, but is intimately shared and delighted in. This, in Edwards’ view, is God’s ultimate end in creating.

ISBN 978-3-525-51701-7

9 783525 517017

Lisanne Winslow

JES 5

The Author Lisanne D. Winslow is Professor of Biology and Theology at the University of Northwestern – St Paul.

Vol. 5

Winslow  A Great and Remarkable Analogy

NEW DIRECTIONS IN JONATHAN EDWARDS STUDIES

17,9 mm

A Great and Remarkable Analogy The Onto-Typology of Jonathan Edwards

New Directions in Jonathan Edwards Studies Edited by Harry S. Stout, Kenneth P. Minkema and Adriaan C. Neele

Volume 5

Lisanne Winslow

A Great and Remarkable Analogy The Onto-Typology of Jonathan Edwards

Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht

Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek: The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data available online: https://dnb.de. © 2020, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht GmbH & Co. KG, Theaterstraße 13, D-37073 Göttingen All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without prior written permission from the publisher. Typesetting: 3w+p GmbH, Rimpar Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht Verlage | www.vandenhoeck-ruprecht-verlage.com ISSN 2566-7327 ISBN 978-3-666-51701-3

For Dr. Walter J. Schultz, friend and colleague, who introduced me to Edwards and who reminds me daily of God’s calling as a Christian Scholar.

I am not ashamed to own that I believe that the whole universe, heaven and earth, air and seas, and the divine constitution and history of the holy Scriptures, be full of images of divine things, as full as a language is of words….. ~Jonathan Edwards Images of Divine Things

Psalm 97:6 The heavens proclaim His righteousness, and all the people see His glory.

Acknowledgements

Special thanks to the University of Northwestern-St Paul, where I have been on faculty for 18 years. I thank the administration for permitting me the freedom to teach and engage students in two departments, the Department of Biology and Biochemistry, and the Department of Biblical and Theological Studies. This has allowed me a great expanse of intellectual fullness in order to integrate my biological knowledge with theological scholarship. Special thanks to my students in Jonathan Edwards Seminar and Science and Theology for fruitful discussions of many of the ideas presented in this book. A special thanks for all the hard work and mind-grinding scholarship of my research student Mr. Daniel Christian who spent two academic years studying with me on Edwards’ ideas of beauty in nature. I appreciate your contribution to the presentation we gave together on Edwards’ Theology of Beauty in Nature at the Faculty Scholarship Symposium at the University of Northwestern in May 2019. A heartfelt thanks to Austin Chiappetta, Bishoy Botros, Anastasia Harper, Arianna Winslow, Halle Ginther, and Olivia Jankowski who helped with typing and transcriptions of citations, quotations, and editing. A special thanks to Mr. Tim Meyer for a rendering of the Rhodopson model in Figures 3 and 4. A special thanks to Dr. Ken Minkema for lively discussions regarding Edwards’ typology, for his encouragement in my work as an Edwards scholar, and for his attention to detail in the final edits of the book. I am also in gratitude to colleagues who helped me to relate thinking as a scientist to thinking as a theologian. In special gratitude, I would like to thank Dr. Phil Ziegler and Dr. Tom Greggs, University of Aberdeen; Dr. Alister McGrath, Ian Ramsey Center for Religion and Science, Oxford University; Dr. Walter Schultz, University of Northwestern, Dr. Philip Rolnick, University of St Thomas; Rev. Dr. Lanny Kuester and the faithful at the Mendota Heights Congregational Church, Ms. Leslie Shore and Mr. Ryan Andersen. A special thanks to my ministry friends in Aberdeen, Scotland, especially the Rev’d Andy and Margaret Cowie and the Rev’d Anne Robertson for delightful

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conversations, Christ-centered ministry, and fun outreach activities with the members of the Cove, Northfield, Danestone, and Balmedie Congregational Churches in Aberdeen, Scotland. Any substantial scholarly work requires those kindred friends that support and walk alongside. I would like to extend gratitude to my dear friends Peggy Novak, Lucy Gibb, Sharon Binger, Cindy Land, Nancy McCreary, and Anne McManus, for their love and support during the arduous task of study, research, and writing toward the completion of this work while serving as Chair of my department, teaching full-time, and parenting two teen daughters. You have saved my sanity on too many occasions. To my dearest treasures, Ari and Sophie. No matter what accomplishments I may achieve in this lifetime, you will always be, far and above, the greatest joy of my life. I am so proud of who you are and who you are becoming. You are the love of my heart. Most of all, I would like to thank the Love that Created for providing such a beautifully fascinating world for me to spend my life studying.

Contents

Acknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

7

Tables, Graphs and Figures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

11

Works of Jonathan Edwards Cited from the Yale Editions . . . . . . . .

12

Foreword . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

13

Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

16

Book Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

18

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

19

Chapter One. Edwards as a Natural Theologian . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Chapter Two. Emanation of the Knowledge and Glory of God into the Creation in Dissertation I: Concerning the End for Which God Created the World . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Chapter Three. Edwards’ Creation Metaphysics Undergirds Natural Typology: Idealism, Panentheism, Occasionalism, and Continuous Creationism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Chapter Four. All Natural Types and Antitypes are Ontologically Real: Introducing Edwards’ Onto-Typology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Chapter Five. The Language of Nature Explored as Analogical . . . . . .

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Contents

Chapter Six. A Method for Discerning Natural Onto-Types as the Analogical Language of Nature . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Chapter Seven. Setting It Straight with Terms: Type, Antitype, Analogy, Trope, Emblem, Symbol, Copy, Ectype, Archetype . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Chapter Eight. Jonathan Edwards’ Consistent Use of Onto-Typology in the “Miscellanies”, Sermons, Treatises, and Discourses . . . . . . . . . .

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Chapter Nine. Onto-Types in Images of Divine Things . . . . . . . . . . .

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Chapter Ten. Extending Edwards’ Onto-Typology into Contemporary Science: Rhodopson Mechanism in the Mammalian Visual System as a Molecular Onto-Type . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A Mechanism from Cell Biology: The Rhodopsin Second Messenger Cascade in the Mammalian Visual System is a Natural Type of Illumination by the Light of Christ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Biological Background: The Mechanism of Mammalian Vision . . . . Light . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Rhodopsin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . G-protein . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . γPDE Inhibitors and PDE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . cGMP to Linear GMP . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Na+/ Ca2+ Gated Ion Channels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Depolarization and Hyperpolarization of the Rod Cell Membrane Resulting in Transduction of Visual Signal to the Brain . . . . . . . .

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115 116 124 125 126 127 128 129

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Chapter Eleven. Beauty in the Clouds: Nature’s Secondary Beauty as an Onto-Type of God’s Primary Beauty . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Chapter Twelve. Bringing Forth Edwards’ Typological Natural Philosophy toward a Trinitarian Theology of Nature . . . . . . . . . . .

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Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Author Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Subject Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Tables, Graphs and Figures

Table I. Table II. Table III. Graph I. Figure 1. Figure 2. Figure 3. Figure 4. Figure 5. Figure 6. Figure 7.

Type/Antitype Repeated Themes in Images of Divine Things . Some Natural Types Used Once in Images of Divine Things . Types and Antitypes in the Mammalian Visual System . . . . Thematic Distribution of Antitypes in Images of Divine Things Made by Lisanne Winslow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Rhodopsin Positioned in the Membrane . . . . . . . . . . . . Structures of Rhodopsin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Schematic of the molecular pathway of vision . . . . . . . . . Schematic of the pathway of vision including onto-types and antitypes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Edwards on beauty in human beings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Edwards on God using nature to communicate to human beings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Edwards on beauty and virtue in nature and man-made entities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

109 110 134 111 135 136 137 138 151 151 152

Works of Jonathan Edwards Cited from the Yale Editions

Freedom of the Will. Vol. 1 The Religious Affections. Vol. 2 Original Sin. Vol. 3 Scientific and Philosophical Writings. Vol. 6 Ethical Writings. Vol. 8 A History of the Work of Redemption. Vol. 9 Sermons and Discourses, 1720–1723. Vol. 10 Typological Writings. Vol. 11 The “Miscellanies”: A–500. Vol. 13 Sermons and Discourses, 1723–1729. Vol. 14 Letters and Personal Writings. Volume 16 Sermons and Discourses, 1730–1733. Vol. 17 The “Miscellanies”: 501–832. Vol. 18 Sermons and Discourses, 1734–1738. Vol. 19 The „Miscellanies“: Entry Nos. 833–1152. Vol. 20 Writings on the Trinity, Grace, and Faith. Vol. 21 Sermons and Discourses, 1739–1742. Vol. 22 The “Miscellanies”: Entry Nos. 1153–1320. Vol. 23 Sermons and Discourses, 1743–1758. Vol. 25 Catalogues of Books. Vol. 26

Foreword

“To have a scientific mind is to respect the consensus facts, which are the resolution of generations of dispute, while maintaining an open mind about the still unknown.” So observes quantum physicist, Lee Smolin. That said, the same words could easily have been written by Rev. Dr. Lisanne Winslow, herself an accomplished scientist, theologian and minister. In this book, Dr. Winslow opens up the beauty and mystery of a twenty-five year career as a marine biologist that led her to pursue theology in order to answer the questions that were too large for science. As she explores these questions into the ontology of nature in terms of the descriptions of science, she beckons and leads the reader into the same sense of mystery and wonder. She found the very conversation partner she needed in the writings of Jonathan Edwards. Consider these words of Edwards that Dr. Winslow begins in the epigraph of this book: I am not ashamed to own that I believe that the whole universe be full of images of divine things, as full as a language is of words… and that there is room for persons to be learning more and more of this language and seeing more of that which is declared in it to the end of the world without discovering all.

Lisanne Winslow has done just that. She has taken up the baton from Edwards and has explored the ontological reality of messages or shadows of divine things embedded in the natural world. She says, “We are on a journey with Jonathan Edwards who encourages us to press into a revelatory faith. This is a natural spirituality that opens the eyes of our understanding to be enlightened by what nature has to communicate. In Edwards’ hands this is a true gospel of nature.” She pursues the clues that Edwards left for us in his corpus of writings to take us, the readers of nature, deeper into that gospel message. What Edwards did in forming a study of natural types in the macroscopic realm of rainbows, spiders, and rivers, Winslow has done at the cellular and molecular level. Her analysis of the mechanism of vision in the mammalian eye is not only at an advanced level of cellular biology, it is spiritually and biblically grounded. She does just what Edwards did in Shadows of Divine Things by

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Foreword

rooting revealed messages in the creation directly to scripture. Having done this typological work throughout her scientific career somewhat in the secret realm of her own mind, she now puts forth the query, “…one wonders if such insight and revelation can be given for all mechanisms that comprise the natural realm? What myriad of hidden messages of the divine reality are there for the Spirit to reveal?” While what she has done here in terms of typological scientific mechanism is a truly extraordinary feat of Edwardsean typology, Lisanne Winslow is an Edwards scholar in her own right. Her entrance into Edwards began while she and I were team-teaching a Metaphysics of Science course at the University of Northwestern. It was in our collegial discourse that we began talking about Edwards. I had been teaching Edwards for more than three decades, and noticed a resonance between her understanding of the natural world and that of Edwards. Dr. Winslow was in seminary at the time and immediately jumped on board. I was struck by the depth and breadth with which she read Edwards, engaging deeply in his treatises, discourses, sermons and of course Shadows. Her keen mind and spiritual heart seemed to come alive. She, as an ordained Congregational minister herself, connected not only with Edwards’ interest in natural science and theology, but his pastor’s heart. She found the kindred spirit she was searching for. Since the inception of our collaboration, we have team-taught Jonathan Edwards Seminar to undergraduates for several years. Her contribution to this course, a course I have taught for many years, expanded its breadth in Edwards scholarship leading to three unique pedagogical curricula. In this well-constructed monograph, Lisanne Winslow offers us a rigorous analysis of Edwards’ creation metaphysics and theology of nature. She uncovers Edwards’ bi-fold method of receiving revelation of what she has termed ontotypes in both the beauty of nature and in the study of scientific information. This is a keen read of Edwards and a very informed one. She searched Edwards for a set of criteria to help guide the theological process of doing onto-typology to avoid subjectivity. However, she is careful not to lapse into solely an intellectual theology, but reminds us that these messages in nature are there to invite us into an Edwardsean mystical spirituality that derives from abandoning one’s self to the revelation of God when encountering nature. In her hands, what people actually “see” and experience, either by being in nature or in studying its manifold processes, is the beauty of a God who is ever reaching to the creatures He loves through what has been made. I will offer here another quote from Lee Smolin who says, “There is not a thing in nature so ordinary that its contemplation cannot be a route to a wordless sense of wonder and gratitude just to be a part of it all.” Rev. Winslow has taken us there. She has offered us a new way to see nature, to be part of it, and thus be part of the end for which God created the world. I will end with her own words to us all,

Foreword

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“Might opening ourselves to God’s revelation of the language of nature, through the discoveries of natural science, incite not merely a new theology, but a fresh wave of experiencing the wide, broad, and deep love of God?” Walter J. Schultz All Saints Day 2019

Preface

In this book, I propose to fill a long-existing lacuna in the corpus of the Edwards secondary scholarship. While there have been numerous excellent texts written on Edwards’ typology, none (to my knowledge) have been written from the perspective of one who has scientific training in addition to theological training and pastoral ministry. I hold a unique position in this conversation. I am a research biologist for more than twenty years. I have taught biology to undergraduate as well as graduate students while conducting an ongoing research program as a cellular marine immunologist with world ocean experience. In my bi-vocational career, I have pursued advanced theological training in seminary leading to ordination as a Congregationalist minister (as was Edwards), followed by a doctorate in Systematic Theology. My training in biology and theology, as well as Congregational ministry in the pulpit, gives me a rare and unique connection to Edwards’ mind and heart as a naturalist, theologian, and pastor. It is from this position that I approach Edwards’ Theology of Nature, hoping to offer some keen and fresh insight into Edwards’ God of creation. Johnathan Edwards knew God in an extraordinary way. As such, when I read Edwards I feel as if I am welcomed into an intimate sacred space of knowing God. I find myself experiencing an expansive, mystical spiritual knowing. For Edwards, this entrance into experiencing God included an understanding of the created world, not just in the beauty of a walk on a crisp fall morning, but through a far deeper communication by God in the very structures and mechanisms that comprise nature. In my life pursuits as a biologist, I also have had such an entrance. I started seeing similar insights early on in my life as I explored the pond in my back yard as a child, then systematically during my college years and graduate career in cell biology. The cells I studied in my research, the mechanisms I taught in my biology classes, all spoke something to me of the Creator, something that the words from science could not adequately express. The questions that were being raised in my mind and the observations I was making felt larger than the scientific language and mechanistic explanations I was given to work with. As a young graduate student, and well into my formative years as

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scientist and professor, I felt a growing lack in the ability of my discipline to help me with answers to these questions about the biological world, as botanist Robin Wall Kimmerer portrays, “I should have been told that my questions were bigger than science could touch” (2013, 45). Thankfully, a few decades later, my theological training gave me such a language. Alighting upon the work of Jonathan Edwards along that journey opened a world of thought from the mind, heart, and spirit of a man who lived three centuries ago, who thought and felt as I did about nature and nature’s God. I found the very conversation partner I needed to do the work broiling up with beauty and fervor within my biologist’s heart; a biologist who conjoined a similar sacred space with the Creator as did Edwards. In Edwards, I resonated with his mystical spirituality that was biblically grounded, while experienced in and through the natural world. As I pursued his writings, I saw a thread throughout the corpus of his works: God reveals himself through nature. Nature has something to say, and it was God’s own design to communicate with his beloved creatures in this way. Through Edwards’ discourses, treatises, dissertations, sermons and more, he consistently uses images in nature to teach of God’s ways thereby giving spiritual insight. It is with this same openness to God’s revelation in the structures and beauty of the physical world that I have pursued this work. I hope that this book opens a new wave of spirituality and practice where the language of nature can speak to us. This, for me, is truly a gospel of nature proclaiming the glory of God, in Christ. Thanks to the insights of Jonathan Edwards, as we receive such beautiful revelation, and delight it as we so often do in nature, we enter into a life-enriching fulfillment of the end for which God created the world. –LW

Book Summary

Jonathan Edwards had a keen insight into the ontological significance of the creation, above and beyond Calvin’s idea of the theater upon which the drama of redemption unfolds. Edwards proposed that natural types in all of creation served as a communication or language of God, pointing to the antitypes of spiritual, biblical, and divine truths. I explore how natural types are not mere poetical assignments of Christian themes onto nature. Rather, these types are ontologically real, in that they eternally existed in the mind of God with intent to communicate divine things to the creature. Thus, we call these natural types ontotypes to reflect their ontological significance theologically and spiritually. In Edwards’ scheme, this was an important part of God’s end in creating. Emerging out of Edwards’ comprehensive metaphysics of creation is a portrayal of God’s commitment to emanate knowledge of the divine Self into the creation. God’s Being is not emanated, resulting in a creation, rather the knowledge and glory of God are emanated into the creation serving to communicate messages of the divine to the creature out of infinite love and faithfulness. Edwards expounded a two-fold method where revelation of this language of nature can be experienced by direct engagement with the beauty in nature and in the study of science and its mechanisms. God’s action in revealing takes the form of willing the creation into being, communicating analogically through onto-types in the physical world, and revealing such knowledge to the creature. In this way, all of nature is the triune God acting: the Father willing into being, Christ communicating, and the Spirit revealing. God’s Trinitarian powerful and magnificent glory is not merely displayed by what has been made, but is intimately shared and delighted in. This, in Edwards’ view, is God’s ultimate end in creating.

Introduction

The Edwards scholarship presented here seeks to reveal precisely how Edwards used natural typology over the course of his lifetime, across the corpus of his theological works, in his pastoral ministry, and as a missionary to the Mohawk and Mahican Native American tribes. For Edwards, seeing messages of the divine reality embedded into the very structures and mechanisms of nature was no mere human assignment or applied metaphor. In a parallel construction to biblical typology, Edwards put forth a controversial and innovative method of natural typology where types in nature prefigure their spiritual antitypes. I will argue that Edwards viewed these embedded natural types as a crucial part of the end for which God created the world. In Edwards’ view, God intentionally embedded spiritual messages into his creation as a subordinate end, in a long line of successive ends, in order to communicate the knowledge and glory of the divine Self to the creature who was fashioned to receive it. God’s end in creation is accomplished when these messages are received and delighted in by the creature, thus re-emanating God’s divine glory back to its eternal and infinite source.1 Beginning with Edwards’ final and most mature work, the Dissertation I: Concerning the End for Which God created the World (hereafter referred to as End of Creation), I propose that Edwards intended to convey the idea that as part of God’s Original Ultimate End in creating, God emanated/communicated the knowledge and glory of the divine excellencies into the creation. God did not emanate himself into the creation which would be a dangerous approximation to pantheism. Rather, Edwards indicates that it is the knowledge and glory of God that is emanated into the creation. This serves the purpose of communicating to the creature toward achieving God’s end in creation, i. e., union with Creator. It is proposed that natural types convey this emanation/communication in the physical world as a subordinate end. Edwards was convinced, particularly by the 1 Much of the work presented in this book was taken, in part, from D’Andrea-Winslow, Lisanne, “A Great and Remarkable Analogy: A Trinitarian Theology of Nature.” PhD diss., University of Aberdeen, Scotland, 2018.

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Introduction

end of his life in writing End of Creation, that God intentionally created everything in the universe with embedded typological messages to reflect attributes of himself, in order that humankind could understand these mysteries in some tangible, analogous way. We shall explore the possibility of discerning the hidden mysteries of God’s eternal attributes in the structures and mechanisms of nature in the form of natural types that are willed into being, emanated/communicated into the structures of the physical world, and revealed by God. However, some criticisms of Edwards’ use of natural types will need to be addressed, particularly the danger of subjective interpretations being construed as divine revelation. This sticky point may be, in large part, addressed by relying on Edwards’ metaphysics of creation; his idealism, panentheism, occasionalism, and continuous creationism. Edwards’ metaphysical commitments are constructed in such a way as to view the entirety of the creation as intended by God, not only to work in beauty, balance, and harmony as the “stage” for life to exist, but also in order to communicate God’s eternal attributes and plan of redemption to the beloved creature. As such, types in nature are not subject to the imagination of the individual in arbitrary assignments and metaphor, but rather represent embedded existing messages in all of creation, instantiated by God and revealed by the divine act of God. It is proposed that Edwards viewed these messages as ontologically real and intentionally woven by God into the structures and mechanisms of nature. In this construal, messages of the divine in nature are not mere metaphors, but represent an onto-typology. We advance Edwards’ theological construct by referring to these messages as onto-types. Embedded onto-types are then explored in relation to the Thomistic notion of analogia. In Thomas, we find a theology of analogy where communication of the Divine is neither univocal nor equivocal, but rather exists in proportion. Edwards’ onto-types are placed in the lineage of the analogia entis representing both God’s transcendence by creating ex nihilo and God’s immanence in a moment-by-moment continuous creation where God himself is ever-communicating to the creature out of supreme divine love. Thus, a deeper, more comprehensive look at Edwards’ proposed method of discernment of nature’s onto-types is put forth here. It is hoped that what is presented offers a more reliable approach than previous renditions that opened Edwards’ natural typology to criticisms and suspicion. Edwards’ contribution is explored using his own proposed method of natural typology as a necessary and valid way to understand God’s character, love, and plan of salvation in and through the created world and its mechanisms. I propose a set of criteria extracted from Edwards to serve as a guide for the theological work of doing natural onto-typology. I then uncover Edwards’ use of onto-types in a two-fold method: A) through the mechanisms in nature as explained by exact science, and B) in personal experiences in nature. Edwards used both and saw validity in each. In

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this way, God’s invisible qualities, eternal power, and divine nature (Romans 1:20) are revealed so that creatures can comprehend with the intellect, as well as the heart. Edwards fully believed that Scripture instructs us that the natural world declares the glory of God. Going back through Edwards’ corpus in his ”Miscellanies,” sermons, discourses, and treatises, a “natural, mystical spirituality” emerges from the pages of these diverse genres of his works. I show that Edwards consistently uses his theology of onto-types to convey a spiritually transformative gospel of nature, spoken through the language of nature, pointing individuals to Christ. This was most intentionally expounded by Edwards in a small, hand-bound folio that Edwards may or may not have intended to publish. In this definitive work, Images or Shadows of Divine Things (hereafter referred to as Images of Divine Things), Edwards recorded his insights into the natural world and the revelations given to him that parallel biblical truths. Using this short text, we shall explore how Edwards adeptly used his two-fold methodology reflecting his own concise systematic theology. We will explore how this work was not purely theological, but incited a dynamic and beautiful spirituality. Next, Edwards’ typological method is applied to the molecular mechanism of vision in the mammalian eye seeking to answer the question: Can Edwards’ onto-types be found all the way down to the molecular level of the creation? This question will be answered in the affirmative where I explore how each step in this higher order, multi-step cellular mechanisms corresponds to biblically grounded, spiritually informed messages for humankind to learn of spiritual principles. While the onto-types in the cellular mechanism of vision show that Edwards’ method of types in scientific mechanisms exist all the way down to the molecular level, I then take you the reader on the second aspect of Edwards’ method which describes direct experiences in the natural world as leading the heart and mind to the Creator. In this way, we explore Edwards’ theology of beauty, specifically referring to beauty in the natural world. While much work in the Edwards secondary scholarship provides an analysis on Edwards’ theology of beauty in humans and in morality, few explore this in terms of the beauty in nature specifically. Here I propose that the beauty humans find in nature exists because the beauty of a sunset, the vast ocean, mountains, etc., are yet another onto-type pointing to the antitype of God’s beauty. Edwards refers to the beauty in nature as secondary beauty pointing to the primary beauty, which is God. Again, an individual’s experience of beauty in nature causing delight is yet another fulfillment of God’s end in creating the world. Next, I invite a new Theology of Nature from the brilliant mind of Edwards, one that is expressly Trinitarian. Edwards not only saw that messages in the creation exist, but that this mode of divine communication was the unified work of the Triune God. He says,

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Introduction

So all the persons [of the Trinity] are concerned in the creation of the world [. . .]. [E]ach person has a distinct part and, as it were, sustains a distinct character and charge in that affair. [. . .] There is this order [that] is observed by the persons of the Trinity in their acting in all affairs appertaining to the glory of the Godhead [and the] creation of the world (WJE 25, 145–146).

Edwards seems to be proposing that the Father, the Son, and the Spirit each play a distinct role in divine action to produce the cohesive whole of the creation as we encounter it. We find in Edwards’ writings a view that God is actively willing into existence and communicating/emanating the knowledge and glory of God into the very structures of the creation. This willing and communicating (as ways of divine action) in the form of onto-types also include the divine act of revealing those real-ized types and their antitypes to created minds. Following Edwards’ direction, nature, then, is God’s acting. But even more, it is the Triune God of the Christian faith that is acting, understood in a Trinitarian Theology of Nature (D’Andrea-Winslow, 2020). In this way, all of nature is the act-result of the triune God such that the Father is willing into being, Christ is communicating through onto-types in the creation, and the Spirit is revealing. This divine action out of infinite agape love, is a crucial aspect of God’s Original Ultimate End in creation. We are on a journey with Jonathan Edwards, who encourages us to press into a revelatory faith. This is a natural spirituality that opens the eyes of our understanding to be enlightened by what nature has to communicate. In Edwards’ hands, this is a true gospel of nature. According to Edwards, nature is speaking. Exactly what nature is speaking is explored here in order to comprehend what the Creator wants for us to know through what has been made.

Chapter One. Edwards as a Natural Theologian

Jonathan Edwards spent many hours each day in his pastor’s study writing his sermons, discourses, and treatises. I can imagine him glancing out the window from time to time to collect his thoughts, or stepping out into the Northampton late afternoon air for a contemplative walk at dusk as the sun was setting. In fact, Edwards’ biographers tell us that the man spent a good deal of time outdoors, either walking, horseback-riding, or chopping wood. He enjoyed and valued being immersed in God’s creation. What comes out of a careful read of Edwards across the breadth of genres he penned and over nearly thirty years of his ministry, is that his enjoyment of the creation exceeded a mere epistemic engagement with nature on a lovely summer’s day. Edwards saw the creation through a metaphysical lens of understanding that framed the entirety of the natural world, and all its mechanisms, as participating in God’s Original Ultimate End in creation. For Edwards, nature was far more than just the stage upon which the drama of redemption was carried out. Edwards constructed a complete creation metaphysics that included a rigorous God-world relation philosophy grounded in idealism and panentheism, as well as a divine action theology that committed him to continuous creationism and occasionalism.1 These metaphysical and theological commitments concerning an ontology of the natural world allowed Edwards to propose a distinctive role for the creation itself in his own thesis on God’s end in creating. In Edwards’ creation metaphysics, a crucial aspect of God’s ultimate end in creating included ontologically embedded natural types pointing to their supernatural antitypes. Edwards masterfully extended the method of biblical typology where Old Testament persons, events, and images served as types foreshadowing their New Testament antitype fulfillments. Out of this method, he formulated an insightful, original method of natural typology where elements in nature prefigure or foreshadow the antitypes of spiritual principles and divine 1 Edwards’ creation metaphysics will be discussed in Chapter Three.

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things. As Michael McClymond and Gerald McDermott say, “Edwards considered everything in nature a pointer to something in a world beyond nature” (2012, 116). In other words, Edwards proposed natural typology as a language of God intending to convey spiritual, biblical, and theological messages to the creature within the very world that they lived.2 He says it this way: Tis very fit and becoming of God, who is infinitely wise, so to order things that there should be a voice of his in his works instructing those that behold them and pointing forth and showing divine mysteries and things more appertaining to himself and his spiritual kingdom (WJE 11, 67).

According to Edwards, all of nature declares the glory of God. God’s fingerprints, as it were, exist all throughout nature providing the grounds for revelation, pointing to the redemptive work of Christ, and other heavenly truths. Tibor Fabiny says that for Edwards nature is God’s acting and communicating himself for the sake of the creature (Fabiny: 2009, 99). Fabiny also summarized Edwards’ position as follows, When a converted person knows and loves Gods beauty, and when the physical universe is known and delighted in by a converted person as an image of God’s beauty, then God’s knowledge and beauty within the Trinity are repeated and enlarged in time and history, The end for which God created the world, which is to repeat God’s inner glory… is actualized (2009, 122).

As Fabiny indicates here, nature in Edwards’ creation metaphysics serves an important role in accomplishing God’s original ultimate end in creating. When Edwards stepped out of his pastor’s study and gazed up at the rainbow, he believed he was partaking in God’s present moment action in order to fulfill God’s end in creating; God’s glory received and delighted in by the creature and “remanated” (that is, re-emanated) back to its divine and glorious source. For Edwards, these experiences in nature were the intentional, reflected and embedded spiritual language of nature, a language that human minds have been fashioned to understand. Edwards’ understanding of nature’s language is affirmed by botanist Robin Wall Kimmerer, who sees the language science uses to describe the natural world as necessary for conveying the fundamental “working parts,” but missing something essential to the grammar nature is giving us. She says, “The language scientists speak, however precise, is based on a profound error in grammar, an omission, a grave loss in translation from the native languages of these shores” (2013, 49).The elements of nature are speaking something 2 Edwards’ natural types are found in many of Edwards’ writings including his ”Miscellanies,” in Religious Affections, Original Sin, Freedom of the Will, in his Two Dissertations, and in numerous sermons. However, the main source of this work would be Jonathan Edwards’ Images of Divine Things.

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far more than the working parts, as profoundly beautiful and complex as they are. Nature’s grammar is communicating something of “God’s invisible qualities–his eternal power and divine nature – [that] have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made.”3 Hence, God reaches to the creature, to communicate the divine Self. One might take all this as a complex unfolding of Romans 1:20, as stated above, perhaps to recover the cry of the Psalmist who declared, The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands. Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they reveal knowledge. They have no speech, they use no words; no sound is heard from them. Yet their voice goes out into all the earth, their words to the ends of the world.4

Edwards fully believed that Scripture instructs us that the natural world declares the glory of God: we are told that the natural world “pours forth speech” and “reveals knowledge.” We are encouraged to press into a revelatory faith that can unblock the eyes of the understanding. Although nature does not use words, its metaphorical “voice” has something vital to communicate, “into all the earth…to the ends of the world.” According to Jonathan Edwards, nature is speaking. Exactly what is nature speaking, according to Edwards? What are the heavens declaring? What proclamations are the skies pouring forth? This is what we want to know in order to fully comprehend what the Creator is speaking through the creation. Edwards, in his engagement with the world, might answer thusly: The voice going out into all the earth pouring forth speech is proclaiming knowledge of God’s invisible qualities, His eternal power, and divine triune nature, interwoven within scientific discovery, placed in the creation by God, in order to communicate the knowledge and glory of himself to humankind. Edwards not only had experiences in nature, on walks observing spider webs, rivers, trees and rainbows. He also engaged with the science of his day, reading Newton and other enlightenment scientists. However, rather than ascribing to a Natural Theology bordering on deism, Edwards formulated a new way to understand both scientific discovery and experiences in nature by locating both in God’s absolute sovereignty and divine action. For Edwards, science itself becomes an investigation of divine action and Self-disclosure that construes nature as creation. The language of the natural world is proclaiming the gospel, preaching the good news of God to humankind, 3 Romans 1:20 4 Psalm 19:1–4.

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and revealing scientific truths about mechanisms and ecosystems that inherently captivate in its mysteries the self-communication of the Divine. Thomas Torrance asserts, Here our fact is the living God, the active, willing and loving God, who communicated himself to us, and it is through his self-communication and self-disclosure that he gives himself to us. …It may be worth pausing here to note a parallel to this in exact science. We have said that the kind of fact we have in the natural world is mute and is only made to talk as it comes to cognition and expression in our rational experience…this rationality of nature objectively transcends our experience of it…we are ready to let it speak for itself…(Torrance:1969, 29).

In this passage, Torrance echoes Edwards’ creation metaphysics and creates a direct link between the eloquence of nature and God’s communication of himself. Edwards is ready to let nature speak, not of itself, but of the living, active God. Even contemporary scientists are recognizing that nature is comprised of more than a physical reductionist view. As life scientist Daniel Nicholson indicates, “None of our representations of the organism capture it in its entirety” (2018, 251). I believe Nicholson is trying to say, as did Edwards, that nature encompasses deeper meaning and complexity over and above its mechanistic processes. Seeing these reflected images in nature invites us, in a sovereign Godworld relation, to walk into a flourishing expansion of our apprehension of the absolute greatness of God who created with not only complexity and order, but beauty and divine goodness. Few of us, as Strachan and Sweeney lament, “have too large a view of God. Most of us have far too small a view of God and his goodness” (2010, 85).5 God reveals, as Torrance expressed above, “his self-communication and selfdisclosure so that he gives himself to us.” God gives “himself to us” through his divinity and supernatural love by displaying his knowledge and beauty within the creation. And why would not we think that God would do this? Jonathan Edwards put it this way: The works of God are but a kind of voice or language of God, to instruct intelligent beings in things pertaining to himself. And why should we not think that he would teach and instruct by his works in this way as well as others, viz. by representing divine things by his works, and so pointing them forth, especially since we know that God hath so much delighted in this way of instruction? (WJE 11, 67).

According to Edwards, the natural world is a language of God, given to teach us of himself. Why should we think that God would not instruct us in this way? Why 5 This idea by Strachan and Sweeney was derived from H. Richard Niebuhr’s 1958 sermon, ”The Anachronism of Jonathan Edwards”: ”Edwards used to say that the trouble with men was not that they had no ideas of God, but that they had little ideas of God. We might add that they are ideas about little gods” (personal communication with Ken Minkema).

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would we think that God would not reveal to us God’s invisible mysteries, God’s eternal power, and divine loving nature through what has been made, when Scripture itself instructs us that he will? Reading the language of nature, then, construes a gospel testimony of nature, where the living, all-loving, and powerful God comes to his creatures in a language they can understand, embedded in the natural world within which they exist. Torrance draws witness to the role of man as the interpreter of nature, one that requires faith: “but whatever is not-God is laid open by God himself as set in the creation of man, and which faith makes clear to him, that man can fulfill his function as an interpreter of nature” (Torrance: 1969, 69). Again, we see the reassertion here that it is God who has the plan to lay open and disclose, to reveal what God has set in the creation. Humankind was created to receive and appropriate that revelation by faith. However, this conceptual theology of God communicating to humankind through the natural world in shadows of divine things did not begin with Edwards. It has precursors in the medieval scholastics such as St. Bonaventure: For creatures are shadows, echoes, and pictures of that first, most powerful, most wise, and most perfect Principle, of that eternal source, light, and fullness; of that efficient, exemplary, and ordering Art. They are vestiges, images, and spectacles proposed to us for the contuition of God. They are divinely given signs…. (2002, 73)

It is most interesting that Edwards and St. Bonaventure both use the same terminology of “shadows,” of “divinely given signs,” when referring to the natural world. Based on the books contained in Edwards’ library, we do not have evidence that he read St. Bonaventure (Thuesen: 2008). Nonetheless, both Edwards and St. Bonaventure saw in the noble, natural order, reflections or “vestiges” of God’s likeness.6 This harkens back to St. Augustine who wrote of the vestigia trinitatis, or images of the Trinity implanted in nature: ”It is necessary that we, viewing the Creator through the works of his hands, raise up our minds to the contemplation of the Trinity, of which creation bears the mark in a certain and due proportion” (2012, 12). Augustine, Bonaventure, and Edwards made profound observations regarding the embedded revelation of God within the natural world. Likewise, Calvin teaches the necessity of viewing the creation and all the creatures as “mirrors” of God’s attributes of wisdom, justice, goodness, and power: There is no doubt that the Lord would have us uninterruptedly occupied in this holy meditation; that, while we contemplate in all creatures, as in mirrors, those immense riches of his wisdom, justice, goodness, and power, we should not merely run over them cursorily, and, not to speak, with a fleeting glance; but we should ponder them at length,

6 Edwards follows this same vocabulary, “shadow,” used also by his earlier contemporary Puritan writers on biblical typology. [On Bonaventure and JE, see Justin Hawkins, ”The Medieval Puritan: Three Case Studies of Scholastic Themes in JE,” Yale Divinity School thesis, 2015.

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turn them over in our minds seriously and faithfully, and recollect them repeatedly (1960, 180).

To Calvin, as for Augustine, Bonaventure, and Edwards, this task of seeing God’s attributes of wisdom, justice, goodness, and power in all aspects of the creation is of paramount importance and should be taken seriously in seeking and serving the God who created. These messages hold vital information and experiential knowledge necessary for created beings to live out the faith, to act in justice, and to be transformed by God’s power, grace, and love. In order for Edwards to construe nature as God’s communication, he must reconcile the revelation of God’s ways, character, and divine plan with the Scriptures, and most importantly, with God’s Self-revelation in the incarnate Son. Edwards follows again in the medieval scholastic tradition, first put forth by St. Bonaventure who claimed, For it is by faith that we believe that the world was fashioned by the Word of life. By faith we believe that the periods of the three laws followed each other in a most orderly way; namely, the law of nature, the law of Scripture, and the law of grace (2002, 77).

According to Bonaventure, the law of nature, the law of Scripture, and the law of grace, each founded by and formed for the Word of Life (Christ) should be understood continually as God’s self-disclosed revelation, yet each having a different function. In God’s created order, the law of nature laid down God’s Selfdisclosure in “shadows, echoes, and pictures…of that eternal source proposed to us for the contuition of God” (2002, 71). The law of Scripture and the law of the grace both reveal God, in that “in them as in mirrors we can see the eternal generation of the Word, the Image, and the Son eternally emanating from God the Father” (2002, 71). According to Bonaventure, and Edwards en suite, it is nature and the incarnate Son (as attested in Scripture) that serve the function to disclose the knowledge of God, differently yet coordinately, by and through the act of God. It is the Book of Scripture and the Book of Nature that give witness to the acts of God, God’s character, and God’s plan. However, with the rise and fall of Natural Theology, God’s self-disclosure through “what has been made” has been in dispute until recently.7 Yet, what is often overlooked is that this theme is, in fact, deeply embedded in Reformed theology, Meanwhile, let us not be ashamed to take pious delight in the works of God open and manifest in this most beautiful theater. For… it is not the chef evidence for faith, yet it is

7 Karl Barth’s objection to Natural Theology, and Emil Brunner’s rebuttal, along with others since, evoke Edwards’ philosophy and theology of nature, an important voice in the ongoing dialogue of God’s revelation through the Book of Nature. See, Brunner, Emil and Karl Barth. Natural Theology: Comprising “Nature and Grace” by Professor Dr. Emil Brunner and the Reply “No!” by Dr. Karl Barth. Eugene: Wipf and Stock, 2002.

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the first evidence in the order of nature, to be mindful that wherever we cast our eyes, all things they meet are works of God, and at the same time to ponder with pious meditation to what end God created them (Calvin: 1960, 170).

Calvin asserts that the physical world attests to the Creator God and the end for which God created. Thus, we can infer through the writings of Scripture, that the Creator Self-discloses the fullness of his own glory and divine nature in two critically important ways: through the incarnation of the Son and in the works of the creation itself. These are not two separate revelations of God in the fullness of God’s supreme glory and essence. They are one unified, consonant revelation, albeit different. In light of this historical grounding, Edwards is particularly relevant in informing the revelation of the divine in and through the creation. Edwards is uniquely poised out of the many others who have thought theologically regarding the creation. Edwards the theologian had an extensive breadth of knowledge regarding the contemporary science of his day. Edwards the pastor incorporated this knowledge into his sermons and his ministry. Thus, Edwards, in addition to being a theologian who elaborated Christology, philosophy, ethics, ecclesiology, and so on, was also a natural theologian. He thought deeply about science and scientific principles as evidenced in his scientific writings.8 It is for this reason that we turn to Edwards for direction as to how to appropriate his work constructively for the purpose of a contemporary theology of nature, one that informs believers spiritually. An answer emerges as we read Edwards beginning in his early years (circa 1722) as a young pastor in New York, then throughout his life ministry, and finally until his premature death in 1758: his lifelong metaphysics and theology of the natural world constitutes a bold claim that God has imbued both the natural world and Scripture with knowledge of divine things. He says, I am not ashamed to own that I believe that the whole universe, heaven and earth, air and seas, and the divine constitution and history of the holy Scriptures, be full of images of divine things, as full as a language is of words (WJE 11, 152).

