MAYHEW, JONATHAN
(8 October 1720, Martha's Vineyard, MA-9 July 1766, Boston, MA). Education: B.A., Harvard College, 1744; postgraduate study at Harvard College, 1744-47. Career: Minister, West Congregational Church, Boston, 1747--66.
Since their earliest years in America, Congregationalists had tried to maintain a balance between reason and piety, human volition and divine providence. Within Congregationalism a kind of dialogue existed between those stressing God's sovereignty and those noting man's independence; the boundaries of the church were sufficiently wide to allow differences on such issues as preparation for grace. But occasionally dissenters took positions unacceptable to most Congregationalists and found a more hospitable climate among the sectaries in Rhode Island or, later, the Anglican churches in New England.
Jonathan Mayhew is an important figure in the process by which Congregationalists determined which views were consistent with and which were antithetical to their faith. A descendant of Puritan missionary ancestors in Martha's Vineyard, Mayhew compiled a distinguished record at Harvard and was called to the liberal pulpit of West Congregational Church in Boston. Partly in reaction to the disorders of the Great Awakening, he came to espouse a human centered theology that many of his colleagues regarded as heretical.
Claiming the Bible, rather than Calvin, as his authority, he argued in favor of free will, individual judgment, and the efficacy of good works in salvation. The Bible was infallible, he said, but it must be understood with the help of human reason. Mayhew rejected the idea of original sin and the role of mystery in religion. Additionally he criticized traditional ideas of the Trinity, claiming that Christ was somewhat less than a God, but more than human. A few decades later other ministers, embracing similar ideas, would break away from the Congregational church and become Unitarians. But Mayhew stayed within the denomination, finding some company in the less outspoken religious liberal, Charles Chauncy*.
Mayhew was better liked for his iconoclastic political views. In 1750 he preached a notable sermon, A Discourse Concerning Unlimited Submission, underscoring the right of citizens to rebel against an unjust monarch. In subsequent sermons Mayhew reiterated his position, winning the favor of such revolutionary leaders as James Otis, Samuel Adams, and John Adams. Mayhew's patriot credentials were reaffirmed when in the 1760s he became one of the most outspoken opponents of Anglican efforts to establish Episcopal bishops in America. Had he lived longer Mayhew might have been one of the leaders of the "Black Regiment" of Patriot clergymen in the Revolution, and he might have been one of the founders of the Unitarian church. Mayhew's life reflects the independent-mindedness that the early Puritans alternately nourished and lamented.
Bibliography
A: Seven Sermons (Boston, 1749; New York, 1969); A Discourse Concerning Unlimited Submission (Boston, 1750); Sermons (Boston, 1755); Observations on the Charter and Conduct of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts (Boston, 1763); The Snare Broken (Boston, 1766).
B: AAP 8,22-29; DAB 12,454-55; DARB, 300-301; SH 7, 264; NCAB 7, 71; UU, 294-95; Alden Bradford, Memoir of the Life and Writings of Rev. Jonathan Mayhew (Boston, 1838); Charles W. Akers, Called Unto Liberty: A Life of Jonathan Mayhew (Cambridge, Mass., 1964).
Since their earliest years in America, Congregationalists had tried to maintain a balance between reason and piety, human volition and divine providence. Within Congregationalism a kind of dialogue existed between those stressing God's sovereignty and those noting man's independence; the boundaries of the church were sufficiently wide to allow differences on such issues as preparation for grace. But occasionally dissenters took positions unacceptable to most Congregationalists and found a more hospitable climate among the sectaries in Rhode Island or, later, the Anglican churches in New England.
Jonathan Mayhew is an important figure in the process by which Congregationalists determined which views were consistent with and which were antithetical to their faith. A descendant of Puritan missionary ancestors in Martha's Vineyard, Mayhew compiled a distinguished record at Harvard and was called to the liberal pulpit of West Congregational Church in Boston. Partly in reaction to the disorders of the Great Awakening, he came to espouse a human centered theology that many of his colleagues regarded as heretical.
Claiming the Bible, rather than Calvin, as his authority, he argued in favor of free will, individual judgment, and the efficacy of good works in salvation. The Bible was infallible, he said, but it must be understood with the help of human reason. Mayhew rejected the idea of original sin and the role of mystery in religion. Additionally he criticized traditional ideas of the Trinity, claiming that Christ was somewhat less than a God, but more than human. A few decades later other ministers, embracing similar ideas, would break away from the Congregational church and become Unitarians. But Mayhew stayed within the denomination, finding some company in the less outspoken religious liberal, Charles Chauncy*.
Mayhew was better liked for his iconoclastic political views. In 1750 he preached a notable sermon, A Discourse Concerning Unlimited Submission, underscoring the right of citizens to rebel against an unjust monarch. In subsequent sermons Mayhew reiterated his position, winning the favor of such revolutionary leaders as James Otis, Samuel Adams, and John Adams. Mayhew's patriot credentials were reaffirmed when in the 1760s he became one of the most outspoken opponents of Anglican efforts to establish Episcopal bishops in America. Had he lived longer Mayhew might have been one of the leaders of the "Black Regiment" of Patriot clergymen in the Revolution, and he might have been one of the founders of the Unitarian church. Mayhew's life reflects the independent-mindedness that the early Puritans alternately nourished and lamented.
Bibliography
A: Seven Sermons (Boston, 1749; New York, 1969); A Discourse Concerning Unlimited Submission (Boston, 1750); Sermons (Boston, 1755); Observations on the Charter and Conduct of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts (Boston, 1763); The Snare Broken (Boston, 1766).
B: AAP 8,22-29; DAB 12,454-55; DARB, 300-301; SH 7, 264; NCAB 7, 71; UU, 294-95; Alden Bradford, Memoir of the Life and Writings of Rev. Jonathan Mayhew (Boston, 1838); Charles W. Akers, Called Unto Liberty: A Life of Jonathan Mayhew (Cambridge, Mass., 1964).