Archibald Alexander and Old School Presbyterianism.

[Jash Comstock]

I had a few questions regarding Archibald Alexander and Old School Presbyterianism. I know he was influential (along with Miller) in the founding years of Old Princeton. What struck me as odd was some facts about his pre-Princeton days. I understand he was an itenerant preacher at one point, and even after moving to Princeton, still held that it was OK to cross presbytery lines in ministry without the approval of those presbyteries. I've also heard him lumped in as a participant with the second great awakening, which (as I understand it) was the opposing group to the Old School Presbyterians. (Most of my info comes from this lecture 01 - Princeton Beginnings (A. Alexander) | SermonAudio.com so if I'm wrong here please correct me). Here are my questions.

1. Was Alexander a part of the second great awakening?

2. Is it true that he had a looser idea of the role of presbyteries and the BCO than we do now?

3. How exactly does he fit into the subsequent Old School/New School controversy? (Especially his views on itenerant ministry)

 

[Wayne]

Garretson knows his stuff when it comes to the Princetonians. However, if he fails to provide citations in evidence, that may be a shortcoming of the lecture format or situation.

He has at least one published work on Alexander and another on Samuel Miller.

Ad fontes: You can also find Alexander's biography, written by his son, on archive.org:

The life of Archibald Alexander, D.D., first professor in the Theological Seminary, at Princeton, New Jersey

 

[Alan D. Strange]

Alexander's itinerating in his twenties (after being ordained by Hanover Presbytery in the 1790s) in Virginia meant that he was not a settled preacher in a particular church but was involved in what we would call today "church planting." And some men back then (because of the Old Side/New Side controversy and subsequent split, 1741-58) thought that permission was necessary to preach in another presbytery. It's not that he had a looser view of the BCO than we do now but that some had a stricter view then. I preach all over, moving in and out of presbyteries, even as Alexander did when president of Hampden-Sydney and first professor at Princeton (not when at Third Presbyterian, Philadelphia).

Alexander was New Side and generally favorable to the First Great Awakening (he and Hodge had some differences here). And the earlier part of the Second Great Awakening (think Asahel Nettleton) was Calvinistic before turning Arminian/Pelagian in the 1820s and 30s. But when the split came in 1837 (Princeton had tried to stay out of it) between Old School and New School, Alexander, together with all of Old Princeton, threw in its lot with the Old School over against the New School (particularly in its doctrinal divergences).

Peace,
Alan