George Whitefield (; 30 September 1770), also known as George Whitfield, was an Anglican cleric and evangelist who was one of the founders of Methodism and the evangelical movement. Born in Gloucester, he matriculated at Pembroke College at the University of Oxford in 1732.
The contention that Whitefield supported slavery comes from a single author Stephen Stein, who attributes anonymous documents to secret authorship of Whitefield. Slavery had been outlawed in the young colony of Georgia in 1735.
He had earlier become the leader of the Holy Club at Oxford when the Wesley brothers departed for Georgia. In 1738 he went to Savannah, Georgia, in the American colonies, as parish priest of Christ Church.
In England and Wales, Whitefield's itinerary included every county. He went to the Georgia Colony in 1738 following John Wesley's departure, to serve as a colonial chaplain at Savannah. While in Georgia, Whitefield served as minister for an orphanage and traveled extensively throughout both North America and Britain in an effort to raise money for the organization.
In response, clergy called Whitefield one of "the young quacks in divinity" who are "breaking the peace and unity" of the church. From 1738 to 1741, Whitefield issued seven Journals.
Joseph Trapp called the Journals "blasphemous" and accused Whitefield of being "besotted either with pride or madness". In England, by 1738 when he was ordained priest, Whitefield wrote that "the spirit of the clergy began to be much embittered" and that "churches were gradually denied me".
″Alexander Garden and George Whitefield: The Significance of Revivalism in South Carolina 1738–1741″.
One was erected in London—Spa Fields Chapel. In 1739, Whitefield returned to England to raise funds to establish the Bethesda Orphanage, now the Bethesda Academy.
In response to Whitefield's Journals, the bishop of London, Edmund Gibson, published a 1739 pastoral letter criticizing Whitefield.
Charles Wesley composed a hymn in 1739, "Hark, how all the welkin rings".
In 1740, Whitefield traveled to North America, where he preached a series of revivals that became part of the "Great Awakening".
On 25 March 1740, construction began.
The Trustees also objected to Whitefield's using "a wrong Method" to control the children, who "are often kept praying and crying all the Night". On returning to North America in 1740, he preached a series of revivals that came to be known as the First Great Awakening.
In 1740 he engaged Moravian Brethren from Georgia to build an orphanage for negro children on land he had bought in the Lehigh Valley of Pennsylvania.
He also arranged to have his sermons published. Whitefield sought to influence the colonies after he returned to England from his 1740 tour in America.
This included 4,000 acres of land and 50 black slaves. ===Campaign against cruel treatment of slaves=== In 1740, during his second visit to America, Whitefield published "an open letter to the planters of South Carolina, Virginia, and Maryland" chastising them for their cruelty to their slaves.
He would often preach and attend public events during his travels, which served to further spread his message. ==Marriage== "I believe it is God's will that I should marry", George Whitefield wrote to a friend in 1740.
In his 1740 visit to Charles Town, it "took Whitefield only four days to plunge Charles Town into religious and social controversy." Whitefield thought he might be martyred for his views.
Furthermore, Whitefield issued a blanket indictment of New England's Congregational ministers for their "lack of zeal". In 1740, Whitefield published attacks on "the works of two of Anglicanism's revered seventeenth-century authors".
He rejected ecclesiastical authority claiming that 'the whole world is now my parish'. In 1740, Whitefield had attacked John Tillotson and Richard Allestree's The Whole Duty of Man.
Whitefield replied that if bishops did not authorize his itinerant preaching, God would give him the authority. In 1740, Jonathan Edwards invited Whitefield to preach in his church in Northampton.
But he was concerned: "I pray God that I may not have a wife till I can live as though I had none." That ambivalence—believing God willed a wife, yet wanting to live as if without one—brought Whitefield a disappointing love life and a largely unhappy marriage. His wife Elizabeth, a widow previously Elizabeth James, née Gwynne, married Whitefield on 14 November 1741, After their 1744–48 stay in America, she never accompanied him on his travels.