In this quote, Edwards affirms two revelations of the divine glory: through the creation and the holy Scriptures. By the “holy Scriptures” it is meant to encompass the entire revelation of God in the Bible and culminating in the incarnation of Christ.9 This claim that the revelation of God is not only pre-

8 See Edwards’ scientific writings here which include the “Spiders” paper, “of Insects,” “Natural Philosophy,” “Of Atoms,” “Of the Rainbow,” “Wisdom in the Contrivance of the World,” and others (found in WJE 6). 9 It is clear from the corpus of Edwards’ writings that he affirms two consonant revelations of God in the creation and in the incarnate Son. However, for the sake of our argument at hand, I

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eminently in the incarnate Son, but also in the creation as well, is not an isolated example within the corpus of Edwards’ writings as theologian, pastor, and missionary. Rather, across more than thirty years of theological and pastoral writing, Edwards consistently claims that God’s divine, Trinitarian, and redemptive nature is revealed in what has been made, and that in the “language” of natural types. Natural types as an emanation of the knowledge of God was, for Edwards, part of God’s design to communicate His fullness and excellencies to the creature. As we shall see next, Edwards addresses the role and function of the creation in accomplishing God’s Original Ultimate End in creating in the Dissertation I: Concerning the End for Which God Created the World.

will be focusing my discussion on Edwards’ position on the communication of the knowledge of God’s divine nature in and through the creation.

Chapter Two. Emanation of the Knowledge and Glory of God into the Creation in Dissertation I: Concerning the End for Which God Created the World

Given Edwards’ necessary inclusion of the natural world in his theological and pastoral thinking, it seems fitting to start with his Dissertation I, Concerning the End for Which God Created the World. By starting with End of Creation, we explore his ideas concerning why God created and what God’s purpose for creation involved. In this way, Edwards’ theological and metaphysical understanding of the natural world can be related to the scheme of that end. By the end of his lifetime, his goal in writing the Two Dissertations was to promote this sort of spirituality by connecting the true virtue of the Christian life to God’s end in creating. Edwards intended to show that God had something very specific in mind for the believer before creating. Aligning with this end was necessary for an authentic and lasting spiritual life. One subordinate end, in the line of succession of ends toward achieving God’s original ultimate end in creating, involved the creation itself. However, in Edwards’ hands, this was not at all in the same manner as the current schemes of Natural Theology were proposing. First and foremost, Edwards was preeminently theocentric in an era when deistic views were coming into fashion. These deistic views undergirding Natural Theology promoted an anthropological starting point where humankind could find God through reason and scientific methods. Edwards, however, affirmed God as the epicenter of revealed glory. As he states in End of Creation, The beams of glory come from God, and are something of God, and are refunded back again to their original. So that the whole is of God, and in God, and to God; and God is the beginning, middle and end in this affair (WJE 8, 531).

Edwards, by affirming God as the “beginning, middle and end in this affair,” places the whole of God’s revelation in God alone, including natural revelation. In this way, Edwards stakes the claim that humankind, through logic and reason, cannot find or search out the knowledge and glory of God, particularly in and through the natural world or the findings of science. While using the accepted philosophical methods constituting “what reason dictates,” Edwards eloquently unfolds a logical proof found solely through the sovereignty of God alone which

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can reveal God’s excellencies to the creature. In End of Creation, we find support that God had in mind before creating the world such a system of “shadows of being,” representing an ontological structure of messages of the Divine, communicated by the Creator into the natural world.1 Edwards construes in his argument that the intent to communicate the wondrous excellencies and fullness of the knowledge and glory of God to the creature, out of infinite love, was part of the end for which God created the world.2 However, to do so, Edwards first needed to address several commonly held contentions regarding God’s end in creating. By writing the End of Creation, Edwards was trying to engage with three commonly held theological beliefs prevalent in the 1700s; namely, that a) God had an end in creating, b) God is perfect and unchanging, and c) God created all things ex nihilo.3 A predominant view in the 18th century was that the ultimate goal of God’s end in creating was human happiness.4 This seemed to account for point (a) above for it understands that salvation and redemption in Christ lead to ultimate happiness in eternity. However, this was debunked by the Scottish philosopher David Hume’s logical proof that since evil exists in the world, man is quite unhappy indeed (including Christians). Therefore, an all-loving, all-powerful God could not exist, much less have had humankind’s happiness as an end. 1 The phrase “shadows of being” was used by Edwards in Miscellanies 362, “The whole outward creation is but the shadows of being [and] so made to represent spiritual things…” The Miscellanies in Vol. 13 The Works of Jonathan Edwards, ed. Thomas A. Schafer (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1996), 434. 2 At first glance, this may seem to harken back to Platonic ideas or forms. For Plato, forms such as beauty are more real than any object made to imitate them. Plato held a fairly sharp distinction between the changeless realm of eternal forms which are timeless and unchanging, in comparison to the material world containing physical things that are in a constant state of flux and change. See Ian A McFarland, David A.S. Fergusson, Karen Kilby, and Ian R. Torrance, The Cambridge Dictionary of Theology (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 2011). While several Edwards scholars locate Edwards as a Neo-Platonist, I align myself with the position that Edwards was developing a distinct view in his understanding of God’s attributes, that is – the knowledge and glory of God emanated into the creation as an act of divine communication. This will be expanded later on. 3 Holmes discusses these three positions throughout his book. For the sake of brevity, I will only briefly discuss each in turn over the remainder of the paragraph to give the reader sufficient background information for what follows. A more exhaustive discussion, while interesting and of value, is beyond the scope of this chapter. Stephen Holmes, God of Grace and Glory: An Account of the Theology of Jonathan Edwards (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans Publishing, 2001), 35– 42. 4 This view was explored in 18th and 19th century utilitarian thinking led by British Moralists, Richard Cumberland (1631–1718) and John Gay (1699–1745) who were considered “theological” utilitarians. They believed that promoting human happiness was the goal of human existence since it was approved by God. This view was later developed in terms of moral actions, pleasure, and pain by Jeremy Bentham (1748–1832). https://plato.stanford.edu/ entries/utilitarianism-history/.

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In this way, the problem of evil and suffering offered a counterpoint to man’s happiness as God’s ultimate end in creating, leaving this point open to theological discourse. This was opposite to the view proposed by the Dutch philosopher Baruch Spinoza who claimed that an “end” in and of itself refutes God’s perfection (point ‘b’ above) since an end implies that God lacks something. He states, “God having an end in creation negates God’s perfection, for if God acts with an end in view he must necessarily be seeking something he lacks” (Spinoza: 1982, 59). Likewise, creating ex nihilo (point ‘c’ above) implies that by creating something out of nothing God would obtain something that he did not have before and is therefore not unchangeable or impassable (refuting point ‘b’). Thus, it was Edwards’ task to put forth a proposal for God’s end in creating to address these three points at a minimum. In order to do so, Edwards defines commonly used Aristotelian terms such as subordinate end and ultimate end. However, neither of these terms could accurately reflect an end whose inception was eternally present, before the action of creation was executed. Edwards explains it this way, In like manner, we must suppose that God, before he created the world had some good in view, that was originally agreeable to him, in itself considered, that inclined him to create the world… I commonly mean in that highest sense, viz. the original ultimate end (WJE 8, 412–13).

Thus, an “Original, Ultimate End” was the term Edwards coined to encompass what God had in mind before the creation of the world. Based on the objections described above, Edwards had to satisfy the following four criteria: It must be i. an end that is inherently valuable, i. e., has value in itself. ii. an end that is valued inherently by God. iii. an end that existed before creation, and must not entail a deficiency, insufficiency, or mutability in God. iv. an end that could be achieved by creating.5 As Edwards elegantly and meticulously unfolds in the first chapter of End of Creation, God’s Original Ultimate End is an externalization of God’s Trinitarian glory to his creatures who can receive such revelation, and in response delight in this glory and knowledge of God, which returns God’s own glory for God’s own happiness and delight. Edwards observes, As it is a thing valuable and desirable in itself that God’s glory should be seen and known, so when known, it seems equally 5 These four criteria are taken from Sections I and II of Chapter 1 in the End of Creation. I would like to acknowledge here the scholarship of Dr. Walter Schultz who put together these criteria for pedagogical use in the Jonathan Edwards Seminar at the University of Northwestern-St Paul.

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reasonable and fit, it should be valued and esteemed, loved and delighted in, answerable to its dignity (WJE 8, 432).

This Original Ultimate End reveals a loving God with the disposition to diffuse the fullness of his glorious attributes, and whose purpose it was to pour forth his own divine goodness and love in order to communicate this knowledge to beloved creatures. This end, however, was not a mere “display” of God’s glorious attributes or communicating some kind of propositional knowledge. Rather, the supposition was that the creatures would fully and entirely experience these glories, and delight in this knowledge. According to Edwards, once creatures received saving knowledge of God, their delight in him and his divine attributes would be ever-increasing and desirous.6 Their delight in his glorious excellencies reciprocates God’s glory back to its source. Edwards refers to this as “emanation” and “remanation”: In the creature’s knowing, esteeming, loving, rejoicing in, and praising God, the glory of God is both exhibited and acknowledged; his fullness is received and returned. Here is both an emanation and remanation (WJE 8, 531).

The process of emanation and remanation (re-emanation) of God’s glory does not entail that God is receiving something he did not already possess, since God’s glory is ad infinitum. Said another way, the remanation of God’s glory back to its source would not entail God receiving anything that he did not already have in God’s eternal nature. Since nothing can ever be added to God’s infinite glory, this can be conceptualized by comparison to the mathematical phrase, x + ∞ = ∞, for x∈ℝ or x · ∞ = ∞, for x>0. Nothing can add to infinity. Hence, Edwards overcomes Spinzoa’s objection. Extending the next counterpoint to Spinoza’s objection, given the infinite source of God’s glory, divine fullness, and love, the process of emanation and remanation does not entail that God “needed” to create in order to have his glory fulfilled. Rather, Edwards located the “motive” of God’s creative act solely in God’s disposition to communicate himself, he says,

6 Edwards expounded in great detail regarding the creature’s delight in the excellencies of God. In his treatise on Religious Affections, Edwards outlines twelve distinguishing signs that the believer has indeed tasted of the heavenly gift. In these twelve signs are descriptions of the believer’s love to God, light to the mind in understanding beauty, moral excellence, and truth in Scripture. Edwards explains in poetic prose how their delight in God’s excellencies will cause them to yearn greatly for more love, more knowledge, in humble dependence. They will hunger for higher spiritual enjoyments, and God in His delight of their delight freely gives them more of himself in godly union. The Works of Jonathan Edwards, Vol. 2, The Religious Affections, ed. John E. Smith (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1957).

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…the disposition to communicate himself, or diffuse his own FULNESS, which we must conceive of as being originally in God as a perfection of his nature, was what moved him to create the world (WJE 8, 433).

Edwards’ concept of emanation here is logically related to his metaphysics of dispositionalism. He accounts for God’s motivation in creation, given that God is self-sufficient and absolutely independent. Edwards’ dispositionalism, therefore, is directly related to God’s freedom in creation. In this way, to avoid any confusion on the matter, Edwards locates God’s act of creating in God’s perfect freedom; God did not have to create in order to diffuse his fullness or communicate his eternal attributes. Edwards continues, “But here as much as possible to avoid confusion, I observe . . . that a disposition in God to communicate himself to the creature, moved him to create the world” (1989, 433). Edwards’ dispositionalism incorporates several key concepts in order to explain what motivated God to create. First, God’s motivation originated from God’s disposition to share his internal Glory. Second, Edwards argues that this disposition is grounded in, and motivated by, God’s eternal and infinitely supreme regard for himself. Based on these assumptions, Edwards continues his line of argument by indicating that God’s disposition to communicate is within the nature of God. This is not solely a disposition to communicate to the creature, which would presuppose the existence of the creature. He writes, For tho’ the diffusive disposition in the nature of God, that moved him to create the world, doubtless inclines him to communicate himself to the creature, when the creature exists; yet this can’t be all: Because an inclination in God to communicate himself to an object, seems to presuppose the existence of the object, at least in idea (WJE 8,433).

Thus, for the manifestation of God’s disposition to diffuse his fullness outside of God’s self, namely, ad extra, God did not need to communicate to a creature; this would presuppose that God needed a creature in order to diffuse knowledge of himself and his eternal glory. Edwards closes his argument by summarizing, “But the diffusive disposition that excited God to give creatures existence, was rather a communicative disposition in general, or a disposition in the fulness of the divinity to flow out and diffuse itself” (WJE 8, 433). According to Edwards, in God’s general disposition to communicate himself, there was no need of a creation, neither was anything added by creating. It was solely in the original property of God’s nature, and out of the fullness of love the creature was given existence “in order to it.” As Edwards puts it, God’s love in a “larger sense” is his disposition to communicate of his own fullness in general; as his knowledge, his holiness, and happiness; and to give creatures existence in order to it (WJE 8, 439).

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Here “it” refers to the communication – an emanation–of the knowledge of God’s internal glory to the creature. God creates and thus emanates. In terms of what God’s end in creating could be, Edwards argues that the emanation and remanation of the fullness of “God’s excellencies and glory” is the only possibility, among all other possibilities, that could satisfy all four criteria above, and overcome Spinoza’s objection. This is, in fact, the most supremely valuable thing in all of existence. He goes on, “he had respect to himself as his last and highest end in this work; because he is worthy in himself to be so, being infinitely the greatest and best of Beings” (and so satisfies criterion i; WJE 8, 421, 433). God’s glory is valued by God since “he manifests a supreme and ultimate regards to himself in all his works” (satisfies criterion ii; WJE 8, 436). God did not gain anything he did not already have before creating since God’s glory existed in the “disposition to communicate himself” before the creation of the world (satisfies criterion iii; WJE 8, 436). Lastly, the emanation and remanation of God’s glory was a world state that could be achieved by creating: “We see that it is a good that God aimed at by the creation of the world; because he has actually attained it by that means” (satisfies criterion iv; WJE 8, 426, 427). As God’s Original Ultimate End, emanation and remanation of glory entails communicating the knowledge of God’s own intra-Trinitarian excellencies by externalizing his glory ad extra, such that the creature’s delight would reciprocate God’s infinite glory back to their source. Thus, it appears reasonable to suppose, that it was what God had respect to as an ultimate end of his creating the world, to communicate of his own infinite fulness of good; that there might be a glorious and abundant emanation of his infinite fulness of Good ad extra (WJE 8, 433).

Edwards is careful to show that God’s Original Ultimate End, that which was in God’s mind before creating, was to communicate knowledge of the divine Self ad extra to other “beings” who could “see.” He states, It seems to be a thing in itself fit and desirable, that the glorious perfections of God should be known, and the operations and expressions of them seen by other beings besides himself (WJE 8, 431).

The phrase “should be known” implies that something important to know is being communicated, and likewise “operations and expressions of them” indicate that they are actively being expressed so that other “beings” beside God can also know them. Edwards is careful to repeat this idea throughout the End of Creation in order to properly convey his intended meaning.7 He says again, 7 We shall take up the idea of “beings who could see” later on in order to indicate that as part of the end for which God created the world, as God fashioned creatures with all the dispositions needed in order to “see” the excellencies that God is communicating through the creation.

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Tis a thing infinitely good in itself that God’s glory should be known by a glorious society of created beings. And that there should be in them an increasing knowledge of God to all eternity (WJE 8, 432).

Here Edwards adds another dimension to the diffusion or multiplication of this glorious knowledge, that it is an ever “increasing knowledge of God to all eternity.” How could God possibly convey the eternal, infinite mysteries of God’s glorious attributes within the limits of a creation? We see Edwards standing firm on the idea that it is indeed God’s Original Ultimate End in creating to communicate the glories of the divine Self, but this extends well beyond the physicotemporal domains of the created universe. It will take all of eternity. However, in regard to the knowledge of God within the limits of the creation, Edwards conveys the diffusion or multiplication of God’s immanent glory ad extra as “emanation” throughout the End of Creation. In many places, Edwards conjoins the term “communication” with emanation as though the two terms are synonymous (WJE 8, 527). Edwards also says it again in this way: They are all but the emanation of God’s glory; or the excellent brightness and fullness of the divinity diffused, overflowing, and as it were enlarged; or in one word, existing ad extra (WJE 8, 527).

The next question at hand, then, is to investigate what precisely “emanation of God’s glory ad extra” means and how this is related to the communication of the knowledge of God’s internal excellencies, particularly in reference to natural types embedded in the natural world. As stated above, God’s Original Ultimate End in Creating was to communicate or emanate the divine fullness to creatures who could receive such knowledge, and delight in it, thus remanating God’s infinite glory back to God. Emanation is a fundamentally important aspect of the end for which God created the world. Understanding it properly in reference to the creation will determine how the natural world is viewed metaphysically and ontologically. We shall begin with some alternative views that have recently argued the idea that Edwards viewed the creation itself as the emanation of God (or God’s Being). For example, Edwards recounts this Neoplatonic narrative of emanation in terms of the exercise of the disposition that is originally in God… In the dispositional understanding of God, creation is the external repetition of God’s internal glory (Morimoto: 2010, 41).

On this view, Edwards is located in a “Neo-Platonic narrative,” implying a philosophical link to platonic forms and emanationism. Other views position Edwards’ creation metaphysics as God emanating God’s own internal glory, and multiplying it, as the creation itself,

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Here Edwards construes creation as an act that expands and enhances God’s own Being. Divinization is the category under which Edwards interprets God’s work of creating (McClymond; 2003, 139–160).

The summative idea is a reading of Edwards implying “That in creating the world, God “diffuses” or “emanates” himself, [which] seems to mean that God emanates himself in creating” (Crisp; 2012, 44–46). In these constructs, God makes himself to be his own end, by replicating himself in the creation. Apart from being a dangerously close approximation to pantheism, I might argue for an alternative reading of Edwards.8 We may turn to Edwards himself in an effort to make the case clear. He states that the end for which God created cannot be God himself in any of his divine operations, since placing God as his own end violates criterion iv above. God’s Being cannot be achieved by creating, Edwards indicates: Thus God’s existence and infinite perfection, tho’ infinitely valuable in themselves, and infinitely valued by God, yet can’t be supposed to be the end of any divine operation (WJE 8, 421).

And again, But whatever is in itself valuable, absolutely so, and that is capable of being sought and attained, is worthy to be made a last end of the divine operation (WJE 8, 421).

Edwards is making an all-important distinction that the end of creation must be something capable of being attained by creating, and this cannot be God’s own Being. This reading of Edwards’ use and understanding of emanation situates Edwards, in my estimation, incorrectly in a position of Neo-Platonic metaphysical monism (Gerson: 2013, 247). The metaphysical concept of monistic emanation is historically traced to the 4th–7th century Neo-Platonists such as Plotinus, Proclus, and Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite, but can also be found earlier in the ancient religions of India, Egypt and Persia. The primary aspect of Neo-Platonic emanationism that has been related to Edwards’ use of the term in End of Creation, is a metaphysics of the process of ceaseless emanation and outflowing from the One.9 As Sang Hyun Lee indicates here, 8 Personal communication with Dr. Walter Schultz, who presented this corrective at the American Academy of Religion Conference, 2016 in a presentation entitled “The Concept of Emanation in Jonathan Edwards’ End of Creation,” full text article submitted to Journal of Reformed Theology, 2019. 9 The term ”emanation” was commonly used in seventeenth and eighteenth century English theological thought, particularly in the Cambridge Platonists Henry More (1614–1687), Ralph Cudworth (1617–1688), Benjamin Whichcote (1609–1683), and John Smith (1618–1652) – all of whom Edwards had read based on “Catalogues of Books,” Vol. 26 The Works of Jonathan Edwards, ed. Peter Johannes Thuesen, (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2008). The Cambridge Platonists’ non-material position moved them toward the use of the term “emanation”

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The idea of self-communication, which Edwards often describes in such emanationist metaphors as ‘overflowing,’ ‘diffusing,’ and ‘shining forth,’ lends itself to a thoroughly Neoplatonic interpretation of Edwards (Lee: 2000, 172).

However, Edwards contradicts the Neo-Platonists in two respects. First, he holds that it is the fullness of God’s internal glory, not God’s own Self or Being, which is emanated, communicated, multiplied, radiated, and diffused; Edwards also uses the images of ”shining forth” or ”flowing out” in this context as well. The thing signified by that name, the glory of God, when spoken of as the supreme and ultimate end of the work of creation, and of all God’s works, is the emanation and true external expression of God’s internal glory and fullness (WJE 8, 527).

Edwards is careful clearly and concisely to state that the creation contains the “expression of” God’s fullness and glory, not God’s own fullness and glory. This is an all-important distinction. Second, emanation of the expression of God’s fullness and glory does not result in a creation, but is the consequence of it. He says in two places, When God was about to create the world, he had respect to that emanation of his glory, which is actually the consequence of the creation (WJE 8, 532).

And, Another thing wherein the emanation of divine fullness that is, and will be made in consequence of the creation of the world, is the communication of virtue and holiness to the creature. This is a communication of God’s holiness; so that hereby the creature partakes of God’s own moral excellency (WJE 8, 532).

It appears that Edwards did not intend to imply that the creation itself is an emanation of God’s own Being, but rather that the creation contains God’s fullness and glory by virtue of the act of creating ad extra. It is a communication of the knowledge of God’s fullness and glory that is emanated into the creation.10 Creation itself cannot be the emanation of God’s Being, since creation itself is ex nihilo. So, we offer a different read to claims that Edwards was a Neo-Platonist on these grounds, citing also John Piper, who in his book God’s Passion for His Glory,

to mean acts of causation resulting in the ceaseless effects of God. This idea of the ceaseless flow of causal activity from the Being of God resulting in the effects of creation has been inaccurately applied to Edwards’ use of the term. Edwards is careful to clarify his own use of the term distinguishing himself from their view, which was opposed to creation ex nihilo. See https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/cambridge-platonists/. 10 This Edwardsean position is seen in scripture, Habakkuk 2:14, “For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD as the waters cover the sea.”

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refutes in numerous places the misinterpretation of Edwards as supporting some form of Neoplatonism or pantheism.11 According to Edwards, what is emanated ad extra is knowledge of the fullness of God’s glory and Being. He states, “Thus it is fit, since there is an infinite fountain of light and knowledge that this light should shine forth in beams of communicated knowledge and understanding” (WJE 8, 433). In this quotation, Edwards clearly describes what is being emanated as “beams of communicated knowledge and understanding.” In order to make this idea perfectly clear, Edwards reiterates, “This appears I say in another way, viz. as these things are but the emanations of God’s own knowledge, holiness, and joy” (WJE 8, 433). God does not emanate God’s own Being, thus resulting in a creation. Rather, it is the communication of God’s knowledge, holiness, joy, and infinite excellencies that are embedded into the creation, created ad extra and ex nihilo, thus likewise affirming Scripture, “the whole earth is filled with His glory”.12 At this juncture, we are ready to make a vital connection and to interject the idea of divine participation in order to gain some insight into what God is doing, and what creation exactly is. In Edwards’ view, God is emanating not God’s own Being, thus making the world one with God, but knowledge of himself. This holds with a metaphysics that retains a proper distinction between God and the world, while investing the latter with value based on the knowledge of the One it reflects. The emanation that Edwards speaks of is the very knowing of God through the metaphysical foundation of analogy embedded in the creation by God through natural types. What I will argue is that the emanation of the knowledge and glory of God, in ontological types, communicated by God to the creature, allows truth to be revealed that neither pure reason can conjure nor can faith merely perceive. The act of God communicating the divine knowledge in and through the actual created world allows nature itself to move beyond epistemic propositions and into an act of divine Self-disclosure to the creature. Thus, creation is communication. Edwards’ understanding of emanation relies on a metaphysics of participation, such that all communication of God’s excellencies and divine attributes are an act of God. Since the creation contains the glory of God – that is, communication of the knowledge of God’s internal fullness and excellencies – it may serve us well to establish the grounds upon which Edwards viewed the creation metaphysically. In the next chapter, we shall incorporate Edwards’ views on idealism, panentheism, occasionalism, and continuous creationism 11 Please refer to John Piper, God’s Passion for His Glory: Living the Vision of Jonathan Edwards (Wheaton, Illinois: Crossway, 1998), 157, fn 38; 159–161, fn 41–45; 243, fn 104; 249, fn 113; 251, fn 115. 12 Psalm 72:19; Isaiah 6:3; Habakkuk 2:14.

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from the End of Creation in order to establish the ontology of types embedded into the creation as the communication of the knowledge of God’s divine attributes.

Chapter Three. Edwards’ Creation Metaphysics Undergirds Natural Typology: Idealism, Panentheism, Occasionalism, and Continuous Creationism

We have just seen how Edwards envisaged the creation itself as a communication of the knowledge of God’s internal glory and excellencies ad extra and ex nihilo. Creation itself is not the externalization of God’s Being; instead, it is the emanation or communication of the knowledge and glory of God. It may be important here briefly to summarize Edwards’ fundamental metaphysics of creation and described precisely how Edwards understood the ontic status of the physical realm. This will involve an assessment of Edwards’ positions on idealism, panentheism, occasionalism, and continuous creationism. This is important groundwork in order to argue that natural types, in Edwards’ construct of the end for which God created, are ontologically real; they originate in God, and are part of God’s Original Ultimate End. This groundwork is crucial for an understanding of types in nature as not mere metaphors originating in the human mind, nor the subject to the discernment of the individual believer, but as ontologically real messages embedded into the creation appropriated to the heart and mind of the believer by the work of the Holy Spirit. Without Edwards’ metaphysics of creation, typology becomes a figment of imaginative thought and not of divine revelation. In order to construct Edwards’ metaphysis of creation, we shall begin with his idealism. Edwards’ idealism, alternately expressed by the term “immaterialism,” has two conceptual metaphysical components. The first is God’s ontological relation to the creation, and the second is the creature’s relation to the objective reality of the physical world. Let us begin with the first aspect of Edwards’ idealism, in terms of God’s ontological relation to the creation, then follow with the second aspect of Edwards’ idealism in terms of the creature’s relation to the physical world. First, in Edwards’ metaphysics all creation exists as ideas in God’s mind (WJE 6, 53–58). These ideas of the creation, its constitution, natural laws, physical mechanisms, existence of creatures, the plan of redemption, and so on, were always present in the divine mind from all eternity.1 In that way, the creation is 1 In this context, we shall understand the “divine mind” as all the knowledge that God knows. God’s knowledge includes the totality and comprehensivity of God’s awareness of His abilities

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“ideal” in the sense of being co-eternal with God, existing as ideas in God’s mind, unchangeable and delighted in by God. As Edwards says in End of Creation, For tho’ these communications of God, these exercises, operations, and expressions of his glorious perfections, which God rejoices in, are in time; yet his joy in them is without beginning or change. They were always equally present in the divine mind. He beheld them with equal clearness certainty and fulness in every respect, as he doth now. They were always equally present; as with him there is no variableness or succession. He ever beheld and enjoyed them perfectly in his own independent and immutable power and will. And his view of, and joy in them is eternally, absolutely perfect unchangeable and independent (WJE 8, 448).

In this long, but telling passage, we see Edwards establishing the ontic structure of the creation as ideas in God’s mind. The entirety of the creation is ideal in the sense that it exists primarily as ideas that were “always equally present in the divine mind,” and yet is ontologically “real” in the sense that, as Edwards says, “God and real existence are the same”(1980, 345). God beheld the structure of the creation “with equal clearness, certainty, and fullness in every respect” as it is now, and as God ontologically exists, so ideas in God’s mind co-eternally exist. Continuing along this line of thinking, we briefly return to the criteria underlying the end for which God created the world in terms of ideas that God had in mind before creating. Walter Schultz, in his analysis on Edwards’ metaphysics of the End of Creation, states it this way, …what God seeks must actually exist in some form or be present to God in some manner before God created. For if the creation as ideas in God’s mind were only valued but not actually and equally as valuable and real before creation, it would be something God desired but lacked before creation. Thus, would fail to overcome Spinoza’s conundrum. The solution, for Edwards, lies in the ontological constitution of creation as ideas in God’s mind (Schultz; 2016, 352).

Thus, the constitution of the physical creation is ideal in relation to God’s mind. Since God’s ideas are eternal, all of the creation existed, in the constitution of divine ideas, perfectly real and inherently valuable, in God’s mind before creating. However, it follows that Edwards’ claims that existence of any created thing lies ad extra, and His omni-competence, that is, all He is capable of doing. This is a representational awareness and is the primordial origin of all possibilities. Divine simplicity disallows divisions in God’s Being, thus the phrase “divine mind” is an anthropomorphic construction in reference to all knowledge that is God’s knowledge given that nothing exists outside of God’s knowledge. If we take Being as the presence of God, then what we are saying is that the inherent knowingness of the divine Being is God’s mind. This includes all God’s ideas, some of which God intends to manifest and some of which God, in perfect freedom, does not manifest. In that sense, everything that exists, including all of the creation, co-eternally exists in God’s mind; and are as such creations of God’s mind, included in the eternal contents of God’s mind. Conceptualizations of the divine mind were put forth by medieval scholastics such as Aquinas and Duns Scotus, among others. https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/concepts-god.

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solely in God supposing them into being, as he described in his essay on “The Mind” no. 40: Since all material existence is only idea, they did exist since all eternity in uncreated idea. Such a course and succession of existences that these things must be supposed to make the series complete according to divine appointment of the order of things; the existence of these things is in God supposing them (WJE 6, 357).

In other words, God has “in mind” ideas that he intends to bring into existence in some order of succession, according to God’s divine plan and purpose, or the “order of things” as Edwards says. Schultz refers to the ideas that God has in mind before creation as representational-intentions-for-existence that order ideas for divine-acts-of-willing-existence (2016, 353). Divine representations for existence and divine acts of willing existence are two kinds of divine ideas. There is a change in the ontic status or form of the idea of creation, and in Edwards’ words “the supposition of God,” but no change in fundamental constitution of the creation, because creation is ex nihilo. Edwards continues in “The Mind” no. 40: The supposition of God which we speak of is nothing else but God’s acting in the course and series of his exciting ideas, as if they, the things supposed, were in actual idea (WJE 6, 357).

The ideas in God’s mind that he had before the creation ontologically, and eternally, exist in one form as ideas in God’s mind, but the ideas in God’s mind change in form once God “supposes them,” or once the divine will of God brings them into being.2 This leads us to the second aspect of Edwards’ idealism as viewed from the perspective of the creature in relation to the objective reality of the physical world. Since Edwards thought that “nothing has existence anywhere else…but either in created or uncreated consciousness,” (meaning human consciousness or God’s consciousness, respectively) it follows that the creature’s conscious perception of the physical world also consists in ideas (WJE 6, 353). However, it is here that Edwards diverges from purely Berkleian idealism.3 Berkley asserts that reality is completely dependent upon the minds of the subjects who perceive it, whereas Edwards would contend that reality is not dependent upon the created mind’s perception, but rather, it is dependent upon God causing the created mind 2 For an expanded discussion, see Walter J Schultz, “The Metaphysics of Jonathan Edwards’ End of Creation,” 352–353. 3 George Berkley’s system of idealism states that reality consists exclusively of minds and their ideas encapsulated in his motto esse is percipi (to be is to be perceived). This form of idealism is ”subjective” not because it denies that there is an objective reality, but because it asserts that this reality is completely dependent upon the minds of the subjects that perceive it. This is often referred to as “immaterialism.” Donald K. McKim, Westminster Dictionary of Theological Terms (Louisville: John Knox Press, 2014), 157.

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to perceive it. The creature’s perception of objective reality as such lies solely in God’s power and will. In Edwards’ metaphysic, the vast material world could never exist in a finite, limited mind. In “The Mind” no. 51, Edwards allows, It is from hence that I expect the greatest opposition. It will appear a ridiculous thing, I suppose, that the material world exists nowhere but in the soul of man, confined within his skull (WJE 6, 368.).

The extant material world, “confined within his skull,” seems a ridiculous thing to Edwards, and would put the ability for humankind to perceive the ontic structure of reality squarely in human ability. Edwards attributes this conveyance of perceived reality to God alone. He says it again this way in “The Mind” no. 34: When we say that the world, i. e. the material universe, exists nowhere but in the mind, that is impossible that it would be meant that all the world is contained in the narrow compass of a few inches of space, in little ideas in the place of the brain; for that would be a contradiction (WJE 6, 353).

Rather, God raises these ideas in created minds so that they can be perceived. In that way, the vast existence of the material world exists in God, and as such, God illuminates the created mind to objective reality upon condition. He goes on to say in “The Mind” no. 36, Things as to God exist from all eternity alike. That is, the existence of things therefore that are not actually in created minds, consist only in power, or in determination of God such that ideas shall be raised in created minds upon such conditions (WJE 6, 353).

We can infer, then, that physical objects are real in relation to human minds because God raises or appropriates the created mind to encounter it that manner. Edwards argues that the propositional knowledge creatures have that things exist outside their minds is a necessary condition of the glory, honor, and praise to God, and, importantly, that this is inherently valuable. The glory, honor, and praise to God that arises from such knowledge is one of God’s consequential ultimate ends. A consequential ultimate end is an end that results as a consequence of one of God’s ultimate or subordinate ends. Creaturely perception of an “actual reality” composed of matter and energy, structures and systems, perceived and understood with the intellect and all the senses, was a subordinate end in the line of succession of ends leading to God’s Original Ultimate End. A consequential end of this subordinate end, and one that is inherently valued by God, is the praise, glory, and honor that will come from such knowledge of the physical world. In Edwards’ idealism, all the ideas that are actually perceived by any finite mind, together with those that God only supposes, constitute a single order and succession of ideas. These two components work in construct to form what Edwards established as “the system of the ideal world” (WJE 6, 107).

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Edwards’ idealism is directly related to his companion ideas of the ontic structure of the physical world as ideas in God’s mind, thus existing in God’s Being. In this way, Edwards’ idealism is panentheism. Although Edwards never used the term ”panentheism” ( Crisp 2010, 108), he maintained a God-world relation typical of that position. Oliver Crisp affirms Edwards’ position, stating that Edwards …maintained that God and the world were distinct, but that the world is somehow maintained in God…so that every part exists “in” him although his being is not exhausted by the creation (2010, 109–110).

Thus, Edwards envisioned a God-world relation in which the creation was not separate from God. According to Walter Schultz, “Edwards’ panentheism is entailed by his immaterialism such that all existence is “comprehended within” God, and since creation is ideal, it follows that creation is “within” God as an idea in God’s mind” (Schultz: 2016, 356). These interpretations of Edwards’ position lends not to a pantheistic view of creation, but rather a panentheist view in which all creation exists in God’s Being, as ideas in God’s mind. As Wallace Anderson asserts in his Introduction to Edwards’ Scientific and Philosophical Writings, Edwards continues to maintain that bodies and indeed all created things exist in God who is the being of all things. Bodies are in God by way of his knowledge or consciousness of them; and this knowledge essentially involves general laws, or determinations of his will with respect to regularities in the order of ideas he causes in created minds (1980, 97–98).

The universe, containing all its physical laws, exists in God mind like an intentional object. Schultz likens this to the “unfolding of a scenario, and thus perhaps is more rightly called intentional object panentheism as opposed to the standard mind/body panentheism” (Schultz: 2016 356). Edwards, in his emerging panentheism, was formulating a “third alternative,” an intermediate position between classical theism on the one hand and pantheism on the other (Crisp; 2012 139). This new position would remain true to God’s creative presence in the world, and communication/emanation of the knowledge of divine Self into the creation, while also maintaining God’s “all comprehensiveness.” Edwards in the End of Creation strains toward a unified explanation: The first Being, the eternal and infinite Being, is in effect, Being in general; and comprehends universal existence, as was observed before. God in his benevolence to his creatures, can’t have his heart enlarged in such a manner as to take in beings that he finds, who are originally out of himself, distinct and independent. This can’t be in an infinite being, who exists alone from eternity. But he, from his goodness, as it were enlarges himself in a more excellent and divine manner. This is by communicating and diffusing himself and so instead of finding, making objects of his benevolence: not by

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taking into himself what he finds distinct from himself, and so partaking of their good, and being happy in them; but by flowing forth, and expressing himself in them, and making them to partake of him, and rejoicing in himself expressed in them, and communicated to them (WJE 8, 461)

Edwards extrapolates here that by God’s infinite nature, God does not encounter beings who exist distinctly and independently from him. Rather, they are in him: “the creature is the object of God’s regard consequently and by implication as being as it were comprehended in God” (WJE 8, 440). Edwards likewise succinctly states this in ”Miscellanies” no. 697: God – as he is infinite, and the being whence all are derived, and from whom every thing is given – does comprehend the entity of all his creatures; and their entity is not to be added to his, as not comprehended in it, for they are but communications from him. Communications of being ben’t additions of being…but God is in no respect limited, and therefore can in no respect be added to (WJE 18).

In plain terms, Edwards’ intentional object panentheism entails that God is infinite and that God is the Being “whence all derive their existence.” God is the Being from whom every existing thing receives everything it is, by way of nothing but communications from him. Since communications of being cannot, according to Edwards, be additions of being, it follows that creatures are not additions of being, but one comprehended within God. To summarize, Edwards’ idealism entails panentheism such that the creation, being an idea in God’s mind, is within God, but is separate and distinct from God. The creation and all its creatures are comprehended within God. The two positions we have just discussed in Edwards’ doctrine of creation and metaphysics – namely, his idealism and panentheism – necessarily commit Edwards to two related positions: occasionalism and continuous creation. Let us see why. If we hold the following: a. Edwards’ idealism indicates that reality exists as co-eternal ideas in God’s mind, that are appropriated as “tangibly real” to the creature’s perception and experience in the physical world; and, b. Edwards’ view of participation entails a panentheist account according to which both the ideas in God’s mind and the creature’s existence exist within God’s Being as intentional objects, then we may say that the ideas that God had in mind before creation are representational-intentions-for-existence in a line of succession of ideas for divineacts-of-willing-existence. This logically leads next to the need for an understanding of divine action that can account for such a creation metaphysics. The ontic dependence of the creation on God commits Edwards to an occasionalist view of divine action. Occasionalism, given Edwards’ stated under-

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standing of creation as ex nihilo, entails that the entire creation is contingent on God’s active will for its existence and for all of its properties and relations. One crucial kind of relation is the apparently natural, causal relation between physical events. Given Edwards’ immaterialism, the apparent causal relation between events is not the real, productive causation. The causing, the producing, the bringing about, or the making something happen is God’s existence-conferring action.4 Therefore, causation in Edwardsean metaphysics is not brute. In Edwards’ account, there are no “powers” that exist outside of God, as Edwards states in “The Mind” no. 27, …beside the very substance of the body itself, which is nothing but his divine power, or rather the constant exertion of it. And as resistance is nothing else but the actual exertion of God’s power, so the power can be nothing else but the constant law or method of that actual exertion (WJE 6, 350).

