This series titled THEIR PAIN, OUR GAIN is telling the story behind many of our favorite hymns and i pray that God will bless you as you read this excerpt, be kind to drop your comment after reading this article.
John Bunyan (28 November 1628 – 31 August 1688) was an English
Christian writer and
preacher, who is well known for his book
The Pilgrim's Progress.
Though he became a non-conformist and member of an Independent church,
and although he has been described both as a Baptist and as a
Congregationalist, he himself preferred to be described simply as a
Christian. He is remembered in the
Church of England with a
Lesser Festival on August 30, and on the
liturgical calendar of the Episcopal Church (US)
on August 29. Some other Churches of the Anglican Communion, such as
the Anglican Church of Australia, honour him on the day of his death
(August 31) together with St Aidan of Lindisfarne.
Life
Bunyan's High Street Cottage
John Bunyan was born in 1628 to Thomas and Margaret Bunyan, in Bunyan's End in the parish of
Elstow,
Bedfordshire, England. Bunyan's End was located approximately half way between the hamlet of
Harrowden (one mile southeast of
Bedford) and
Elstow's
High Street. John is recorded in the Elstow parish register as having
been baptised, with his surname spelled 'Bunyan', on 30 November 1628.
The surname ‘Bunyan’ has been found spelled over thirty-four
different ways: Binyan, Buniun, Bonyon, Buignon, being the most common –
Bunyan being the most recent. These differences could be partly due to
the possibility that there were several distinctively different
families. However, most of the later differences in spelling are simply
due to how individual scribes thought the sound of the name should be
spelled. Almost certainly the surname came from the French 'Buignon', a
family that came to England as Norman feudal retainers. There are
various local records of people with really the same surname; a William
Bunion, of nearby Wilsamstade (Wilstead), is mentioned in the 1199
Assize rolls; a Henry Bunyan & a John Buingnon is mentioned in a
Dunstable Chronicle report dated 1219; a Ralph Buingnon of Dunstable was
hanged 1219; a John Boynun of Pullokes hille died in 1286; and most
think that John Bunyan and these persons all belonged to the same
family, mostly living near to Bedford and Elstow. It seems fairly
certain that the following people were among John Bunyan's antecedents,
given that the places in which they are recorded as living - Harrowden
and Bunyan's End - were but tiny hamlets; a Matilda who married a
William Boynun of Harewedon (500 yards from Bonyons End) in 1327, a
William Bonyon 'of Bonyon’s End' 14?? -1541, a Thomas Bonyon born 1502,
and a Widow Bunnion buried 29/7/1612.
It is known for sure that John's grandfather was one Thomas Bonyan,
(born 15?? died 1641). Thomas Bonyan is recorded on Elstow Manoral court
rolls as being as a juror. His last home was a cottage on Elstow High
Street, right next to Moot Hall, where Elstow's Manor Court hearings
took place. Thomas had three children by his first wife (name unknown) -
Elizabeth, born 159?, Edward, born 1600 and Thomas - born 24th February
1603. Thomas's first wife died in 1603 - possibly while, or as a result
of, giving birth to Thomas Jnr. Thomas Snr. went on to marry three more
times and sired another seven children.
Thomas Bunyan (b.1603) married Anne Pinney (or "Purney") in 1624 but
she died in April 1627. Just one month later, on 23 May 1627, Thomas
married his second wife, Margaret Bentley. Like Thomas, Margaret was
from Elstow and had also been born in 1603. (In 1628, Margaret's sister,
Rose Bentley, had married Thomas Bunyan's half-brother Edward.) Thomas
earned his living as a
chapman, but he may also have been a
brazier
- one who made and/or mended kettles and pots. John Bunyan later wrote
of his modest origins; "My descent was of a low and inconsiderable
generation, my father's house being of that rank that is meanest and
most despised of all the families of the land". This seems something of
an exaggeration, given that his grandfather (Thomas Snr.) is recorded as
having owned several properties in Elstow.
In his writings, John refers to his days when he was 'put to school'.
