I've been reading Iain Murray's biography of Jonathan Edwards, and I have a feeling that it is going to give rise to more than one blog entry topic over the next few days. One thing I have remarked upon as I've read it is how essential to Edwards' ministry hospitality was, and how the hospitality for which his family was apparently fairly well-known would have been non-existent if it hadn't been for his wife, Sarah. Even the impact Edwards' life was to have on later generations sprang, to some extent, out of the draw of the hospitableness of his home.
It was that hospitality which drew Samuel Hopkins, a primary source of information about Edwards for many of his biographers, to show up at the Edwards' home as a total stranger, expecting and receiving a warm welcome. One of Jonathan Edwards' more influential books, The Life and Diary of the Rev. David Brainerd, was inspired by a friendship that was started in a similar fashion. Brainerd, having met Jonathan Edwards only once, showed up on his doorstep one spring and apparently stayed for the rest of the summer. He became good friends with the entire family, and Edwards spoke at his funeral. These were two figures among countless people who benefited from the hospitality of the Edwards household, and Murray quotes both as remarking upon the hospitable atmosphere of the Edwards home created by Sarah.
The disparity between the education of men and women at the time is readily apparent in the spelling and style of the letters and other writings that have survived to be recorded in Murray's biography, so I am not about to whole-heartedly endorse the general attitude toward women during Edwards' era. I will, however, point out that there was a marked appreciation for the atmosphere in the home--for which women were mostly responsible--that we rarely see today. Perhaps a renewal of that appreciation would help women to stop seeing staying home as the isolated, unfulfilling death trap that a lot of women still seem to consider it to be. Right now it seems almost socially taboo to compliment a woman on creating a hospitable home.
A renewed appreciation of the art of hospitality might require a better understanding of what truly good hospitality requires. The hospitality of Sarah Edwards was not merely good food and a warm bed; guests of Jonathan Edwards naturally came expecting spiritual food as well. Sarah openly and knowledgeably conversed with her guests about theological issues and moral concerns. When we relegate the art of hospitality to what one can learn in Home Ec in middle school, is it any wonder that most women are turned off by the idea of spending a good portion of their day in creating a hospitable home? When so many people seem to think of the "stay-at-home mom" as one who is primarily concerned with her own children and her own household affairs rather than as someone whose responsibility is the comfort, knowldge, and well-being of anyone who walks in the door, it is no wonder those SAH moms feel isolated. Everyone loses in a culture with that attitude.
Posted by waltondammerung at February 24, 2005 5:26 PMActually, I think that Better Homes and Gardens and Martha Stewart have done as much to stifle true hospitality as most other influences. The notion that the hospitality must be administered in a picture-perfect environment to be acceptable is depressing and suffocating. No one can measure up! In addition, the Martha mentality shifts focus from the recipient of hospitality to the skills of the giver, which guarantees something less than a true warm welcome. As a Puritan, Sarah Edwards was most assuredly free of such notions, and therefore freed to focus on the eternal nature of each encounter, and the eternal, true needs of each guest. Oh, to be so free!
Posted by: Mom at February 25, 2005 8:37 AM