Hence, there is no causation actually accomplished by things, entities, natural laws, or forces. Every “cause” is an apparent cause to the observer, exerted by God’s power, and God’s power alone, as the sole and only cause. This may at first glance seem somewhat Humean, but it is not. Edwards is not saying that there is no real and actual cause, he is saying that no cause exists outside of God’s existence conferring action. Again, given Edwards’ immaterialism, God conferring existence is simultaneous with the occurring of the event (Schultz; 2009, 329). While causation appears primitive and even brute, it is not; it merely represents a relation between physical states as effectuated by God. In other words, the seeming causal relation is simply the “immediate effect of the exercise of divine power,”5 as Wallace Anderson relates Edwards’ metaphysics in “On Atoms”: Beyond this, as he had argued in “Of Atoms” that solidity is the immediate effect of the exercise of divine power….that God is the immediate cause of the ideas that are presented to us in sense experience, and that the order of such succession of these ideas depends entirely upon God’s will (WJE 6, 97).

Causation, viewed in this way, represents God’s sustaining action of the universe, and thus is a subordinate end, in order to achieve God’s Original Ultimate End. Therefore, real causation is not in nature; it grounds nature. Edwards’ occa4 For a more complete discussion on causation and God’s existence conferring action see Walter J. Schultz, “Dispositions, Capacities and Powers: A Christian Analysis,” Philosophia Christi 11:2 (2009), 321–338. 5 Edwards’ occasionalism has been refined and presented in a new account of occasionalism called Divine Compositionalism, discussed in Schultz and D’Andrea-Winslow in “Divine Compositionalism: A Form of Occasionalism or a Preferable Alternative View of Divine Action?” Theology and Science 12, no.3 (2014): 216–235. The formulation of causal powers in scientific mechanisms using this view of divine action in the mechanism of the solubility of salt was discussed in D’Andrea-Winslow and Schultz (2018), “The Solubility of Salt: A Theistic Account,” Theology and Science 16: 107–125.

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sionalism is thus entailed by God’s full sovereignty, or aseity, creation as ex nihilo, and creation as ideal. As Stephen Daniel indicates, “The key to understanding Edwards’ doctrine of substance…lies in seeing how his idealism informs his occasionalism” (2010, 1). And Edwards’ idealism informs his occasionalism (and his continuous creation) in that he reconciles divine sovereignty with a momentto-moment recreation as a “communication of ideas to created minds” (Daniel; 2010, 1). However, unlike those views that hold to secondary causes, Edwards’ view of God’s primary causal activity meets three essential conditions. First, since God is not in time or space, there is no temporal or spatial separation between his activity and its effects. Second, since God is essentially omnipotent, his will is necessarily effective; it is logically impossible for God to will situation x and for situation x not to take place. And, third, God is omnipotent and doesn’t need the cooperation of other causal powers to produce his effects. Since aseity belongs to God alone, aseity, by its very definition, is not “conferred” to created entities. God does not share His causal power with others. God’s decrees are fully sufficient for their effects. God alone, then, is the only real cause (WJE 6, 350–351). In terms of the moment-by-moment events occurring in nature, Edwards attributes the laws of nature and all mechanisms solely to God’s divine action. He says in “Of Atoms,” Corollary 15, Hence we see what’s that we call the laws of nature in bodies to wit: the stated method of God’s acting with respect to bodies and the stated conditions of the alteration of the manner of his acting (WJE 6, 216).

And importantly, in Corollary 16, Hence that we learn that there is no such thing as mechanism, if that word is taken to be that whereby bodies act each upon other, purely and properly by themselves (WJE 6, 216).

We must pause here and formulate what Edwards is actually saying in regards to the natural world, its laws and its mechanisms. According to Edwards, natural laws and governing mechanisms of nature are nothing more than God’s constant acting. Stephen Daniel sees this as the core of Edwards’ occasionalist metaphysic of creation. He says, “For some, this contrast between thinking of God as a cause whose actions are mediated by laws of nature versus being an immediate cause might seem insignificant. But it is at the core of the debate” (2010, 3). Laws, mechanisms, or processes do not act on their own accord, but are the existence conferring action of God moment-by-moment.6 Edwards is clear here regarding 6 I would like to point the reader to Wolfhart Pannenberg’s view on contingency and law of nature. Pannenberg is arguing against natural law being non-contingent. Rather on his view, natural law is the substratum for divine action in God’s moment-by-moment faithfulness.

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secondary causes; they simply do not exist. Bodies do not act upon each other by themselves, nor by natural laws operating independently of God’s direct action. Thus, nature itself simply is God’s acting.7 This position commits Edwards to a view of creation that involves God willing into existence every sequential moment in a string of sequential moments. Edwards describes this view as continued creation, God’s preserving created things in being is perfectly equivalent to a continued creation or to his creating those things out of nothing at each moment of their existence (WJE 3, 401).

Edwards’ position on continuous creationism, as with Edwards’ occasionalism, is also the logical consequence of the supposition that God is a se, creation is ex nihilo and creation is ideal. These entail that no continuant individual, object, or substance, ever self-exists. These further entail that every created thing exists when, only as long as, and only because God wills it, (not before, not after, not between, not from any other source). Since the universe is never constituted by anything other than God’s existence conferring acts of willing it to be, there is no difference in God’s action between the first moment of a thing’s existence and any subsequent moment of its existence. Like the still frames of a motion picture, each frame or temporal slice of the world at any given moment in time is a discrete contiguous moment that has no causal bearing on the frame that follows it or precedes it. God creates each moment, ex nihilo. As Edwards describes in the End of Creation, The notion of God’s creating the world in order to receive any thing properly from the creature, is not only contrary to the nature of God, but inconsistent with the notion of creation; which implies a being’s receiving its existence, & all that belongs to its being, out of nothing (1989, 420).

Laws of nature, and likewise all the fundamental forces, are God’s constant acting, as he states, “rooted in the faithfulness of God.” See Wolfhart Pannenberg, Toward a Theology of Nature: Essays on Science & Faith, 37. Aligning with Edwards’ view, Wolfhart Pannenberg’s understanding of laws of nature as God’s faithfulness, has now been extended in Divine Compositionalism (See Schultz and D’Andrea-Winslow, “Divine Compositionalism: A Form of Occasionalism or a Preferable Alternative View of Divine Action?” Theology and Science 12, no.3 (2014): 216–235). Divine Compositionalism extends both Edwards and Pannenberg’s understanding of event causality and natural law to account for natural and physical events in an occasionalist view and agent causation in a concurrentist view. As such, this position overcomes a major weaknesses in the occasionalist which by its commitments entail God as causal agent for sin and evil. 7 It is my position that if nature is in fact God speaking, God emanating or communicating the knowledge and glory of His excellencies into the creation, then nature itself is a manner of God’s acting. Inferring from Edwards that God is communicating the world into existence, by His existence-conferring power, with all the knowledge and glory of God’s attributes and excellencies, implicates all of nature as God’s divine acting for His glory and purposes in Christ.

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These individual moments each created anew to form what appears to be a contiguous, uninterrupted sequence of action, just as in a motion picture. As Oliver Crisp summarizes, Nothing persists from one moment to the next. God populates the world with numerous instantaneous duplicates of each individual at one moment, only to obliterate these individuals and create almost exact duplicates in their place for the next moment in time in contiguous sequence. So, no created thing persists long enough to bring about any action whatsoever (2005, 132).

In this way, God is the sole causal agent, and God brings about the appearance of continuous action across time. However, in this theological and metaphysical construct, God is also the sole moral agent. Crisp also asserts that “It should be clear . . . that Edwards’ theory of occasionalism [and continuous creation] is the single greatest flaw in his doctrine of sin” (2005, 132). This is because by holding to the paired doctrines of occasionalism as a mode of divine action and continuous creation, it follows that God must be the author of sin, evil, and suffering. It has been contended that, turning to Edwards’ response to the accusation that his doctrine makes God the author of sin, his reply is less than satisfactory. A distinction between God creating sin and permitting sin is introduced, but the force of Edwards’ argument depends on further invoking his understanding of providence as continuing creation. It becomes immediately clear an inconsistency exists in Edwards’ occasionalism regarding culpability for sin, one that would require the idea of a secondary causation, even if God were “permitting” evil or sinful acts and events.8 The idea of continuous creation and occasionalism are an inescapable result of Edwards’ prior commitments in his metaphysics. Stephen Holmes postulates that the dependence of creation on God for moment-by-moment existence may be a reaction in Edwards to prevailing doctrines of the creation being a se, as a “world machine” having been set going by God, but not needing God’s intervention to continue. He says, “Perhaps Edwards goes too far in the other direction, but his concern to speak strongly against these prevalent positions is surely understandable” (2001, 94). We have established here an understanding of Edwards’ metaphysical positions of non-Berkleian idealism, panentheism, occasionalism, and continuous 8 What Edwards was unable to overcome in his occasionalism, since it included both physical events in the natural world, and free agent causation, was accounted for in Divine Compositionalism as a preferred view of divine action over occasionalism. In Divine Compositionalism, God is the sole causal agent for every physical event in the natural world, but not the causal agent in free agent action. In this way, Divine Compositionalism accounts for human agent free will by leaning toward concurrentism in terms of free agent causation.

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creationism that provide the philosophical groundwork of God’s absolute sovereignty: only God, the Almighty epicenter, is communicating the divine fullness into the creation; God is the only real cause and only true substance. Only God is a se. Before the creation of the world, as part of God’s Original Ultimate End, knowledge and glory of God were intended to be embedded into the ontic structure of the creation within the construct of ideas in God’s mind for God’s Self-communication to the creature. In God’s plan, in alignment with the scriptures, Edwards viewed God’s revelation in the incarnate Son, but also in the analogous natural types communicated into the structures of the created world. According to Edwards, the intention of this communication is purely for the creature to receive the knowledge of God’s glory and excellencies, to delight in it, and this can only be accomplished through God’s own Self-disclosure in divine revelation. The creature is thus drawn closer and closer into union with the Creator. The creature is, as the Apostle Paul writes in Romans 8:29, ”conformed to the image of his Son.” Edwards says, For so much the more is it united to God in love, the heart is drawn nearer and nearer to God, and the union with him becomes more firm and close: and at the same time, the creature becomes more and more conform’d to God (WJE 8, 433).

This union, according to Edwards, is for the creature’s great spiritual and eternal benefit, and is ultimately, God’s end in creation. Given this grounding in Edwards’ metaphysics of creation, we can propose that all of the analogies in the creation, as understood in natural types and their corresponding antitypes, were ideas in God’s mind before the foundation of the world, and were intended to be an instrument used by God for this communication upon God’s supposition, or willing them into existence. Types, and of course their corresponding antitypes, are ontologically eternally existent and real, not human assignments, and represent a vital aspect of God’s Original Ultimate End in communication to the creature for union with the Creator. As Edwards succinctly summarizes here, Thus it appears reasonable to suppose, that it was what God had respect to as an ultimate end of his creating the world, to communicate of his own infinite fulness of good; that there might be a glorious and abundant emanation of his infinite fulness of Good ad extra, or without himself, and the disposition to communicate himself, or diffuse his own FULNESS, which we must conceive of as being originally in God as a perfection of his nature, was what moved him to create the world (WJE 8, 433).

For Edwards, all of the natural world was full of the communication of God’s own “infinite fullness of good.” If we take this to be the case, then the next right question to ask is, How do we discern those messages in the creation? Are the messages in the creation mere poetic metaphors constructed by humans? Or, as I believe was Edwards’ contention, are the messages embedded in the creation

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in the form of natural types, intended to reveal divine truths to the creature? In the next chapter, we shall explore Edwards’ understanding of the messages in nature as ontologically real and assigned by God to communicate to the creature.

Chapter Four. All Natural Types and Antitypes are Ontologically Real: Introducing Edwards’ Onto-Typology

As shown in the previous chapter, Edwards’ metaphysics of creation affirms that within the complex construct of the Original Ultimate End in creating the world, God had in mind to communicate his divine excellencies by emanating knowledge of himself into the creation. Edwards posits it this way: And if it was God’s intention, as there is great reason to think it was, that his works should exhibit an image of himself their author, that it might brightly appear by his works what manner of being he is, and afford a proper representation of his divine excellencies, and especially his moral excellence, consisting in the disposition of his heart ; then ’tis reasonable to suppose that his works are so wrought as to show this supreme respect to himself, wherein his moral excellency does primarily consist (WJE 8, 422).

This statement is worthy of some attention. Here we find Edwards’ final and most definitive and declarative statement on the matter. Edwards stakes a claim that the works of God exhibit the image of God. We might say that God instressed1 the creation with images of himself, revealing “what manner of being he is.” The image or knowledge of the Creator within the ontic structure of the creation, as ideas in God’s mind that have been “real-ized” – or, as Edwards says, supposed into being – gives a “proper representation” of God’s fullness and God’s moral supremacy within a structural reality that the creatures can comprehend. As such, his works are created primarily for this particular reason. It was Edwards’ belief that God had this in mind before the foundation of the world as part of the Original Ultimate End of creation. These ideas are ontologically eternally existent and real. Edwards’ metaphysics of creation then, is precisely the groundwork for natural types not as mere metaphors constructed by human minds, but rather as onto-types originating in God’s mind, revealed to the creature. Precisely, then, the ideas in God’s mind that constitute natural types, which God intentionally em1 The term “instressed” was coined by the Victorian era poet Gerard Manley Hopkins and used by Alister McGrath to describe messages in nature in his book A Fine-Tuned Universe: The Quest for God in Science and Theology. Louisville: Westminster/John Knox, Inc, 2009.

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bedded in the creation, point to their antitype counterpart in the heavenly realm. On this point, Stephen Holmes writes: The key assertion, on which all of Edwards’ efforts in natural typology are based, is that the natural, physical world has been deliberately created in order to represent in various parts, spiritual realities (2001, 195).

The whole of physical reality, having “been deliberately created,” reflects spiritual realities, thereby rightly establishing a teleological ground for all of the creation. For Edwards, the teleological grounding of the natural world is what expanded and deepened his Christian experience. Edwards was able to find in nature an experiential understanding of the divine revelation of God’s own Trinitarian Selfknowledge, love, and joy. It was out of this mystical engagement that Edwards was prompted to write and preach using images from the natural world in illustration of spiritual truths (Marsden; 2003). He exerted a consistent effort to enlighten the people of God to truths embedded in the structures of the natural world toward a fulfillment of God’s end in creating. According to Edwards, God intentionally created everything in the universe analogically in order to reflect attributes of the divine nature so that humankind could understand these mysteries in a creaturely manner. Edwards observes, “Again, it is apparent and allowed that there is a great and remarkable analogy in God’s works” (WJE 11, 53).2 For Edwards, the entirety of creation was intended by God not only to work in beauty, balance, and harmony for life to exist, but analogically to reveal God’s eternal, infinite attributes and redemption within a finite world. Edwards’ use of the term ”analogy” is used as one inciting a resemblance – a proportional comparison even – between the spiritual, which is the “superior” or “primary” beauty, and the material world, which is its inferior analogical shadow. He says, in reference to God, “And why should we not suppose that he makes the inferior in imitation of the superior, the material of the spiritual, on purpose, to have a resemblance and shadow of the spiritual world?” (WJE 11, 53). God’s original plan was to communicate the truths of the spiritual world within the framework of the natural world to his beloved creatures made to dwell in that world. In God’s design, the material was purposefully made as a shadow of that spiritual realm. However, Edwards does not stop at the idea that the material world is analogically related to the spiritual world. He embarks upon a radically new way of understanding this analogical connection, ontologically, much in the same way Old Testament prefigurings connected New Testament fulfillment. He claimed that the biblical type/antitype system, which revealed God’s overarching plan and 2 It was this quote that inspired the title of this book.

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conveyed knowledge of God’s mysteries, could also be applied to the natural world. In his lifetime, Edwards did not formulate a constructive theology of nature using this method. However, as we shall see in later chapters, he wrote widely in notebooks, most extensively in a hand-bound notebook he titled Images of Divine Things, as well as other writings about such ideas. For Edwards, natural types and antitypes were not propositional but rather ontological, originating in God’s “Original Ultimate End” in creation, and only through revelation would this end be accomplished. Edwards indicates, “Indeed, this affair seems properly to be an affair of divine revelation…he best knows his own heart, and what his own ends and designs were in the wonderful works which he has wrought” (WJE 8, 419). Nature, and the conscious messages embedded therein, was an intricate, interwoven aspect of the fulfillment of God’s end in creating. In this way, we can summarize the following four points. For Edwards, a) God alone is the sovereign epicenter that reveals God; b) God created with the intent to communicate two unified revelations of God, namely, nature and the incarnate Son (as revealed in the Scriptures), and the two are in perfect harmony; c) knowledge of God’s glory revealed by God in the creation is conveyed analogically; and, d) analogies exist in the ontological structure of natural types and antitypes intentionally created by God as a subordinate end in creating. Natural types are a subordinate end, in that they serve to reveal knowledge of spiritual things. This knowledge has the capacity to draw people into relationship with God as he communicates through the messages in the physical world. As they receive and delight in it, as people do when in nature, the process serves as a subordinate end. There will inevitably be several subsequent subordinate, mixed and consequential ends in line of successive ends toward fulfillment of God’s Original Ultimate End. Thus, in functioning as a subordinate end, nature holds a wondrous telos in its purposeful existence. If, as Edwards claims, God had in mind all of the natural types that would convey an analogical correspondence to spiritual truths, and created intentionally in this way, then all of the created order holds this teleological significance. As Avihu Zakai points out, nature for him was a great treasure of divine signs and metaphors. In this grand theological teleology of typological order, the whole world is imbued with spiritual, divine meaning and significance (2010, 20).

In reading Edwards rightly, the teleological significance to which Zakai refers in this quote is that nature itself is God’s acting. We see God willing (”supposing,” in Edwards’ terminology), emanating/communicating, and revealing. Each of these

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are divine acts. This is what gives nature its inherent and supreme value and teleological meaning. God acts by manifesting the ideas God had in mind before the creation of the world (all of the structures, mechanisms, and forces perceived in nature), all of which declare knowledge and glory of God’s divine Being. If Thomist analogy entails concurrentism, then Edwards’ natural typology entails a form of occasionalism. God is acting. Edwards’ view, that nature is a complex amalgam of divine action, teaches that what science reveals as mechanism in nature is merely revealing what God does constantly.3 In this way, natural typology becomes a marriage of God’s transcendence and God’s immanence. In view of Edwards’ metaphysics of creation as described in the previous chapter, the transcendency of God is represented by creating ex nihlo, and the immanency of it is represented by creating momentby-moment contingently, continually willing into being the ideas God had in mind as God’s original Ultimate End. In doing so, God is emanating knowledge of himself in the form of natural onto-types pointing to their ontological antitypes. This knowledge is conveyed in human language, revealed by a loving, immanent God to both the intellect and the heart of the creature, as yet another divine act.4 Embarking upon natural typology seems to be a significant inroad into opening wide the heart and the mind for revelation from God regarding what it is God desires to communicate to the creature. In this way, understanding creation as an onto-typology relies upon Edwards’ natural philosophy and metaphysics of creation. For Edwards, natural types are ontological in the sense that they eternally existed in the mind of God with the intent to be communicated to human hearts and minds. The perception of natural onto-types is obtained once the eyes of the understanding are opened by God; then, types in nature are seen everywhere, more numerously, and more deeply. Throughout the End of Creation, we see Edwards relying on natural types freely and fluidly to demonstrate a typological communication of God’s fullness and excellencies within the created order. We will look at a few passages by way of example. In one instance, he describes the emanation of light from a luminary as a natural type pointing to the antitype of God’s glory emanated from God as its source: “And [the glory of God] is fitly compared to an effulgence or emanation of light from a luminary, by which this glory of God is abundantly represented in Scripture” (WJE 8, 530). In this onto-type, Edwards indicates that as light originates at a source and radiates outward, so God’s glory originates in its source and 3 Emil Brunner asserted that “Science is in the service of God” by disclosing what God does, how God acts in the creation. 4 In Edwards’ methodology, as we shall see in Chapters Nine-Eleven, revelation of God to the creature in and through the natural world will take two forms: through types reflected in scientific discovery, and through direct numinous experience in the natural world. Both originate solely in God’s revelation. Both are revealed to the intellect and the heart.

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radiates outward. Another frequently used type in End of Creation is the sun as prefiguring the antitype of the knowledge and glory of God. Edward continues, [Take] the sun for instance: It is the abundant, extensive emanation and communication of the fullness of the sun to innumerable beings that partake of it. ‘Tis by this that the sun itself is seen, and his glory beheld, and all other things are discovered: ‘tis by a participation of this communication from the sun, that surrounding objects receive all their luster, beauty and brightness. ‘Tis by this that all nature quicken’d and receives life, comfort and joy. Light is used in Scripture to represent and signify these three things, knowledge, holiness, and happiness (WJE 8, 433).

In this natural onto-type, Edwards relies on the properties of the sun to illuminate the physical world so that creatures can see and receive life, comfort, and joy. The corresponding antitype points to the reality revealed in Scripture to signify the light of God leading to “knowledge, holiness, and happiness.” Edwards also uses two different onto-types in nature to reveal the antitype of the propensity in God’s general disposition to diffuse his fullness, as we discussed above. First, he uses the onto-type of the disposition of a tree to send forth shoots: Thus that nature in a tree, by which it puts forth buds, shoots out branches, and brings forth leaves and fruit, is a disposition that terminates in its own complete self (WJE 8, 439).

In the same passage, Edwards then goes on to use a second onto-type. Again, he uses the sun, but this time it is the disposition of the sun to shine forth, And so the disposition in the sun to shine, or abundantly to diffuse its fullness, warmth, and brightness, is only a tendency to its own most glorious and complete state (WJE 8, 439).

Upon which follows immediately the corresponding antitype for both: So God looks on the communication of himself, and the emanation of his infinite glory and good that are in himself to belong to the fullness and completeness of himself (WJE 8, 439).

One final example found in End of Creation, is the natural type of a flowing fountain which by its design pours forth, prefiguring the antitype of the emanation of God’s knowledge and glory which flows out from its source. Thus it is fit, since there is an infinite fountain of light and knowledge, that this light should shine forth in beams of communicated knowledge and understanding: And as there is an infinite fountain of holiness, moral excellence and beauty, so it should flow out in communicated holiness. – And that as there is an infinite fulness of joy and happiness, so these should have an emanation, and become a fountain flowing out in abundant streams, as beams from the sun (WJE 8, 433).

And again,

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The emanation or communication of the divine fullness… is something divine, something of God, something of his internal fullness; as the water in the stream is something of the fountain… (WJE 8, 531).

Interestingly, unlike Edwards’ earlier works, the End of Creation does not show Edwards referring to these analogical images as “types,” nor do we find Edwards justifying the use of them as a mode of communication of the divine attributes in the creation. By this time in his career, he was adroit at using them, feeling at ease with their ontological significance. As Stephen Nichols affirms, I still think we need to see the ways in which Edwards appropriated nature. These nature references are, for Edwards, more than metaphors as they reflect both an ontology and an ethic (2010, 20).

As Nichols affirms, for Edwards, types in nature were ontologically real and represent that aspect of God’s Original Ultimate End wherein God communicates/emanates Self-revelatory knowledge into all aspects of the created order. Nichols goes on to say, “Edwards doesn’t merely employ nature to help one see God. In Edwards’ scheme of things God is communicated in that which is seen” (2010, 20). Nichols is correctly stating Edwards’ position, locating the messages found in nature within the centrality of God, an ontology in which God is actively communicating, rather than merely messages to “help one see God.” Likewise, Janice Knight finds in Edwards a similar construct of natural ontotypes as prefiguring a communication of the divine presence. She muses, [Types] are part of a divinely instituted system of symbols that continuously prefigure and communicate the divine presence in nature and in history. God displays his will through a wide variety of types…. Edwards’ innovations in typology can be understood in terms of these principles (1991, 532).

According to Knight, in this divinely instituted system, referring to God’s Original Ultimate End, onto-types in the natural world must then be ways of knowing, since they began in the mind of God, and are communicated to the creature by revelation. Such ontological types function as divinely instituted emblems, making immediately apprehensible the same spiritual truth that can be perceived with the unfolding of history (1991, 532,549).

As we shall explore later in this book, the use of words such as “symbol” and “emblem” in Knight’s synopsis may need some refinement, but the concept is altogether correct. The use of typology is effectively God’s original plan in nature to communicate the divine fullness to the creature. Since the creature is continuously living with the structures of the creation, it has continual exposure to divine things represented in and through the natural world. She further clarifies,

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The extension of typology to nature is of a piece with God’s role as a communicator and the saint’s joy in spiritual knowledge. Natural types allow that ”wherever we are, and whatever we are about, we may see divine things excellently represented and held forth” (1991, 549).

Since we have established that natural onto-types originated in the mind of God, and were a subordinate end leading toward the Original Ultimate End of creation, we can assert that onto-types and their corresponding antitypes are metaphysically connected, that is, ontologically real. As Stephen Holmes suggests in this regard, One final point is relevant here: physical type and spiritual antitype are connected by a relationship expressly thought of by God – that is the connection is metaphysical; types are really related to their antitypes (2001, 198).

Holmes here is suggesting that God indeed has something to communicate to us through ontological types and their antitypes. In the next chapter, we will explore how natural onto-types are related to the theological lineage of analogy. We take a step back to the origins of the analogia entis in the scholastic Thomistic tradition, to ground our theology of onto-types in an understanding of how God seeks to communicate spiritual realities to the creature on an analogical, physical level. It is the physical world that the creature encounters every day, and as Edwards reminds us, why would God not speak to us in this way?

Chapter Five. The Language of Nature Explored as Analogical

In the previous chapter, an onto-typology was proposed that moved beyond a modern naturalistic view of nature. Edwards introduced this theology grounded upon an immanent revelation of God disclosing the divine Self in and through the creation as a subordinate end in God’s ultimate end in creating. Such a revelation would contend the distinction between natural knowledge of God versus revealed knowledge of God. Edwards’ astute understanding of the types embedded in nature as ontologically real, originating in God, offers a reassessment of an ‘either/or’ theology. This is a new conceptual frame in which natural knowledge is revealed knowledge. Nature only holds knowledge of God because the Creator intended it so, and as such, God discloses Godself through what has been made. This teleological position holds that all creation is in Christ, through Christ, by Christ, and for Christ, whereby the knowledge of such is revealed by the Holy Spirit. Thus, as we shall see later in this book, Edwards’ philosophy of nature is intentionally Trinitarian. We now turn our attention to the actual language of nature put forth by Edwards and propose the following two foundational suppositions: Supposition 1: Scripture mandates that creatures know God’s (Trinitarian) essence by a) God’s Self-revelation in the person and work of Christ, and b) through God’s works in creation. In accomplishing the latter, God has instantiated a language of nature that consists in analogies, shadows, and images of divine things. Supposition 2: Analogies embedded in the creation are ontologically real, given to the creature as an act of divine communication from God to the human heart and intellect. They are not merely epistemic anthropomorphic human assignments.

Let us address Supposition 1 by examining the idea that God’s Self-revealing must be analogical in order to be comprehensible to the creature. In order to lay the groundwork for validating Edwards’ typological method as ontologically real (in the form of onto-types) and not a mere epistemic metaphorical or poetic association, we shall trace the lineage of analogy through the Christian tradition and find our way directly to Edwards. Let us

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begin with the earliest Protestant reformed thinking. Martin Luther put it this way: God in his essence is altogether unknowable, nor is it possible to define or put into words what He is, though we burst in the effort. It is for this reason that God lowers himself to the level of our weak comprehension and presents himself to us in images, in coverings, as it were, in simplicity adapted to a child that in some measure it may be possible for Him to be known by us.

And Luther goes on: That Scripture thus assigns to God the form, voice, actions, emotions, etc., of a human being not only serves to show consideration for the uneducated and the weak; but we great and learned men, who are versed in the Scriptures, are also obliged to adopt these simple images, because God has presented them to us and has revealed himself to us through them (1969, 46).

This quote from a founder of the Reformed tradition illustrates a strong thread running through historical theology regarding analogical language. Much theological debate has ensued over its authenticity. However, in order to establish grounds for an understanding of analogy in terms of the language of nature, we must very briefly revisit the Thomistic tradition as a foundation. Thomas attested to a causal relation between the Divine and the creation in terms of analogical language. He was careful in delineating the univocal use of a word or concept, as opposed to an equivocal use. A univocal use of words indicates the exact meaning of the word wherever found, in every context. By comparison, equivocal use of a word is a grammatical homonym, such that a word spelled and pronounced the same way may have different meanings depending on the context. For example, take the word “wave.” Wave used univocally refers to the function of any undulation of curves that follows the trigonometric function in amplitude and frequency. This applies to sound waves, microwaves, the wave function of a photon, and the waves caused by a rock thrown into a lake. All such examples are used univocally. On the other hand, the word wave used equivocally can be applied to an ocean wave breaking on the shoreline, the movement gesture of the hand, a swell or surge, and even to the onset of a disease or social movement. In terms of language about God, Thomas in his famous treatise on analogy in the Summa Theologica claimed, “It is impossible to predicate anything univocally of God and creatures” (2012, 5–6). In other words, Thomas explains that the very effects of God must be less than its source. Any word used in reference to God must be far greater than the same word used in relation to the creature. Philip Rolnick in his book Analogical Possibilities: How Words Refer to God, explains:

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God is sui generis and therefore not an object which could be adequately described by our language. Divine simplicity closes off the possibility of straightforward description. Any attempted description would necessarily describe something other than, or inadequate to, the divinity of God (1993, 131.).

The words we use, by their very creaturely nature, are properly incapable of referring to God, but they can tell us something of God. A word can reference a quality in the created realm, but when used in reference to God goes far beyond it. Thomas used the word “wise” as an example here.1 Saying that a person is wise tells us about the person’s intellect and integrity; however, the use of the word “wise” in terms of God goes well beyond the human understanding of the word. Words, in the Thomistic view, cannot be used univocally of God and creatures. On the other side of the discussion, Thomas is also careful to explain that words about God are likewise not equivocal. Words do not hold completely different meanings when referring either to humans or God. To continue with the word “wise” for example, while the word holds its meaning, there is a different relation of the word when used in reference to humans and to God. This is described in terms of analogy. Thomas observes, “We must say, therefore, that words are used of God and creatures according to an analogy that is a certain proportion between them” (2012, 5–6). Words, then, must be understood proportionally. Even though there is a similarity in terms of language, there is still a greater dissimilarity in the significance of such.2 If we continue this line of argument, the word “wise” in terms of humans is proportional to the limits of being a creature, whereas in terms of God is infinite and non-composite. For Thomas, “nomina dicuntur de Deo et creaturis secundum analogiam, id est proportionem” (the names of things are said of God and creatures in an analogous sense, that is, in proportion). Such a view retains the Creator-creature distinction while still allowing language to say something about God’s divine, infinite nature (McGrath; 2007,17). According to Thomas, “analogice, et non 1 Discussed in Alister McGrath, The Christian Theology Reader, (West Sussex: Wiley Blackwell Publishing, 2011), 18. 2 In his book, Freedom and Necessity in Modern Trinitarian Theology (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016), Brandon Gallaher traces out tensions in the God-world relation through Christologies of Barth, Przywara, and von Balthasar. Here he relates an understanding of analogy from the Fourth Lateran Council as a definitive declaration prescribed by Przywara. He says, “…the idea of analogy Przywara has, with this subordination of the analogia entis to the Trinity, repeated and rehearses the movement of the Fourth Lateran Council, for it too explained the difference between the unity and perfection of the creatures and the unity and perfection of God….here reaches its final form as the Fourth Lateran Council most properly expressed it: that in the yet-so great of the similarity of the ‘Trinity in us’ there arises the supratranscendence of the ever-greater of the dissimilarity of the ‘Trinity in itself.’” The latter part of that quote speaks to a consensus of proportionality in terms of human language and God’s divine attributes.

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aequivoce pure neque pure univoce;” language is neither purely univocal since God is far greater in essence and being than the creation, nor purely equivocal, since meanings can be retained within the correct proportionality between Creator and creature (McGrath; 2007,17). This, in essence, is the analogia entis from the Thomistic tradition. So what then of the language of science and the language of nature in Thomistic analogy? Rolnick argues from the Catholic tradition for the use of analogy in terms of science and the natural world. He says, From its inception, the Thomist tradition has presupposed the complementarity of reason and faith. For Aquinas, the joint project of philosophy and theology, reason and faith, is the development of analogies from the created realm of nature and the revealed realm of grace (1991, 23).

According to Rolnick’s understanding of Thomas, gifts of grace are given to the individual in order to enhance the gifts of nature, not to take them away. In Thomism, the importance of reason is not obliterated by faith; rather, reason and faith operate in concert. In this way, we may propose that the traditional Thomistic inception of analogia entis relies on a view of divine action requiring secondary causation. God, as First Cause, sets up, if you will, analogous language and of course all structures represented by language. Then, secondarily through logic and reason, the analogies are deciphered. This concurrentist, secondary causality relies on a separatist view that maintains a transcendent separation between God and creature. In the traditional view, then, one is committed to a concurrentist view of divine action where understanding of analogies in the creation is a secondary cause, constructed by and through humanity’s quest for knowledge of God.3 Hence, in keeping with the proposition that rejects the human quest to find God through reason and scientific inquiry, one wonders if we can advance the traditional understanding of the analogia entis toward a more complete understanding of the created order in terms of the divine action of the Creator? 3 The idea that holding to the traditional analogia entis commits one to a concurrentist view is introduced here in order to set the stage for the discussions to follow in the remainder of this chapter, and in subsequent chapters. What is important to note here is that the traditional Thomistic analogia entis views analogies as a comparison, thus relying on secondary causation. God gives analogy of being, then in a second “step” human logic and reason are the secondary cause producing human understanding of language in relation to God’s Being. It is the action of the creature to find and apprehend. It is proposed that this interpretation is open to revision from an Edwardsean occasionalist point of view; one that relies on a metaphysics of participation. It will be proposed that analogia entis as divine communication is itself divine action. There is no need for a “second step” grounded in secondary causation. Analogy is indeed a comparison, but it is a comparison rather of two coordinated ways of divine action: creating analogies in the creation and revealing those to the creature. Both are equally and solely divine.

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(WJE 11, 25). Knowing through a metaphysical foundation of analogy would allow truth to be revealed, which neither pure reason nor faith perceives; nature itself moves beyond epistemic propositions and into an act of divine Self-disclosure to the creature. The 19th-century Dutch theologian Herman Bavinck goes on to affirm, as we saw in Martin Luther above, an ontology of analogy as a way of divine revelation: If God were to speak to us in a divine language, not a creature would understand him. But what spells out his grace is the fact that from the moment of creation God stoops down to his creatures, speaking and appearing to them in human fashion. This is why all the names by which God calls himself and allows us to call him are derived from earthly and human relations (2008, 100).

This raises the question of how, in, and through the natural world, God has intended that we understand God’s invisible qualities, divine nature, and power, by analogy. We might proceed to explore in what ways and capacities God reveals himself to us, and importantly, how the creature has been fashioned to apprehend this information, and be enabled to respond to it. If God has fashioned the creation to be analogical, then words and their meanings, scientific findings and the messages they hold, are not arbitrary metaphors projected by human beings, but are ontological. They are structures that are brought to speech and mind. The analogies are recognizable, not because they are imagined, but because they are there to be received. Next, let us take up Supposition 2, Analogies embedded in the creation are ontologically real, given to the creature as an act of divine communication from God to the human heart and intellect. This supposition implies that analogies are not merely epistemic, anthropomorphic human assignments, but rather, that analogies of the physical world itself are the communication of the messages embedded therein by an act of God.4 In this scheme, analogy is used to convey the knowledge and glory of God to the creature by way of divine revelation, and to affirm that God has intended it to be so. One way in, is to open new theological lines of inquiry regarding how one goes about engaging with a) the natural world experientially, and b) the possibility that science itself offers an analogical language of ontological reality. The former provides an expansion, a more refined understanding, perhaps, of the human experience of nature. The assumption is that this ability to receive divine 4 Again, here the idea that the physical world is itself an act of God is introduced to open the reader to the idea that if traditional analogia entis requires human intellect to know God, then one is committed to concurrentism, and a separateness between God and the creature. If all nature is an act of divine communication, then what is language? What is being spoken about the Divine Being? What is/was God’s intent in this mode of divine acting, and, more precisely, what view of divine action will account for this? These questions will be addressed in subsequent chapters.

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knowledge by direct experience in nature is written into the DNA of human beings. The latter (b) gives us a system of entities, and then words to describe them. Theology gives us the words to reference spiritual, biblical, and theological construals; science gives us the words we need to understand the complex processes discovered in nature, e. g. – migration of birds, ocean tides, cellular motility, DNA replication, the speed of light, the collapse of the wave function, supernovas–indeed, all of the created order. The role of the theologian-scientist becomes one of creating tools for understanding ultimate, unified reality through the language of theology and the language of science, in order to understand what God is communicating of Godself. So, let us propose the following: 1. All of our theological speech, and all scientific language, involves analogy because all of God’s self-revelation in the physical realm is analogical. It is neither purely univocal nor equivocal, but ontologically analogical. 2. We cannot speak of God apart from analogy. God designed it this way. 3. Created analogy does not entail arbitrary assignment of a relationship between the tangible image and the intangible concept it portrays. 4. Rather, created analogy requires a metaphysical or ontic analogical correspondence between the tangible image and the intangible concept it portrays. 5. The Creator intentionally and indelibly imprinted upon creation analogical correspondences between the invisible and the visible spheres, between the tangible and the intangible realms, between the created and the uncreated domains, in order to communicate His divine nature to the creature. These proposals turn the epistemological tables up-side-down from Enlightenment and post-Enlightenment thinking.5 We do not creatively assign relations or analogies; rather, they are ontologically designed by God with intention and purpose given in divine revelation. Thus, “human analogical language,” rather than being an arbitrary assignment, takes on a greater significance; it reflects an ontological function in God’s intent to communicate his plans, purposes, and essence to the creature in terms that are comprehensible and apprehendable. Edwards, as a voice in this era, believed that human language served an integral function in communicating or representing elements of the spiritual world, Edwards reasoned that if moral philosophy needs to use language from nature to express moral concepts, and if such a use seems to be successful, then there must actually be an ontological analogy between the two worlds. One must have been created with the purpose of representing the other (McClymond and McDermott 2012, 121)

5 By “Enlightenment and post-Enlightenment thinking” I am referring to Natural Theology, which was originally based on the premise of humankind’s quest to find and know God through scientific inquiry. The quest was anthropocentric and dependent on human ability, rather than theocentric and fully dependent on God’s revelation.

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Perhaps an example would be helpful here. Consider Psalm 18:2, “The LORD is my rock, my fortress and my deliverer; my God is my rock, in whom I take refuge, my shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold.” In this Psalm there are many words that refer to God; rock, fortress, shield, stronghold. Each of these words holds meaning to the human who reads this Psalm. A rock is strong, sturdy, protective, and perhaps unmovable. Likewise, the words fortress, shield, and stronghold indicate qualities of protection and safety. One might say that the Psalmist looked around his environment and picked out objects to use as metaphors for how he understood the qualities of God. But what if this were exactly the opposite? What if these analogies were recognizable to the Psalmist because they were given? Another way of understanding this idea would be to say that God, in the ideas God had in mind before the foundation of the world, freely chose to create an object – “rock” – in order to communicate something about his own character and qualities. Likewise, God freely chose to create cultural objects such as “fortress” and “shield” in order for that object itself to signify a meaning analogous to the eternal quality of divine protection. In other words, God created all entities, and a corresponding language to describe these entities, to hold meaning by which the analogy would convey something of his nature or eternal qualities in addition to the actual functions these objects serve in the human realm. However, words themselves are not the shadows of divine things since they hold no intrinsic significance. Words are the mere tools of language used to refer to the properties/dispositions held by the created entity that the word represents. So, words are only derivatively analogical because the entity that they represent is the primary ground or basis of the analogy. For example, the word “shield” refers to the object that one holds in front of them in order not to be impaled by a spear. Thus, words hold significance in our objective reality by what they signify. The entity to which they refer can additionally be used as a sign toward heavenly knowledge and understanding. Eberhard Jüngel addressed this conception of language “used as a sign.” He states, The critical question which must immediately be posed is this: Is the linguistic relevance of the word exhausted with its sign function? Are the words of language merely signs for something else? (2014, 4.)