This may have meant his being schooled at his father's house, possibly
with other poor country boys, but it is also possible that he attended a
formal school, possibly the one in
Houghton Conquest. Some think that Bunyan may have attended
Bedford Grammar School,
but some records show that only pupils living within the Borough of
Bedford were eligible for a place there - and Elstow was not then part
of Bedford Borough. Either way, John's later writings demonstrate a
fairly good level of literacy.
Like his father Thomas, John chose a job 'on the road' by adopting the trade of
tinker.
Few people could afford to purchase new pots when old ones became
holed, so they were mended time and time again. The arrival of a tinker
was therefore often a welcome sight. Whilst this was a semi-skilled
occupation, the semi-nomadic nature of their life led to tinkers being
regarded, by some, in the same poor light as gypsies.
1644 was an eventful year for the Bunyan family: in June, John lost
his mother and, in July, his sister Margaret died. Following this, his
father married (for the third time) to Anne Pinney (or Purney) and a
half-brother, Charles, was born.
It may have been the arrival of his stepmother that, following his
16th birthday, led John to leave the family home and enlist in the
Parliamentary army and, from 1644 to 1647, John served at
Newport Pagnell garrison. The
English Civil War
was then nearing the end of the first stage. There is a story that John
was saved from death one day, when a fellow soldier volunteered to go
into battle in his place and was killed while walking sentry duty.
[1] After the civil war was won by
the Parliamentarians, Bunyan returned to Elstow and to his former trade.
In his autobiography,
Grace Abounding,
Bunyan wrote that he had led an abandoned life in his youth and was
morally reprehensible as a result. However, there appears to be no
outward evidence that he was any worse than his neighbours or colleagues
in the Parliamentary Army - who spent much of their time in Taverns and
Brothels of Newport Pagnell. Examples of sins which John actually
confessed to are; profanity, dancing, and bell-ringing. An increasing
awareness of his un-Biblical life led him to contemplate acts of impiety
and profanity; in particular, he was harassed by a curiosity in regard
to the "
unpardonable sin"
and a prepossession that he had already committed it. He was known as
an adept linguist as far as profanity was concerned; even the most
proficient swearers were known to remark that Bunyan was "the ungodliest
fellow for swearing they ever heard".
He continually heard voices urging him to "sell Christ" and was tortured by fearful visions. While playing a game of
Tip-cat on Elstow
village green,
Bunyan claimed to have heard a voice that asked: "Wilt thou leave thy
sins and go to heaven or have thy sins and go to hell?" Because
Puritans
held the Sabbath day sacred and permitted no sport, John believed that
this had been the voice of God, chastising his indulgent ways. John's
spirituality was born from this experience and he began to struggle with
guilt, self-doubt and his belief in the Bible's promise of
damnation and
salvation.
In 1649, when he was about 21, John moved from 'Bunyan's End' into a cottage on the western side of the northern end of
Elstow's High Street (the cottage shown above).
In 1650 he married a young woman, an orphan, whose inheritance from her father was just two books;
Arthur Dent's
Plain Man's Pathway to Heaven and
Lewis Bayly's
Practice of Piety,
and the content of these two books appears to have strongly influenced
John towards a religious life. John's wife's name is not recorded, but
their first daughter (born, blind, in 1650), was named Mary - so it is
possible, as was common in those days, that she was named after her
mother. The Bunyans' life was modest, to say the least. Bunyan wrote
that they were "as poor as poor might be", not even "a dish or spoon
between them".
As John struggled with his new-found
Christian faith,
he became increasingly despondent and fell into mental turmoil. During
this time of conflict, Bunyan began a four-year-long discussion and
spiritual journey with a few poor women of Bedford who belonged to a
nonconformist sect that worshipped in St. John's Church. He also increasingly identified himself with
St. Paul, who had characterised himself as "the chief of sinners."
As a result of these experiences, John Bunyan was received into that
independent church and he began to follow the teachings of its pastor,
John Gifford.
A second daughter, Elizabeth, was born in 1654.
In 1655, Bunyan moved his family to St Cuthberts Street, Bedford.
