Men's Study: Defining Biblical Meditation Within Puritanism

Who were the Puritans?

The Puritans were English Protestants in the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries who sought to purify the Church of England of Roman Catholic practices, maintaining that the Church of England had not been fully reformed and needed to become more Protestant. They took a stand for religious purity in Europe. Their rise was directly related to the increased knowledge that came to the common people in the Age of Enlightenment. As people learned to read and write, and as the Bible became more accessible to commoners, many began to read the Bible for themselves (a habit that was strongly discouraged in the established church). Some Puritans were connected with Anabaptist groups in continental Europe, but the majority were connected with the Church of England. The word Puritan was first coined in the 1560s as a derisive term for those who advocated more purity in worship and doctrine.

They took a stand for religious purity in the 16th, 17th, and 18th centuries in Europe. Their rise was directly related to the increased knowledge that came to the common people in the Age of Enlightenment. As people learned to read and write, and as the Bible became more accessible to commoners, many began to read the Bible for themselves (a habit that was strongly discouraged in the established church). Some Puritans were connected with Anabaptist groups in continental Europe, but the majority were connected with the Church of England. The word Puritan was first coined in the 1560s as a derisive term for those who advocated more purity in worship and doctrine.

What did they believe?

Many Puritans advocated separation from all other Christian groups, but most were “non-separating” and desired to bring cleansing and change to the church from within. Holding a high view of Scripture, and deeming it as the only true law of God, Puritans believed that each individual, as well as each congregation, was directly responsible to God, rather than answering through a mediator such as a priest, bishop, etc. The Congregational Church in America is a descendant of the early Puritan settlers, and any group that advocates congregational rule and individual piety has been impacted in some way by Puritan teaching. Even today, theologians from many church backgrounds appreciate reading the works of the old Puritan divines, even if they differ in some points of doctrine.

Puritans and America

Both America and Great Britain owe a great debt to the Puritans for the foundations they laid that gave us the framework for our freedoms today. Philosophies such as the “divine right” of kings gave way to individual liberties and the recognition of the rights of the common man. The “Yankee work ethic” came about because of the belief that a man's work is done first for God's approval. The belief in public education comes from the Puritans, who founded the first school in America (Roxbury, 1635), as well as the first college (Harvard, 1639), so that people would be able to read the Bible for themselves. The moral foundations of the early United States came from the emphasis on godly behavior by Puritan leaders. Even Alexis de Tocqueville, after studying America in the 1830s, declared that Puritanism was the primary foundation that gave rise to our democratic republic.

Some well-known Puritans are John Bunyan (The Pilgrim's Progress), John Winthrop (“City upon a Hill” sermon), Cotton Mather, and John Foxe (Foxe's Book of Martyrs).

Puritan Definition of Biblical Meditation

Like no other movement within church history, the Puritans understood the importance of Christian meditation so they developed and defined it with keen precision and insight. Today, we live in a time where biblical meditation is well understood. Therefore, classic Puritan definitions of meditation will help us on our journey.

Puritan Definition

By Thomas Hooker: Meditation is a serious intention of the mind whereby we come to search out the truth, and settle it upon the heart.

William Fenner: Meditation is a settled exercise of the mind for a further inquiry of the truth, and so affecting the heart therewith, and therefore there be four things in meditation:

An exercise of the mind.

A settled exercise…it dwells upon the truth.

To make further inquiry…Meditation pulls the latch of the truth and looks into every closet, and every cupboard, and every angle of it.

It labors to affect the heart.

William Bates: Meditation is a serious exercise of the understanding, whereby our thoughts are fixed on the observation of spiritual things in order to practice.

Thomas White: Divine meditation…is a serious, solemn thinking and considering of the things of God, to the end we might understand how much they concern us, and that our hearts thereby may be raised to some holy affections and resolutions. He lated explained that the three parts of meditation are - Consideration, affections, and resolution.

Thomas Watson: Meditation…is a holy exercise of the mind whereby we bring the truths of God to remembrance, and do seriously ponder upon them ad apply them to ourselves. Meditation is the soul’s retiring of itself so that, by a serious and solemn thinking upon God, the heart may be raised up to heavenly affections.

John Ball: Meditation is a serious, earnest and purposed musing upon some point of Christian instruction, tending to lead us forward toward the Kingdom of Heaven, and serving our daily strengthening against the flesh, the world, and the devil.

Isaac Ambrose: Meditation is a deep and earnest musing upon some point of Christian instruction, to the strengthening up against the flesh, world and devil, and to leading us forward toward the Kingdom of Heaven; or Meditation is a steadfast bending of the mind to some spiritual matter, discovering of it with our selves, till we bring the same to some profitable issue.

Puritan Meditation: Filling One’s Mind with Scriptural and Heavenly Thoughts.

Key ingredient is the serious use of the mind. A believer must think deeply about a biblical subject.

Ephesians 4:17–24 NASB95

17 So this I say, and affirm together with the Lord, that you walk no longer just as the Gentiles also walk, in the futility of their mind, 18 being darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the hardness of their heart; 19 and they, having become callous, have given themselves over to sensuality for the practice of every kind of impurity with greediness. 20 But you did not learn Christ in this way, 21 if indeed you have heard Him and have been taught in Him, just as truth is in Jesus, 22 that, in reference to your former manner of life, you lay aside the old self, which is being corrupted in accordance with the lusts of deceit, 23 and that you be renewed in the spirit of your mind, 24 and put on the new self, which in the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth.

reflect this truth of progressive sanctification that God’s people must walk “not as other Gentiles walk, in the vanity (futility) of their mind, having the understanding darkened… [but] be renewed in the spirit of your mind.”

Paul said that the battle for spiritual growth and victory is really a battle for the mind. To succeed we must slow our pace and have time to allow God’s truth to sink into their thinking. Consider the godly counsel of James Ussher:

Set apart some time for meditation, that the word may be engrafted into thy heart…If the meat that thou eateth be not digested, it will do thee no good. You see the necessity of labor to retain the Word, to digest it, to make it thine own, that you maybe transformed by it: and as a man’s meat is turned to his substance, so the Word of God being digested will nourish you.

Puritan Meditation: Affecting One’s Heart with the Goal of Personal Application.

Puritan meditation never encourage a life of actionless contemplation or useless theological speculation. To think so would be a serious misunderstanding of Puritan spirituality. To bring a person to the point of personal application, practice, and resolution, the Puritans taught that the mind must rightly consider the truth’s of God’s Word. Clarifying the use of the mind in meditation, Oliver Heywood wrote, “No, this is not a mere exercise of the mind and memory about good things, but working them upon the heart, the impressing of these things on the will and affections; it is not merely speculative, but practical.

If our meditation is merely speculative, it is like a winter sun, which shines but does not warm.

Meditation is exercise of the mind regarding God’s truths whereby it needs to be applied to ones life affecting the process by which one reason while handing struggles in life arriving at the will of God on those matters.