This implies a dual function for language. First, language in our realm describes objects, places, and experiences pertinent to our daily living in this realm of matter and energy. Second, language also holds a significance in that it can be used to connect information analogically about the qualities held by the entity it describes and some element of the reality of the heavenly realm. Jüngel would agree that the word used as “sign” does indeed have significance as reference to a

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“thing” in and of itself, even if it is also functionally used as a sign.6 He confirms, “every sign has a being beyond its sign function” (2014, 5). So, for example, in Jesus’ parable of the mustard seed, the seed itself has a function in its very being – to grow a mustard plant for human use, but it also serves as a sign used by Jesus to indicate the results of even a small amount of faith. God intended it for both. Jüngel attests to the need of analogical language in understanding what the “thing” is and its functional use as a sign: ”the eternal and authentic ’things’” can be reached only through the mediation of signs,” he writes. ”This is true of the whole process of living” (2014, 6). The most important idea here is that analogical use is not a random assignment, nor an anthropomorphic construction of the human intellect, but rather it originates in the mind of God as an intentional mode of communication to the creature in a form that the creature can interpret. The use of analogical language as seemingly “anthropomorphizing” is then inverted to reposition the analogical language squarely in the use of the Creator for purposes of divine revelation, not in the domain of the creature trying to fit a human construct to the divine Being. For example, rather than saying that we apply the term “king” to God (a way of anthropomorphizing), we say that God created the creaturely office of “king” to allow us a way of understanding God’s sovereignty. R.C. Trench further explains this construct: There is far more in it than this: the earthly relation is indeed but a lower form of the heavenly, on which it rests, and of which it is the utterance… The Lord is king, not borrowing this title from the kings of the earth, but having lent his own title to them – and not the name only, but so ordering, that all true rule and government upon earth, with its righteous laws, its stable ordinances, its punishment and its grace, its majesty and its terror, should tell of Him and of his kingdom which ruleth over all – so that “kingdom of God” is not in fact a figurative expression, but most literal: it is rather the earthly kingdoms and earthly kings that are figures and shadows of the true (1889, 14– 15).

Thus, rather than saying that Jesus looked around and saw a mustard seed to use in his parable, we say that God created the mustard seed to function as a sign in order for humans to understand the amount of power in even a little smidgen of faith. Jüngel would add that the mustard seed, in its being, also gives flavor to our hot dog. In other words, the natural world and language of the natural world are given as analogical types, ordained and executed by God, for God, and for God’s ultimate purposes. One does not merely describe the other.

6 For a historical perspective, this was introduced by St. Augustine in his treatise On Christian Doctrine (trans. J.F. Shaw [New York: Dover Publisher, 2009], I.II.2, “All instruction is either about things or about signs; but things are learnt by means of signs.” See also, II.I–III.

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Now that we have addressed our first two suppositions, we can move to assess the validity of viewing analogy as originating in God’s design and revelation, rather than in human metaphorical assignments. Emil Brunner, in his doctrine of creation, establishes the correct God-human relation as an absolute prerequisite for understanding God’s manifestation in revelation, Either human thought has power over God – then God is no longer Lord, nor is He Creator; or God is Lord and Creator, and then human thought has no power over Him; then God can only communicate himself and His Being as Creator by His own act, and man cannot reach this truth by his own thought, he can only accept it in faith. The Lord God, who alone creates the world by His Word, is also the Revealer who alone imparts himself to man (1956, 12).

In this way, we rightly formulate that our reality, this world and all that is in it, is a shadow of the ultimate divine reality. Language is the way that God appropriates those truths to creatures in revelation, so that we may come to a place of “rightside-upping” that which has been turned up-side-down. We are warned in Isaiah 29:16, You turn things upside down, as if the potter were thought to be like the clay! Shall what is formed say to him who formed it, “He did not make me”? Can the pot say of the potter, “He knows nothing”?

Seeing analogy in this way, we reverse the sentence of being guilty of anthropomorphizing; we see that God has given us these images, and the language to describe them, as ways of understanding divine things. It moves beyond God “commandeering the language” (Barth’s phrase), which has the implication of God “encountering” language and then commandeering it. Rather, created analogy rests in an ontological structure initiated in the plan of God to create entities that would reflect or portray information about divine things, communicating across the natural/supra-natural. This is a flow of information and understanding: beginning with God, revealed to the human intellect, and ending with an experience of God. It does not ascribe the reverse; that is, human intellect looking around to earthly things trying to fit epistemic and propositional constructs into a formulation of the knowledge of God. To help conceive of a description of the natural world as analogical, we might look to Thomas’ analogia entis, expanded by Erich Przywara and others.7 Przywara’s treatise on the analogia entis was offered as a response to the Reformed, neo-orthodox position that set God above the creation, effectively removing a holy God from the creation due to the fall and to the sin of humankind. 7 Much of this discussion will focus on the work of Erich Przywara, Analogia Entis: Metaphysics, Original Structure and Universal Rhythm, trans. John R. Betz and David Bentley Hart (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2014).

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Hence, God judges the world. Przywara’s desire was to avoid mistakes in Protestant theology, in order to meet the spiritual needs of contemporary culture, seeking an ever-present God (Johnson; 2010,10). In Przywara’s hands, the analogia entis recovered the balance between God being near and close, and God as all powerful and sovereign. Essentially, Przywara’s is really two interrelated concepts: first, the concepts of essence and existence, and second, an understanding of transcendence and immanence. Przywara’s analysis is the bridge we will take to connect words about the natural world, words describing its mechanisms, and God’s communication to the creature through them. Toward that end, we shall take essence and existence, and transcendence and immanence, each in turn. First, regarding essence and existence, Przwara claims that the essence of the creature comes fully from the Creator who fashioned it. The creature reveals God’s essence in its own essence. At this point, we may care to insert Barth’s objection: how can we account for the creation revealing knowledge of God, who is “wholly other,” a creation that is not God, not emanated from God, separate from God, fallen, corrupt, yet created by God? Here, in his polemic condemning the analogia entis as the “anti-Christ,” resounding a similar “Nein” against Natural Theology, we see Barth’s position against what he views as a corruption of the true and only source of revelation (Brunner and Barth; 2002). What is relevant here is just how Przywara offers a fresh vision of the revelation of God in and through the creation. According to Przywara, God has God’s own underived essence; creatures have a derived essence. God’s essence is underived and found solely in God; the creature possesses essence, derived from God and found solely in God. Likewise, God and the creation both have existence, but in different ways. The creature’s existence is fully contingent on God for its existence, and is not necessary since God could have created otherwise, or not at all. The creature’s existence is created, finite, and temporal; God’s existence is non-contingent, and thus, necessary. God’s existence is uncreated, everlasting, identical to his essence, and is eternal. By analogy, both the Creator and the creation possess essence and have existence, but differently. Said another way, the creation is separate, derived, composite, contingent, and dependent on God for both essence and existence. The Divine also has essence and existence, but these are one, unified, non-composite, simple, underived, necessary, and non-contingent (Przywara; 2014, 213–14). What is shared here, finally, is that Creator and creature both possess existence and essence, though the creature’s existence and essence are derived fully from the Creator who communicates analogically about the divine self in terms of essence and existence in and through the creature. The creature knows and understands its own essence and existence, because God imparted it.

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From this understanding, then, created analogy allows creatures to apprehend, and respond in faith to, the knowledge of God’s essence revealed in the creation. All of creation, as understood analogically, then becomes an indicator of the divine essence, a way of knowing God, a communication of God to the creature. Przywara here is building a line of thought for us to follow. He next uses Jesus’ words in Matthew 16:10, “Whoever finds their life will lose it, and whoever loses their life for my sake will find it” (synoptic pericope in Luke 17:33), to show that we cannot separate the knowledge of God’s essence from the creation: If you are illuminated by drawing near to him and darkened by withdrawing, your light was not in yourselves, but in God….If you live by drawing near to Him, and die by withdrawing, your life was not in yourselves. For that which is your life is the same as that which is your light (2014, 213f).

Przywara reaffirms the biblical truth spoken by Christ, namely, that the life of the creature is in direct connection to the life of the Creator. The creature finds its life in the Creator. Thus, he claims that the creature, whose life is inextricably linked to the Creator, possesses an essence analogical to the essence of the Creator who established all of the creation in love. In this way, the creature who must find its life in the Creator, and who by design possesses essence derived from the Creator, is, by virtue of its existence, the analogical revelation of the Creator. Likewise, by extension, all creation must reveal God in analogy, as affirmed throughout Scripture. In this way, Przywara overcomes Barth’s objection to any revelation of God in nature. Przywara’s argument overcomes the need for a separation between God and the creation, as the essence of the creation, reflecting the essence of the Creator, is internal to the creation itself. This is indeed the bridge we are looking for. Przywara summed up his argument in this elegant statement: “… analogy is established as a participatory being-related-above-and-beyond” (2014, 212; italics mine). All creation, by way of derived essence and existence, is related by analogy to the “above-and-beyond,” or the ontological ground of Being, which is God. The creature receives the knowledge of God’s essence in the creation by virtue of this relation. Second, we now turn to transcendence and immanence. In order to relate these truths to a right understanding of the analogia entis in creation, Przywara relies on two important aspects of the doctrines of creation: creatio ex nihilo and creatio continuans. He aligns the doctrine of creatio ex nihilo with God’s divine transcendence: only a transcendent God can create out of nothing. In this way, the Protestant concentration on a transcendent God, one who is separate from the world, is preserved through creatio ex nihilo. Then, in order not to sacrifice the presence of God to the transcendence of God, Przywara relies on the doctrine of creatio continuans. In this way, he recovers God’s immanence; through continual creation God is present, in a continuous, moment-by-moment commu-

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nication with the creation. Przywara offers both the transcendence and the immanence of God, accounted for simultaneously without incoherence. Przywara holds together the connection that God is both “in” the creation, in the sense of essence, and “above” the creation in the sense that the creation is fully contingent upon a non-contingent God who created out of nothing. Keith Johnson goes on to develop Przywara’s discussion in this way, While God is ’in all things’, Przywara says, he also is ’beyond all things, a God who is comprehensible in creatures, who are in the divine image … transcendence in that creation is ex nihilo (2010, 38).

To summarize briefly: Przywara unifies the doctrine of a transcendent God who creates out of nothing, with the understanding of the immanent God in an ongoing intimate relationship of communicating the divine Self through analogies in the creation. The problem of having to reconcile a) a Thomistic understanding of God’s Self-revelation in the world via analogy, with b) Barth’s objection to God’s Self-disclosure in nature (on Christological grounds), is thus resolved. The reason why Przywara’s advancement on the analogia entis works elegantly is due to divine participation. God’s role in participation is not an either/or – either transcendence or immanence – rather it is ontologically both. God is the all-powerful, sovereign, transcendent Creator who creates out of nothing, who also continually creates through ongoing participation with the creation in the communication of the divine attributes in and through what has been made. Thus – and this is the unifying idea – creation is the communication of God, therefore creation is divine acting. The transcendent yet ever-present God is acting out of divine love, toward the ultimate end of revealing the knowledge of himself through analogy. Keith Johnson, referring to Przywara’s analogia, claims “the analogy of being is the solution to the problem” (2010, 70). The analogia entis is the solution to the problem because it asserts that there is no separation between God revealing Godself to humankind in his creative works and in the revelation of himself in his Son. Both are God’s acting, both are revelation from above to below, both are in accordance with God’s essence, and both are given in analogy in order that we may know him, within the limits of our creaturely essence and existence. Emil Brunner sees promise in pursuing the analogia entis as a way to explore and understand God’s revelation in the natural world. He sums it up by observing that Barth …also rejects the Biblical principle of analogy, and indeed every kind of possible analogy in created existence; in so doing he not only contradicts his own theology, which, like every other theology which is not satisfied with mere negations. Lives on the principle of analogy (1956, 43.).

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Here, Brunner moves beyond a theology of negation, an apophatic approach of limited value. We see here the validation and legitimization of analogy as a way of divine expression to us, as finite creatures, yet created with the creaturely capability to comprehend and apprehend the language embedded in the creation, Thus we ought to make a very clear distinction between the analogia entis as the principle of Natural Theology, and the Biblical idea that created existence, and man in particular, because he bears within himself the ”image” of the creating God, can – in a parabolic way – ”reflect” God, in order to express God’s revealed Being, and His revealed relation to Man (1956, 44.).

Continuous creation, which is God’s acting moment by moment, communicates the truth of God’s Being through the analogia entis, since the human intellect only knows the natural world we live in. Brunner goes on to say, Creation lights up the sphere of things with which we are familiar, what it says is not familiar. Of ourselves, we do not know that God is Creator, as we know the things of this world. This statement is not merely part of Natural Theology, in the sense of being a truth, which a man can acquire for himself, but, like every other article of the Christian Creed, it is an article of faith; and that means, a statement based upon revelation (1956, 5.).

Brunner’s insight buttresses the idea that humans are familiar with the natural world, how it works, what can be expected of its ongoing reliability – the rain will fall, the crops will grow. But it also tells us something more: that God is Creator. This knowledge needs to be given in revelation by God; humans cannot acquire this knowledge by themselves, by their own efforts. Brunner sees this as missing – in fact, crucially absent – from Natural Theology. This point is crucial because only revelation can lead to faith. McGrath contends that this aspect of Brunner’s theology means that “the capacity to be addressed by God presupposes the capacity to respond to God” (McGrath; 2014, 119). To hear God’s Word is one thing, to believe it by faith is another. For Brunner, a rightly derived Theology of Nature in and through analogy is only possible from the standpoint of faith. This may lead us to ask, Why then not subscribe to Barth’s analogia fidei, or to the analogia relationis, or even Jüngel’s “Analogy of Advent?” Each of these theological accents of ontology hold nuanced connotations of God’s communication and disclosure that are worth deciphering next. As we have seen earlier, Barth was in strong opposition to the analogia entis as the “anti-Christ” and subsequently offered the analogia fidei as an alternative to the Thomistic/Przywarian view, staking the claim that as Christ is the only revelation of God, our faith in Christ is the only means of analogical understanding. Barth added this corrective in line with Reformed teaching, in that only faith can be the ”point of contact” between God and the human that takes place solely because of, and within, the ongoing event of God’s self-revelation to the human.

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The analogia fidei enables Barth to show how, in the event of faith, the broken capacity for communion with God is restored by God’s grace, and God’s grace alone, in Jesus Christ.Barth’s analogia fidei is the re-establishment of the real human capacity to know God that can only be actualized in faith.8 As a way of bringing forth an olive branch to reconcile the two opposing positions, Von Balthasar offered a mediating alternative by indicating that the analogia entis is incorporated within the analogia fidei. He claimed that both Barth and Przywara were correct, and in fact saying the same thing two different ways. Von Balthasar’s position intended to show that God indeed creates and communicates by analogy, but that it takes faith to apprehend it and respond in faith. In essence, the two positions are not in opposition, but are two facets of one unified understanding. Keith Johnson indicates that Von Balthasar’s mediating position was helpful in advancing the debate, and in softening Barth’s strong opposing stance: Barth himself praised von Balthasar’s [position] as a helpful and incisive analysis.… after von Balthasar’s book, Barth simply stopped discussing the analogia entis in print. His silence led many to believe that von Balthasar’s arguments had been convincing to Barth himself (2010, 4).

In fact, after Barth’s silence, he emerged with a new understanding of the analogia in his presentation of the analogia relationis. Barth in refining his position indicated that analogy was playing a larger part in his theology than ever before. The analogia relationis served as a sequel to the analogia fidei: it offered an addendum that included faith, as in the fidei, yet incorporated the analogy of God’s Being and essence seen in the revelation of God’s intra-Trinitarian relationship of Father to Son, and Father as well as Son to the Holy Spirit (Barth; 1994, 82). Interestingly, after a thorough read of Barth’s account of the analogia relationis, Emil Brunner came to the conclusion that Barth’s theological thinking on the analogia entis had changed. He stated that this new position indicated that their former disagreements were resolved: “This is exactly what I said in my pamphlet Natur und Gnade, some time ago. I am happy to know that this controversy, which caused so much discussion, may now be regarded as settled.”9 It would be nice to say Brunner was correct and that the debate was settled once and for all, but this is not the case. Positions in the literature vary among theologians and the effort to advance the understanding of analogy continues. The most recent advance is found in Eberhard Jüngel’s attempt to further Barth’s analogia fidei and analogia relationis with an account of the “Analogy of Advent” (Jüngel; 2014, 286f.) Jüngel’s theological position is an attempt to re8 For a lengthy and expanded discussion, see Keith Johnson, Karl Barth and the Analogia Entis, 169–170. 9 For a complete discussion see Keith Johnson, Karl Barth and the Analogia Entis, 4.

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think the being of God along the lines of God’s advent, as the preeminent and only grounds for God’s self-communication. As a result, the absolute revelation of God’s Supreme Being is found solely in God’s coming to humanity in Jesus Christ. God is speakable because God’s Being is not locked up in God’s Self, but is always rather in actu. God’s Being is thinkable because God’s Being is in coming, or more poignantly, God’s Being “comes to language” (Jüngel; 2014, 380, 389f.). By taking up the Barthian mantle of a high Christology, Jüngel places the possibility of analogy, and so all language of God, fully in the advent of the incarnation of Christ into the natural world. Considering all of these positions, I suggest that neither the analogia fidei, the analogia relationis, nor the Analogy of Advent really advance the discussion much. For the purposes of identifying analogical language in the creation as a necessary framework for an Edwardsean Theology of Nature, one that leans on Scripture to validate nature as a bona fide revelation of God, I suggest that the Przywarian understanding of the analogia entis provides the most useful construal. Within its conceptual framework, the Doctrine of the Trinity is held; God as ”in us and above us” points to both the immanence of God and the transcendence of God. It is Trinitarian in that God “in us” refers to the immanent presence of Christ in us, by whom, for whom, and through whom all things are created, and the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.10 Brandon Gallaher unfolds Przywara’s claims to the analogia entis as precisely Trinitarian, by the very notion of the “Trinity in us” (Gallaher; 2016, 84). Similarly, God “above us” accounts for the sovereign, transcendent God who creates out of nothing. This position provides a doctrine of God as distinct from the world, yet in the world. Knowledge of God is revealed through the creation, by revelation from God, not from humanity’s own active knowledge. So, as the analogia entis is in agreement with the “above to below” theocentric starting point, it also opens up the natural world as an instrument of divine communication as proposed by Edwards.

10 Colossians 1:27, “Christ in you, the hope of glory”, and 1 Corinthians 3:16, “Do you not know that you yourselves are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you?”

Chapter Six. A Method for Discerning Natural Onto-Types as the Analogical Language of Nature

In order to proceed deploying the analogia entis in a bona fide language of nature, the next step involves developing a reliable analytic methodology. In this chapter, we begin by claiming that God speaks to humanity in terms of analogical language. Second, we lay out a method to discern the meaning behind the analogy given in revelation. According to Jonathan Edwards, all nature possesses an analogical form in relation to the spiritual. Edwards refers to this world as the “inferior” and the spiritual world of all God’s attributes, knowledge, glory, power, and plan as the “superior.” According to Edwards, all of nature is an imitation of the spiritual world, the inferior an imitation of the superior. He says, And if so, why should not we suppose that he makes the inferior in imitation of the superior, the material of the spiritual, on purpose to have a resemblance and shadow of them? And why is it not reasonable to suppose he makes the whole as a shadow of the spiritual world? (WJE, 11, 53)

Edwards uses the phrase “on purpose,” referring to God’s design of the creation, as a semblance of the spiritual to indicate his own theology of the natural world. Edwards sees God embedding shadows or representations of divine things into the creation “on purpose,” i. e., as preserved in God’s design, to convey God’s knowledge and glory to the creature. For Edwards, God intentionally created everything in the universe analogically to reflect attributes of himself in order for humankind to understand these mysteries in some tangible, yet analogous way. The entirety of the creation is intended to reveal God’s eternal attributes and redemption. Edwards suggests, ’Tis very fit and becoming of God, who is infinitely wise, so to order things that there should be a voice of his in his works instructing those that behold them, and pointing forth and showing divine mysteries and things more appertaining to himself and his spiritual kingdom (WJE 11, 67).

What a different view of nature this portrays! Instead of being something for human use and consumption, nature becomes a beacon of God’s mysteries.

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Likewise, Tibor Fabiny says that for Edwards, nature is God communicating himself for the sake of the creature (2009, 99). Fabiny also summarized Edwards’ position as follows, When a converted person knows and loves God’s beauty, and when the physical universe is known and delighted in by a converted person as an image of God’s beauty, then God’s knowledge and beauty within the Trinity are repeated and enlarged in time and history, The end for which God created the world, which is to repeat God’s inner glory… is actualized (2009, 122).

Here Fabiny indicates that the beauty of the creation reflects the Trinity, and when it is apprehended by a converted person this will result in delight, bringing glory to God, which in the Edwardsean tradition is the end for which God created the world. Now, to turn to our second point above: there must be a method to discern the meaning behind the analogy given in revelation. This begs the need for a theological method, as McGrath asserts: “the very idea of natural theology designates a method” (2009, 5). One approach in developing a method may be achieved through an exploration of natural typology. Edwards’ work, Shadows of Divine Things, proposes a method concerning the hidden mysteries of God’s eternal attributes in the fabric of nature (1999, 3–146). Edwards expanded the biblical typological method of his day that used Old Testament figures and images as types pointing to the antitypes revealed in Christ in the New Testament. He asserted that this method of typology could also apply to the creation; he saw images and forms in nature and in scientific discoveries as types representing the antitypes of divine attributes, of the Christ, and of redemption. As Edwards deciphered biblical types, which served as both an eschatological and spiritual shadows of things to come, so he likewise explored natural types serving as shadows of things above (Zakai; 2010). We have already established that these messages in nature are ontologically real and represent an ontotypology. We have also established that the language of nature must be analogical, since it cannot be otherwise. How then do we relate the analogy of being, the analogia entis, with onto-types? The analogia entis, is related to onto-typology in a system in which, by faith, the analogia entis in the natural world is the communication to the creature through revelation by God in and through the embedded onto-types that prefigure their spiritual antitypes. By grounding onto-types in analogy, we can now turn to Edwards’ narration of God’s communication and nature. Edwards formulated a unified communication of the Creator God through Scripture, history, and the natural world. As Christopher Grasso says, The creative tension between conservative exegesis and a much broader, imaginative interpretation of divine communication, as Lowance concludes, propelled Edwards

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toward ‘a synthetic process of reading Scripture, history, and nature as one revealed expression of [God’s] will’ (1996, 181).

Edwards proclaims the intentionality of a loving, ever-reaching God who communicates in a variety of forms, such as in Scripture and history, but also in natural typology as one such form. As Janice Knight explains, [types] are part of a divinely instituted system of symbols that continuously prefigure and communicate the divine presence in nature and in history. God displays his will through a wide variety of types: Thus God glorifies himself and instructs the minds that He has made (1991, 532).

Knight highlights Edwards’ brilliance in describing how God glorifies himself by and through instructing the very minds God has made. God divinely institutes this system of analogous forms in nature, with the intent to communicate. The analogous forms construct the structure of onto-types whose antitypes reveal God’s invisible qualities – God’s eternal power and divine Trinitarian nature. Likewise, God crafted humankind with the intellectual and spiritual capacity to apprehend, enjoy and respond to such knowledge. Analogy is indeed a comparison, but it is a comparison of ways that God acts: creating analogies in the creation and revealing those to the creature. The ways of divine action are equally and solely divine. On Edwards’ view, God’s act of communicating the knowledge and glory of himself (which is of course in the creation and in the incarnate Son) is grounded in God’s original ultimate end in creating. Using Edwards’ metaphysics of participation, the task then is to formulate a position showing how a contemporary understanding of the analogia entis, according to Przywara, involves no separation between God and the creature while still holding to a distinction between God and the world. In this view, nature is speaking; this is God acting. Thus the analogia entis, as divine communication through onto-typology, is divine action. Using Edwards’ typology, the traditional view of analogy is advanced by positing a new view of the natural world as divine communication, where God is acting for God’s own divine purposes and end in creating. This places God at the epicenter of the process. It is not humanity’s quest, but God’s. It is by placing God’s divine revelation at the center that Edwards justifies his use of natural onto-typology, in the same way that biblical typology is justified. God communicates to humankind in types, and humans are to receive this communication by revelation from God in order to discern the will and plan of God. This enables the ultimate, best and supreme goodness, delight, and love in the individual. Thus, divine communicating and revealing through the structures of the natural world lies solely in God, and thus offers a natural-revealed knowledge of God. According to Christopher Grasso, Edwards uniquely developed a method of receiving spiritual truths that he perceived as God commu-

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nicating not only through history and Scripture, but intently through the nature (1996, 684.). God created the world and everything contained in it, Edwards established, in order to communicate the fullness of himself and his glory to his creatures. Christopher Grasso further goes on to say, Everything in the natural world-–”substance” itself–is merely an idea held in God’s mind and communicated to finite beings who perceive the world through their senses. These things that we see and feel, however, whether waning moons or silkworms, may also communicate spiritual meaning that created things could signify his divine perfections (1996, 684.)

However, these vast messages in the creation not only serve to “signify his divine perfections,” as if messages in the creation merely serve as a display of God’s glory. Rather, they are the ontological vehicle used in God’s design toward the end for which God created. Its goal is relational. God communicates the fullness and beauty of his glory to the creature so that the creature receives and delights in this revelation. This spiritual relation in its reciprocity brings glory to God. Hence, the emanation and remanation of God’s intra-Trinitarian fullness and love, which, in Edwards’ theology, is the end for which God created the world. By using analogy in the form of natural onto-types, Edwards met with opposition in the theological validity of their use. There will inevitably be inherent dangers of confusing subjective interpretations with divine truth. The question becomes, How can Edwards be so sure that his own interpretations of nature (and also ours, for that matter) are an actual revelation from God and not figments of ”a fruitful brain”? It seems that a method of discernment of the spiritual messages conveyed through onto-types is necessary. Did Edwards have one? If so, was it a valid theological method? In addition, did he have a set of criteria by which he was operating? To give us some clues, Edwards brilliantly applied the widely accepted methods of biblical typology of his day to the natural world. He wrote extensively on biblical types in his treatise, History and the Work of Redemption, as well as a shorter treatise in an entry in the ”Miscellanies” called “Types of the Messiah” (Lowance; 1980, 157–324). As Edwards was astute with biblical types, he seamlessly applied this method to the natural world as a useful methodological approach for a deeper spirituality. However, even with the kind of notebook Edwards in which was writing his reflections of nature, he did not formulate a hermeneutic for ”doing” natural typology, as we might wish. The notebook, Images of Divine Things, is reminiscent in style and manner to his ”Miscellanies”; he jotted down entries when they came to him. We do not know if Edwards ever planned to formalize his natural typology, or if he ever planned to publish it as a finished work. Despite this rather informal process, we can still find some clues to the method he was implicitly employing. His theological method seemed to involve two distinct

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approaches. First, Edwards found onto-types present in the findings of science that he studied in various texts; and second, from direct observation of the natural world. Thus, Edwards was operating on a two-fold method.1 We can also find some indications of the criteria he used in determining the authenticity of types as ontological and not merely epistemic projections. For example, in Images of Divine Things Edwards was careful to say how he rendered a prefiguring of natural type to its antitype, just as he did in biblical typology. He also, in several places, was sure to say that there was a “rigorous correspondence” or likeness between the type represented in nature and its spiritual antitype.2 In other words, it had to be convincing. Edwards did not, in the entries he made in Images of Divine Things, leave room for a stretch in linking the natural onto-type to its antitype. Edwards remained true to the actual factual nature of the onto-types to avoid lapsing into metaphor. A seed was a seed; a tree was a tree. These elements of nature were grounded in scientific fact, such that the actual correspondences provide depth to spiritual truth and an understanding of God’s character and plan for the world. Lastly, Edwards was sure rigorously to connect the onto-types and antitypes to passages of Scripture, which he included for nearly every entry. Thus, even though Edwards did not formalize his theological method, nor his working set of operating criteria, we can use these indications in his writings to offer a much-needed set of criteria to set us on the right path, in order to avoid subjective or willy-nilly interpretations of nature. We can distill the observations of Edwards’ criteria from the entries in his typological writings to construct four main criteria for qualifying a natural onto-type/antitype construct: 1. In an onto-type/antitype, the factual nature of the item in question remains such that the meaning and use of the word, person, object or situation does not change, but is only different in its relation. 2. There must be a rigorous correspondence between the onto-type and its corresponding antitype, not just a mere resemblance. 3. There must be a chronological or systematized prefiguring or foreshadowing of the onto-type to its corresponding antitype. 4. The onto-type/antitype must convey truth regarding knowledge of God as affirmed in scripture

1 This will be expanded and discussed in detail in Chapter 9. 2 In nearly every one of the 212 entries in Images of Divine Things, Edwards is sure to clarify that in the natural onto-type there is a “rigorous correspondence,” a “lively representation,” a “great respect to” the antitype. Here is one example from ”Images” no 63: “In the manner of birds and squirrels that are charmed by serpents [to] go into their mouths and are destroyed by them, is a lively representation of the manner in which sinners under the gospel are charmed and destroyed by the devil.” WJE 11:71.

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In an attempt to be true to Edwards, as best as we can be from this side of history, we shall use this set of criteria throughout this book in developing an ontotypological method of understanding nature.

Chapter Seven. Setting It Straight with Terms: Type, Antitype, Analogy, Trope, Emblem, Symbol, Copy, Ectype, Archetype

In order to comprehend Edwards’ use of typology, both biblical typology and natural typology, it is important to note that a great disparity exists across the secondary scholarship in the area of Edwards’ typology. Theological methods are not clearly delineated because terms are used randomly, interchangeably, and often incorrectly. This has made the discipline of natural typology, particularly in scholarship on Edwards, confusing and inadequate. The aim of this chapter is to explore these terms and their usage, then to analyze typology in the Edwards secondary scholarship in order to gain some clarity. First and foremost, justifying the usefulness of typology, as put forth by Edwards, demands a clear and unified understanding of the terms and concepts employed. The use of devices such as types, allegory, analogy, metaphor, emblem, symbol, and so forth, in reference to the Divine are threaded throughout religious history. We find such literary applications appearing as early as the book of Job (second millennium BCE), the Psalms (circa 1000 BCE), and up through the theological discourses of the fourth century Antioch School, in the medieval theologians, reformers, and Puritans. In his book The Language of Canaan, Mason Lowance chronicles this development of typological scholarship by attempting to distinguish “types” from “tropes” in order accurately and appropriately to exegete Scripture toward relevant biblical revelation and eschatology (1980, VIII). Types, traditionally used to link the Old and New Testaments, reflect the actual nature of a word, person, or circumstance, subsequently to reveal its antitype. For the type to serve in this capacity, both the element of the authentic nature of the word, person, or circumstance has to be represented and a chronological element fulfilled. In this way, the type is prefiguring or foreshadowing something yet to be revealed in the subsequent antitype. A trope, on the other hand, is simply a figure of speech. When using this as a literary device, there is a shift from the literal meaning of a word, person, or circumstance to a non-literal meaning. Trope is an umbrella category that includes literary devices such as hyperbole, cliché, metaphor, irony, simile, metonym, symbol, and pun.

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It is highly important for our discussions briefly to designate the literary and figurative meaning of analogy and to explain how analogy is related to types and antitypes. Analogy is not a type, and analogy is not a trope. Analogy, or ἀναλογία (Latin, analogia), is a term meant to relate two entities that possess a similarity on which a comparison may be based. In ancient Greece, ἀναλογία was primarily used as a mathematical term to designate proportion. Scholastics operating in the Aristotelian tradition explored the use of analogia for understanding the relational or proportional comparison between divine things and earthly things. It is my intention to relate analogia and typology such that the analogia entis represents an ontological structure or system of types embedded by the Creator in the natural world, with the intent to communicate divine things, within a Creator/creature proportionality, to the creature. Typology, both biblical and natural, then provides a system in which by faith, the analogia of God’s knowledge and glory (taking into account the proportionality implied in that term) are communicated to the creature through divine revelation in and through the type and its antitype. In the Edwards secondary scholarship on typology, many terms have synonymously been used to designate God’s communication to the creature. Words such as symbol, emblem, copy, emblem, trope, type, antitype, archetype, and so on, have distinct meanings and uses, both in the literary sense as well as in theological discourse. The distinction between them is altogether crucial for this discussion, so we will take a moment to explore each in the following discussion with examples for clarification. We will begin by citing Lowance, who describes biblical typology used by medieval theologians and early Puritans: [Those] who attempted to give continuity of the canon of the Holy Scriptures by demonstrating how the Old Testament prefigured the New through types and figures through which the New Testament persons and events were the antitype (1980, 1).

Here Lowance gives the traditional definition of type/antitype according to biblical types. Old Testament events and persons were types that prefigured the revelation in the New Testament, referred to as antitypes. Correlations between the types in the Old Testament, and the antitypes in the New, in terms of people, circumstances, and objects, were understood as intentionally embedded by God in order to give credence to messianic prophesy and to God’s overarching divine plan of salvation. Prefigurings in the Old Testament, such as Adam as a type of Christ, or the blood of bulls and goats as a type of the blood of Christ, gives insight into a preconceived plan by God in order to communicate to his people things to come, that surely will come, and indeed did come to pass.1 Typological hermeneutics 1 Early puritanical works, such as William Guild’s Figures Which Served unto the Patterne and

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interpret the Old Testament based upon a foundational theological unity of the two Testaments so that the Old shadows, prefigures, adumbrates something in the New. Hence, what is interpreted in the Old Testament is not foreign, peculiar or hidden, but rather it arises intuitively out of the text due to the fundamental relationship of the two Testaments. They represent one continual message of a faithful God communicating to his creatures regarding his love, and their salvation. Conversely, in a trope there is a shift from the literal meaning of a word or words to a non-literal meaning. As Perry Miller says, Typology repeatedly gave rise to a host of extravagances, but even at its most fantastic, strove to distinguish between the type, which was true, and the trope, which was merely invention… (1946, 6).

This is a vital distinction. A trope is a construct of the mind, an invention, as Miller says. Biblical tropes would include common vernacular associations, such as saying that someone is a “Jezebel,” or that “he has the patience of Job.” These are used regularly in conversations, in sermon illustrations, and serve an important purpose in understanding and explaining the vicissitudes of life. Biblical tropes provide a non-literal way of applying spiritual concepts to life; this is due in part to their long-standing associations with life experiences. Many of these tropes are well embedded in secular lingo, in literature, theater, and music. If someone said, “The turnout at the party was incredible, it was like feeding the five-thousand!,” most people would immediately understand the trope to mean that it would take a miracle to feed them all. Or, for instance, an overworked employee just given additional responsibility might respond in jest to his supervisor, “Do you think I can walk on water?” Biblical tropes are deeply embedded within culture in the forms of metaphor, cliché, symbol and other literary devices, to communicate effectively regarding human experience. There are many tropes within Scripture itself that are used to convey deeper, symbolic meanings. In the moving scene recorded in the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus laments over Jerusalem, ”Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were not willing” (Matthew 23:37). Here Christ uses the trope (in this case, the literary form of simile) of a hen gathering her chicks to indicate his desire to love and protect the children of Israel from evil and darkness. Shadow of Heavenly Things (1620), and Samuel Mather’s The Figures or Types of the Old Testament by Which Christ and the Heavenly Gospel were Preached and Shadowed to the People of God of Old (1683) were of the foundational treatises on biblical typology. It is highly likely that Edwards continues the use of the term “shadows” from these books. See Lowance (1980) p. 5 for historical discussion on this topic.

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Biblical types, on the other hand, also serve an important but very different role than biblical tropes. Biblical types, as indicated above, serve as real prefigurings intended by God to communicate God’s own self-disclosure of His very nature and plan of salvation.2 This is a very different function from tropes. Types and their corresponding antitypes serve as a direct communication of God’s knowledge and plan for his people. So, for example, Paul in Galatians 4:21–5:6 describes the prefiguring of the children of Hagar and Sarah as types of the old and new covenants, respectively. He states, “His son by the slave woman was born according to the flesh, but his son by the free woman was born as the result of a divine promise.” (Galatians 4:23). Paul continues to the end of the chapter, expounding the significance of the type and the antitype; the children of the slave woman (type) are a prefiguring or foreshadowing of the children of Israel who are under the law (antitype), the children of the free woman (type) are shadows of believers under the covenant of the divine promise (antitype). In this way, the Old Testament type adumbrates the fulfillment of God’s promise in the New Covenant. Thus, there exists an important distinction in both meaning, use, and function between type and trope. Miller goes on to say, “In the type there must be evidence of the one eternal intention; in the trope there can be evidence only of the intention of one writer” (1948, 6). Miller realizes here that there is not only a difference in the author or originator of the type/trope, but he also indicates that there must be “evidence” to distinguish type from trope. This leads to the necessity of a systematic protocol for deciphering type from trope. There must be clearly demarcated criteria that would qualify something as type vs trope in the scheme of theological analysis. Miller assists us on our way toward developing such criteria: The type exists in history and its meaning is factual; as Pascal, to whom typology was precious, put it, ‘The type has been made according to the truth, and the truth has been recognized according to the type.’ By contrast, the allegory, the simile, and the metaphor have been made according to the fancy of men, and they mean whatever the brain of the begetter is pleased they should mean (1948, 6).

Thus, the first criteria is the factual nature of the item in question. So, let us say for example, one says, “The work of the Holy Spirit was like a sweet-smelling aroma.” This, according to Perry Miller would be a trope, in the subcategory of 2 Pascal, in Section X of Pensées, devoted thought to biblical typology, writes: “To prove the two at one stroke, we need only see if the prophecies in one are fulfilled in the other. To examine the prophecies, we must understand them. For if we believe they have only one meaning, it is certain that the Messiah has not come; but if they have two meanings, it is certain that He has come in Jesus Christ.” See Blaise Pascal, Pensees, trans. A. J. Krailsheimer (New York: Penguin Publisher, 1995), 44–45.

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simile. Whatever the work of the Holy Spirit was in that instance, unless it actually had a sweet-smelling aroma, this statement is a metaphor, and would be a trope, not a type. Another biblical trope from Scripture itself might be the references to God’s “hand,” as in, “His hand was heavy on me” (Psalm 32:4, 1 Samuel 5:6, Ezekiel 37:1). These are tropes used as metaphors, since God does not have a human hand. This leads to the following questions: Does the trope have value? Indeed. Is it a way to describe that which resulted from a work of God? Yes. Did it originate in God? Indeed it did. The work of God originated in God, yet the language used to describe the experience originated in the human intellect, also given by God. So, the trope is of great value in religious experience and in theological discourse. Another example might involve saying something such that “God’s presence in the worship service was palpable.” This trope is a metaphor, since the word palpable refers to something that can be touched or handled, when God’s spirit cannot. In this example, the trope changes the meaning of the word in a poetic way to indicate, in this example, that people in the worship service had a moving spiritual experience. In turning to an example from natural typology, the phrase, “God is the Rock of my salvation” could serve as a type.3 As we have discussed earlier, as ontologically analogical the characteristics of the rock do not change the meaning of its use, in that the qualities of strength, immovability, endurance, weightiness and substance are preserved. The rock foreshadows the qualities of God in the life of one whose savior is God. In this case, the rock (type) was created with its properties in order to shadow God’s characteristics of strength (the antitype). Another natural type frequently used by Edwards is that of the sun with its rays continually streaming down to give us light and warmth. Here, the sun is a type pointing to the antitype of God’s love continually poured out to us, giving us light to the mind and the warmth of his presence in our hearts. The sun (type) prefigures the love of God (the antitype). In this instance, there is a chronological element applied as well since there is a time before receiving God’s love in an unregenerate heart and a fulfillment after receiving God’s love in the redeemed. The meaning and use of the word does not change, it is only different in its relation. Miller continues with a second criteria for deciphering types from tropes. He indicates that there must be a rigorous correspondence between the type and the antitype, not just a mere resemblance. The type is grounded in association, not only in a mere resemblance. He states it this way: In the type there is a rigorous correspondence, which is not a chance resemblance, between the representation and the antitype; in the trope there is correspondence only 3 This harkens back to an understanding of the analogia entis, in which the strength of the rock in this example is an inferior version of the superior, which is God’s infinite strength.