That same year, John Gifford died and John Bunyan started preaching.
In 1656, John's first book; "Some Gospel Truths" was published, his
first son - Thomas - was born, John became a member of the St John'
church and John Burton was appointed minister.
In 1657 John became a
deacon,
his second son - John - was born and his second book "Vindication" was
published. There are descendants of John but none bearing his surname.
Imprisonments
As his popularity and notoriety grew, Bunyan increasingly became a
target for slander and libel; he was described as "a witch, a Jesuit, a
highwayman" and was said to have mistresses and multiple wives.
In 1658, his wife died leaving him with 4 children, one of whom was blind. Aged 30, he was arrested for preaching at
Eaton Socon and indicted for preaching without a license, but that offense did not result in imprisonment. He continued preaching.
In 1659, Bunyan married again - to Elizabeth (surname unknown), by
whom he had two more children, Sarah (born 1667) and Joseph (born 1672).
The Restoration of the monarchy by
Charles II of England began Bunyan's persecution, as England returned to
Anglicanism.
Meeting-houses were quickly closed and all citizens were required to
attend their Anglican parish church. It became punishable by law to
"conduct divine service except in accordance with the ritual of the
church, or for one not in Episcopal orders to address a congregation."
Thus, John Bunyan no longer had that freedom to preach which he had
enjoyed under the Puritan Commonwealth. He was arrested on 12 November
1660, whilst preaching privately in Lower Samsell In Westoning,
Bedfordshire, 10 miles south of
Bedford.
John was brought before magistrate Sir Francis Wingate, at Harlington
House (still standing, but now called Harlington Manor - and the only
currently occupied residential building connected with Bunyan) where he
refused to desist from preaching. Wingate sent him to Bedford County
Gaol,in Silver Street, Bedford, to consider his situation. After a
month, Bunyan reports (in his own account of his imprisonment) that
Wingate's clerk visited him, seeking to get him to change his mind.
Wingate's clerk told Bunyan that all the authorities wanted was for
Bunyan to undertake not to preach at
private gatherings, as it
was suspected that these non-conformist meetings were being used by
people plotting against the king. In answer to the clerk, John argued
that God's law obliged him to preach at any and every opportunity and so
he was duty bound to refuse this suggested compromise.
In January 1661, Bunyan was brought before the quarter sessions in
the Chapel of Herne, Bedford. His prosecutor, Mr. Justice Wingate,
despite Bunyan's clear breaches of the Religion Act of 1592, was not
inclined to incarcerate Bunyan. However, John's stark statement 'If you
release me today, I will preach tomorrow!' left the magistrates - Sir
John Kelynge of Southill, Sir Henry Chester of Lidlington, Sir George
Blundell of Cardington, Sir Wllm Beecher of Howbury and Thomas Snagg of
Milbrook - with no choice but to imprison him. So Bunyan was
incarcerated for 3 months for the crimes of "pertinaciously abstaining"
from attending mandatory Anglican church services and preaching at
"unlawful meetings".
Strenuous efforts were made by John's wife, Elizabeth, to get his
case re-heard at the spring assizes. But Bunyan's continued assertions
that he would, if freed, preach to his awaiting congregation resulted in
the magistrates refusing to consider any new hearing. Similar efforts
were made the following year but, again, to no avail.
The legality of John's early years of imprisonment is thought to have
been dubious, to say the least, as there was no statute in force
prohibiting preaching at private gatherings. However, in early 1664, an
Act of Parliament the
Conventicles Act made it illegal to hold religious meetings of five or more people outside of the auspices of the Church of England.
Bunyan's incarceration was punctuated with periods of relative
freedom - lax gaolers allowing him out to attend church meetings and to
minister to his congregation. It was during his time in Bedford County
Gaol that John Bunyan conceived his allegorical novel:
The Pilgrim's Progress.
(Many scholars however believe that he actually commenced writing this
work during his second, shorter, term of imprisonment of 1675 - referred
to below.)
