Journal: Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society
Volume: JETS 49:2 (Jun 2006)
Article: Jonathan Edwards’s End Of Creation: An Exposition And Defense
Author: Walter J. Schultz

---

JETS 49:2 (June 2006) p. 247

Jonathan Edwards’s End Of Creation:
An Exposition And Defense

Walter Schultz*

I. Introduction

Jonathan Edwards’s Dissertation Concerning the End for which God created the World 1 is a treasure trove of resources and insights for contemporary philosophical theology—especially given his interest in resisting the erosion of the centrality of God in science, history, moral philosophy, and “true spirituality.” His concerns were—and still are—legitimate. In this paper I make common cause with Edwards by defending his End of Creation against criticisms grounded in a recurrent strategic error in interpretation. I will examine three such critical works.2 William Wisner (1850) argues that Edwards’s view of God and God’s purpose in creation is inconsistent because God’s making himself his end, as Edwards claims, entails both a deficiency in God and Neoplatonic emanationism, which contradict God’s aseity and creation ex nihilo, respectively. Michael J. McClymond (1995) argues that Edwards’s view of God as being normatively bound to regard each creature according to their inherent worth overrides God’s freedom in creating and shows God to be inconsistent when he saves only the elect. James Beilby (2004) argues that Edwards’s defense of his theses entails that God must demonstrate his glory. Since God’s glory consists in the demonstration of attributes expressible only in creating, it follows that “to be who he is—He must create.”3 Beilby then observes that this entailment is inconsistent with Edwards’s commitment to God’s aseity and freedom in creation. I defend Edwards against these charges by showing that each of these scholars commits a strategic error in interpretation. Each of these theorists, while apparently ignoring Edwards’s own explicit claims that a complete and trustworthy account of God’s end and motive in creation requires scriptural revelation, draws almost exclusively from the chapter that Edwards devotes to

* Walter Schultz is associate professor of philosophy at Northwestern College, 3003 Shelling Ave., St. Paul, MN, 55113.

JETS 49:2 (June 2006) p. 248

ascertaining what “reason teaches.”4 But what reason teaches provides only the first part of Edwards’s complete argument. Notice the difference between the claims: God’s end in creation is X and Reason teaches that God’s end in creation is X. Edwards should be understood to assert the latter. This is not to say that Edwards did not believe what he wrote about...

visitor : : uid: ()