George Whitefield
George Whitefield ( [ˈhwɪtfiːld] ; born December 16, 1714 in Gloucester , England , † September 30, 1770 in Newburyport , Massachusetts ) was an English clergyman . The preacher was a co-founder of Methodism , a religious revival movement that grew out of the Anglican Church .
Life
Whitefield (pronounced: Wittfield ) was born to a couple who run inns in Gloucester , England. Since his father died two years after he was born, George grew up in his widowed mother's inn without a paternal example. He attended Latin school and at 18 went to Pembroke College at Oxford , where he trained as a priest . There he met the brothers John and Charles Wesley at the Holy Club. He was converted in the spring of 1735 and that same year founded the first Methodist Society in Gloucester. In June 1736 Whitefield was ordained a deacon . A little later he began to work as a restless preacher (30,000 sermons), where he became famous for his loud voice and his acting in the pulpit. He traveled between England and the British colonies 13 times. And was one of the first to preach publicly - outside of churches. He made contacts with the circle around Selina Countess of Huntingdon (1707-1791), which intensified from 1748 after the death of her husband.
Whitefield died on September 30, 1770 in Newburyport , Massachusetts . In the American War of Independence Whitefield's legacy was recognized politically. Sun visited Benedict Arnold , the military leader of the invasion of Canada by the American revolutionary troops at the start of the campaign with his officers Whitefield's grave beneath the pulpit of the Church of Newburyport. They opened the coffin and cut off strips of Whitefield's collar and cuffs to carry as relics on the march to Canada . The campaign was elevated to a "quasi-religious campaign" in the name of Whitefield.
According to him, Whitfield County named in Georgia.
background
While the Anglican Church remained in a phase of paralysis with its rituals, Whitefield preached in the open air to the common people and was able to shake the masses in Great Britain and America deeply. As an enthusiastic and rhetorically gifted preacher, he described the decay of human nature, the wrath of God and the agony of hell that overtook the unconverted sinner. The only salvation from this is conversion through a new birth in Jesus Christ, in which the Holy Spirit makes contact with the soul of man. The power of the blood of Christ alone is capable of washing every truly believing sinner from all the atrocities he has committed, regardless of whether one has been a drunkard, adulterer or even a murderer.
Whitefield was therefore considered the greatest evangelist after the apostles of the New Testament. In addition to his sermons, he was extremely involved in the social field. He looked after the poor and needy and visited prisoners in prison. He raised substantial sums of money for his orphanage in Georgia. Actor David Garrick once said he would give 100 guineas for being able to say "Oh" like Whitefield.
theology
The foundations of his faith were the sinfulness of man and the grace of Jesus Christ. Theologically, Whitefield, unlike John Wesley , was a strict Calvinist . Because of differences in the doctrine of predestination , Whitefield separated from the Wesleyans and founded a separate branch of Calvinist Methodism. However, this did not change the mutual respect between Wesley and Whitefield.
See also
literature
- William Reginald Ward: Whitefield, George . In: Theologische Realenzyklopädie (TRE). Volume 35, de Gruyter, Berlin / New York 2003, ISBN 3-11-017781-1 , pp. 727-730.
- Harry S. Stout: The Divine Dramatist. George Whitefield and the Rise of Modern Evangelicalism . Library of Religious Biography. Eerdmans, Grand Rapids Repr. 2001, ISBN 0-8028-0154-4 .
- Frank Lambert: “Pedlar in divinity”: George Whitefield and the Transatlantic Revivals, 1737-1770 . University Press, Princeton 1994, ISBN 0-691-03296-3 .
- Benedikt Peters: George Whitefield, the awakening of England and America . CLV, 1997, ISBN 3-89397-374-5 .
- Karl Heinz Voigt: George Whitefield. In: Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon (BBKL). Volume 13, Bautz, Herzberg 1998, ISBN 3-88309-072-7 , Columns 1011-1020.
- Whitefield, George . In: Encyclopædia Britannica . 11th edition. tape 28 : Vetch - Zymotic Diseases . London 1911, p. 603 (English, full text [ Wikisource ]).
- Dallimore Arnold A .: George Whitefield: God's Anointed Servant in the Great Revival of the Enlightened Century . Crossway, 1990, ISBN 978-1-4335-1341-1 .
Web links
- Literature by and about George Whitefield in the catalog of the German National Library
- Biographical data and texts by George Whitefield . In: Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL).
- Project: Sermons in German translation
- The Essential George Whitefield on the Internet Archive
- The George Whitefield Homepage ( Memento August 24, 2005 on the Internet Archive ) on the Internet Archive
Individual evidence
- ^ Joel Tyler Headley : The Clergy and Chaplains of the Revolution . Charles Scribner, New York 1864, p. 93.
- ^ Nancy Isenberg : Fallen Founder: The Life of Aaron Burr . Viking Press, New York 2007, p. 23.
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Whitefield, George |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | English clergyman and preacher |
| DATE OF BIRTH | December 16, 1714 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Gloucester , England, UK |
| DATE OF DEATH | September 30, 1770 |
| Place of death | Newburyport , Province of Massachusetts Bay, British Empire |