[2]
In 1666, John was briefly released for a few week,s before being
re-arrested for preaching and sent back to Bedford's County gaol, where
he remained for a further six years. During that time, he wove taglaces
to support his family and preached to his fellow prisoners - a
congregation of about sixty. In his possession were two books,
John Foxe's
Book of Martyrs, the
Bible,
a violin he had made out of tin, a flute he'd made from a chair leg and
a supply of pen and paper. Both music and writing were integral to
John's Puritan faith.
John Bunyan was released in January 1672, when
Charles II issued the
Declaration of Religious Indulgence.
1672 to 1688
In the same month as his release, John Bunyan became pastor of St
John's Church. On 9 May, Bunyan was the recipient of one of the first
licences to preach as an independent preacher, under the new law. He
formed a
nonconformist
sect from his surviving parishioners and established a church in a barn
in Mill Street, Bedford - the present-day site of the Bunyan Meeting
Free Church.
By his preaching, Bunyan became popular in Bedfordshire and several
surrounding counties, including Hertfordshire, Cambridgeshire,
Huntingdonshire and Northamptonshire. His own congregation at the
independent Baptist church in Bedford grew strongly at this time and
many village chapels, for miles around Bedford, owe their roots to John
Bunyan's influence. He would even speak to large crowds and
congregations as far away as London. As his fame and popularity as a
preacher increased, he became affectionately known as 'Bishop Bunyan'.
In March 1675, following Charles II's withdrawal of the Declaration
of Religious Indulgence, John was again imprisoned for preaching. This
second term of imprisonment was, again, in the county gaol - not, as was
formerly thought, in the Town jail on Bedford's stone river bridge.
(The original warrant, discovered in 1887, is published in facsimile by
Rush and Warwick, London.)
It was the
Quakers
who most probably helped secure Bunyan's release. When the King asked
for a list of names to pardon, the Society gave Bunyan's name along with
those of their own members. Within six months, John was free and, as a
result of his popularity, was never arrested again. He was, however,
said to have dressed for a time like a waggoner, whip in hand, when he
visited his various congregations, so as to avoid another arrest.
When, in 1687,
James II
asked Bunyan to oversee the royal interest in Bedford, John declined
this influential post because James refused to lift the tests and laws
which served to persecute nonconformists.
In 1688, John served as
chaplain to the
Lord Mayor of London, Sir John Shorter.
As John Bunyan was riding from
Reading, Berkshire to
London,
to resolve a disagreement between a father and son, he caught a cold
and developed a fever. He died at the house of his friend John
Strudwick, a
grocer and
chandler on Snow Hill in
Holborn in London, on 31 August 1688. He was buried in the cemetery at
Bunhill Fields in
London.
[3]
In 1862 a recumbent statue was created to adorn John Bunyan's grave. He lies among other historic nonconformists,
George Fox,
William Blake and
Daniel Defoe.
In 1874, a bronze statue of John Bunyan, sculpted by Sir
Joseph Edgar Boehm, was erected in
Bedford. This stands at the south-western corner of St Peter's Green, facing down
Bedford's High Street. The site was chosen by Boehm for its significance as a crossroads. Bunyan is depicted expounding the
Bible, to an invisible congregation, with a broken
fetter representing his imprisonment by his left foot. There are three scenes from "The
Pilgrim's Progress" on the stone plinth: Christian at the
wicket gate; his fight with
Apollyon; and losing his burden at the foot of the cross of
Jesus. The statue was unveiled by Lady Augusta Stanley, wife of the
Dean of Westminster,
on Wednesday 10 June 1874. There is another statue of him in Kingsway,
London, and there are memorial windows in various churches including
Elstow Abbey and Bunyan Meeting in Bedford.
John Bunyan had six children, five of whom are known to have married, of which four had children. Moot Hall Museum (in
Elstow
) has a record of descendants in the 19th century, but whether there
were any later descendants is currently (April 2013) unknown.
The Pilgrim's Progress
Bunyan wrote
The Pilgrim's Progress
in two parts, the first of which was published in London in 1678 and
the second in 1684. He conceived the work during his first period of
imprisonment, and probably finished it during the second. The earliest
edition in which the two parts combined in one volume came in 1728. A
third part - attributed to Bunyan - appeared in 1693, and was reprinted
as late as 1852. Its full title is
The Pilgrim's Progress from This World to That Which Is to Come.