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between the thing and the associations it happens to excite in the impressionable but treacherous senses of men (1948,6)

Miller might be taking the suspicion of the trope a bit too far here in saying that tropes can arise from whatever associations may “excite in the impressionable but treacherous senses of men,” thus making the trope a spiritual and theological villain. We want to avoid such harsh judgement since tropes serve an important function in the church, in spiritual conversation, and of course, in theological discourse. We only need to identify the roles of types and tropes to see the intrinsic value in both, and that both were given by God for differing functions. The salient idea here is that both are divinely given by God. Tropes were given to illuminate the human intellect as a way of forming poetic ideas concerning spiritual things, thereby adding beauty and dimension to our understanding. They are free-flowing and permit a wide range of expression that can be lovely and delightful in crafting sermons, or in describing religious experience. Alternatively, types are grounded in factual representation and actual correspondences pointing to corresponding spiritual truths, offering a more direct understanding of God’s character and plan for the world. However, at this juncture it is important to show how types have been confused with numerous other terms and tropological devices such as metaphor, symbol, emblem, copy, and others in the secondary scholarship. Writings on this topic have used such terms interchangeably and in numerous cases, incorrectly. For example, one scholars discusses Edwards’ emblematic, symbolic view of the world of nature, the typological reading of created order… Edwards believed that ”natural things were ordered for types of spiritual things” (2010, 20).

Words such as “emblematic,” “symbolic,” and “typological” are used interchangeably, as though they were synonymous. While I appreciate how an analysis such as this one greatly affirms Edwards’ understanding of nature by placing value in the interpretations of the natural world as typological, the terms are confused. We must precisely identify Edwards’ “emblematic worldview,” which sees nature as a vast collection of “signs and metaphors.” The terms emblem/ emblematic, symbol/symbolic, type/typological, and metaphor are too often used promiscuously and with no corresponding reference to the antitype. There is no distinction between these terms as literary or theological devices; instead, they are used as if they all refer to the same phenomenon synonymously. But they are not. In his writings, Edwards utilized both types and tropes (simile, metaphor, emblems, symbols and so forth). It is an important task to distinguish between these, since Edwards himself did so. In a similar manner, Stephen Stein, in his essay on Jonathan Edward’s use of the rainbow as a type, loosely employs the terms trope/tropological, allegory,

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association, and analogy/analogical. In his analysis, he seems to be clearly referring to the Edwardsean method of natural typology/antitypology, but does not discriminate the important differences between these terms. Stein observes, For example, the light of the rainbow appearing in a cloud gave rise to Edwards’ speculations about the union of God and man in Christ… he tried to explain the mystery of God dwelling in flesh by the analogy. He interpreted this observation prescriptively as a model for the Christian life. Tropologically speaking, the saints must work for unity of doctrine and avoid factionalism in the church as they grow in knowledge and holiness (1974, 454).

Strictly speaking, Stein misuses the phrases “the analogy” and “tropologically speaking” when his analyses were, in both instances, typological. Scholarship in this area of typology, particularly in reference to Edwards, needs to be more precise. Without belaboring this point, I will cite just two more instances where terminology is deployed haphazardly. One example is William Wainwright’s excellent article on Edwards’ use of typology as a language of God. Although Wainwright offers insightful theological analysis, he weakens his position by mixing the terms emblem, symbol/symbolic, allegory, type, and analogy, and with no reference again to the antitype. I appreciate how Wainwright supports Edwards’ interpretation of the natural world as embedded with messages that are intended to communicate the divine mind. He submits, Edwards’s types, then, are emblems, not symbols. An allegorical or emblematic world, on the other hand, presupposes the existence of a divine mind . . . . On the other hand, emblems and allegories are decipherable messages. This very concept presupposes the existence of an intelligent mind which invents them. An emblematic world is thus a theistic world (1980, 519–530).

However, we find Wainwright straining conceptually when he says, “Edwards’ types, then, are emblems, not symbols.” He is categorically confusing types and tropes. Both emblems and symbols are literary tropes. We can re-write Wainwright’s sentence then by substituting “emblem and symbol” with the term, “trope.” The sentence would then read: “Edwards’ types, then, are tropes, not tropes.” This is nonsensical. On the one hand, Wainwright’s conceptual understanding succeeds in taking us part of the way there, but it is important to move beyond for clarity and accuracy to get at the analytical. Wainwright has categorically confused terms, thus his theological analysis becomes confused and unsubstantiated. What precisely is Wainwright (and we can add others as well) trying to say theologically regarding the ontological significance of the natural world? Here, he is struggling with terms toward a very deep and important truth. Although his use of terms is misleading, he is on to something altogether accurate, in my view, in his conceptualization of Ed-

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wards’ types as presupposing “the existence of a divine mind” and providing “decipherable messages” invented by the divine intelligence. Wainwright continues, Is it reasonable to believe that our world is an ”emblematic” or ”typical” world? Edwards argues that it is. God’s visible works evince a delight in analogy, similarity, agreement, and harmony. ”The less perfect” is ”made in imitation of the more perfect” (1980, 525).

Conceptually speaking, Wainwright’s analysis of Edwards’ all-important insight that “’[t]he less perfect’ is ’made in imitation of the more perfect’” is an important contribution. However, his interchangeable and synonymous use of “emblematic,” “typical,” “analogy, similarity, agreement, and harmony” is misleading, because they are all saying very different things regarding the ontology of the created world and how Edwards viewed elements in nature in terms of the knowledge of God’s own Being and divine Self-communication. From these quotes, we can see a persistent straining with terms to say precisely what these elements actually represent from a theological point of view. Without a clear understanding of terms, their uses, differences, and functions, we are left juggling the vocabulary without arriving at an accurate theology. I hope this discussion corrects some of this discrepancy and offers a more precise use of terms–how they accurately function theologically in a natural typology, and how they help us to gain insight into an ontology of the natural world as proposed by Edwards. Given the type/antitype terminology, what has been deemed as both biblical and natural onto-types are indeed correctly subsumed in the category of types (rather than tropes). To serve as a type, the meaning of a word, object, situation, or structure does not change and has proportionally served as a prefiguring of something yet to come. The meaning of the word, object, situation, or structure either in Scripture or in the natural world lies solely in God – God’s attributes, eternal character, plan of salvation, purpose, glory, and knowledge. Both biblical and natural types are reflections of spiritual elements with intent to communicate. Both are ontological in the sense that they communicate God’s knowledge and glory, originating in God’s perfect ideas. Types, biblical or natural, do not originate in the human mind as a device to place a human construction onto the concept of God, as do tropes. God is not the object to be explained, rather the objects explain God. Natural types, like biblical types, have a chronological element embedded in them. They either serve to foreshadow what is to come or has come, or foreshadow God’s eternal Kingdom culminating at the end of eschatological time. The type represents the antitype, albeit proportionally, in a parallel sense to the analogia entis, which we have explored in this chapter. In essence, the analogia entis is but a structure or system of types, originating in God that has been manifested in the creation. All other tropes, including all of the

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kinds of tropes (metaphor, simile, emblem, symbol, allegory, etc), are constructs of the human mind, and are useful in poetic language for religious experience, liturgy, worship, and conversation.

Chapter Eight. Jonathan Edwards’ Consistent Use of Onto-Typology in the “Miscellanies”, Sermons, Treatises, and Discourses

As we have seen in the preceding chapters, Edwards was onto something. His ideas of nature were not merely a subjective application of Christian principles toward the elements in nature. Edwards’ keen metaphysics of creation entails that God had something in mind before creating, an end in creating. Edwards proposes that God emanates the knowledge and glory of Godself, so that the creature could receive such knowledge, delight in it and remanate that glory back to its source. God’s glory is what existed before creating, and is that which God receives after creating, thereby proving that God did not gain anything by creating. God has many subordinate ends in a long line of successive ends in accomplishing God’s original, ultimate end: the union of Creator and creature. Edwards constructs a view in which the knowledge and glory of God that emanates into the creation can only be received by the creature through divine revelation. Reason or logic cannot acquire this. It rests solely in a divine act of God. In Edwards’ theology, God’s revelation exists in the incarnate Son, the Lord Jesus, in Scripture, and also in embedded messages that God tucked into the creation at all levels of the physical reality.1 It is for this very reason that Edwards is deliberate and consistent in his use of natural onto-types in nearly all of his writings. He saw how important the messages in the creation could be as a scholarly and ministerial tool that leads people to a dynamic and full spirituality. We now turn to the extent of natural onto-typology found across Edwards’ discourses, dissertations, sermons, and typological writings. However, reading Edwards is a vast undertaking. His works span more than a thirty-year career and engage Christian theology, sermonology, philosophy, ethics, metaphysics, personal jottings, and science. Across the variety of genres in which Edwards worked during his lifetime, there are several important themes we can trace. One such 1 We have previously established that these two revelations are one unified revelation of God, but are not equal. God reveals himself in the Son as the perfect representation of the Father (Hebrews 1:3). God also reveals himself through what has been made (Romans 1:20). The crucial difference here is that Jesus is fully divine, while nature is not. Jesus is the radiance of His glory, while the creation as a shadow points to that glory.

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theme that consistently arises in nearly all his writing is that God embeds knowledge of the excellencies of the divine Self into the physical world. In this way, God communicates and reveals himself in his works, “that his works should exhibit an image of himself their author” (1989, 422). In Edwards’ metaphysics of the physical world, the knowledge of God’s Being is known in and through nature, and represents a kind of communication of the knowledge of God’s Being to us, those who engage with nature every day. We are fortunate to have Edwards’ own account of how he embarked upon this revelation, in his “Personal Narrative.” Early in his life, Edwards had a profound religious experience that is referred to among scholars as his ”conversion.”2 In his narrative, Edwards recalls walking alone out into his father’s pasture in deep contemplation. On this walk in the beauty, serenity, and solitude of the meadow, God’s Spirit met him in a profoundly mystical experience. He was given “eyes to see” the creation through a new lens, receiving a deep revelation of God’s glory in the structural framework of the creation. “The appearance of everything was altered,” he recalled; ”there seemed to be, as it were, a calm, sweet cast, or appearance of divine glory, in almost everything” (Marsden; 2003, 41–42). It seemed to him as if the entire creation had a new patina, a teleological glow, as it were, of God’s glory perceived from grassy meadows to the highest heavens. He applied this new way of seeing to everything – “In the sun, moon, and stars; in the clouds, and blue sky; in the grass, flowers, trees; in the water, and in all nature” (Marsden; 2003, 41–42). This “conversion” initiated a lifelong quest to understand the Creator’s end in creating the world, and the role that the created order played in that end. In this pursuit, Edwards developed the method of natural typology as a translatory tool of revealing God’s deep mysteries embedded in the physical structures of creation. Edwards goes on to use this tool in nearly all of his writings. Early on, we find Edwards justifying and validating the use of nature’s types, as he began to experiment with their usefulness; it was as if he knew intuitively that these ontotypes hold truth, in ontologically encoded messages directly from the mind of God to the human heart. By the end of his life, onto-types appear fluidly and freely amidst his writings with no justifications or explanations. Over the course of his ministry, Edwards became fully convinced that God had in mind, before the foundation of the earth, eternal ideas to communicate the divine Self in and through the structural reality of the created realm. In this chapter, we shall explore Edwards’ use of onto-types across his work. First, we will survey his use of 2 For two parallel accounts of Edwards conversion, see Jonathan Edwards, “Personal Narrative,” The Works of Jonathan Edwards, Volume 16, Letters and Personal Writings, ed. George S. Claghorn (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1998), 793–94; and George Marsden, Jonathan Edwards: A Life, (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003), 41–42.

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natural onto-typology is his miscellaneous writings, sermons, treatises, and discourses. Then, in the following chapter we will dive into his most concise and concentrated writing on natural onto-types and their antitypes in Images of Divine Things. As we have seen, by the time Edwards wrote End of Creation, his use of natural onto-typology was seamless and fluid. He was comfortable with their use and was fully convinced of their divinely ordained resourcefulness in communicating knowledge of God’s loveliness and excellence. However, Edwards began thinking about the “emanations, or shadows, of the excellencies of the Son of God” in the creation early on in his career, and continued writing in this way across his writings, theologically, philosophically and pastorally.3 He kept an ongoing series he called the ”Miscellanies,” containing over 1,400 entries spanning his entire adult life. Throughout the entries in this series, we find many references to natural onto-types, and justification of their use. ”Miscellanies” no. 362, written as early as 1728, reads in part: The whole outward creation is but the shadows of being [and] so made to represent spiritual things…the inferior and shadowy parts of his works should be made to represent those things that are more real and excellent, spiritual and divine…(WJE 13, 434).

This entry, written approximately seven years after his “conversion” experience, indicates that during those years Edwards had been thinking about the ontological significance of his teleological vision of the natural world, and its significance in God’s plan for the world. Later, in ”Miscellanies” no. 108, we find one of the more substantive and extensive references to onto-types found in The Miscellanies. This entry spans several pages in length and covers numerous natural onto-types as well as justifications for God’s purpose in them. God, Edwards writes, communicates a sort of shadow or glimpse of his excellencies to bodies, which as we have shown are but the shadows of being, and not the real being (WJE 13, 434).

It is worthwhile to note Edwards’ consistent use of terminology in references to, and legitimizations for, onto-types throughout his writings. This terminology, embedded in his theology and metaphysics, is consistent and clear: everything created is but a shadow of the heavenly realm. Some of Edwards’ onto-types in nature are truly lovely and edifying. ”Miscellanies” no. 108 continues, So the green trees and fields, and singing of birds, are the emanations of his infinite joy and benignity; the easiness and naturalness of trees and vines are shadows of his infinite 3 It would be a weighty endeavor to attempt to present an exhaustive account of Edward’s typological references throughout the corpus of his works. The goal of this chapter is to present a representative sample of natural onto-types found across his works in order to show how Edwards used this method frequently, and was convinced of its authenticity and usefulness.

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beauty and loveliness; the crystal rivers and murmuring streams have the footsteps of his sweet grace and bounty (WJE 13, 279).

The idea that the creation reflects divine things was one that Edwards held, refined, and deeply understood in increasing complexity throughout his life. Later, in the 1740s, Edwards made the connection with the persistence of ontotypes and God’s end in creating. He muses in “Miscellanies” no. 1304: God is not negligent of the world he made … . ‘Tis evident that, as God has made man an intelligent creature, capable of knowing his creator and discerning God’s aims in creation (WJE 23, 253).

As Edwards was working through these theological and metaphysical connections in his ”Miscellanies,” he was simultaneously crafting sermons and other writings using these very onto-types, treating them as ontological, intended by God to be used for the edification of the saints. In A Divine and Supernatural Light (1734), Edwards constructs the entire sermon around the natural onto-type of physical light as a prefiguring of the antitype of Christ’s light illuminating the soul. Here, he describes spiritual light as a true sense of the divine excellency in all manners of receiving the knowledge of God of the things revealed in the Word of God … in religion …. in God’s holiness.4

Edwards relies on the properties of light that enable the eyes to see in the physical world, as a means of a greater understanding of the spiritual properties of “God letting light into the soul.” In this sermon, Edwards expounds one of his more famous references to the taste of honey: “Reason may determine that honey is sweet to others, but it will never give me a perception of its sweetness.” In this onto-type, Edwards posits that just as one can never accurately describe the taste of honey to another person (all reason can do is say it is “sweet”), so one can never comprehend the sweetness of God by reason alone. One must experience a ”taste” of God directly by the indwelling divine and supernatural light. As Edwards says, Yea, the least glimpse of the glory of God in the face of Christ doth more exalt and ennoble the soul than all the knowledge of those that have the greatest speculative understanding in divinity without grace.

4 The natural onto-type used in this sermon is examined at the molecular level in Chapter Ten. This onto-type is explored all the way down to the physical properties of light as a type Christ. Then, applied to the molecular level in the mammalian retina through the photoreceptor rhodopsin as an onto-type pointing to the antitype of spiritual sight given through Christ as the Light of the world. See Jonathan Edwards, Divine and Supernatural Light, WJE 17, 413.

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Using the powerful tool of natural typology, in all of its ontological significance, Edwards is drawing his congregation into an authentic spirituality, a light entering the soul far greater than all “speculative understanding in divinity without grace.” Beyond mere outward piety, Edwards urges them to “taste the honey” of God’s sweetness in the soul. Edwards does not usually craft entire sermons around a single onto-type, as he did in Divine and Supernatural Light, but he does make abundant use of them in sermons throughout his pastoral ministry. We shall look at representative sermons from each major period of Edwards’ pastoral ministry to locate the thread of this onto-typological methodology running through them. In The Everlasting Love of God, delivered in 1736, Edwards refers to several natural onto-types in the sermon; we will examine two here. Early in the sermon, he uses the onto-type of a child’s entire heart of love to its parents as a prefiguring of the believer’s union with God. “It is a childlike union of his heart to God that God himself gives.”5 Later, as he proceeds to the Application, he uses the natural onto-type cited in Scripture of a tree bearing good fruit, to prefigure “those that truly love God,” who ”will have good fruit.” Similarly, in Hope And Comfort Usually Follow Genuine Humiliation And Repentance, delivered in 1737, Edwards preaches on the onto-types of the wilderness as an adumbration of spiritual dryness that will remain until the rains of God’s presence come and turn everything into a lush garden. She should first be in a wilderness, where she shall see that she cannot help herself, nor any of her idols help…and then God will help her, that she shall see that it is God and not any of her idols or lovers.6

Throughout this sermon, Edwards develops his onto-typological theme in some detail, showing how God uses spiritually dry times in order to prepare for a season of great blessing. This was a poignant message as the fires of the Great Awakening were dwindling, and many questioned its authenticity. A very important sermon for natural typological analysis, Approaching the End of God’s Grand Design, was delivered in Northampton in 1744. Here we find Edwards making the crucial metaphysical connection between types revealed in nature and God’s end in creation. In this pertinent sermon, Edwards uses many onto-types including the familiar natural type of rivers and streams, one that he uses frequently. Even more important, however, is that here Edwards confirms the two foundational elements for his construct of the end for which God created

5 Jonathan Edwards, “The Everlasting Love of God,” WJE 19. 6 Jonathan Edwards, “Hope and Comfort Usually Follow Genuine Humiliation and Repentance,” WJE 19.

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the world, almost verbatim to his metaphysics in the End of Creation. What follows are two significant passages from the sermon: God’s end in creation of the world consists in these two things, viz. to communicate himself and to glorify himself. God created the world to communicate himself, not to receive anything. By such was the infinite goodness of God that it was his will to communicate his own glory and happiness… he made the world to glorify himself (WJE 25, 116).

And, He communicates himself to this world and so communicates himself to all elect creatures. God’s design in all the works of the creation is to glorify his Son…all was created for him…and by him…and through him to glorify himself (WJE 25, 117).

In the first reference above we see Edwards beginning to formulate a response to the Spinoza conundrum when he says, “God created the world to communicate himself, not to receive anything.” This was a crucial first step, worked through in a sermon, toward a coherent account of God’s end in creating. Relevant to our discussion, we find here that Edwards sees the communication of God’s Self in the works of creation as an aspect of the end for which God created. It was God’s design to communicate the divine Self in and through the creation, made in, for, by, and through the Son, in order to glorify God. Moving forward in Edwards’ ministry, we find him leaving his twenty-year pastorate, over some very difficult congregational issues, for Stockbridge, Massachusetts to pastor a mission to the Native Americans. He knew well of Native American presence, but very little of its culture. Not only were Native American still present (and at times even threatening) in western Massachusetts; Edwards’ own family suffered great losses during the 1704 raid at Deerfield, Massachusetts, where Edwards’ grandparents lost children, grandchildren, nieces, and nephews to slaughter and capture. George Marsden says, “Edwards’ earliest memories were shaped in this wartime setting” (2003, 15). Yet, despite his own personal feelings and memories, Edwards was moved spiritually with great compassion, and was able to craft his sermons for a very specific congregation. A glance at the 226 Stockbridge sermons shows a profusion of natural onto-types and references to nature, and to nature’s God.7 Stephen Nichols has noted, What ties together his sermonizing and his pastoral if not civil action on behalf of his congregants is, curiously enough, nature. Edwards floods his sermons with nature allusions and references. This is quite understandable, given the world of his congregants (2010, 48–49).

7 Some of the Stockbridge sermons were original, and some were reworked sermons from Northampton and re-preached in Stockbridge.

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Edwards intrinsically grasps the deep connection of the Mahican people to the land, and thus uses his life-long method of natural typology to reach them with the Gospel. Just reading the title of his 1751 sermon, Christ is to the Heart like a River to a Tree Planted by It, conjures the Housatonic River in the Berkshires of western Massachusetts, where native peoples, and their descendants in his congregation, hunted and fished, depending on its resources for their survival for generations (WJE 25, 602). Interestingly, this sermon is similar to a sermon preached in Northampton in the 1740s, and parallels ”Images” nos. 77 and 78 in Images of Divine Things. Two more brief examples from Edwards’ sermons will show his prolific use of natural types, in particular to the Stockbridge Native American congregation. One of the first sermons that Edwards preached in Stockbridge was Heaven’s Dragnet, in which he used the natural onto-type of nets to gather and catch fish. This illustration in Edwards’ hands indicated a prefiguring of the church casting the net to draw in believers. Wilson Kimnach conjectures that “Edwards’ selection of it for use in one of his first Indian sermons may have been an attempt to engage the hunter-gatherer culture of the Indians” (WJE 25, 575). Likewise, in the 1754 sermon, Warring with the Devil, Edwards chooses the natural type of a “strong man armed” as a prefiguration of the devil’s attacks against humanity (WJE 25, 676). He goes on to use the image of a house or dwelling as the prefiguring of the interior soul of a person, where all thoughts and lusts dwell. In both of these natural types, Edwards appeals to images from the natural world that his congregation of Native Americans would understand in order to communicate deep truths of God’s glory, love, and Spirit. While items such as a net, armor, or a house are not direct elements of nature, they are derived of materials from nature and thus Edwards used them as natural onto-types. Now we will briefly turn to a few examples of natural onto-typology found in Edwards’ treatises and discourses. Edwards’ discourse, Charity and its Fruits, was first published by Edwards’ great-great grandson in 1852, but was originally a sermon series preached in 1738 (WJE 8, 123–366). In Sermon 4, Edwards uses the onto-type of calm water pointing to the interior calm of forbearance: “The inner calm, serenity, peace, and rest are the goal. Like calm water, nothing should ruffle their stance in God whose love is greater than any injury of men” (WJE 8, 193). Not long after, Edwards penned the “Discourse on the Trinity.” Throughout the discourse, Edwards provides a substantive array of natural onto-types prefiguring the work and character of each person of the Trinity. Here, he refers to the sun prefiguring differing characteristics of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit: The other is in the visible creation, viz. the sun. The Father is as the substance of the sun. The Son is as the brightness and glory of the disk of the sun or that bright and glorious

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form under which it appears to our eyes. The Holy Ghost in the action of the sun…in its intense heat, and being diffusive, enlightens, warms, enlivens and comforts the world (2003a, 138).

Edwards delineates the unique characteristics of the sun as prefiguring distinctive aspects of the divine economic office of each of the three persons of the Godhead. However, in the ”Discourse on the Trinity” it is his onto-typology prefiguring of the Holy Spirit that provides an abundant array of natural ontotypes. He prefigures the Holy Spirit’s intra-Trinitarian union and divine work as the “internal heat of the sun, emitted beams of the sun,” likened to a “chemical bond of union, a liquid love poured out, like a mathematical sum of all good things” (WJE 21, 113–146). From these we can observe Edwards receiving deep and insightful revelatory information about the persons and work of the Trinity from onto-types imbedded in nature. Edwards also offers here, yet again, a justification for using onto-types and their antitypes: And I believe the variety there is in the rays of the sun and their beautiful colors was designed by the Creator for this purpose, and indeed that the whole visible creation which is but a shadow of being is so made and ordered by God as to typify and represent spiritual things, for which I could give many reasons (WJE 21, 138–139).

Turning now to the 1754 treatise, Freedom of the Will, we find that Edwards introduces the natural onto-type of a fountain as a prefiguration the antitype of God out of which flows all moral agency and virtue (WJE 1, 166). Edwards also uses this onto-type several times in the End of Creation. In addition, on several occasions in Freedom of the Will, Edwards uses the image of flying and birds to prefigure the power of liberty or agent free will. In Edwards’ treatise on Original Sin, published in 1758, he seamlessly extends his method of natural onto-typology throughout. One familiar onto-type is that of the tree with many spreading branches, prefiguring the spread of sin (WJE 3, 117, 122). Another is that of “a noble vine and wholly right seed” to prefigure the antitype of the true virtue that grows out of a life in Christ (WJE 3, 107). Taken together, these brief excerpts highlight Edwards’ prolific and widespread employment of natural onto-types across all his works, including his personal writings in the ”Miscellanies.” We find his use of onto-types appearing prolifically in sermons over the duration of his ministry, and within his major treatises and discourses. Edwards believed strongly in their authentic theological use and spiritual value. In his understanding of the creation, it was God’s precise and intentional end to embed messages of the excellencies of the divine Being into the framework of the creation in order to instruct creatures of his divine glories. This is most fully on display in his definitive work on natural onto-types and antitypes, Images of Divine Things to which we now turn.

Chapter Nine. Onto-Types in Images of Divine Things

This neatly hand-stitched folio, found among the many documents Edwards penned in his unique and often unreadable hand, is a gem of insight and natural beauty. In it, he meticulously unfolded a new method of natural typology. Pairing biblical and philosophical theology, along with scientific and natural observations, he relates structures found in the natural world with the hidden messages embedded in them concerning the knowledge and glory of divine and heavenly things. He gave this folio several titles throughout the course of his entry additions including “The Shadows of Divine Things,” “The Book of Nature and Common Providence,” and “The Language and Lessons of Nature,” and “Images of Divine Things.” Most commonly, this text, believed not to be intended for publication by Edwards, is referred to as “Images or Shadows of Divine Things,” but his latest title was ”Images of Divine Things,” which is the one the Yale edition uses. According to analysis of ink, paper, and handwriting, Edwards commenced this notebook as early as 1729, adding entries and sections in 1737 and in 1741–42 (WJE 11, 34–35). It seems to have been a notebook that he turned to regularly over the course of several decades, much in the same way as he did in the ”Miscellanies.” This manuscript is often considered in tandem with a second typological treatise called “Types of the Messiah” (which is actually ”Miscellanies” no. 1069), containing Edwards’ biblical typology. Unfortunately, he was not able to develop his system of natural typology with theological rigor during his lifetime. As we have already established, Edwards’ onto-types were a way of “seeing” the mind of God – that is, the original ideas in God’s mind to communicate the infinite, unutterable, unexplainable divine perfections that only come from the source of grace to the seer. This endeavor, although necessarily scientific, theological, and philosophical, was also a spiritual endeavor for Edwards. He was convinced of a human relation to the natural world all around, such that the created mind could receive revelations of shadows of the spiritual world given by God. In other words, there is a reciprocity in which nature is made to communicate, and humans are made to see and delight. In Edwards’ understanding, this

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reciprocity contributed to accomplishing the end for which God created the world. The entries in Images of Divine Things were Edwards’ recordings of such observations. Just for interest’s sake, we will begin our exploration into this text by starting with a quote from the final entry, no. 212. Edwards concludes the treatise with these affirming words upon which his typological metaphysics stands firm: The immense magnificence of the visible world, its inconceivable vastness, the incomprehensible height of the heavens, etc. is but a type of the infinite magnificence, height and glory of God’s work in the spiritual world; the most incomprehensible expression of his power, wisdom, holiness and love is what is wrought and brought to pass in that world, and in the exceeding greatness of the moral and natural good, the light, knowledge, holiness and happiness which shall be communicated to it (WJE 11, 130).

In all of his theology, Edwards’ method is always theocentric, originating and ending with God. In his construct of natural onto-types, Edwards attests that the excellencies in the divine perfections and magnificence of God’s work in the spiritual realm are the ontological antitypes of the messages found in the vastness of the visible world, the “incomprehensible height of the heavens.” For Edwards, the eternal excellencies of the heavenly realm, “the most incomprehensible expression of his power, wisdom, holiness and love is what is wrought and brought to pass in that world.” This is precisely what is intended to be communicated in this physical realm of matter and energy. As Wallace Anderson affirms in the introduction to Typological Writings, “In so doing, God constantly and variously communicates to us an idea that is fixed and entirely unchanging and eternal” (WJE 11, 17). However, in doing so, Edwards embarked upon a controversial endeavor that was dramatically shifting the traditional emphasis on Baconian empirical method. Edwards inverted the starting point; he was beginning with the heavenly realm to confirm the meaning embedded in natural phenomena, rather than discovering natural phenomena to confirm the meaning of heavenly (1948, 36). Edwards’ method of natural onto-typology was a defense against emerging rationalists promoting Natural Theology and he “anticipated that his view would be challenged on all sides” (WJE 11, 32). As Perry Miller outlines here, “Edwards was only too well aware that an objection could be and had been raised from this doctrine of types. He knew that it would take the courage of a saint to handle it with impunity” (1948, 26). Indeed, Edwards did have the courage of a saint, as well as the astute mind of a profound scholar, to combat the objections laid before him. His response to the “moral sense writers,” primarily his contemporaries Shaftsbury and Hutcheson, illuminates how his view of the “natural world as analogous to the spiritual” fit into his larger metaphysical system. This view constituted an important element in Edwards’ defense against the rationalists.

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The moralist’s epistemology posited that the reasoning mind could through nature discover the “forming power.” However, Edwards inverted the position, considering the “primary” beauty to be that of the spiritual world from which the natural world shadowed forth (WJE 11, 19). Edwards found three major sources of contemporary opposition. First, were the Lockeans and Deists, all part of the new and “fashionable” divinity; second were the Catholics and High Church Anglicans; and third were the Reformed Evangelicals. In true Edwardsean style, he meticulously addressed each group according to their own devices. The first group of those in the “fashionable” divinity dismissed typology as illogical; they disparaged revelation and prophesy in favor of reason. Edwards in turn gave the rationalists a philosophical and logical rebuttal, demonstrating that God was the only real substance and the entire natural world an analogue. He did this, as we have already seen, in his ongoing use of natural onto-types in his sermons, and in his wider published treatises and discourses. The second group of Catholics and Anglicans relied on their High-Church piety and ritual, using old methods of allegorization in sermons. Edwards in turn critiqued their failure in understanding the language of nature as a guide to the spiritual (WJE 11, 19). The final group of opponents, the Reformed Evangelicals, objected to his expansion of types beyond Scripture into the natural world, to which Edwards responded with Calvinist-based scriptural arguments showing that the Bible itself sanctioned types in the natural world (WJE 11, 32). In addressing the naysayers, Edwards intuitively relied on his mystical and experiential faith combined with his keen intellectual prowess and ability. He had strong convictions concerning the end for which God created the world, particularly in the emanation of divine knowledge and glory into the creation for the purpose of communication to the creature.1 Edwards was confident of its truth and verity. We find his justifications sorted out in a cluster of entries in Images of Divine Things as Edwards stakes the claim on the validity of ontological natural types and their corresponding antitypes. A few examples would be helpful here. He says in entry No. 8, Again it is apparent and allowed that there is a great and remarkable analogy in God’s works…throughout nature. It is very observable in the visible world. Therefore ‘tis allowed that God does purposely make and order one thing to be in agreeableness and harmony with another (1993, 53).

In this entry, Edwards is careful to use words and phrases such as “allowed,” “very observable,” and “does purposely make and order,” to convey the idea that this 1 As we have seen earlier in this chapter, at the time of the writing of Images of Divine Things, these ideas are found in many entries and references in the ”Miscellanies,” sermons, and other writings and continued for more than two decades on this topic.

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method is justifiable and permissible because God has purposefully chosen to create in this way. Another example is in ”Images” no. 19 (where he also references ”Miscellanies” no. 362, quoted previously), where he says, “So it is God’s way in the natural world to make inferior things in conformity and analogy to the superior so as to the image of them” (WJE 11, 55). His use of the phrase here, “So it is God’s way in the natural world,” is a disclaimer to verify that natural ontotypes were God’s intent, God’s way to communicate, and not merely an arbitrary system of propositions originating in the human mind. Additionally, he affirms their verity in ”Images” no. 57, probably his most declarative statement in the entries justifying natural typology, And why should we not think that he would teach and instruct by his works in this way… by representing divine things by his works… especially since God has so much delighted in this way of instruction? (WJE 11, 67)

These entries are most helpful in discerning how Edwards at this time was beginning carefully to formulate his argument in favor of natural onto-types, much as he had done for biblical types, and of course as he had done in sermons and other treatises. For this endeavor, he had to find justifiable unity in scientific and theological terms. As Perry Miller states, “If Edwards was to find the unity of the Bible, he had also to find the unity of nature and history in Newtonian and Lockean terms” (1948, 25). The question will ever remain if Edwards would have formulated a systematic formalized treatise on natural onto-typology had his life had been extended, but what can be gleaned from the extant writings permits us further theological expansion of his original insights. What Edwards has left in his legacy is a vital link between the physical sciences and knowledge of the divine. Through his connection between God’s original intent in creation and emanation as communication into ontic structural reality, Edwards came to conceive the manner in which the physical sciences were to be perfected. As Anderson says, “He thought the perfection of them would issue in a fuller and more perfectly understood divinity” (WJE 11, 17.) From these entries, we see Edwards formulating an ontology of the natural world in which God ”makes the whole as a shadow of the spiritual world” (”Images” no. 8). The communicated messages in the natural world serve as Godembedded-intentional-guides for created minds to receive knowledge of the beauty and perfection of the One who created. Anderson continues, The beauties of the natural world, as they were the ‘shadows of being’ or reflections of the divine beauty of God, could be used as guides to the presence and purpose of God for God’s intention in creating was to exercise the communication of his perfections to spirits which were ‘properly beings’ (WJE 11, 19).

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In this way, as Perry Miller also posits, “The beauty of a type was exactly that . . . it only needed to be seen, not argued” (1948, 26). We turn now to the types themselves in Images of Divine Things. This poetic and deeply biblically grounded group of 212 entries leads the reader into a spirituality of seeing. To Edwards, God reveals messages embedded in the creation, and it is God’s Spirit that reveals their spiritual and theological meaning. As such, these brief entries can be read purely for their deeply spiritual value, allowing an entrance into Edwards’ understanding of natural onto-types and their antitypes. The entries can also be studied and analyzed to gain important information and insight into Edwards’ method and theological emphases. By doing so, we find some very important themes recurring among natural onto-types in Edwards’ two-fold method of a) types embedded in scientific information, and b) types gleaned from personal engagement with the natural world. Likewise, a quantitative analysis of the theological themes represented in the antitypes, provides an entrance into key aspects of Edwards’ own systematic theology. Let us begin first with what we can render from the natural onto-types Edwards uses, then proceed with an analysis of themes represented in the antitypes. Although Edwards provides a wide spectrum of onto-types, we find several elements of nature recurring in multiple entries.2 As can be seen in Table I, Edwards often repeats several elements of nature in the onto-types he includes in Images of Divine Things. The most common elements of nature presented are the sun, moon, stars, and heavenly bodies, found in twenty-seven entries. Natural onto-types referring to plants, plant growth, and trees are found in twenty entries, and types concerning light, the colors of light, or heat emanated from light occur in nine entries. Although Edwards records certain parts of nature repeatedly, nearly each of the repeated entries of a given natural onto-type offers a unique antitype, or a more refined, nuanced version of the antitype. An example here might be helpful. Let us look at three entries from the sun/moon series: 14. The sun’s so perpetually, for so many ages, sending forth his rays in such vast profusion, without any diminution of his light is a bright image of the all-sufficiency and everlastingness of God’s bounty and goodness (WJE 11, 54). 50. The rising and setting of the sun is a type of the death and resurrection of Christ (WJE 11, 64). 185. That the sun is designed by God as a type of Christ may be argued from Scripture, not only by Christ being frequently represented by it, being called the Sun, the Sun of Righteousness, the Light of the world, etc.; but also by the sun’s withdrawing its light when Christ was crucified, as it were conforming to its antitype (WJE 11, 120).

2 Refer to Table I. Taken from Jonathan Edwards, “Images of Divine Things,” in Vol. 11 Typological Writings.

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Here, Edwards uses the sun as a natural onto-type revealing three different antitypes. In ”Images” no. 14 above, the characteristic of the sun constantly sending forth its rays is reflected in the antitype of God sending forth everlasting goodness, whereas in Type No. 50, the quality of the setting and the rising of the sun points to the antitype of Christ’s death and resurrection, respectively. Lastly, in ”Images no. 185, Edwards uses the sun as an onto-type of Christ, pointing to the antitype of the “Light of the world.” In each case, Edwards nuances his knowledge of varying aspects of the natural elements to reveal a multifaceted array of antitypes. Interestingly, not only do we see the recurring onto-types such as heavenly bodies, plants, serpents, rivers, marriage, and so on, we also find elements of nature or science that are only used once.3 He refers to natural onto-types such as the crocodile, the watch, the telescope, embryological development, blood flow out of the human heart, the optics of a bubble, gravity, and even hieroglyphics that are used only one time each. While some of these scientific images that Edwards uses singularly in Images of Divine Things are not directly from nature – say, the watch or the telescope – they are nevertheless drawn from natural elements, giving them, for Edwards, onto-typological significance.4 From these entries, we may infer that the scientific images Edwards is reporting are derived from his reading and exploration of physics, zoology, and anatomy books, or other sources. For example, he says in ”Images” no. 177, It is observed of the CROCODILE that it cometh of an egg no bigger than a goose egg, yet grows till he is fifteen cubits long; Pliny says thirty. He is also long lived and grows as long as he lives (1993, 118).

In the case of the crocodile, he reveals the antitype as a prefiguring of sin, which is easily crushed in its early stages, much like an egg is easily destroyed, but when sin takes root and grows it is much harder to destroy becoming stronger and more destructive, as the full-grown crocodile. Another natural onto-type used only once is that of the embryo. In Edwards’ rendition, the embryo prefigures the regenerate believer as a new creation in Christ that grows and develops, or “comes into its proper function,” much in the same way that an embryo develops into the mature creature it was intended to become (WJE 11, 122). Again, it is presumed that Edwards, while studying human and animal embryology, was given the revelation of this natural onto-type and its antitype. Edwards perceived that the realization of natural onto-types and their correlative antitypes in the mechanisms and findings of science were an all-important conduit through

3 Refer to Table II. 4 See Griffin Black, “Spectator” of Shadows: The Human Being in Jonathan Edwards’s “Images of Divine Things”, Jonathan Edwards Studies 8.2 (2018).