In response, clergy called Whitefield one of "the young quacks in divinity" who are "breaking the peace and unity" of the church. From 1738 to 1741, Whitefield issued seven Journals.
These attacks resulted in hostile responses and reduced attendance at his London open-air preaching. In 1741, Whitefield made his first visit to Scotland at the invitation of "Ralph and Ebenezer Erskine, leaders of the breakaway Associate Presbytery.
This criticism was in part evoked by Whitefield's criticism of "their education and Christian commitment" in his Journal of 1741.
His exuberant and "too apostolical" language were criticised; his journals were no longer published after 1741. Whitefield prepared a new installment in 1744–45, but it was not published until 1938.
He furnished newspapers and booksellers with material, including copies of Whitefield's writings. When Whitefield returned to England in 1742, a crowd Whitefield estimated at 20,000 and William M'Culloch, the local minister, at 30,000, met him. One such open-air congregation took place on Minchinhampton common.
In addition to his work in North America and England, he made 15 journeys to Scotland—most famously to the "Preaching Braes" of Cambuslang in 1742—two journeys to Ireland, and one each to Bermuda, Gibraltar, and the Netherlands.
In 1743 after four miscarriages, Elizabeth had bore the couple's only child, a son.
But he was concerned: "I pray God that I may not have a wife till I can live as though I had none." That ambivalence—believing God willed a wife, yet wanting to live as if without one—brought Whitefield a disappointing love life and a largely unhappy marriage. His wife Elizabeth, a widow previously Elizabeth James, née Gwynne, married Whitefield on 14 November 1741, After their 1744–48 stay in America, she never accompanied him on his travels.
Later, Edwards delivered a series of sermons containing but "thinly veiled critiques" of Whitefield's preaching, "warning against over-dependence upon a preacher's eloquence and fervency". During Whitefield's 1744–1748 visit to America, ten critical pamphlets were published, two by officials of Harvard and Yale.
His exuberant and "too apostolical" language were criticised; his journals were no longer published after 1741. Whitefield prepared a new installment in 1744–45, but it was not published until 1938.
When he returned to America for his third tour in 1745, he was better known than when he had left. Much of Whitefield's publicity was the work of William Seward, a wealthy layman who accompanied Whitefield.
The "Declaration of the Association of the County of New Haven, 1745" stated that after Whitefield's preaching "religion is now in a far worse state than it was".
In 1747, Whitefield attributed the financial woes of his Bethesda Orphanage to Georgia's prohibition of black people in the colony.
In 1747 he published A Further Account of God's Dealings with the Reverend George Whitefield, covering the period from his ordination to his first voyage to Georgia.
He argued that "the constitution of that colony [Georgia] is very bad, and it is impossible for the inhabitants to subsist” while blacks were banned. Between 1748 and 1750, Whitefield campaigned for the legalisation of African-American emigration into the colony because the trustees of Georgia had banned slavery.
These letters document the creation of an orphanage for boys named the Charity School. And in 1749, Franklin chose the Whitefield meeting house, with its Charity School, to be purchased as the site of the newly-formed Academy of Philadelphia which opened in 1751, followed in 1755 with the College of Philadelphia, both the predecessors of the University of Pennsylvania.
He argued that "the constitution of that colony [Georgia] is very bad, and it is impossible for the inhabitants to subsist” while blacks were banned. Between 1748 and 1750, Whitefield campaigned for the legalisation of African-American emigration into the colony because the trustees of Georgia had banned slavery.
"Had Negroes been allowed" to live in Georgia, he said, "I should now have had a sufficiency to support a great many orphans without expending above half the sum that has been laid out." Whitefield's push for the legalization of slave emigration in to Georgia "cannot be explained solely on the basics of economics." It was also his hope for their adoption and for their eternal salvation. Black slaves were permitted to live in Georgia in 1751.
