Biblia Americana, Volume 4: Ezra–Psalms by Cotton Mather

Abstract

Reviewed by: Biblia Americana, Volume 4: Ezra–Psalms by Cotton Mather Matt Millsap (bio) Biblia Americana, Volume 4: Ezra–Psalms cotton mather Edited by harry clark maddux Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Academic, 2015 869 pp. Continuing one of the more ambitious publishing efforts in recent American historical scholarship, Baker Academic has released the fourth of the anticipated ten-volume series of Cotton Mather’s Biblia Americana. As it was the first major biblical commentary produced on the American continent, its publication will continue to open new avenues of research for a wide range of scholars. Those interested in New England Puritanism, colonial church history, the polemics surrounding early modern biblical interpretation, and an emerging transatlantic network of Christian intellectuals wrestling with the implications of early Enlightenment thought will benefit from the efforts of Reiner Smolinksi and Jan Steivermann, general and executive editors of the series. Even a casual association of the Enlightenment with such a sectarian figure as Mather may come as a surprise. However, Smolinski and Stievermann intend to reframe the prominent Puritan as a polymathic intellectual and theologian comparable to Jonathan Edwards. The publication of Cotton Mather and Biblia Americana: America’s First Bible Commentary, Essays in Reappraisal (2010) in conjunction with the published volumes of the Biblia Americana—volume 2 is still forthcoming—have not only served this purpose but enhanced our understanding of the early modern Atlantic world. The latest volume contains Mather’s commentary on the canonical biblical texts Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther, Job, and the Psalms, filling 707 pages excluding introductory and bibliographic materials. Consistently with the [End Page 526] general format of the series, the volume’s editor, Henry Clark Maddux, helpfully annotates Mather’s catechetical, question-and-answer format employed throughout the Biblia. In the primary text, Mather emphasized ancient Israel’s return from the Babylonian captivity and the rebuilding of Jerusalem’s walls in the books of Ezra and Nehemiah. In Esther, he portrayed Mordecai’s refusal to bow before Haman as a culturally informed act of pious resistance. It was a learned piety that Mather thought was not just historically instructive but also indicative of the proper balance between religion and learning. As he was wont to do, the Boston minister often segued, and not always seamlessly, from biblical commentary into contemporary philosophical and philological debates. He delved into controversies surrounding the age of the book of Job as well as the implications of believing in pre-Abrahamic divine revelations. Further, this volume has unique value insofar as Mather’s work on the Psalms suggests he deviated from the traditional Puritan belief that Christ’s return would be heralded by a mass conversion of the Jews to Christianity. Maddux quite adeptly highlights this eschatological turn, and locates a probable cause for the shift in Mather’s reading of Blaise Pascal’s Pensées (1670). For most readers, Maddux’s introduction will prove an indispensible guide to the text. His background in Puritan poetics and modern biblical hermeneutics provides valuable insights into the subtle and varied influences at play in Mather’s comments. In many ways, the introductory essay serves as a critical analysis of early modern biblical scholarship, foregrounding the collaborative nature of biblical interpretation characteristic of the period. Particularly instructive is Maddux’s identification of Mather’s guiding principles: one, “that academic learning and experiential religion need to be mutually supportive endeavors,” and two, that scholars of the time stressed breadth of knowledge over originality of thought (3, 9). Maddux contends that these principles informed not only Mather’s devotional application of all forms of proper knowledge but also his methodological approach to the biblical text. In accord with Smolinski’s and Stievermann’s larger project, Maddux presents Cotton Mather as a prodigious intellect comparable to any other in the English Atlantic, and he takes to task scholars who would argue otherwise. For example, in the most provocative section of the introduction he points to some of Michael Winship’s work on Mather as being “limited by its Whiggish presumption of a history that works in broadly [End Page 527] progressive ways” (26). Maddux argues that Mather is still not properly understood or represented by historians. Though this scholarly misperception...