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which the divine Creator communicates of himself to his creatures. And, in Edwards’ metaphysics, as we have already seen, this an important aspect of how God accomplishes the end for which the world was created. From the above analysis, we see Edwards using a two-fold method, including a) every-day experiences and observations outside in nature, and b) intimations of onto-types gleaned from scientific sources. In the former, he received revelation of natural onto-types from his personal every-day experiences out in nature. In the latter, Edwards empirically received revelation of natural ontotypes emerging out of knowledge from his own scientific studies uncovering the revelatory messages hidden therein. In this two-fold methodology, Edwards relies on both direct experiences in the outside world and scientific investigation as valid sources of communicated messages of the Divine. Here we see an aspect of Edwards as a naturalist. He tapped into an ontology of the beauty and grandeur common to nearly every people group in recorded human history: the transcendent sense of the divine in nature. In this aspect of his method, we can imagine Edwards looking up at the sky from his pastoral study, or his consistent engagement with an agrarian society in which seeds, plants, harvest, and rains were an integral part of daily life and survival. In these familiar elements of nature, which Edwards encountered each day, he learned truths of God’s character, the Christian life, evil, and providence. From these onto-types, we can almost piece together Edwards’ world. Likewise, through reading anatomy textbooks, physics, and optics, he received deep revelatory communication of God’s character, Christology, spiritual truths of temptation, and the spiritual life. It is interesting to note that entries that incorporate a scientific theme, such as a microscope or telescope, appear only once. This is in comparison to entries from his every-day experiences, which appear multiple times in the text. Perhaps this is a reflection of the frequency of exposure Edwards had to each. As we have previously seen, Edwards indeed had a method and a set of operative criteria by which he was able to validate his typological claims. However, he did not delineate the method or criteria in typology in any systematic way. However, what we can glean from Images of Divine Things is that he was using a consistent methodology and did have a working set of criteria, even if in his own mind. His method, as we have seen, involved direct experiences with nature and a study of science. We can also find clues pointing to his principles.5 He used, as we have pointed out earlier, a similar set of criteria to those used in his work on biblical typology. Just as he did in his work on biblical types, he consistently notes throughout Images of Divine Things how the natural type adumbrates its antitype as a foreshadowing or prefiguring of heavenly things. Then, Edwards metic5 I refer the reader to Chapter Six.

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ulously shows that these associations were not mere human epistemic assignments, but ordered by God. It was Edwards’ express goal to show that these messages were God’s design, and not human metaphorical associations. This revelation was of God’s own working. He says, “Tis certainly agreeable to what is apparently the method of God’s working” (1993, 70). He was also very clear in numerous entries to assert that in each type there was a “rigorous correspondence,” a “lively representation,” or a “great respect to” the corresponding antitype. In doing so, he was careful to be sure to show that there was an inherent, direct meaning of the natural process or element in nature in connection with its paired antitype. Lastly, but likely most importantly, Edwards grounded his onto-types in biblical references.6 In this way, onto-types from the natural world were not another revelation of God, but were consonant with the revelation of God found in Scripture. Next turning to analysis of the antitypes, we find a selection of theological themes recurring throughout the entries that seem to reflect Edwards’ own emphases in systematic theology.7 For example, we find five major categories of theological themes emerging out of the antitypes: the Doctrine of God, Christology, Spiritual Formation of the Believer, Evil/Devil/Temptation/Hell, and the Church/Eschatology.8 Interestingly, we do not see substantive references to several other categories typically found in the divisions of systematic theology such as bibliology or pneumatology. On another note, the 212 entries recorded in Images of Divine Things contain at least 241 antitypes. This can be attributed to the fact that, on numerous occasions, Edwards offers several antitypes for a single natural type, or he offers multivalent aspects of a single type. For example, in ”Images” no. 78, Edwards uses the type of the structure of a tree to prefigure three different antitypes. As Edwards himself asserts, “What is observable in trees is also a lively emblem of many spiritual things” (WJE 11, 80). He goes on to show that the extensive branching of a tree represents God’s varied providence, likening the trunk to Christ and the individual branches to the church. This is why the number of antitypes exceeds the number of onto-types. What follows from Graph I is that the Doctrine of God holds preeminent place, appearing in seventy-five antitypes. Antitypes in this category include references to the character of God, the works and acts of God, God as creator, providence, and heaven as the place of the eternal love of God. This abundant occurrence of the Doctrine of God in the antitypes comes as no surprise, since this aspect of 6 It is from these observations in the text that the set of four criteria used in this book were determined. See Chapter Six. 7 Refer to Graph I. 8 In order to decipher these five theological categories, each onto-type and its antitype was carefully read and analyzed for theological content and scriptural references. Theological themes in the antitypes as stated by Edwards were recorded, tallied, and graphed.

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Edwards’ theology represents an important theological theme in all of his sermons, books, and treatises. It was Edwards’ primary vision as pastor and theologian for people to know and worship the most excellent, sovereign creator God. The next most abundant theological theme in the antitypes is the spiritual formation of believers, appearing in forty-nine entries. Edwards’ ministry as pastor and missionary, as well as in his treatise on Religious Affections, in sermons, and personal letters, all attest to his dedication to teaching on the exemplary Christian life. Next of interest is the quantitation of antitypes on Christology and references to Satan, evil, and spiritual death, which were equally weighted at forty-four entries each. Although this was presumably unintended by Edwards, it reveals how these themes for Edwards go hand-in-hand; evil is the destructive force leading to death, whereas redemption in Christ is the cure or remedy. Lastly are references to the church and eschatology, appearing in twentynine entries. Antitypes in this category include references to the work of the church, the presence of the church in the world, and the eschatological destiny of the church. Again, even a brief read of Edwards’ sermons reflect this as an important theme. Reviewing the content of natural onto-types and their corresponding antitypes gives us insight into Edwards’ daily life and his pressing theological thoughts. However, as we have briefly seen above, one recurring urgent idea in Images of Divine Things was a sincere and grounded justification for the use of natural onto-typology as a valid method of receiving communication of the things of God. There are fourteen entries in which Edwards provides a compelling argument that natural onto-types and their antitypes were intended to communicate “spiritual and divine things,” through what has been made, to the creature.9 ”Images” no. 70 reads: If we look on these shadows of divine things as the voice of God, purposely by them, teaching us these and those spiritual and divine things, to show of what excellent advantage it will be and how agreeably and clearly it will tend to convey instruction to our minds, and to impress things on the mind, and to affect the mind. By that we may, as it were hear God speaking to us (WJE 11, 74).

This passage shows how Edwards viewed “shadows of divine things” or the ontotypes embedded in nature, as “God speaking to us.” Edwards indicates that these messages are taught to us, giving instruction to our minds, impressing things on the mind, and thus affecting the mind. Edwards seems to be referring to a specific work of God, something that is not of the individual, but given by God to the mind of the creature, in order to produce beneficial spiritual effects. This work of God does not replace the Word of God in the Scriptures, but corroborates and 9 See final entry in Table I.

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agrees with it. Edwards often uses scriptural references to substantiate either the use of a particular type (say, a seed for example) or to show the biblical homologue for a given antitype.10 He states further in ”Images” no.70: Wherever we are and whatever we are about, we may see divine things excellently represented and held forth and it will abundantly tend to confirm the Scriptures, for there is an excellent agreement between these things and the Holy Scriptures (WJE 11, 74).

As stated above, Edwards uses Scripture as the grounding criteria for the authenticity of a natural onto-type and its antitype. In a related passage, Edwards is careful to underscore that there is a direct correspondence of natural onto-types originating in God’s mind, with the Holy Scriptures, Edwards declares in ”Images” no. 201, By which it appears that God don’t think it a thing improper, or unbecoming of his wisdom, thus designedly to contrive his works…in such manner as to represent divine things and signify his mind as truly as his Word (WJE 11, 125). Edwards seems to be saying that it was God’s design to represent divine things, that is, to signify the divine mind, reflected in both the physical world and in the Scriptures. A careful read of Images of Divine Things gives us a great deal of information regarding Edwards’ ontology of nature. Edwards opposed the common schemes of a deistic theology and rightly placed God at the epicenter of revelation in and through the natural world. Edwards also was careful to justify this naturally revealed knowledge that opposed the swirling assumptions of Natural Theology, which placed discovery of the knowledge of God in the hands of people. From this work, we see that Edwards was fully convinced that God intended to instruct humanity in this way. What is next is to see if Edwards’ onto-types extend down to the deeper layers of the created order. In other words, can onto-types be found all the way down to the cellular, molecular, atomic, and quantum levels of nature? In the next chapter, we will address this question by exploring the higher order cellular mechanism of vision in the mammalian eye.

10 See Edwards’ Scripture references in Tables I and II.

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Table I. Type/Antitype Repeated Themes in Images of Divine Things Edwards’ Scripture References Christ 4,50,53,54,80,85, Num 10:10 103,128,185,209 I Chron 29:2 Church 4,53,76 Rev 4:3 Glory and happiness of 4,21,40,43,47, 53,79,124,139 heavenly inhabitants Height above heavens 143,144,154, Heavenly (God’s) glory 157,202 Heavenly things Heb 9:16, Resurrection 7,9,23,86 John 12:24 New life in Christ 90,93,165 Dependence on God 13,60,83, for spiritual welfare 171, 192 God’s gracious influences Matt 12:33 Trunk is Christ 26,28,34,78 Branches are the 99,135,166 John 15:15 church 172 Known by its fruit

Total Times Used 27

Light Colors of Light

Christ Everlasting goodness of God

14,45,52,58, 96, 97, 152, 168,186

9

Heat Serpent charms prey Spider and fly Cat and mouse

Trials Temptation

11, 16, 63,69,73, James 3:6–8, 87,160,181, 182 Psalm 104:3

9

Grinding of corn, grain, Bread grapes

Refining of the soul Spiritual nourishment

48,68,107,112 187,189, 197

Uphill Mountains

Spiritual trials Ascending to Heaven, Eminence

29,64,66,67 151,159,175

Water Rivers Streams Stormy Sea

Nourishment of Christ’s Spirit Spirit Shed abroad Goodness of God Wrath

15,22,27,77, 117,161

Marriage

Union and communion of believer to Christ

TYPE Sun Moon Heavenly bodies Stars and planets Universe and cosmos Seed germination Plant growth

Trees

ANTITYPE

Type Number

5,9,12,32,56

Mic 6:15, Deut 32:14 Lev. 24:7, Is 37:30

20

7 7

Jer 17:8, Psalm 1:3, Num 24:6, Ecc 1:7, Psalm 88:7 Psalm 42:7 Eph 5:30, Rev.12:5, I Cor 15:42

6

5

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Table I. (Continued) TYPE

ANTITYPE

Silk Worm

Christ

Breath in Man Lightening Fire Childbirth Children born in nakedness

Type Number

35, 142,198, 208 God’s spirit in the soul 17,62, 141

Wrath of God Suffering to produce beauty Spiritual pains bringing forth Christ Original Sin

Justifications for the use of Typology

Edwards’ Scripture References 2 Sam 5:23 Psalm 84:6 Ez 37:9–16 John 20:22

2,3,74

Total Times Used 4 3 3

10,8,25

3

8,19,43,45, 55,57,59 70,86,169,170, 201, 203, 212

14

Table II. Some Natural Types Used Once in Images of Divine Things Types Used Once

Antitype

Blood flow from the human heart Refining metal by heat Gravity

Out of the heart flow the issues of life Wrath of God that refines believers in their suffering Attraction of Love in spiritual world Hell

Volcano Telescope Crocodile

Increasing knowledge of the things of God Sin

Workings of watch/ Workings of God’s providence clock Embryological devel- Christian spiritual development opment Optics of a bubble Hieroglyphics

Type Edwards’ ScripNumber ture References 6 Prov. 4:23 31 79 84 146 177 178 190

Seeing worldly pleasures, easily 191 broken Use of symbol to convey spiritual 206 truth

Psalm 37:35–36 Hos. 10:7

Onto-Types in Images of Divine Things

Graph I. Thematic Distribution of Antitypes in Images of Divine Things Made by Lisanne Winslow

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Chapter Ten. Extending Edwards’ Onto-Typology into Contemporary Science: Rhodopson Mechanism in the Mammalian Visual System as a Molecular Onto-Type

Over the preceding chapters, we have made a case that the natural world has something to communicate to humankind regarding God’s divine excellencies and attributes. We have argued that this revelation is not “in addition to” biblical revelation in Christ, but rather is parallel; the two represent a unified, consonant revelation that reveals the Trinitarian God. In this way, nature itself represents a natural-revealed knowledge of God. We have drawn from the rich metaphysics and theology of Jonathan Edwards who was Trinitarian in an increasingly Unitarian age and who saw natural types as ontological, revealing the knowledge of God. In fact, Edwards understood the ontology of nature to include communication/emanation of the knowledge of God’s glory through natural types as an integral part of God’s original, ultimate End in creating. As we have established in earlier chapters, when rightly placed, the types revealed in nature are better considered as onto-types. For Edwards, these messages were found in a) the elements and mechanisms given by science, and b) from direct experiences in nature. In this chapter, we will treat an onto-typology in the former, that is, that extends down into cellular and molecular mechanisms. In the next chapter, we will explore messages of the divine from direct experiences with nature and its beauty. Now, we ask ourselves, can Edwards’ natural typology, considering his idealism, panentheism, occasionalism, and continuous-creation metaphysics, be extended beyond the visible and into the foundational elements and processes of nature? Perhaps one way to answer this question might be to knit together ideas from the conversation partners we have already engaged in previous chapters, with Edwards’ methodology as the foundation, in order to conduct an Edwardsean experiment. This entails a suggestive enterprise in which the Thomistic construct of analogy, combined with Przywara’s addendum encompassing transcendence and immanence, might buttress an Edwardsean way of thinking that assume that all aspects of the creation can and do reveal God in analogy, even at the cellular, molecular and quantum levels. The Thomistic understanding of analogy showed us that analogy must be a form of divine communication, so that

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created beings can understand, to a lesser degree, the attributes of the Creator. Przywara extended the analogia entis to include a transcendent God who creates ex nihilo, One who is immanent in a continuous creation. This resonates with Edwards’ creation metaphysics and method of natural onto-typology regarding the Creator, who communicates to the creature through the natural world. This leads one to ask the following: Might opening ourselves to God’s revelation of the language of nature, through the discoveries of natural science, incite not merely a new theology, but a new way of experiencing the wide, broad, and deep love of God? Two outcomes flow naturally from a response to this question. First, receiving the language of nature through God’s divine revelation delivers a valuable human experience, one that engages historical and contemporary scholarship in theology and the sciences. The second outcome moves the language of nature, as a true gospel of nature, seamlessly into the realm of the Church where it can lead believers into deeper contemplation and faith. Calvin comments on this phenomenon: “The contemplation of God’s goodness in his creation will lead us to thankfulness and trust” (1960, 181–82). Albert Einstein, one who saw into some of the deepest scientific mysteries of the natural world as revelation, called it “rapturous amazement” (1954, 3). This two-fold purpose was used by Edwards in his natural typology as he used the gospel of nature in his sermons, discourses, and treatises. Using both direct experiences in the natural world and revealed onto-types in the discoveries of science, Edwards was led into a new spiritual experience, and a deeper knowledge of the loving Creator. The knowledge and insight that Edwards was given was consonant with the message of the gospel found in Scripture. Perhaps, just as Edwards was given this insight, we might further this enterprise and examine the hypothesis of consonance with rigor and delight. We are examining the hypothesis of the consonance of the natural world in light of biblical revelation, scientific discovery, and the dynamic experiential indwelling of the Holy Spirit in the human mind and heart. The goal in this work, then, is not to force an integration of Science and Theology, but rather to embark on a path of discovery into a unity that already exists. Exploring this hypothesis might begin by rightly recognizing that God reveals Godself, and then by complying with the pattern for interpretation which God has prescribed. Torrance eloquently asserts the same: whatever is not-God is laid open by God himself as set in the creation of man, and which faith makes clear to him, that man can fulfill his function as an interpreter of nature (1969, 69).

The fruition of scientific discovery is an expanded recovery of an observation of the Psalmist (along with many other writers in Scripture) regarding nature, calling the intellect and a heart of sincere enquiry into an ontological reality

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beyond a naturalistic worldview. Types, intentionally embedded in nature by God, allow an ingress into a deeper exploration of nature from a theistic perspective. It is part of an ever-growing expansion of the depth of the natural world, instressed with an infinite array of messages of the divine character and glory, ethics, redemption, ecclesiology, and so on. These spiritual truths are revealed to humankind synchronistically with scientific discovery. In this way, God’s acting becomes a dynamic revelation to the creature in and through an understanding of the natural world, by learning to read the language of nature. With Edwards, we explore the possibility that the language of nature can be understood through myriad of messages embedded into the creation in the form of natural onto-types, prefiguring their ontological antitypes. Our discussion of Edwards’ metaphysics of creation has shown us that he understood the types embedded into the creation as metaphysically eternal and ideal in relation to God, and real in relation to the creature. Edwards bridged this paradox by relying on the metaphysics of the end for which God created, including the emanation of the knowledge and glory of God into the structures of the creation. This knowledge, which includes scientific descriptions of structures, dispositions, mechanisms, and forces – as well as all of the embedded onto-types containing consonant messages of the divine attributes – is appropriated as God makes the creation ”real” to the creature, who has been created in turn with the capacity to receive such knowledge. In applying Edwards’ natural typology, we might question whether his method can be tested, not with his science, but with ours. Can Edwards’ method of typological meaning be applied to complex mechanisms in fine detail? In other words, is Edwards’ eighteenth-century method extendable to the findings of today’s science? If so, what might complex mechanisms offer in terms of natural types that may carry the knowledge of God? What we are doing here expands an Edwardsean reading of the natural world down to the fundamental operations undergirding life itself. We turn here to the four main criteria proposed earlier for qualifying a natural onto-type/antitype construct: 1. In an onto-type/antitype, the factual nature of the item in question remains such that the meaning and use of the word, person, object or situation does not change, it is only different in its relation. 2. There must be a rigorous correspondence between the onto-type and its corresponding antitype, not just a mere resemblance. 3. There must be a chronological or systematized prefiguring or foreshadowing of the onto-type to its corresponding antitype. 4. The onto-type/antitype must convey truth regarding knowledge of God as affirmed in scripture.1 1 These are the criteria used in this analysis as proposed earlier.

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With this foundational guideline, we proceed with the enterprise at hand, that is, to explore the hypothesis of consonance to see if Edwards’ method of natural typology is extendable all the way down to the base structures of the biological world. We begin this exploration with an example from contemporary cell biology. This mechanism, the visual system in the mammalian eye activated by light, parallels the numerous references Edwards used in the type of natural light prefiguring the Uncreated Light. Edwards used the natural type of light more than any other in his discourses, treatises and sermons. For Edwards, light from the sun, moon and stars, as well as light emanating from a luminary or lamp was a direct analogical type of God’s truth and knowledge being emanated to the creature. In this way, we explore this type even further down into the molecular structures, beginning with the photon of light itself as a type of Christ, both exhibiting a dual nature, the former prefiguring the latter. Then we examine the effects of light, just as Edwards did, to determine if the mechanism prefigures the illumination of spiritual light leading to a change in spiritual perception.

A Mechanism from Cell Biology: The Rhodopsin Second Messenger Cascade in the Mammalian Visual System is a Natural Type of Illumination by the Light of Christ The molecular mechanism we shall explore in order to bring forth the viability of the Edwardsean method of natural typology, is the mammalian visual system.2 The visual system in mammals is a photoreceptor system that uses light as the stimulus to signal the visual cortex region of the brain to transmit images carried informationally through photons. This process begins with light entering the eye of the mammal and encountering the rod cells in the retina (see Figure 1). Cells lining the retina contain a photosensitive protein molecule called rhodopsin. A molecule is considered ‘photosensitive’ if it contains a reactive part of the molecule (called a moiety) that changes in shape and configuration when stimulated by light (see Figure 2). This initial change in the shape of the rhodopsin protein, induced by photons of light, causes a series of complex cellular events (explained in detail below) that eventually lead to a stimulus that is sent to the visual cortex of the brain and interpreted as an image. This cycle was elucidated by Dr. George 2 Although as a biologist for nearly twenty-five years I have elucidated similar typological analyses for many cellular and biological mechanisms, I have chosen this one for the purposes of our discussion here. The reason is that this mechanism is complex, yet easily understood by non-scientists or those with a basic understanding of biology. In addition, the natural typology parallels Edwards’ use of Light and vision as powerful types supported by Scripture. This type reflects the basic spiritual truth of redemption and transformation in Christ as the light of the world, which should, for the most part, be familiar to Christians and non-Christians alike.

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Wald (1906–1997) for which he received the Nobel Prize in 1967. Even though this is a complex, multi-step mechanism (as we shall see below) the mechanism holds an overarching typological message: • Type: In the mammalian visual system, light enters the eye, encounters the rhodopsin photoreceptor protein, a transformation occurs which sets in motion a complex cascade of steps signaling the brain, perception is changed, leading to sight. • Antitype: Christ (the light) enters into the life and encounters the mind. A complex spiritual process of transformation occurs in the heart of the individual, which causes an eternal perception change leading to salvation. The broad overarching scheme of the mechanism typologically conveys one grand Edwardsean type, that is, that created light was made to figure the Uncreated Light in bringing a change of vision, from darkness to light, or from spiritual darkness to the light of Christ. As Edwards says, ”The Son is as the brightness and glory of the disk of the sun or that bright and glorious form under which it appears to our eyes” (WJE 21, 138). Although this overarching natural type is simple, and even elegant, one wonders if the stepwise details constituting the mechanistic process itself might also offer typological meaning? How far down into the structures of the mechanisms might God emanate/communicate knowledge and glory of the divine Self into the creation? Using Edwardsean perception, we dig deeply, paying attention to details at every level. In order to explore the depth of typological learning, we follow Edwards’ lead. Just as Edwards consulted the scientific texts of the day seeking God for revelation of himself, here we proceed with the biological background of our mechanism at hand and see if it might be ladened with typological insight and meaning.

Biological Background: The Mechanism of Mammalian Vision The mechanism we are about to explore is considered a complex second messenger system in cell biology. Second messenger systems in both plant and animal cells refer to a complex multi-step chain reaction mechanism that functionally changes cell physiology from one state to another. Typically, second messenger systems can “turn on” or activate a cellular process that was previously inactive. One example would be the binding of growth hormone to receptors on the surface of bone and muscle cells during childhood activating musculoskeletal growth. Cells activated to grow will continue in the active state until there is a signal telling the cell to stop cell division. In the case of musculoskeletal growth, activation stops when the hormone ceases to be produced sometime in late adolescence (Marieb; 2016, Chapter 16). Similarly, the mecha-

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nism of sight in the mammalian visual system is a complex second messenger mechanism where light is the activator “turning on” or activating a cellular process leading to a signal transmitted to the visual cortex of the brain, giving spatial and temporal perception. The organism can “see” what information the photon was carrying. This is an unusual mechanism biologically since for most plant and animal cells, the initiator in signal transduction mechanisms typically involves a chemical substance (a protein molecule called a ligand) binding to a protein receptor, such as growth hormone and the growth hormone receptor in the example given above. In the visual system, however, light itself is the initiator of the cascade of events leading to the sensory perception of vision in the organism, which, biologically speaking, is crucial for survival. The physical properties of light contribute to this all-important function. At the quantum level, light is composed of photons which are unique among quantum structures. Photons, as energy-carrying units, are similar to electrons in that they have a wave nature, but also have a mass and occupy space as a particle similar to protons. Classical and well-established experiments in physics, such as the Photoelectric Effect and the Compton Effect3, have confirmed the particle theory of light. In this way, light behaves as a particle much like that of any subatomic particle. However, Young’s double slit experiment on interference and diffraction have also equally confirmed the wave theory of light indicating that light behaves as a wave, much like other forms of energy such as electromagnetic energy4. Thus, a conundrum exists where photons of light are fully particle and 3 The Compton Effect, discovered in 1923 by Arthur Holly Compton (for which he was granted the 1927 Nobel Prize), showed that a collision of photons with a target causes the release of bound electrons from the outer shell of atoms in the target. The scattered radiation from the collision also produced a shift in wavelength that could not be explained in terms of classical wave theory. The combination of these two phenomena (electrons emitted from a substance after photon bombardment and a shift in the energy state of the wavelength of light) supported Einstein’s photon theory indicating that light possessed both a wave nature and a particle nature. Likewise the photoelectric effect demonstrates that energy can be transferred from a photon to material substrates resulting in elevating an electron to a higher energy state. This can only be accomplished if the photon has both wave and particle properties, known as discrete wave packets. Since photons consist in two co-equal “natures” or properties, this is referred to as the wave-particle duality of light. 4 Thomas Young in 1801 (note this is a century before quantum mechanics) performed an experiment that supported the wave theory of light. In the original version of this experiment, a concentrated light source shines on a plate pierced by two parallel slits. The light passing through the slits is observed on a screen behind the plate. The wave nature of light causes the light waves passing through the two slits to interfere, producing bright and dark bands on the screen, This result demonstrated classic wave behavior and would not be expected if light consisted of “classical” particles. Young’s Double Slit experiment (and many others after) combined with quantum experiments such as the Compton and Photoelectric Effects, have led to the Photon Theory of Light stating that photons are not “classical” particles, but possess a dual wave/particle nature that can be explained by each set of experiments.

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fully wave. The conundrum was settled by taking all of these experiments into account and affirming that photons have a dual nature- referred to as the waveparticle duality. Neils Bohr proposed his famous Principle of Complementarity allowing for a co-equal state of properties in wave and the particle aspects of light (Giancole; 1995, 782). Photons, having a dual wave-particle nature, are able to interact with specialized photo-sensitive protein molecules found throughout nature. They are commonly known as pigments or photoreceptors. These proteins have highly specialized domains configured with the correct amino acid composition and three-dimensional configuration to react when they encounter photons. Photons binding to these domains in photoreceptor molecules causes a transfer of energy and information: the “wave” nature passes energy to the molecule thus converting light energy into chemical energy, and the particle nature interacts with the amino acid binding domain which causes a three-dimensional transformation in the shape of the receptor molecule. It is the interaction of light with the photoreceptor molecule that initiates the signal transduction cascade. In the mammalian eye, the retina, a thin tissue, is composed of rod cells and cone cells required for vision. Rod cells function in black, white, and grey scale vision, and dim light vision, while cone cells are responsible for color vision. One way to determine if an animal has color vision or not is the presence or absence of cone cells, respectively. We will focus on the rod cells since the cell biology and the signal transduction pathway have been elucidated in these cells.5 As shown in Figure 1, rod cells are elongated cells in the retina that contain unique intracellular organelles called “membrane shelves” or disks (Figure 1; see also Figures 3 and 4). These stacked membranes are lined with millions of transmembrane photoreceptor proteins that are poised and ready to receive the photon signal that will activate the cascade of molecular events leading to sight. The process begins with the transmembrane photoreceptor protein, rhodopsin. The structure of rhodopsin consists of seven transmembrane domains with flanking intracellular and extracellular domains (see Figure 1). The extracellular loops comprise the photon-binding domain, or the receptor’s active site for activation (see Figure 2). Rhodopsin can exist in one of two conformational states:6 Conformation 1 (C-1) and Conformation 2 (C-2) 5 For excellent discussion of the biological mechanism, please see the following sources: Harvey Lodish and Arnold Berk, Molecular Biology of the Cell, 8th ed. (New York: W.H. Freeman Publishers, 2016) 760–755; Thomas Ebrey and Yiannis Koutalos, ”Vertebrate Photoreceptors,” Progress in Retinal and Eye Research 20 (2001): 49–94; Ilya Leskov et al., ”The Gain of Rod Phototransduction: Reconciliation of Biochemical and Electrophysiological Measurements,” Neuron 27 no. 3: 525–537. 6 A conformational state refers to the overall three-dimensional shape of the protein molecule.

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(see Figure 3, step 1; rhodopsin is labelled O for conformation 1 and O* for conformation 2). C-1 is the 3-dimensional configuration of rhodopsin in the dark-adapted state, before the photon of light has reached it, and thus cannot supply the cascade of events necessary for vision. C-2 is the state of rhodopsin after the photon of light has activated it. When light enters the eye, photons bind to the extracellular photon-binding loops, inciting a conformational change in the structure of rhodopsin from the C-1 to the C-2 state, the activated form of the molecule. This conformational change is a cis-trans linearization of the retinal moiety of the molecule (see Figure 2) causing downstream effects in the opposite side of the rhodopsin molecule. This light-induced conformational change to the C-2 form exposes the binding domain necessary for the next step in the cascade: The G-protein second messenger activation process. Gproteins represent a superfamily of activator enzymes in all cell types that bind to the cofactor GTP, converting it to GDP. The GTP to GDP transition initiates the second messenger system that will lead to cell activation (or in some cases, inactivation). All G-proteins are a tri-peptide complex system consisting of three protein units: a Gα subunit and a di-peptide Gβ/Gγ subunit. In inactivated rod cells (that is–in the dark), the Gα subunit and the Gβ/Gγ subunits reside separately, in the unbound state, in the disk membrane. Upon activation (in this case, when rhodopsin is converted to the C-2 state), the Gα subunit binds to the Gβ/Gγ subunits forming the tri-peptide GαGβ/Gγ which is the activated state of the super-molecule where the GTP-GDP transitions takes place. Rod cells use this G-protein second messenger activation process to effectuate vision where light binding to rhodopsin is the first step in activating this cascade. Thus, once rhodopsin is activated by light, it changes to the C-2 configuration. This opens up the active site on rhodopsin in order for Gα to bind. This molecular ionic bonding causes an immediate conformational change in Gα, allowing Gβ/ Gγ binding. Once in the activated tri-peptide GαGβ/Gγ state, GTP binds to the Gprotein complex (see Figure 3 Step 2–3). The activated GαGβ/Gγ with bound GTP is now in the proper configuration to bind to the next molecule in the cascade. Figure 3 shows the next molecule in the disk membrane, PDE (phosphodiesterase), which also exists in an inactive form (in the dark-adapted state) and an active form (in the light). In the inactive form, PDE is bound with two smaller identical inhibitory polypeptides denoted as γ (shown in Figure 3, step 3, in yellow). These two γ inhibitors are bound to the next molecule in the chain called PDE. The γ inhibitors prevent PDE from carrying out its function (described below) in the dark. However, in the presence of light, the activated GαGβ/Gγ-GTP protein binds to the inhibitory γ proteins on PDE (note the stoichiometry requires two GαGβ/Gγ-GTP proteins in the membrane for every one inactive PDE molecule with its two inhibitory γ proteins; see Figure 3, step 4).

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Once the inhibitory γ proteins are removed from PDE, it is activated to perform the most crucial step in the cascade. In the dark-adapted state (no light) the rod cell accumulates a high level of the cofactor cGMP (cyclic GMP) in the cytoplasm of the cell, approximately as high as 70μM. High levels of cGMP (in the dark) function in the cell to keep Na+/ Ca2+ gated ion channels in the rod cell membrane open, thus Na+ and Ca2+ions flow down their concentration gradients into the cell. This results in a depolarization of the rod cell membrane,7 in this case shutting off the neurotransmitter signal to the optic nerve. This is precisely why we cannot see objects in the dark, even though the objects are right in front of us or are in our field of view. In the light, the signal pathways to the brain open in order for transmission of light-induced visual signals to reach the visual cortex of the brain. Once the PDE inhibitors are removed, PDE can resume its enzymatic function of converting the cyclic form of GMP (cGMP) to the linear form of GMP (see Figure 3, step 5). Within a nanosecond timescale, levels of cGMP are decreased more than a thousand-fold in the cytoplasm. Without the high levels of cGMP, Na+/ Ca2+gated ion channels in the rod cell membrane close, (see Figure 3, step 6) resulting in a hyperpolarization of the rod cell membrane, thus opening the signal to the optic nerve. Thus, in the light, inhibitors are removed in order for the signal to be transmitted to the visual cortex of the brain, and perception is fully functional. When the lights are turned out, rhodopsin returns to the inactive C-1 state and the cascade is shut down. The GαGβ/Gγ-GTP protein hydrolyzes GTP to GDP and the subunits separate. Without GαGβ/Gγ-GTP protein present, the γ inhibitors re-bind to PDE, levels of cGMP begin to elevate in the cytoplasm, and Na+/ Ca2+ gated ion channels in the rod cell membrane open, resulting in depolarization of the rod cell membrane, shutting off neurotransmitter signal to the optic nerve. Thus, there is no perceived sight in darkness, even though the objects before our

7 The terms depolarization and hyperpolarization refer to the cellular effects of movement of charged atoms across the cell membrane. This change is measured electrically in the membrane potential. The resting membrane potential of a cell can be measured with microelectrodes at –70mV. When charged atoms (typically Na+, K+, or Ca2+) move across a cell membrane, through a protein molecule in the membrane called a gated ion channel, the interior of the cell becomes more positively charged, measuring as high as +30mV. This change from the resting membrane potential of –70mV to +30mV is called depolarization and is typically the activation cue in neurons to release neurotransmitter for neurological transmission. However, rod cells use a slight variation of this cellular paradigm. In the dark-adapted state, rod cells have a resting membrane potential of +30mV due to the open Na+/ Ca2+ gated ion channel, flooding the cell with positive charges. However, in the light, the entrance of these ions into the cell is closed, resulting in a decrease of the membrane potential to ~–80mV (note this is a bit lower than the typical resting membrane potential of –70mV) resulting in an activated state called hyperpolarization. It is the hyperpolarization in rod cells that allows transmission of the signal to the optic nerve, and on to the visual cortex of the brain.

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eyes are fully present. Objects cannot be registered in the brain through the visual senses in the absence of light. For ease, here is a summary of the basic cascade of the visual mechanism step by step: 1. Light enters the eye and hits the retina of the eye 2. Photons bind to the extracellular loop of rhodopsin in the C-1 state 3. Input of photon energy causes the cis to trans linearization of the retinal moiety on the extracellular loop of rhodopsin 4. This transition causes a molecular change to the activated C-2 state 5. Rhodopsin in the C-2 state can bind to Ga in the membrane, which in turn changes conformation allowing Gb/Gg binding 6. Activated GaGb/Gg binds to GTP. The fully activated GaGb/Gg-GTP complex binds to the gPDE inhibitors. The gPDE inhibitors fall off PDE. 7. With the gPDE inhibitors removed, PDE can linearize cGMP to GMP. 8. Reduction of high cGMP concentrations in the cytoplasm closes Na+/ Ca2+ gated ion channels resulting in a hyperpolarization of the rod cell membrane, thus opening the signal to the optic nerve. Sight is achieved. 9. In the dark, rhodopsin returns to the inactive C-1 conformation and each step is reversed. Details of Typology of the Visual System Prefiguring the Light of Christ Leading to Salvation The mechanism above describes the molecular transition that occurs in an organism from the condition of the dark-adapted state to the light-adapted state. This process is vital for survival and allows the organism to live and function in the manner for which, biologically speaking, it is intended. In Edwardsean thinking, the condition from darkness to light has spiritual implications for the soul of the individual. Typologically, this mechanism becomes a possible case study for applying Edwards’ lessons, paying close attention to the finer details to reveal whether they hold typological meaning. In the most general sense, the overall mechanism itself suggests analogical significance as Edwards was careful to acknowledge its biblical roots in many sermons, discourses, treatises, and most notably in The End of Creation. Edwards understood the physical transition from darkness to light to typify, as revealed in Scripture, the antitype of the transition from spiritual darkness to salvation through the light of Christ. This is a foundational concept in the Christian faith. For example, one of the most dramatic moments ushering in the earthly ministry of Jesus of Nazareth was recorded in Matthew’s Gospel as fulfilling the prophesy, “The people sitting in darkness have seen a great light; and to those sitting in the region and shadow of death, to them light has risen” (Matthew 4:16). This passage taken from Isaiah 9:2 offers insight into two conditions of the human experience: living in darkness,

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and seeing the light. The meaning of this passage, first from Isaiah as a prophesy, then fulfilled in the New Testament, is that Jesus of Nazareth, the Christ, entered into the realm of humanity and was that very light, bringing humankind out of spiritual darkness and into the light of life.8 Light is used frequently throughout Scripture as a natural type pointing to the antitype of the illumination and revelation of God, his ways, his character, his transforming truth, his Son, and his glory.9 It is for this reason that Edwards so frequently drew from this type in his sermons, treatises and discourses for illustrative analogies of the illumination of God’s divine truth.10 Thus, light as a natural type lends a rich and fruitful example as a case study for our hypothesis of consonance, since Scripture itself esteems this analogous type as an all-important image, pointing to spiritual illumination. Darkness, in contrast, is the absence of light, and is used throughout Scripture to denote spiritual blindness in those who do not know God, those who do not follow God’s ways. Drawing from the discussion exploring an onto-typology, how might we understand the significance of this mechanism, and of created light itself ? One way, among the many ways of interpreting such natural images, might be to say that God intended to create light as we know it in the physical world with properties that figure God’s knowledge and glory, prefiguring the Uncreated Light.11 For example, as physical light acts upon photoreceptors throughout nature to elicit transformation, the correlative antitype that might follow is that spiritual light (knowledge of God’s glory) also falls upon those receptive to the light of God, and thusly are transformed spiritually. In such a worked example, we attempt to determine if types extend down into the individual components, beginning with the physics of light itself, and through each molecular step in the pathway. It is enticing to extend into the details of the mechanism of the mammalian visual system to see if we can find Edwardsean lessons there as well, revealing natural 8 Similarly, the words attributed to Christ in John 8:12 tell us “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” There is an answer, a solution to the problem of human darkness, sin, misery, and despair. Jesus of Nazareth, as the fulfillment of God’s revelation in bodily form, is typified in Scripture as the “true light” (John 1:9) and the “Light of the World” (John 8:12; 9:5; 12:46). He was born during the night watch (Luke 2:8), the time when darkness was the deepest and most intense. Moreover, the Incarnation of the Son was the fulfillment of prophesy, the antitype of all such references to the light shining in the darkness (John 1:5), the glory of the Lord that shined (Luke 2:9); a light so illuminous that the darkness has not overcome it (John 1:5), and it enlightens all (John 1:9). 9 There are far too many references in Scripture to give an exhaustive list here, but a few examples include, 2 Samuel 22:29, Psalm 18:28, Psalm 17:1, Isaiah 60:19–20, Micah 7:8, John 1:9, John 12:46, I John 1:5–7. 10 I refer the reader to the previous chapter for numerous examples of Edwards’ use of light as a type in the End of Creation, in treatises, discourses, sermons and in Shadows of Divine Things. 11 As the writer of 1 John conveys, “God is light; in him there is no darkness at all.”

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types and antitypes pointing to the process of transformation from spiritual darkness into the light of Christ.12 As stated above, the overarching typological message would be as follows: • Type: In the mammalian visual system, light enters the eye, encounters the rhodopsin transmembrane photoreceptor protein, a transformation occurs which sets in motion a complex mechanism signaling the brain, perception is changed, leading to sight. • Antitype: Christ (the light) enters into the life and encounters the mind. A complex spiritual process of transformation occurs, which causes an eternal perception change leading to salvation. At this stage of the analysis, we can apply the four criteria presented earlier to see if we are on the right track:13 Criterion 1: In the type/antitype above, the factual nature of a) light is preserved such that the intended meaning to illuminate remains, but is only different in relation (physical illumination versus spiritual illumination, and b) the photoreceptor system prefiguring reception of the illumination is preserved in that light (physical or spiritual) will induce a transformation. Criterion 2: There is a rigorous correspondence between the natural type of a) light and its corresponding antitype of God’s Glory, and b) photoreceptor system leading to a transformation, and the human life transformed by receiving the light of Christ. Criterion 3: There is a chronological or systematized prefiguring in that the person walking in darkness prefigures the illumination of the light of Christ followed by transformation by the light of Christ. Criterion 4: This type/antitype strongly conveys biblical truth regarding God’s plan of salvation in Christ.