These letters document the creation of an orphanage for boys named the Charity School. And in 1749, Franklin chose the Whitefield meeting house, with its Charity School, to be purchased as the site of the newly-formed Academy of Philadelphia which opened in 1751, followed in 1755 with the College of Philadelphia, both the predecessors of the University of Pennsylvania.
These letters document the creation of an orphanage for boys named the Charity School. And in 1749, Franklin chose the Whitefield meeting house, with its Charity School, to be purchased as the site of the newly-formed Academy of Philadelphia which opened in 1751, followed in 1755 with the College of Philadelphia, both the predecessors of the University of Pennsylvania.
In 1756, a vigorously edited version of his journals and autobiographical accounts was published.
Whitefield revised the opening couplet in 1758 for "Hark, the Herald Angels Sing". ==Veneration and legacy== Whitefield is honoured together with Francis Asbury with a feast day on the liturgical calendar of the Episcopal Church (USA) on 15 November. Whitfield County, Georgia, United States, is named after Whitefield.
"Another climbed a tree to urinate on him." In 1760, Whitefield was burlesqued by Samuel Foote in The Minor. ===Whitefield changes=== Selina Hastings, Countess of Huntingdon made Whitefield her personal chaplain.
In 1763, in a defense of Methodism, Whitefield "repeated contrition for much contained in his Journals". Among the nobility who heard Whitefield in the Countess of Huntingdon's home was Lady Townshend.
Thus, "her death set his mind much at liberty". Elizabeth died of a fever on 9 August 1768.
Another collection of sermons was published just before he left London for the last time in 1769.
George Whitefield (; 30 September 1770), also known as George Whitfield, was an Anglican cleric and evangelist who was one of the founders of Methodism and the evangelical movement. Born in Gloucester, he matriculated at Pembroke College at the University of Oxford in 1732.
George Whitefield in 1770.
The baby died at four months old. ==Death== In 1770, the 55-year-old Whitefield continued preaching in spite of poor health.
The next morning Whitefield died in the parsonage of Old South Presbyterian Church, Newburyport, Massachusetts, on 30 September 1770, and was buried, according to his wishes, in a crypt under the pulpit of this church.
An edition of the journals, in one volume, was edited by William Wale in 1905.
His exuberant and "too apostolical" language were criticised; his journals were no longer published after 1741. Whitefield prepared a new installment in 1744–45, but it was not published until 1938.
This was reprinted with additional material in 1960 by the Banner of Truth Trust.
Edinburgh or Carlisle: Banner of Truth Trust, 1970.
1 (January 1970), pp. 1–16. Kidd, Thomas S.
Hodder & Stoughton, 1973 Reisinger, Ernest.
London: Banner of Truth Trust, 1978.
Whitefield and Wesley on the New Birth (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Francis Asbury Press of Zondervan Publishing House, 1986). Streater, David "Whitefield and the Revival" (Crossway, Autumn 1993.
Whitefield and Wesley on the New Birth (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Francis Asbury Press of Zondervan Publishing House, 1986). Streater, David "Whitefield and the Revival" (Crossway, Autumn 1993.
The Founder's Journal, Issue 19/20, Winter/Spring 1995: "What Should We Think of Evangelism and Calvinism?".
Fearn (maybe Hill of Fearn), Tain: Christian Focus Publications, 1997.
Nashville: Cumberland House Publishing (acquired by Sourcebooks), 2001.
Stoke-on-Trent: Tentmaker Publications, 2007.
Edinburgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 2007 (reprint) [1837].
Catholic Spirit: Wesley, Whitefield, and the Quest for Evangelical Unity in Eighteenth Century British Methodism (Scarecrow Press, 2008). Smith, Timothy L.
New Haven: Yale University Press, 2009.
Cardiff: University of Wales Press 2015 Johnston, E.A.
On 2 July 2020, the University of Pennsylvania announced they would be removing the statue due to Whitefield's connection to slavery.
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