Solomon Stoddard

Solomon Stoddard (September 27, 1643, baptized October 1, 1643 – February 11, 1729) was the pastor of the Congregationalist Church in Northampton, Massachusetts Bay Colony. He succeeded Rev. Eleazer Mather, and later married his widow around 1670. Stoddard significantly liberalized church policy while promoting more power for the clergy, decrying drinking and extravagance, and urging the preaching of hellfire and the Judgment. The major religious leader of what was then the frontier, he was known as the "Puritan Pope of the Connecticut River valley" and was concerned with the lives (and the souls) of second-generation Puritans. The well-known theologian Jonathan Edwards (1703–1758) was his grandson, the son of Solomon's daughter, Esther Stoddard Edwards. Stoddard was the first librarian at Harvard University and the first person in American history known by that title Religious leader Stoddard was an influential religious leader in colonial New England, and was the grandfather of the prominent theologian Rev. Jonathan Edwards. For 55 years, Stoddard occupied an unparalleled position in the Connecticut River Valley region of Massachusetts. His theology was not widely accepted in Boston, but was popular on the frontier. Opponents sometimes referred to him as "Pope" Stoddard, rhetorically placing him in the locally detested camp of the Roman Catholic Church. Yet what started as an insult from Increase Mather changed as his presbyterian influences over Congregational church government grew. Stoddard insisted that the sacrament of the Lord's Supper should be available to all who lived outwardly pious lives and had a good reputation in the community, even if they weren't full members of the church. This was his attempt to save his church from a "dying religion", and was the cause of great theological controversy in 18th century New England (see also Halfway Covenant). Although in acknowledging his grandfather as a "sort of deity", Edwards minimised his influence over Northampton, being dismissive of the oracle who had caused great wounds and split the church. Nevertheless, years later Timothy Dwight would assess his impact as more profound than any other clergyman over a thirty-year period.