12 I am thinking here of the words of Jesus in John 12:46, “I have come into the world as a light, so that no one who believes in me should stay in darkness.” 13 By way of reminder, the four criteria are: 1. In an onto- type/antitype, the factual nature of the item in question remains such that the meaning and use of the word, person, object or situation does not change, it is only different in its relation. 2. There must be a rigorous correspondence between the onto-type and its corresponding antitype, not just a mere resemblance. 3. There must be a chronological or systematized prefiguring or foreshadowing of the ontotype to its corresponding antitype. 4. The onto-type/antitype must convey truth regarding knowledge of God as affirmed in scripture.

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Thus far, it seems that this type/antitype satisfies all four criteria, so we can move to the next step of analysis: examining each step in the mechanisms to see if the typology holds across the cascade of events leading to the type/antitype of illumination and transformation. In order to begin, let us be reminded of each component of the system that will be defined as natural types (see Table V). These components are: light comprised of dual-natured photons; rhodopsin molecule C-1 and C-2; G-protein consisting of a) Gα subunit and the dipeptide Gβ/Gγ subunit and b) the activated Gα Gβ/Gγ subunit; γPDE inhibitors; PDE, cGMP; GMP; Na+/ Ca2+ gated ion channels; membrane polarization change; and the final signal sent to the optic nerve and to the visual cortex. For clarity, we will refer to Table III and to Figure 4 in the following discussion.

Light To initiate the mechanism, a photon of light enters the eye and interacts with a rhodopsin molecule in the disc membrane of the rod cell. This light activates the rhodopsin photoreceptor and causes a conformational change in the protein structure. In this way, light is a type of Christ (see Table III, and Figure 4, upper left aspect labeled “Light”).14 There are some very interesting typological prefigurings in “created light” that point to the antitype of Christ, the “Uncreated Light.” For example, as we have seen above, photons as fundamental units of visible light possess a dual nature: fully particle and fully wave. Light as a type of Christ extends down to the quantum level since as photons have a dual nature – wave and particle – so Christ has a dual nature – divine and human. The wave quality of the photon might represent a type of the divinity of Christ and the particle nature of the photon the physical, material aspect of Christ’s humanity. Just as created light illuminates the creature to the world around, being able to see, apprehend, and understand all manner of visual objects and visual stimuli, so the light of Christ illuminates the creature to the spiritual world, giving spiritual sight and enlightenment in order to see, apprehend, and understand the things of God, the ways of God, the knowledge and glory of God and the salvation of God.

14 The following are several Scripture references to Christ typified by light: John 8:12, “When Jesus spoke again to the people, he said, I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” cf. John 1:4–5, 2 Corinthians 4:4–6, Ephesians 5:14.

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Rhodopsin The photoreceptor that receives the initial photon of light in this system, Rhodopsin is a natural type of the human mind (Table III, Figure 4, Step 1). The human mind acts as the receptor to receive the knowledge of God in the light of Christ as the rhodopsin photoreceptor in its inactive state receives the photon. The human mind, out of all the creatures on earth, has the correct configuration to receive the knowledge of God in the light of Christ, in a similar way as the rhodopsin molecule has the correct molecular configuration out of all other biological molecules to receive the photon of light leading to sight. As we have seen above, the rhodopsin molecule can exist in two conformational states, C-1 and C-2. The C-1 state represents rhodopsin in the dark-adapted state, before the photon of light has reached it, and thus cannot supply the cascade of events necessary for vision or perception. Thus, the rhodopsin molecule in the C-1 state is a type of the unregenerate mind represented within people who do not know Christ, who have not encountered the fullness of the attributes of God and the saving grace of Christ.15 Although all of the necessary components are present, these individuals are bound in their darkened state, blinded to the things of God. However, going from darkness into light, the photons of light interact with the active photoreceptor site on rhodopsin C-1 – prefiguring the light of Christ interacting with the unregenerate mind – causing the conformational change in the molecule to produce the C-2 state. This transformation from the C-1 to the C2 state as a result of photon binding prefigures Christ who is our light illuminating the mind to the knowledge of truth.16 The unregenerate mind can certainly know many aspects of morality and virtue, and can know of Christ, but as Edwards affirms in the End of Creation, it is the regenerate mind in the fullness of the light of Christ that attains to the truest fulfillment of virtue in humanity (WJE 8, 531). This is typified by C-2. Just as C-1 serves a very important purpose, it is not fulfilling its most excellent purpose of providing vision until it has interacted with light. Thus, rhodopsin C-2 is a type representing the antitype of the regenerate mind fulfilling its full purposes in salvation in Christ.17

15 See Romans 8:5, “Those who live according to the flesh have their minds set on what the flesh desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires.” Cf. Ephesians 4:18, Romans 1:21. 16 Refer to the following are Scripture references: 1 Timothy 2:4, “who wants all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth.” cf. 2 Timothy 2:25, 2 Timothy 3:7. 17 Refer to the following Scripture references: 2 Corinthians 4:6, “For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of God’s glory displayed in the face of Christ.” cf. 2 Peter 3:18.

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Moreover, mutations in the rhodopsin gene account for up to 40 % of blindness cases including the disease retinitis pigmentosa.18 There are many mechanisms of retinal degeneration attributed to rhodopsin mutations that involve aberrant functions of rhodopsin. Without proper functioning of rhodopsin in the photoreceptor rod cells vision is not possible. In a similar way, an unregenerate mind leads to spiritual death, similar to a mutated rhodopsin photoreceptor leads to retinal death and blindness. Said another way, mutation in the rhodopsin photoreceptor which leads to retinal degeneration is remedied by extreme measures such as retinal transplant, so individuals who are firmly fixed in their opposition to Christianity, much like a mutated protein is fixed in its conformation, would require an extreme measure of an experience of the divine to lead to a regenerate mind.

G-protein As a result of the conformational change to rhodopsin C-2, Gα is capable of binding to the newly exposed active site. As stated above, the G-protein complex exists in the inactive form in the darkness, as the separate Gα subunit and the Gβ/ Gγ subunits. The natural type of the inactive G protein subunits represent the antitype of spiritual truth, which can only be apprehended once the light of Christ enables the mind to comprehend it (Table III, Figure 4 step 2). In this typological representation, just as the inactive G protein is always present in the membrane, the truth is always present in the world, accessible to the intellect. The type represented by the inactive Gα subunit and the Gβ/Gγ subunits may represent disjointed, unregenerate intellectual truth of morality present in the human mind, inactive to the spiritual things of God, and not leading to salvation of the soul. Just as the Gα subunit and the Gβ/Gγ subunits are present in the darkadapted state, so an intellectual concept of right and wrong is present even in the unregenerate life. Morality is present in the human soul but is not fully revealed in the mind until it is changed by the knowledge of God through the light of Christ. The antitype of the capability of morality is present, typified by the representation of inactive subunits present and waiting in the disk membrane. This is itself a type pointing to the spiritual antitype of God’s laws being written on the hearts of humans, ready and waiting.19 It is only when the light of Christ enters that intellectual truth of God’s saving grace, already written on the hearts 18 For a comprehensive discussion see, Andreas Gal, et al., “Rhodopsin mutations in inherited retinal dystrophies and dysfunctions,” Progress in Retinal and Eye Research 16, (1997): 51–79. 19 As it says in Romans 2:15 “They show that the requirements of the law are written on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness,” cf. Jeremiah 31:33

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of individuals, is activated into saving truth. In the type representing the rhodopsin-G-protein activation step, it is the photon of light that activates rhodopsin, which in turn activates the union of the GαGβ/Gγ subunits, pointing to the antitype of transformation of mere moral truth into the saving truth of the Gospel. This is accomplished by the work of the Holy Spirit in illuminating the light of Christ to the human mind.20 The activated GαGβ/Gγ super-molecule is now in the form to act upon the inhibitors bound to PDE. This type prefigures the antitype of the saving truth of Christ, through the work of the Holy Spirit, acting upon the inhibitors in a person’s heart and mind, attitudes and behaviors, keeping the individual in the dark.21

γPDE Inhibitors and PDE The next step in the model involves the functional GαGβ/Gγ molecule to remove the γ Inhibitors from the PDE molecule. In this type/antitype construct, the γ Inhibitors represent blinders inhibiting the heart, where the heart is typified by the PDE molecule (Table III, Figure 4, step 3). The γ Inhibitors bound to PDE in the system are a natural type that prefigures the antitype of spiritual blinders in the darkened heart that inhibit the knowledge of Christ and living the Christian life.22 Scripture offers many examples of spiritual blinders that are present in an unregenerate life.23 Scripture attests that spiritual blinders, hindrances, and inhibitors are present that need to be removed by the light of Christ, through the power of the Holy Spirit, for transformation unto salvation to take place. For the sake of our analysis, spiritual inhibitors, or blinders, are typified by the γ Inhibitors. The heart in spiritual darkness is typified by PDE with the γ Inhibitors bound. Likewise, the PDE molecule with the inhibitors removed is a typological

20 This is indicated in John 16:13, “But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all the truth.” 21 Just as the words of Christ teach in John 16:8 “And when he (the Advocate) comes, he will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment.” 22 This is depicted in Ephesians 4:18, “They are darkened in their understanding and separated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardening of their hearts.” 23 For example, the Apostle Paul states in 2 Corinthians 4:4, “The god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that they cannot see the light of the gospel that displays the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.”

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representation of the regenerated heart (Table III, Figure 4, step 4), now free of the bonds of sin, saved by the grace of God in Christ.24 Therefore, in sum, the natural type at this stage of the mechanism is represented first in the dark-adapted state by the inactive PDE molecule with its inhibitors bound. This points to the antitype of the unregenerate heart before the light of Christ, with inhibitors preventing the saving knowledge of Christ and living a redeemed life. The type continues such that in the light-adapted state, GαGβ/Gγ removes the γ Inhibitors from the PDE molecule. This prefigures the antitype of truth leading to salvation, as a result of the light of Christ as appropriated to the heart by the work of the Holy Spirit, thus removing blinders and inhibitors from the unregenerate heart. Once removed, the activated PDE molecule is free, pointing to the antitype of freedom in the regenerate heart that is now a “new creation in Christ.”25

cGMP to Linear GMP With the inhibitors gone, PDE is activated and can now perform its all-important function: converting cGMP (cyclic GMP) to linear GMP. cGMP is a type denoting the cycle of sinful and unregenerate human behaviors (Table III, Figure 4, step 5, lower box).26 Analogous to the biological model, cGMP levels increase in the dark-adapted state, typifying the sinful attitudes and behaviors that increase in a life in spiritual darkness. The linearization of cGMP to GMP by the now freed and activated PDE is a type pointing to the antitype of how the change in the heart induced by the light of Christ leads to straightening of old behaviors, attitudes, and patterns. Just as in the light-adapted state cGMP levels dramatically drop in the rod cell, so these attitudes, behaviors, actions, and patterns will decrease in the life regenerated by salvation in Christ through the process of sanctification. The saving truth of Christ removes the evidences of the old self with its passions and desires.27 24 This is given in John 8:32, where Christ proclaims, “If you continue in My word, you are truly my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” 25 As the Apostle Paul says in 2 Corinthians 5:17, “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!” 26 The Apostle Paul states the evidences of the sinful cycle of the old life in behaviors, attitudes, and desires in Galatians 5:19–25, “Now the deeds of the flesh are evident, which are: immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, envying, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these, of which I forewarn you, just as I have forewarned you, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.” 27 As stated above in Galatians 5:24 “Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.” The Apostle Paul distinguishes the transformation of a life after

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Another interesting aspect of the analysis at this point in the mechanism indicates that if light is diminished in the visual system, cGMP levels will immediately increase. This could be typified by a situation when the light of Christ is diminished in the life of the believer (such that the believer no longer walks in faith) oftentimes unregenerate behaviors begin to increase once again (similar to the type of cGMP levels increasing when the light is removed).28 As darkness in the visual system diminishes visual perception, and can lead to danger and harm to the individual, so spiritual darkness in the life of the believer without continuing in the light of Christ through spiritual practice, worship, prayer, Scripture reading and so on, diminishes spiritual perception and affects spiritual growth in faith.29 At this point in the typological mechanism, the cascade of events is underway, leading to the re-polarization of the rod cell membrane leading to perception in the visual system, as well as the antitype model pointing to a re-polarization of perception of a life toward God.

Na+/ Ca2+ Gated Ion Channels In the next step of the visual mechanism, as the cGMP levels decrease, gated ion channels that require cGMP to function will close. Thus, closing Na+ and Ca2+ gated ion channels in the rod cell membrane decreases Na+ and Ca2+ concentrations in the cell, leading to visual perception and sight in the individual. The natural type of Na+/ Ca2+ represent sinful desires in the individual. In the light of Christ, desire for sin is diminished in the life of the believer, resulting in spiritual sight just as in the light-adapted state Na+/ Ca2+ ions are diminished in the rod cell resulting in physical sight. Conversely, in the dark-adapted state of the visual system, high levels of Na+/Ca2+ in the cell prevent stimulus to the brain, and there is no vision. Likewise, the antitype of the desires of darkness, such as murder, theft, adultery, and so on, are elevated in the life of the person in darkness, the saving knowledge of Christ in the Spirit in Galatians 5:22–24 “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. Now those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit.” 28 At this point, such typology could lead into a discussion of predestination and losing one’s salvation. However, to avoid side-tracking into a Calvin-Armenian debate, I restrict this discussion here to behaviors, actions, and attitudes that reflect spiritual growth by walking in the light of Christ, or not. 29 This is supported by 1 John 1:7, where believers are admonished to remain in the light of Christ, “But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin.”

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leading to no spiritual vision or perception.30 In the dark, as indicated in Scripture, sinful desires from within the individual are present without restraint. Here we see a typological representation of presence of the desires or cravings of the unregenerate life, when one is in darkness.31 The typology of the reduction of Na+ and Ca2+ ions in the light-adapted state represents how sin is diminished in the presence of the light of Christ. By keeping sinful desires under the control of Christ, our spiritual vision is opened and we can perceive spiritual realities. However, just as Edwards pointed out in his many sermons, and in his treatise on Religious Affections, Christians while having the light of Christ, still struggle with sin. How can we account for this in our mechanism? The mechanism seems to connote an all-or-none situation; an open configuration leads to elevation of Na+ and Ca2+ ions in the darkness, which is completely diminished in the light. The antitype might then seem to imply that once an individual is in Christ the deeds of darkness are fully removed. However, Christians still struggle with sin.32 This might be accounted for in our mechanism by what is considered the dim-adapted state. In certain situations in dim light there can be high enough levels of cGMP to partially open the cGMP gated ion Na+/Ca2+channel allowing the ions to enter. This might be a typological representation of areas of the believer’s life that are still in partial darkness (dimness) thus representing an ongoing struggle against sin.33 There is a type/antitype parallel in the situation of the dim adapted state where there is just enough light to allow some vision, but enough darkness to keep the levels of Na+ and Ca2+ elevated to cut off full vision. Scripture attests to the struggle with sin, even after the light of Christ has entered the life of the believer, yet spiritual growth is limited with the persistence of sin. As there is a gradient in the visual system from complete darkness, to ranging levels of dim light, to full light, so in spiritual illumination there is a range of “walking in the light” in the lives of various believers in their own process of spiritual growth and sanctification in the faith.

30 This may be corroborated by the words of Christ in Mark 7:20, “He went on: “What comes out of a person is what defiles them. For it is from within, out of a person’s heart, that evil thoughts come – sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance and folly. All these evils come from inside and defile a person.” 31 This is also supported by Ephesians 2:3, “All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our flesh, and following its desires and thoughts.” 32 Hebrews 12:4, “In your struggle against sin, you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood.” 33 The Apostle Paul attests to his own struggle with sin as part of the sanctification process, in Romans 7:23, “For in my inner being I delight in God’s Law. But I see another law at work in my body, warring against the law of my mind and holding me captive to the law of sin that dwells within me. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?”

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Depolarization and Hyperpolarization of the Rod Cell Membrane Resulting in Transduction of Visual Signal to the Brain As we continue with the final step in the mechanism of the visual system, the reduction of Na+ and Ca2+ concentrations causes a change in membrane potential of the rod cell. The membrane which was depolarized in the dark-adapted state becomes hyperpolarized in the presence of light. This hyperpolarization results in neurotransmitter release at the synapse resulting in a signal transduction to the optic nerve and on to the visual cortex of the brain where vision is interpreted and understood. The information carried initially by the photons of light is now perceived as a developed/perfected image. The change in polarization typifies the change in polarization of the life of the believer who now has spiritual sight and insight, and is “saved” by grace, through faith as a result of the Light of Christ. Just as in this model, the sequence of events could not have been accomplished by the will of the individual, but only if the gift of light was present. Precisely where in the mechanism the representation of actual salvation takes place is still somewhat unclear to me. Just as theologically we believe that we are “saved by grace, through faith” (Ephesians 2:8), yet precisely when and where it is in an individual’s life that one is “saved” resides only in the mystery and governance of God, and God alone. If I were to offer a guess, the typology of salvation might best be represented when the G-protein, now activated, removes the γ PDE Inhibitors, in the presence of light, in order for physical sight to take place. This step typifies, as described above, the removal of habitual sin. The bondage of sin is broken in the Light of Christ, leading to a regenerate heart, now open to spiritual sight. This sight is a type of the spiritual sight that we are granted through Christ, by the power of the Holy Spirit, as a free gift of God the Father. In this way, we can see the Trinity represented. Coming full-circle now, it has been the explicit goal to determine if indeed vestigia trinitatis is revealed in the mechanisms of nature. If this can be established, then we have proven the hypothesis of consonance in the revelation of God in Scripture and the revelation of God in nature. Thus, the mammalian visual system (representing a complex mechanism in cell biology) was used as a case study to examine the hypothesis of consonance in order to examine just how far typological ideas can be formed. We explored the Edwardsean method of natural typology against a set of criteria and alongside the standard of Scripture to see if indeed a consonance or unified revelation of a Trinitarian God might be represented in the “things that have been made” all the way down to complex biochemical pathways. We used a mechanism that reflected the typology of light richly used by Edwards throughout the corpus of his works. In this analysis, drawing from Edwards’ original insight, each physical step of the mechanism seemed to convey typologically represented spiritual truths in a

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process that mirrored the process of redemption in Christ. Of course, Edwards did not have this detailed scientific information in his time. However, nearly three-hundred years later we can analyze this mechanism in a way that Edwards simply could not. The cascade of physical states of the system prefigured a cascade of spiritual states proposed in Scripture, i. e., leading one out of darkness and into the light of Christ. In the visual system model, the sequence of events could not have been accomplished by the will of the individual, but only if the gift of light was present. In this way, the mechanism prefigures salvation as the gift of God.34 The basic premise of the typological work presented here suggests that emanation of the knowledge and glory of God into the creation seems to extend all the way down as far as scientific discovery leads. In this way, God not only creates complex structures and mechanisms but also embeds within them shadows of divine things. It is suggested, then, that the natural types represented in the rhodopsin mechanism above are not arbitrarily assigned metaphors. Rather, it is proposed here that analogical types are ontological: these messages are intentionally embedded into the structures of the creation by a God who loves in order to communicate divine truths to the human heart and mind. Such truths can only be revealed by God. Types revealed in the rhodopsin mechanism suggest that God created a system that uses light in order for the creatures to see the world around them in order to enhance physical survival. At the same time, the physical system of vision, with each step in the cascade from rhodopsin all the way to the ion gated Na+/Ca2+ channel, was also created with the intent to be an analogue pointing to the spiritual transition of spiritual darkness to salvation in the light of Christ. What Edwards proposed using the science of his day, we have brought forth and shown to be extensible in contemporary science. Thus, our experiment reveals a consonance between God’s revelation of spiritual truths in his Word, and spiritual truths revealed in the structures of the physical world. Nature has something typologically to say of divine truths. With such consonance displayed, let us review in what capacity the Trinity is represented in this typological model. From the analysis above, we find each person of the Trinity revealed, in an Augustinian-type vestigia trinitatis. First, the Creator God, as part of the Original Ultimate End in creating embedded these truths into each step of the rhodopsin mechanism in order to communicate the ontological message of spiritual sight through the light of his Son. Christ is seen in the initiating step in the mechanism as typified by the light; comprised of the dual natured photon typifying the dual divine and human nature of Christ. Without 34 Ephesians 2:8–9, “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith – and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God – not by works, so that no one can boast.”

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the Light of Christ, there is no spiritual illumination leading to salvation. The third person of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit, is represented as transforming earthly moral truth to heavenly, eternal truth leading to salvation as typified by the Gα and Gβ/Gγ subunits transformed into the activated GαGβ/Gγ molecule. Thus, all three persons of the Trinity are represented in the mechanism. From this natural typological mechanism as a foundation, we begin the task of pursuing a constructive theology that might be applied to all of creation. Such a construct must also account for God’s divine action, in a Trinitarian way, to substantiate analogical types, and their use, in God’s plan for the world. Edwards’ typological method is thus applied to a contemporary biological mechanism revealing “shadows of divine things” embedded in the mechanism of the mammalian visual system. The mechanism satisfied the four criteria put forth for analytical typology and corroborated with the biblical Scriptures in prefiguring the spiritual truth of Christ as the “light of the world.” Visual sight through the photoreceptor cascade, initiated by rhodopsin, provided an analogical understanding of the transformation of spiritual darkness to spiritual “sight” given to the believer in Christ. With this one example undertaken, one wonders if such insight and revelation can be given for all mechanisms that comprise the natural realm? What myriad of hidden messages of the divine reality are there for the Spirit to reveal? In order to address these questions, an exploration into divine agency is needed to better grasp how such messages exist in terms of God’s original ultimate end in creating and God’s divine acting to carry it out. It is here that we draw forth from previous chapters to put together a constructive theology that can account for God’s intent in embedding natural types in the creation and revealing those to hearts and minds. The preceding chapters argued for a new species of a Theology of Nature, one that overcomes the inherent flaws in previous forms of Natural Theology. To be precise, first was the argument to turn “right side up” the God-world relation from an anthropocentric position to a theocentric one where God reaches to humankind in communication of God’s Self through the incarnate Son as revealed in Scripture, and the natural world. Perhaps typological messages emanated into the creation, such as in the rhodopsin mechanism, convey such a notion. The second corrective was to eliminate the view of science as a proof-text for the existence of God. What has been proposed here is that science, rather than “proving” the existence of God, is in the service of God revealing the ways in which God acts. Natural types in that scheme, then, are revealed to communicate the glories and excellencies of God through that which has been made. The view proposed here is one way toward achieving that end. As such, we have explored how knowledge of the natural world does indeed have something teleological to offer, and more. Nature was proposed to speak of the excellencies of the Creator, hence holding teleological significance. What is more is that what

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Table III. Types and Antitypes in the Mammalian Visual System Types Light

Antitypes Knowledge of God in Christ

Photons-wave/particle dual nature

Divine and human dual nature of Christ “activates” knowledge of God in recipient

Rhodopsin Molecule C-1

Mind

C-2 G-protein: Gα subunit Gβ/Gγ subunit GαGβ/Gγ subunit γ PDE Inhibitors PDE cGMP GMP

Scripture Psalm 119:105, Psalm 119:30, Matthew 4:16, John 8:12, John 12:35–37, Ephesians 5:14, 1 Peter 2:9, 1 John 5:9, John 1:1, John 8:12, John 8:58, John 9:35, John 10:30, John 20:28, Colossians 2:9, Romans 1:20

Romans 8:5 Ephesians 4:18, Romans 1:21 Mind in Spiritual darkness John 1:32, Corinthians 4:6, Ephesians 5:91, Timothy 2:4, Mind opened to the Light of 2 Timothy 2:25, 2 Timothy 3:7, 2 Christ Peter 3:18, 1 John 2:8, Truth: John 8:32 Romans 2:15, Jeremiah 31:33 Intellectual truth of morality John 16:8 Spiritual truth leading to salvation activated by the work of the Holy Spirit Old Self, attitudes, actions, spiritual blinders, sin Heart

Ephesians 4:22 Galatians 5:19–21 Ephesians 3:17–19

Habitual sin, behaviors in Galatians 5:19–21 darkness/generational patterns The cycle is broken, attitudes, Galatians 5:22–24 actions, behaviors are 2 Cor 5:17 straightened out

Na+/ Ca2+ gated ion channels Polarization Change

Desires/inflow and outflow of the heart Changed desires change actions

Galatians 5:17 Ephesians 2:3 Galatians 5:24

Signal Sent to the Optic Nerve and to Visual Cortex

Perception changed from flesh to spirit

Philippians 3:12, Galatians 5:16 2 Cor 4:6

nature speaks incorporates the totality of typological messages embedded therein by God, revealed to the creature in a continuous creation. In this way, nature is God’s acting. Affirming nature as God’s divine action in this way, this view embodies two crucial ideas. First, any revelation of the divine Self must be revealed by God, and God alone. Second, if a Theology of Nature is to be a Christian view, it must, in some form, reveal the triune God of Scripture. What

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could satisfy this need might be a model of nature that entails God’s original ultimate end, types embedded in nature, and revelation of those truths. This represents three unique modes of action by a triune God: willing, communicating, and revealing. Such a model is weighty enough to account for all of what nature is (structures and embedded messages), would draw on a view of divine action to allow for how God’s creative action takes place within a Trinitarian understanding of God.

Figure 1. Rhodopsin Positioned in the Membrane. Left: Model of the rod cell showing membrane discs. Right: 3-dimensional rendering of the seven membrane spanning regions of rhodopsin molecule in the lipid bilayer of the plasma membrane (http://www.calderglen.s-lanark.sch.uk/wpBiology/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/AH-2d-Dete cting-and-amplifying-and-enviromnmental-stimulus.pdf)

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Figure 2. Structures of Rhodopsin. A transition from the cis to the trans configuration of the retinal moiety in the presence of light, B) 3-Dimensional structure of the rhodopsin molecule in the cis configuration C) 3-Dimensional model of the rhodopsin molecule; in the trans configuration after photon activation. (https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Structure-of-the-retinal-binding-site-in-rhodopsin-A-struc tures-of-the-11-cis-and_fig1_23956807)

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Figure 3. Schematic of the molecular pathway of vision. (Rendering: Tim Meyer)

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Figure 4. Schematic of the pathway of vision including onto-types and antitypes (Rendering: Tim Meyer)

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Chapter Eleven. Beauty in the Clouds: Nature’s Secondary Beauty as an Onto-Type of God’s Primary Beauty

In the previous chapter, the Edwardsean method of onto-typology was extended down to the cellular and molecular mechanisms of science. Using Edwards’ twofold method, we have found that there are spiritual messages on a mechanistic level, and now we will explore the second aspect of his method whereby messages of the divine are revealed by a person being in nature and experiencing its texture and beauty. Ever wondered why a lovely sunset will take our breath away or a walk through a rose garden will bring joy and delight? People from nearly every culture and time period have reported a feeling of awe in nature. Using Edwards’ treatise, Dissertation II: On the Nature of True Virtue (hereafter referred to as True Virtue), as well as other sources, I propose that Edwards understood the beauty both observed and felt in nature as ontologically real, as a shadow of God’s divine beauty. This insight contrasts contemporary scientific views holding that there is no meaning or purpose in nature or in nature’s beauty. According to naturalism, biological processes arose out of random chance events devoid of any teleological significance. Given this contemporary understanding of nature, what might a plausible explanation be for the human response to nature as beautiful? There is no satisfying evolutionary explanation for why humans find nature beautiful. Being moved in the heart by a rainbow, or a spider’s web, or the blue of the sea is counter to the paradigm of survival of the fittest. In the early anthropology of human evolution, gazing deeply at a spider’s web in the grass might reduce survivability by distraction, leaving one open to danger.1 Aesthetic pleasure in nature’s beauty encourages us to contemplate its object. But why is this good, from an evolutionary point of view? Why have humans from all cultures and time periods found it valuable to be absorbed in contemplation, with all 1 This is not to say that appreciation of beauty in nature holds no intrinsic significance for humans, quite the contrary. According to Kant, nature’s aesthetic is important for human cognitive faculties and reflection. Aesthetics in nature serves as a condition of the exercise of reflecting judgment, and is important in human psychological development in other areas of life. For an excellent discussion of Kant’s philosophy on nature’s purposiveness for human cognitive faculties see https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/kant-aesthetics/#3.2.

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the attendant dangers of reduced vigilance? In addition, wasting time and energy puts organisms at an evolutionary disadvantage. For large animals such as humans, unnecessary activity is particularly expensive and evolutionarily counterproductive. This leaves us without a satisfactory biological explanation of nature’s aesthetic to human beings. With this in hand, how can we formulate a satisfying explanation, beyond mere cognition, for why humans are drawn to nature’s beauty, and have felt a sense of the transcendent or the numinous when immersed in it? Edwards offers us an explanation from a biblically-grounded, theistically informed ontology of the natural world in which beauty plays a crucial role. Edwards viewed nature as God’s moment-by-moment divine acting in a continuous creation. As part of God’s Original Ultimate End in creating, Edwards construes that God intended to communicate the divine excellencies to the creature through what has been made. One way to communicate God’s excellencies, as we have seen earlier, is through onto-types embedded in the structures and mechanisms of nature as a form of communication, or God-embedded-intentionalguides for the creature. Along these lines, the beauty in nature can be seen as yet another way for God to communicate His excellencies. In addition to a lovely countenance, a virtuous dispositions, a piece of music or art, Edwards also viewed beauty in the natural world as a reflection or shadow of God’s own beauty. Perhaps, in much the same way, God is communicating something of the divine Self through the secondary beauty or inferior beauty of nature pointing to the ontologically real beauty that is God’s primary beauty or superior beauty.2 In this construct, all forms of created beauty serve God’s end in creating as a shadow or an onto-type pointing to the antitype of God’s primary beauty. The motivation in God to create nature as intrinsically beautiful as it is, is to communicate the divine beauty to the creature in forms that they encounter every day in the natural world. Encountering this beauty lifts the heart and brings joy. By displaying God’s splendor, nature becomes yet another pursuit of God toward relationship with the ones God infinitely loves. Through the dimension of nature’s breathtaking beauty, God reaches to the very heart of the creature. In this way, we recover the biblical narrative claiming that indeed nature has meaning and purpose plaited in its functionality. Simply put, people are deeply moved in heart by nature’s beauty. In an Edwardsean construal, this is precisely because the beauty that nature presents is a reflection of the ultimately real beauty that speaks of the knowledge and glory of God, the One who is the most supremely beautiful and valuable in all existence.

2 Secondary/inferior beauty and primary/superior beauty are Edwards’ terms used throughout True Virtue.

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In True Virtue, Edwards details his understanding of such beauty. In Edwards’ construction and nomenclature, primary or superior beauty is God himself in all of God’s attributes and excellencies. Secondary or inferior beauty reflects God’s excellencies. In True Virtue and elsewhere, Edwards often correlates the word “excellencies” with “beauty.” As Roland Delattre expounds in his book Beauty and Sensibility in the Thought of Jonathan Edwards, For Edwards the relation between beauty and glory in God is one of virtual identity – an identity between the divine glory and the primary, spiritual, and moral beauty of God understood as a beauty distinct from and yet embracing also as a shadow and image of itself the secondary or natural beauty of proportion and harmony manifest in God’s natural perfections (1968, 136).

Delattre is saying that Edwards sees natural beauty and God’s beauty as virtually identical. Well, it cannot be “virtually identical” since God’s beauty in a Thomistic analogical proportion would necessarily be far higher and eternally more beautiful than anything we can see on earth. However, Delattre has a good point here in his reading of Edwards. Edwards trusts that God’s external manifestation extends eternally real divine ideas into an earthly reflection of something in God. It will certainly reflect the information that God intends to convey to the creature. We can then ask, what is the information that God intends to convey through nature’s beauty? Edwards offers that the excellencies and perfections of God are what is communicated for the purpose of divine-human relationship.3 To propose beauty as one such element of communication, he opens the second dissertation with an immediate definition. This is in typical Edwardsean fashion. He wants us to know right from the beginning his use of terms and the determined meanings he intends to use throughout. In the first sentences he says this: WHATEVER controversies and variety of opinions there are about the nature of virtue, yet all… mean by it something beautiful, or rather some kind of beauty or excellency (WJE 8, 539).

If Edwards here equates virtue with beauty, then the title of the second dissertation could equally be read as “On the Nature of True Beauty.” Continuing along this line of thinking, one could conjecture that since this dissertation comes directly after the Dissertation I (the two are meant to be partnered in content and theme) the intent is to ascertain something of the role of beauty in God’s end in creating. We may also infer from this quote, since it is one of the final thoughts that Edwards penned in his lifetime, that the term “excellency/ excellencies” is referring, at least in part, to beauty in one form or another. Edwards uses this term often throughout the entire corpus of his works. 3 This is grounded in biblical theology see, Psalm 72:19, Isaiah 6:3, Ezekiel 43:2.

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Next, he begins to refine what beauty is referring to and how this beauty may relate to virtue. In other words, while all virtue is beautiful, not all beauty is necessarily virtue. He seems to be nuancing the non-reciprocity of the terms by indicating that beauty exists in non-human forms such as a building, a flower or rainbow, but these are not to be considered virtuous. He says it this way, “Tis it is not all beauty that is called virtue; for instance, not the beauty of a building, of a flower, or of the rainbow…” (WJE 8, 539). Edwards distinguishes that beauty is the broader category under which virtue falls. It cannot be the reverse. This is important when distinguishing beauty and virtue in non-human forms such as in nature, art, music, architecture, and so on, in comparison with sentient beings. The former cannot hold virtue, but can exhibit beauty. Only sentient beings can display the disposition of virtue. While beauty in human beings is the highest form of beauty in Edwards’ ontology of beauty, he also affirms beauty in human-constructed objects, inanimate objects, and shapes. He says this, …primary beauty being the proper and peculiar beauty of spiritual and moral beings, which are the highest and first part of the universal system, for whose sake all the rest has existence. Yet there is another, inferior, secondary beauty, which is some image of this, and which is not peculiar to spiritual beings, but is found even in inanimate things; which consists in a mutual consent and agreement of different things, in form, manner, quantity, and visible end or design; called by the various names of regularity, order, uniformity, symmetry, proportion, harmony, etc. Such is the mutual agreement of the various sides of a square, or equilateral triangle, or of a regular polygon (WJE 8, 561– 562).

Let us consider what Edwards is stating. In this passage he claims that there exists “another, inferior, secondary beauty.” This consists in other aspects of the creation outside of the beings created in God’s image. This would necessarily identify all of nature, including its mechanisms, as created by God. Edwards also includes objects created by human beings such as art, architecture, music, and so on in this category. Edwards proposes that even in these other created entities, God emanates/communicates the knowledge and glory of divine excellencies. We have already seen Edwards explore this theme in Images of Divine Things where he found onto-typological meaning in such created elements as a telescope, and even in hieroglyphics. Likewise, here in True Virtue he boldly claims that even non-human created entities carry the secondary beauty of God. Next, Edwards further refines the concept of beauty and virtue when it is found in sentient beings. He is careful to distinguish between a person’s physical beauty, let’s call it external beauty or “beauty at a glance,” and the internal beauty of the heart and mind (see Figure 5). The internal is considered virtue, while the external is restricted solely to beauty. In this way; beauty can be virtuous when “belonging to beings that have perception and will” (WJE 8, 539).

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As Edwards lays a foundational groundwork for these terms, and the concepts they imply, he is careful to determine that external beauty or poise or grace does not necessarily denote virtue, but rather in humans, virtue is something intrinsic in the individual. He claims it is in the “original seat of the mind,” and that precisely is what makes a person beautiful: It is not all beauty of mankind that is called virtue; for instance, not the external beauty of the countenance or shape, gracefulness of motion, or harmony of voice: but it is a beauty that has its original seat in the mind (WJE 8, 539).

His phrase, “original seat of the mind,” may be referring to all operations of the mind, including objective reasoning as well as moral/godly exercises of the mind. However, Edwards is still not done because he goes on to further delineate that not all exercises of the mind in humans are virtuous, even though they may be beautiful: But yet perhaps not everything that may be called a beauty of mind, is properly called virtue. There is a beauty of understanding and speculation; there is something in the ideas and conceptions of great philosophers and statesmen that may be called beautiful: which is a different thing from what is most commonly meant by virtue (WJE 8, 539).

What Edwards seems to be saying is that moral/godly exercises of the mind, perhaps such as wisdom, goodness, compassion, and so on, are beautiful because they are virtuous. But, other objective reasoning-type exercises of the mind such as intellectual ideas and concepts, perhaps even mathematical equations and other historical or political facts, can be a thing of beauty but are not necessarily virtuous. At this point Edwards is preparing us for the climax statement from which this hierarchy of meanings has led us. He has taken us by the hand through the nuanced varieties of beauty, careful to arrive at a final destination of the relationship between virtue and beauty. He says, “But virtue is the beauty of those qualities and acts of the mind that are of a moral nature… do not belong merely to speculation: but to the disposition and will, or… to the heart” (1989, 539). While moral character denotes virtue, and hence beauty, he is careful to state that this form of virtue and beauty can be present in humans whether or not they have faith. Even a person with little or no faith commitments can still do moral acts that are virtuous. This is why Edwards shows how beauty and virtue in humans can be taken to yet another level, above moral character. This highest level of beauty is when a person is redeemed in Christ. In this way, the person’s motive for moral actions and their own godly character are rooted in Christ and are a deeper work of God. Edwards calls this true virtue, a vital and necessary aspect of the end for which God created the world. For Edwards, true virtue, which is true beauty, has everything to do with the ontological redemptive work of God in a human being’s heart and life.

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We have just seen that Edwards in his prologue (that is, paragraph 1) has taken care to set the stage for how terms are used and in what context they are to be understood.4 Now it is Edwards’ task to show us why it is so that true virtue is beautiful to us when we encounter it. Edwards sums it up at the end of his prologue this way: There-fore I suppose I shall not depart from the common opinion when I say, that virtue is the beauty of the qualities and exercises of the heart, or those actions which proceed from them. So that when it is enquired, what is the nature of true virtue? This is the same as to enquire what that is, which renders any habit, disposition, or exercise of the heart truly beautiful? (WJE 8, 539).

These are qualities of a person’s heart, out of which their actions flow, that when experienced are perceived as beautiful. However, Edwards is careful to warn that some human actions and dispositions appear to be virtuous, but are not. He says, “…there is a distinction to be made between some things which are truly virtuous, and others which only seem to be so” (WJE 8, 539–40). This, having to do with human agents, relies on the fact that humans have free will, and as such can have motives and false pretenses that may appear virtuous, but in fact, are not. With this groundwork establishing Edwards’ nuanced delineation of beauty, virtue, and true virtue, how might these terms, and the spiritual implications they hold, relate to beauty in nature? In other words, we now come back to the original question of why human beings find nature beautiful. There is a filling of the human heart and soul on some metaphysical and spiritual level when one encounters a stunning mountain vista, a beautiful sunset by the sea, or even a cool breeze on a summer evening. In addition, people experience beauty, wonder, and awe in learning the mechanisms of nature that science teaches and in the precision of natural laws for life to exist. There seems to be something intrinsic in nature that correlates to an affect in the human psyche, heart, and soul tuned to illicit this response. The feeling of the numinous, the loveliness, or the wonder of nature seems to be a universal part of the human experience. We have already seen how Edwards proposed a divine communication through analogy in the natural world. Could nature’s beauty fall into this scheme as well? I believe we find evidence in Edwards toward the affirmative. First, his proposal is fully grounded in biblical theology.5 From this biblical grounding, Edwards proposed that nature is beautiful to us because it likewise reflects the 4 It is of interest to note that this is in parallel construction to how Edwards began the Introduction to the Dissertation I by defining terms such as subordinate end, consequential end, and so on. 5 The creation reveals/displays God’s glory, divine nature, and eternal attributes. Some scriptural references include: Job 12:7–8, Psalm 19, Proverbs 3:19, Psalm 57:5, Psalm 57:11, Psalm 108:5, Habakkuk 3:3, Numbers 14:21, Psalm 72:19, Romans 1:19–20, Romans 11:36, Colossians 1:15–16, Hebrews 1:3, Hebrews 2:10.

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very loveliness and grandeur of God’s divine nature emanated/communicated into the creation. In this way, the awe inspiring beauty we feel in the natural world is appreciated precisely because it reflects God’s attributes in kind. Edwards says that the whole of creation reflects not only the knowledge of God, appealing to the reason and intellect of the creature, but also reflects the fullness and glory of God’s beauty, touching the heart. He says it this way, For as God is infinitely the greatest Being, so he is allowed to be infinitely the most beautiful and excellent: and all the beauty to be found throughout the whole creation, is but the reflection of the diffused beams of that Being who hath an infinite fullness of brightness and glory. (WJE 8, 550–551, emphasis mine).

Edwards indicates here that all beauty we encounter in the creation (that is, secondary beauty) is supremely beautiful to us because it is a reflection of the primary beauty, or in his words, “diffused beams of that Being who hath an infinite fullness of brightness and glory.” In this way, then, nature’s beauty is also an onto-type pointing to the antitype of God’s primary beauty. The onto-type/antitype ontology of beauty recovers a teleological significance of the natural world ascribing to it meaning and purpose intended by God. This natural teleology has far-reaching significance for human beings.6 Nature speaks to a deep resonant core of the human person, fashioned to receive this communication, leading to a universally reported transcendent feeling of the divine presence in nature. When one is sad or in distress, the full moon ascending in the night sky or the brilliant colors of the fall leaves can uplift the soul in hope, giving life a deeper meaning. The peace felt by encountering nature’s beauty and wonder can heal the human soul and bring joy. The very fact that God made nature beautiful, is indicative of God’s goodness. Edwards goes on to say, “as it is supposed that it is God’s goodness which moved him to give them both being and beauty.” As God had infinite possibilities to create, God created the totality of the natural realm in contingent existence, and also in beauty. It was God’s goodness to create for the creatures he loves a beautiful, stunning place to have existence. From our own observations and experience, we see that God did not create the universe comprised of flat, benign shapes in muted grey tones. Rather, the creation is diverse with vast arrays of colors, patterns, and textures. For example, there are over fourteen-hundred

6 Natural teleology here is not intending to prove the existence of God. This was all but debunked in earlier inceptions of Natural Theology. However, if we again point to a Kantian interpretation of natural teleology, it may provide an important element in human experience nonetheless. Finding beauty in nature enhances human life and the feeling of well-being, and according to Romans 1:20 may point humans to inquire into the attributes of God as the author of nature. Perhaps as Kant puts it, it “drives us to seek a theology” (Immanuel Kant, Critique of Judgment, trans. Werner Pluhar, Indianapolis: Hackett, 1987, 85, 440).

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species of coral reef fish alone, each with brilliant colors and intricate patterns that are beautiful to the eye. Interestingly, scientists have pondered this vast diversity since the beauty among reef species holds no significant evolutionary selection pressure. In other words, there is no biological reason for having so many different colors and patterns in this ecosystem. And this is just one example out of the thousands of examples of colors, patterns and aesthetic beauty found among the various ecosystems of the world. We thereby conclude that God created such diversity in beauty out of his infinite goodness and love to communicate himself to his beloved creatures through what has been made. God is a communicative Being stopping at nothing to share his divine glory with the creatures he infinitely loves. Without the brightness and glory of God’s Being reflected in the Earth we are reduced to solely a knowledge of God which when appropriated only in one’s mind and intellect lacks the attention needed to grip one’s heart and soul in devotion to God. Ergo, fourteen-hundred species of brightly colored coral reef fish. Edwards says, And here by the way I would further observe, probably it is with regard to this image or resemblance which secondary beauty has of true spiritual beauty, that God has so constituted nature, that the presenting of this inferior beauty, especially in those kinds of it which have the greatest resemblance of the primary beauty, as the harmony of sounds and the beauties of nature, have a tendency to assist those whose hearts are under the influence of a truly virtuous temper to dispose them to the exercises of divine love, and enliven in them a sense of spiritual beauty (WJE 8, 565).

Edwards is relating to us “that God has so constituted nature” implying that God intentionally created nature beautiful in order to appeal to the hearts of humankind. As Sang Hyun Lee says of Edwards on beauty and nature, “God’s beauty and natural beauty are both relations of proportion…to reflect and typify the beauty of God” (2003, 60). Here, Lee is affirming the idea of nature’s beauty as a type, pointing to the antitype of God’s beauty. This in turn elicits the spiritual beauty of appreciation, gratitude, awe, wonder and so on, in the individual. Perhaps we can even say that in an appreciation of nature’s beauty we are living more fully into our humanity as spiritual beings living in a natural world. What Edwards is constructing here is an acknowledgement that when we are attracted to something beautiful in nature, such as a mountain landscape, a sunset, colorful coral reef fish, or the elegant structure of a molecule, our true attraction is not necessarily for this beauty itself, but for the actual, ontological beauty that brought it into being. As Delattre says, “The creation of the world…is a manifestation and communication and shining forth of the divine beauty” (1968, 136). What the human creature is actually attracted to in nature’s beauty is the communication of God’s own divine beauty shining forth from its inception. Individuals may or may not recognize it as such, or even acknowledge it as a reflection of God’s beauty, but it is nevertheless. Edwards says, “For true virtuous

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principle is supposed to be implanted naturally in the hearts of all mankind” (WJE 8, 573). The feeling of the numinous, or the sense of breathtaking awe, when gazing at the Alps or the Grand Canyon, or even a spider web with dew drops pearled along its slender threads, is ontologically a receiving of divine revelation. The idea is that human minds and hearts have been fashioned to receive this divine revelation of beauty, even if they only consciously sense an aesthetic attraction or sensibility to it. He states, The reason, or at least one reason, why God has made this mutual agreement of things beautiful and grateful to those intelligent beings that perceive it, probably is, that there is in it some image of the true, spiritual, original beauty (WJE 8, 565).

This appreciation is not limited to Christians or people of faith. Edwards says, “For true virtuous principle is supposed to be implanted naturally in the hearts of all mankind” (WJE 8, 573). All people have been equally fashioned with the antenna to receive nature’s revelation of the divine, “so that people are without excuse.” However, according to Edwards, while the beauty of nature is available to be appreciated and loved by all human beings, there is still a distinction between those without faith who can appreciate nature’s beauty, and those of faith who can appreciate nature’s God. He distinguishes the most gloriously supreme human experience in the latter, that is – when one can engage nature out of a heart of love to God. When someone does experience the beauty of the scent of rain, or a beautiful waterfall, or the stars on a summer night’s sky, and they acknowledge the God of creation, they are, in Edwards’ estimation, ascending to an even higher form of human experience. In this way, the human being appropriates the intrinsic secondary beauty in nature and is delighting in the divine nature of God. In this way, nature acts as a moment-by-moment communication of God’s divine love being poured out to the creature in order for them to receive this divine gift and be transformed by it. As he stated above, “those whose hearts are under the influence of a truly virtuous temper to dispose them to the exercises of divine love, and enliven in them a sense of spiritual beauty” (WJE 8, 563). You may say, however, that not everything in nature is beautiful and pleasing. How can the repulsive and grotesque things we find in nature be pointing to God? If all of nature is an onto-type point to the antitype of God’s beauty, what about a decaying animal carcass loaded with maggots? What about the devastation of a wildfire? There are many things in nature that we find repulsive or devastating. These aspects of nature reflect God as well. They point to the devastation of the cross of Christ that portrays his brutal suffering and death. Who can look upon a rendition of the crucifixion scene and not feel horror and disgust? 7 Even grue7 In Isaiah 52:14 it states, “Just as there were many who were appalled at him – his appearance

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some elements in the natural world, including death in nature, point to the suffering and death of Christ. In addition, just as the resurrection of Christ brings new life, the death of plants and animals brings forth new life as nutrients are cycled in the environment. In this way the repugnancies in nature are beautiful and serve as an ontotype pointing to the antitype of the beauty and supremacy of Christ’s passion and resurrection power. God has so construed the structures, mechanisms, and ecological cycles of nature that images pointing to the incarnation, life, death and resurrection of Christ are represented in every single aspect of the creation from the biosphere to the cosmos. The story of redemption is the most important story in human history. God embedded that story as the very basis for the ongoing continuance of the entire created order. The story of redemption is everywhere for us to see. In this way, secondary beauty in nature serves as yet another subordinate end toward God’s Original Ultimate End. This can now be summarized together in Edwards’ two-fold methodology: first, through messages, or onto-types, embedded in the structures of nature, and second, through direct experiences of the beauty in nature. The former are natural onto-types that convey the knowledge and glory of God through what science discovers. The latter are also onto-types pointing to the beauty of God (see Figure 6). Both communicate something of the character of God and of spiritual things to the creature. However, there is yet one more aspect of beauty in nature that we can consider. Previously, we showed that Edwards found a higher form of beauty and virtue in humans which he called true virtue. One wonders if there could be a similar proportion of true virtue in nature as well? The first thing to consider is that unlike human persons, nature does not have intent or will. Nature does not have a moral character. Neither is nature sinful. Nature while beautiful, cannot be virtuous because it does not have a moral character, as Edwards said in the quote above, “Tis it is not all beauty that is called virtue; for instance, not the beauty of a building, of a flower, or of the rainbow” (WJE 8, 539). A flower or rainbow, or any other aspect of the natural world is beautiful, but cannot hold virtue since it does not have a moral character. However, despite these differences, perhaps nature reflects the more pure form of virtue, true virtue. Let’s see how. Nature comes into being, created by God, in form and existence without any interruption or intervening corruption. Once in being, however, nature receives and endures the effects of sin as a result of the Fall (eg. disease, pollution, deforestation, endangerment of species, etc.). was so disfigured beyond that of any human being and his form marred beyond human likeness.” Thus, the disturbing, repugnant aspects of nature point to the gruesome elements of Christ’s suffering.

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Nature, while suffering the effects of sin, cannot itself sin (it is not a moral agent) and does not need to be redeemed as do people. Rather, scripture affirms that the natural world “groans” in expectation for restoration, in a new heaven and a new earth at the end of eschatological time. How does this relate to virtue and beauty? Comparatively speaking, human beings can possess beauty, virtue, and/or true virtue depending upon their relationship with Christ. But what of nature? Nature possesses beauty but not virtue. But, can we make an argument whereby nature possesses true virtue? Let us begin by looking again at Edwards’ criteria for what constitutes true virtue. For Edwards, it is the union with God in Christ that elicits true virtue in a human person. Individuals, the redeemed in Christ, possess true virtue through that union. We could argue that nature, which communicates the knowledge and glory of God, is already in union with God in Christ. Scripture informs that all of the creation is made by, for, in, and through Christ.8 Thus, nature has an ontological connection with God in Christ.9 Nature reflects its inherent union with Christ since all things that were made have been made in Christ (see the flow chart in Figure 7). This can be further contrasted with human-made objects which can hold beauty, but neither virtue nor true virtue. In other words, true beauty, or true virtue, whether in persons or in nature, exists due to union with God in Christ. This can either be present or absent in a human being, depending upon redemption, but can never be absent in nature because all creation is ontologically in union with – or as Edwards says, “consent to, benevolence to” – the Creator by virtue of the creation being in God as well as the perfect and eternal ideas in God’s mind that God intends to create.10 The intrinsic union of the creation, out of the ideas for the creation in God’s mind, is being sustained in Christ by an ongoing moment-by-moment continuous existence conferring action, and that by his powerful word.11 Edwards says this, “And if every intelligent being is some way related to Being in general, and is part of the universal system of existence; and so stands in connection with the whole;

8 Scriptural references include, Romans 11:36; Colossians 1:15–17; John 1:3,10; 1 Corinthians 6:8; Hebrews 1:2. 9 See “Christology of Nature” in D’Andrea-Winslow, Lisanne, A Trinitarian Theology of Nature, Wipf & Stock, 2020. 10 The concept is that according to Edwards’ panentheism, all of the creation exists within God. Creation, on some metaphysical level, is union with God in Christ. Likewise, the ideas in God’s mind regarding the natural world and its inception are ontologically real since God is real. God’s ideas for the creation are part of all the knowledge that God knows, thus are in God This is discussed in D’Andrea-Winslow, Lisanne, “A Great and Remarkable Analogy: A Trinitarian Theology of Nature.” PhD diss., University of Aberdeen, Scotland, 2018, and in D’AndreaWinslow, Lisanne, A Trinitarian Theology of Nature, Wipf & Stock, 2020. 11 Hebrews 1:3

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what can its general and true beauty be, but its union and consent with the great whole?” (WJE 8, 541) The whole of the creation, that is, all of the physical world, is in union with Being in general. Edwards goes on to say it this way, And benevolence or goodness in the divine Being is generally supposed, not only to be prior to the beauty of many of its objects, but to their existence; so as to be the ground both of their existence and their beauty (WJE 8, 542).

Edwards is careful here to be sure to state that all things created are beautiful because God’s benevolence and goodness is the ground of their existence and is the source of their beauty. Thus, we can summarize as follows: Humans have true virtue when they • come to the saving knowledge of Christ • reflect God’s attributes in a moral lifestyle and attitude • have union with the Creator

Nature has true virtue intrinsically • by continually reflecting God’s invisible qualities • by displaying his eternal power and divine nature • through ontological union with the Creator derived from God in Christ

To answer the question of why humans are attracted to nature and find it beautiful is because, as Edwards affirms, nature is a reflection of the beauty which is God. Secondary beauty is in analogy to primary beauty. Thus, all of nature acts as an onto-type, pointing to the antitype of God’s beauty. In addition, nature, like regenerate humans, exhibits true virtue. However, nature does so due to its persistent ontological union with Christ as afforded by the scriptures. The reflection of God’s beauty in nature communicates the beauty, wonder, and loveliness of God to creatures who encounter it each day. In this way, God is ever communicating himself in divine beauty to the creatures he loves.

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Figure 5. Edwards on beauty in human beings

Figure 6. Edwards on God using nature to communicate to human beings

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Figure 7. Edwards on beauty and virtue in nature and man-made entities

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Chapter Twelve. Bringing Forth Edwards’ Typological Natural Philosophy toward a Trinitarian Theology of Nature

In Edwards’ approach toward an otology of nature in spiritual terms, he proposed that out of his supreme and infinite love, God had an end in mind when creating the world. A subordinate end in the Original Ultimate End was emanation/ communication of the knowledge and glory of God into the structures and beauty of the creation in order to consistently communicate the excellencies of divine love. In Edwards’ ecclesial theology, the revelation of God’s Self is located fully in the Trinitarian understanding of Father, Son and Spirit. God’s revelation of himself in the Book of Nature would likewise reveal the Trinitarian God of the scriptures. One would think that it would be very important for Edwards to address what precisely Romans 1:20 meant when it claims that God’s “divine nature” is “clearly seen, being understood from what has been made.” What exactly did the apostle mean when he boldly stated that God’s nature is clearly seen in the physical world? The phrase “divine nature” in an Edwardsean view would most likely point to God’s divine Trinitarian essence. It was argued, in the Augustinian tradition, that the natural world carries messages or vestiges of the Trinity, but did Edwards have anything to say regarding God’s Trinitarian essence reflected in the fabric of nature? Yes, in fact he did. In his 1745 sermon, “Of God the Father,” Edwards says it this way, The whole Trinity is concerned in every work of God. All the persons of the Trinity are concerned in the creation of the world. Each person [of the Trinity] has a distinct part, and as it were, sustains a distinct character and charge in that affair. They are all not only concerned as joint actors and co-workers in the affairs of creation but each has a distinct part in the affair assigned to him. There is this order that is observed by the persons of the Trinity in their acting in all affairs pertaining to the glory of the Godhead in the creation of the world (2006, 145–146).

This quote is of particular interest for several reasons. Typically, in systematic theology the Doctrine of Creation is relegated solely and primarily to the first person of the Trinity, the Creator God, the Father, the fountainhead of the

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Godhead. However, Edwards is moving into new theological territory here. In this quote, Edwards puts forth several distinct, but crucially inter-related ideas indicating that the “whole Trinity” is concerned in every work of God including God’s divine acting in nature. This is a highly novel idea on Edwards’ part. The novel idea here is not that the whole of the Trinity is involved in all affairs, as he says, “The whole Trinity is concerned in every work of God.” Historically, the inner perichoresis of the Trinity has been established in the Trinitarian literature for some time, discounting heresies and anomalous thinking such as tritheism, partialism, and modalism.1 What is truly novel is that Edwards opens the idea that all three persons of the Godhead are playing an active role in the construction and manifestation of states of the physical reality as we encounter it, he says, “All the persons of the Trinity are concerned in the creation of the world.”2 This is highly novel thinking since most extant views of the Doctrine of Creation relegate “creating” of the natural world to God the Father, the Creator.3 It seems fitting for Edwards to apply the idea of God acting “trinitarianly” within the physical world and within the mechanisms in nature since scripture is clear that everything created was made in Christ, by Christ, for Christ, and through Christ. Likewise we see scripture references of the Spirit “hovering over the waters” in Genesis and other references in the New Testament portraying the Spirit’s work in revelation.4 According to this scriptural grounding, Edwards affirms that the Father, Son, and Spirit are all, in fact, acting in nature, “Each person [of the Trinity] has a distinct part, and as it were, sustains a distinct character and charge in that affair.” It seems that Edwards is proposing that the Father, Son, and Spirit each have a distinct divine action role in crafting and

1 The idea here is that a Trinitarian theology of nature relies on “the eternal perichoresis of the tri-unity” emphasizing the inter-relation of the three persons of the triune God (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit) to one another, with one another, and with the creation, as Edwards put forth in his Discourse on the Trinity, and in accomplishing God’s Original Ultimate End in creating. In this way, such a constructive theology does not fall into the trap of tritheism, partialism, or modalism. Also see, Tim Chester, Delighting in the Trinity: Why Father, Son and Spirit are Good News (London: Good Book Company, 2010), 115. 2 In such a construct, a Trinitarian account of divine action in nature must avoid collapsing into tritheism or partialism. In doing so, we can turn to Karl Barth’s Doctrine of Appropriation for a conceptual framework (Barth, 2009, 36870). Here, Barth refers to the “Trinity in unity,” bringing to speech the language of distinguishing the operations of the triune God, while simultaneously recognizing the perichoretic unity in the One living God. In the Doctrine of Appropriation, all the works of God are the indivisible works of the triune God, even in the witness of scripture to the distinctive works of the persons of the Trinity. 3 Extant views of divine action theories include, Deism, Mere Conservationism, Concurrentism, Divine Compositionalism, and Occasionalism. Please see Chapter 6 in D’Andrea- Winslow, A Trinitarian Theology of Nature, Wipf & Stock, 2020. 4 See John 16:13; 1 Corinthians 2:10.

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executing the physical world that we encounter. That is a bold and powerfully robust idea. However, Edwards is careful not to lapse into a disunity of the Trinitarian essence of God by being sure to affirm that, “They are all not only concerned as joint actors and co-workers in the affairs of creation but each has a distinct part in the affair assigned to him.” By reasserting that they are “joint actors and coworkers” Edwards is being true to the internal perichoresis of the Trinity and careful to retain indivisibility. Yet, he also is proposing a new way of seeing nature and God’s divine acting in it, as he attests “each has a distinct part in the affair assigned to him.” What might this be? One wonders how might Edwards be construing a creation ontology where the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are each actively acting moment-by-moment in order to produce the physical world as we know it? Unfortunately, Edwards did not expound on this any further in his writings. We are left to extrapolate on Edwards’ notion and perhaps develop it constructively into a Trinitarian theology of nature.5 A model subscribing to such a Trinitarian theology of nature would serve to expand and extend Edwards’ idea to include the unified and intentional action of each of the three persons of the Godhead in constituting the creational reality encountered by the creatures. In this way, the whole of nature is act-result. The triune God acts and creatures experience the result. While these divine acts are distinct to each person of the Godhead, all the works of God are the indivisible works of the triune God. We can derive some clues from Edwards’ metaphysics alongside his understanding of onto-types in the natural world, to gain some understanding of how each person of the Trinity might be acting in the whole of creation.6 First, we have seen how in Edwards’ idealism, all the divine ideas for creation existed eternally in God’s mind. These eternal ideas incorporate both the structures of earthly entities as well as the divine messages embedded therein – that is, the onto-types. These are God’s ideas that are willed into existence. This may, in Edwards scheme, be “the affair of” first person of the Trinity, the Creator, Father God who actively wills ideas in the divine mind into existence. All such ideas are the range of possibilities for the physical structures and functions operating in the physical world. These ideas also include all of the natural ontotypes embedded in the structures and beauty present within the physical world.7

5 D’Andrea-Winslow, A Trinitarian Theology of Nature (Wipf & Stock, 2020). Here Edwards’ notion of the triune God acting trinitarianly in nature is formulated a constructive theology involving a Theo-logy of Nature, a Christology of Nature, and a Pneumatology of Nature. 6 This is in terms of the states of the physical world only, not free agent action. For an expanded explanation, see D’Andrea-Winslow, 2020, Chapter 6. 7 This is intended as the Theo-logy of Nature.

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Second, these ideas are communicated/emanated, that is manifested, in physical form. The structures and their embedded messages are emanated/ communicated into nature in Christ, for Christ, by Christ, and through Christ in a continuous creation. This is accomplished by the divine action of the second person of the trinity, the incarnate Son, Christ Jesus, who communicates/emanates all of the structures of the world into existence according to the scriptures.8 Communication of the physical states of the universe into existence contains the knowledge and glory of God in the form of natural onto-types. Third, in Edwards’ idealism the whole of the creation is “supposed” to the human mind by divine revelation. Without this divine revelation, all of the creation would be unknown to the heart and mind in all physical and teleological significance. According to the scriptures, it is the third person of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit, that reveals all things.9 The Spirit reveals all aspects of this reality to the creatures in the way Edwards envisions God “supposing” actualized physical states of the ipso facto real world to the mind of the creature. Revelation by the Spirit would necessarily also include revealing the real-ized onto-types and their antitypes to created minds. In this complex amalgam of divine action, there are three simultaneous and coordinated actions: willing, communicating/emanating, and revealing, effectuated by the Father, the Son, and the Spirit, respectively. Give this construct, nature itself just is God’s divine acting, and in a fully Trinitarian manner. In this way, each person of the Trinity is acting according to “the affair assigned to him.” Edwards ends this passage by reiterating that God’s acting in the creation of the natural world is a complex aggregate involving the Triune God, “There is this order that is observed by the persons of the Trinity in their acting in all affairs pertaining to the glory of the Godhead in the creation of the world.” In this view, we may construe each person of the Godhead as uniquely acting, yet in an indivisible and cohesive manner, where willing, communicating and revealing are all aspects of divine action. Such a tri-fold plan of divine acting reflects how God is acting moment-by-moment trinitarianly to produce the concurrent and consecutive world states that we encounter and experience. Thus, the natural world’s ontology and teleology as we engage it in our daily lives are an encounter with the persons of the Trinity in their present-moment acting. Following Edwards’ direction, then, nature is not an emanation of God’s Self. Nature is God’s acting by willing structures into being, communicating the divine Self through what has been made, and revealing such knowledge to the creature. 8 Everything that in creation was made in Christ, by Christ, for Christ, and through Christ, see John 1:3, Colossians 1:16, Romans 11:36. This is the Christology of Nature. 9 John 14:26, 16:13. In a Trinitarian Theology of Nature, this is formulated as the Pneumatology ofNature.

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This is toward the ultimate end (Edwards’ Original Ultimate End) of the creature receiving the fullness of divine love, and delighting in it. When this revelation is received by the creature in faith, and delighted in, this brings glory back to its source. This remanation of God’s glory is, according to Jonathan Edwards, the end for which God created the world. A Trinitarian account of the natural world, including the complexity and breadth of natural onto-types, does not detract from the God of Scripture, but on the contrary, reveals the magnitude of God’ power and greatness, in all God’s being and characteristics. A Trinitarian theology of nature is not intended to supplant or refine other understandings of the doctrine of the Trinity in the corpus of Systematic Theology as such. Rather, the aim is to take the understanding of God’s Trinitarian essence and use this knowledge of God’s being as a lens. This lens helps to understand what God intends to communicate about himself to the creature through the natural world. With this in mind, we do not seek to advance an understanding of the Doctrine of the Trinity per se, but rather to ground an Edwardsean theology of nature in the reality of the Trinity. That is, God eternally exists as a complex relational union of Father, Son, and Spirit according to the creeds of the church.10 Within this union there is, as Alister McGrath asserts, “a continuity of relationships between Father, Son and Spirit, thus establishing an unbreakable link between encounter with, or experience of, the Spirit, Son, and Father” (McGrath, 1998, 129). It is through the lens of the Trinity that we see how eternal truths embedded in the natural world, conveyed analogically through natural onto-types, originated in the mind of God. All such ideas are created in Christ, for Christ, through Christ, and by Christ, and are revealed to the human mind by the Holy Spirit. Thus, in this constructive theology, all that nature is and all that nature reveals in its complex structures, mechanisms, and beauty can be understood as God’s divine Trinitarian acting from an infinite wellspring of divine love.

10 See R. E. Olson and C. A Hall, The Trinity, 52. “The Nicene (Niceno-Constantinopolitan) Creed of 381 gradually became accepted practice in Western monasteries and was justified on the basis of Augustine’s doctrine of the Trinity, in which the Holy Spirit is distinguished from the Father and Son by “procession” or “spiration” from both of them.”

Conclusion “Again, it is apparent and allowed that there is a great and remarkable analogy in God’s works.” Jonathan Edwards

In this book we have explored the legacy that Jonathan Edwards left for us in his understanding of the physical world. We live in this world and encounter it in many diverse ways each day. Edwards causes us to take pause and consider what it is we are encountering when we look up at a beautiful morning sky or see the first buds of spring. What is it that we are engaging with when we rake our fall leaves or feel the lap of the ocean waves on our feet? Edwards believed that we are encountering God’s divine Trinitarian action moment by moment. Edwards had a keen insight into the elements of nature that were infused with the knowledge and glory of spiritual truths within the very morphologies and functions they possess. He believed that the physical structures we see, feel, hear, and participate in every day not only function in the structures and mechanisms that make the world work as it does, but that these also hold instruction for our lives. For Edwards, this was a supreme act of divine goodness and love. God creates with the intent not only to provide a stage upon which the theater of human activity can take place, but also to communicate God’s beauty and love. It is within this continuous communication in the language of nature that Edwards offers a mystical, experiential spirituality that he feels is a crucial aspect of (and a subordinate end in) the end for which God created the world. Edwards sees scripture being very clear regarding how God communicates and what God is communicating to the creature. In Edwards’ theology, scripture affirms two primary ways that God reveals God’s Self: in the incarnate Son and in the natural world. Throughout his career, not only did Edwards proclaim God’s revelation in and through the person of Jesus Christ, but he offers a fresh way to hear God’s voice in the language of nature. Nature is preaching. Edwards uncovers these hidden gospel messages in shadows of divine things as mandated by the Psalmist and the New Testament writers, but also later proposed by patristic and scholastic theologians, particularly in the Thomistic lineage, as ontologically grounded in analogy. These vestiges in nature convey analogical knowledge of the spirit realm in a lesser proportion. In this historical lineage, Edwards invests his energies in a new form of typology, natural typology. Edwards was fully

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assured that natural types originated in God’s mind to serve as intentional guides for spiritual instruction. These natural types were, and are, ontologically real and not merely human epistemic projections of spiritual metaphors. In this way, we advance Edwards’ natural typology by calling these messages onto-types. The existence of, and God’s revelation in, onto-types embedded in the natural world satisfies an important aspect toward Edwards’ Original Ultimate End in creation. On Edwards’ view, God created in order to externalize God’s infinite excellencies and share these spiritual treasures with creatures who were fashioned to receive them. In a series of complex and inter-related subordinate and consequential ends, God accomplishes his task. Creatures are given the knowledge and glory of God and in turn have the free will to accept or reject this supreme divine gift. When received, the creature delights in the glorious knowledge of, and union with the Creator resulting in salvation. God’s glory is remanated back to its source, and since nothing can be added to God’s infinite glory, God did not receive anything he did not already have before creating. The onto-types emanated/communicated in nature, by revealing the things of God to the creature, serve as a subordinate end in this process. Edwards did not, however, formulate a rigorous method of doing natural typology, as we might expect in typical Edwardsean fashion. He left that to us. Edwards was, however, operating on a set of assumptions and criteria, whether conscious or unconscious, when he was doing this work. From the vast corpus of Edwards’ writings, in sermons, treatises, discourses, Miscellanies and other writings, we can glean important information about the method and criteria he was using in his natural typology. First, Edwards seemed to devise a two-fold method in doing his onto-typology: a) in the findings of the science of his day, and b) in personal experience out in the beauty of nature. Second, a set of four criteria was derived from Edwards’ writings to help guide our way in doing natural onto-typology without lapsing into subjective or metaphorical assignments. I like to think that Edwards would nod in agreement. In the first of his two-fold method, Edwards engaged the science of his day. Edwards the theologian and pastor was also a naturalist, a scientist in his own right. He read widely and deeply of scientific literature and, to judge by his scientific writings, had an excellent grasp of its contents. Edwards was, of course, confined by the very limits of scientific knowledge available to him at that time. But given that historical limitation, he did extend onto-types from the macroscopic world of planets, trees and rivers down to the physiological levels of zoology, embryology, and anatomy. It was the task of this present work to see if Edwards’ onto-types extend even further, all the way down to the cellular, molecular, and quantum levels of nature. Of the dozens of mechanisms I have explored with my students, I answer in the resounding affirmative that indeed, messages of the divine penetrate all the way down to the fundamental levels of

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our knowledge of the natural world. To echo Edwards, Why would we think that God would only put the divine fingerprint into trees and rivers, and not all the way down to every molecule and particle of the physical world that was created? In this work, the complex, multi-ordered mechanism of vision in the mammalian eye was given as a working example of this deep truth. Yes, images and shadows of divine things extend all the way down to the fundamental structures of nature. The second aspect of Edwards’ onto-typological method was derived from direct experiences in nature. An analysis into Edwards’ theology of beauty, particularly the beauty in nature, offers us an experiential understanding of that universal phenomenon. In his account of virtue, we have located nature in Edwards’ theology as possessing a form of true virtue, since nature is ontologically in union with Christ by being created in, through, by, and for Christ according to the Scriptures. This may be yet another analogy of the redeemed in Christ having true virtue by their union with the Creator. What we encounter when our soul is lifted by a gorgeous sunset or the breathtaking beauty of snow on a spring flower is really an encounter with God’s ultimate primary beauty. We were fashioned to be moved by this beauty, and we are. The effective brilliance in Edwards’ theology of nature is how he posits all of the physical world as divine action. What we encounter in our everyday life – driving to work, going to the grocery store, or walking in the woods – is a physical reality willed by God, communicated into being with its structures and embedded messages, and revealed to human awareness. I believe that Edwards was beginning to think about his divine action theory regarding his metaphysics of nature in Trinitarian terms. In one of his later sermons from 1746, he unfolds a crucial insight into nature, and God’s acting to produce it. He states, “They are all not only concerned as joint actors and co-workers in the affairs of creation, but each has a distinct part in the affair assigned to him. There is this order that is observed by the persons of the Trinity in their acting in all affairs pertaining to the glory of the Godhead in the creation of the world” (WJE 25, 145–146). Edwards is on to something quite profound and overlooked in the divine action literature. Edwards is formulating an idea around a Trinitarian Theology of Nature, in which each divine person of the Godhead is involved in the inception, creation, and manifestation of the physical world as we know it, as well as the divine messages embedded therein for our edification and instruction. With this insight, how can we apply Edwards’ “great and remarkable analogy” to our spiritual lives? The hope is that this insight of Edwards will lead to a wonderful, new and exciting line of theological investigation infused with an Edwardsean mystical spirituality. What Edwards has given us in his legacy of nature is a divine reciprocity in which God speaks of himself through the natural world to individuals designed to hear and understand the language of nature. As we open ourselves to this elegant divine revelation, we rejoice in a gospel of nature

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intended to draw us into a closer relationship with the One ever reaching to us. In this way, God’s beauty and glory are not only displayed in the grandeur of creation, but also intimately shared.

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Author Index

Aquinas, Thomas 64 Augustine 27 seq. Barth, Karl 69–74 Bonaventure 27 seq. Brunner, Emil 69 seq., 72–74 Calvin,John 18, 27–29, 113 Crisp, Oliver 38, 46, 51 Daniel, Stephen H 49 Delattre, Roland 141, 146 Einstein, Albert Fabiny, Tibor

113 24, 77

32, 51, 55, 60

Johnson, Keith 70, 72, 74 Jüngel, Eberhard 67 seq., 73–75 Kimmerer, Robin Wall Knight, Janice 59, 78

Nichols, Stephen 59, 96 Nicholson, Daniel 26 Pascal, Blaise 85 Piper, John 39 Przywara, Erich 69–72, 74 seq., 78, 112 seq. Rolnick, Philip

Gallaher, Brandon 75 Gerson, Lloyd 38 Giancole, Douglas 118 Grasso, Christopher 77–79 Holmes, Stephen

Marieb, Elaine 116 Marsden, George 55, 92, 96 Mason, S. F 82 McClymond, Michael 24, 38, 66 McDermott, Gerald 24, 66 McGrath, Alister 7, 63 seq., 73, 77, 157 Miller, Perry 84–87, 100, 102 seq. Morimoto, Anri 37

24

Lee, Sang Hyun 38 seq., 146 Lowance, Mason 77, 79, 82 seq. Luther, Martin 62, 65

7, 62, 64

Schultz, Walter 7, 15, 43 seq., 46, 48 Spinoza, Baruch 33 seq., 36, 43, 96 Stein, Stephen 87 seq. Strachan, Owen 26 Sweeney, Doug 26 Thuesen, Peter 27 Torrance, Thomas 26 seq., 113 Trench, R. C 68 Wainwright, William Zakai, Avihu

56, 77

88 seq.

Subject Index

ad extra 35–37, 39 seq., 42 seq., 52 Analogy 19 seq., 40, 55, 57, 60–67, 69–79, 82 seq., 88 seq., 101 seq., 112, 144, 149 seq., 158, 160 – Analogia entis 20, 60, 63–65, 69–78, 83, 86, 89, 113 – Analogia fidei 73–75 – Analogia relationis 73–75 – Analogy of Advent 73–75 Aseity 49 Beauty in Nature 7, 18, 21, 139 seq., 144 seq., 148, 150, 160 Biology 7, 13, 16, 115 seq., 118, 131 Causation 39, 48, 50 seq., 64 Criteria 14, 20, 33, 36, 43, 79–81, 85 seq., 105 seq., 108, 114, 123 seq., 131, 133, 149, 159 Dispositionalism 35 Divine Action 22 seq., 25, 47–51, 57, 64 seq., 78, 133–135, 154, 156, 160 – Concurrentism 51, 57, 65, 154 – Divine Compositionalism 48, 50 seq., 154 – Occasionalism 20, 23, 40, 42, 47–51, 57, 112, 154 divine-acts-of-willing-existence 44, 47 Divine communication 21, 32, 61, 64 seq., 75, 77 seq., 112, 144 Divine love 20, 72, 146 seq., 153, 157

Emanation/communication 19, 153 End in Creation 19, 33, 52, 95 seq. – Consequential End 45, 56, 144, 159 – Original Ultimate End 19, 22–24, 30 seq., 33 seq., 36 seq., 42, 45, 48, 52, 54, 56 seq., 59 seq., 78, 132 seq., 135, 140, 148, 153 seq., 157, 159 – Subordinate End 19, 31, 33, 45, 48, 56, 60 seq., 91, 144, 148, 153, 158 seq. Ex nihilo 20, 32 seq., 39 seq., 42, 44, 48–50, 71 seq., 113 Gospel of Nature 160 Intentionality

13, 17, 21 seq., 113,

78

Language of Nature 15, 17 seq., 21, 24, 27, 61seq., 64, 76seq., 101, 113 seq., 158, 160 Law of Nature 28, 49 seq. Metaphysics of creation 18, 20, 42, 52, 54, 57, 91, 114 – Continuous creation 20, 47, 49, 51, 73, 113, 134, 140, 156 – idealism 20, 23, 40, 42, 44–47, 49, 51, 112, 155 seq. – Occasionalism 20, 23, 40, 42, 47–51, 57, 112, 154 – Panentheism 20, 23, 40, 42, 46 seq., 51, 112, 149

Subject Index

Native Americans, Sermons to 96 seq. Natural Theology 25, 28, 31, 66, 70, 73, 77, 100, 108, 133, 145 – Natural knowledge 61 – Natural-revealed knowledge 78, 112 – Revealed knowledge 61, 108 Northampton 23, 95–97 Onto-typology 14, 20, 57, 61, 77 seq., 91, 93, 97 seq., 100, 102, 107, 112 seq., 122, 139, 159 Perichoretic unity 154 Philosophy of Nature 61 Prefigurings 55, 83, 85, 124 Primary Beauty 21, 139 seq., 142, 145 seq., 150, 160 Remanation 34, 36, 79, 157 Representational-intentions-for-existence 44, 47 Rhodopson 7, 112 Secondary Beauty 21, 139 seq., 142, 145– 148, 150 Stockbridge 96 seq. Symbol 59, 78, 82–84, 87 seq., 90, 110 Theology of Nature 14, 16, 19, 21 seq., 28 seq., 50, 56, 73, 75, 133 seq., 149, 153– 157, 160 Trinitarian Theology of Nature 4 Tropes (21) 82, 84–90 – Allegory 82, 85, 87 seq., 90 – Emblem 59, 82 seq., 87 seq., 90, 106 – Metaphor 19 seq., 39, 42, 52, 54, 56, 59, 65, 67, 80, 82, 84–87, 90, 132, 159

171 – Simile 82, 84–87, 90 Typology 7, 14, 16, 42, 54, 59 seq., 77 seq., 82–85, 88, 91, 101, 105, 110, 112, 121, 124, 129–131, 133, 158 – Antitypes 18, 19, 22, 23, 52, 54, 56, 57, 60, 77, 78, 80, 83, 85, 93, 98, 100, 101, 103, 104, 106, 107, 111, 114, 123, 156 – Biblical typology 19, 23, 27, 78–80, 82– 85, 99, 105 – Natural typology 19 seq., 23 seq., 42, 55, 57, 77–79, 82, 86, 88 seq., 92, 95, 97, 99, 102, 112–115, 131, 158 seq. Vestigia trinitatis 27, 131 seq. Visual System 112, 115, 116, 117, 121, 122, 123, 129, 130, 131, 132, 133 Works of Jonathan Edwards 12, 32, 34, 38, 92 – Charity and Its Fruits 97 – Discourse on the Trinity 97 seq., 154 – Dissertation I, End of Creation 19, 30 seq., 141, 144 – Dissertation II, True Virtue 139 – Divine and Supernatural Light 94 seq. – Freedom of the Will 12, 24, 98 – History and the Work of Redemption 79 – Miscellanies 12, 21, 24, 32, 47, 79, 91, 93 seq., 98 seq., 101 seq., 159 – Original Sin 12, 24, 98, 110 – Religious Affections 12, 24, 34, 107, 130 – Sermons 12, 14, 17, 21, 23 seq., 29, 87, 91, 93–98, 101 seq., 107, 113, 115, 121 seq., 130, 159 seq. – Shadows of Divine Things 13, 21, 27, 67, 77, 99, 107, 122, 132 seq., 158, 160 – Types of the Messiah 79, 99