The Pilgrim's Progress is arguably one of the most widely known
allegories ever written, and has been extensively translated.
Protestant missionaries commonly translated it into local languages as the first book after the
Bible.
Two other successful works of Bunyan's are less well-known:
The Life and Death of Mr. Badman (1680), an imaginary biography, and
The Holy War (1682), an allegory. A third book which reveals Bunyan's inner life and his preparation for his appointed work is
Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners
(1666). It is a classic example of a spiritual autobiography, and thus
is focused on his own spiritual journey; his motive in writing it was
plainly to exalt the Christian concept of grace and to comfort those
passing through experiences like his own.
The above works have appeared in numerous editions. There are several noteworthy collections of editions of
The Pilgrim's Progress, e.g., in the British Museum and in the New York Public Library, collected by the late James Lenox.
Bunyan became a popular preacher as well as a prolific author, though
most of his works consist of expanded sermons. Though a Baptist
preacher, in theology he was a
Puritan.
The portrait his friend Robert White drew, which has often been
reproduced, shows the attractiveness of his true character. He was tall,
had reddish hair, prominent nose, a rather large mouth, and sparkling
eyes.
He was no scholar, except of the
English Bible, but he knew Scripture thoroughly. He was also influenced by
Martin Luther's
Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians, in the translation of 1575.
Some time before his final release from prison Bunyan became involved
in a controversy with Kiffin, Danvers, Deune, Paul, and others. In 1673
he published his
Differences in Judgement about Water-Baptism no Bar to Communion,
in which he took the ground that "the Church of Christ hath not warrant
to keep out of the communion the Christian that is discovered to be a
visible saint of the word, the Christian that walketh according to his
own light with God." While he owned "water baptism to be God's
ordinance," he refused to make "an idol of it," as he thought those did
who made the lack of it a ground for disfellowshipping those recognised
as genuine Christians.
Kiffin and Paul published a response in
Serious Reflections
(London, 1673), in which they argued in favour of the restriction of the
Lord's Supper to baptised believers, and received the approval of Henry
Danvers in his
Treatise of Baptism (London, 1673 or 1674). The
controversy resulted in the Particular (Calvinistic) Baptists leaving
the question of communion with the unbaptised open. Bunyan's church
admitted
paedobaptists to fellowship and finally became paedobaptist (
Congregationalist).
At one time,
The Pilgrim's Progress was considered the most widely read and translated book in the English language apart from the Bible.
[4]
The charm of the work, which gives it wide appeal among old and young,
learned and ignorant, readers of all possible schools of thought and
theology, lies in the interest of a story in which the intense
imagination of the writer makes characters, incidents, and scenes alike
live in the imagination of his readers as things actually known and
remembered by themselves, in its touches of tenderness and quaint
humour, its bursts of heart-moving eloquence, and its pure, nervous,
idiomatic
English. Macaulay has said, "Every reader knows the straight and narrow
path as well as he knows a road on which he has been backwards and
forwards a hundred times," and he adds that "In England during the
latter half of the seventeenth century there were only two minds which
possessed the imaginative faculty in a very eminent degree. One of these
minds produced the
Paradise Lost, the other
The Pilgrim's Progress."
The images Bunyan uses in
Pilgrim's Progress are but reflections of images from his own world; the strait gate is a version of the wicket gate at Elstow church, the
Slough of Despond
is a reflection of Squitch Fen, a wet and mossy area near his cottage
in Harrowden, the Delectable Mountains are an image of the Chiltern
Hills surrounding Bedfordshire. Even his characters, like the Evangelist
as influenced by John Gifford, are reflections of real people. This
pilgrimage was not only real for Bunyan as he lived it, but his portrait
evoked this reality for his readers.
Rudyard Kipling once referred to Bunyan as "the father of the novel, salvation's first Defoe."
Bunyan wrote about 60 books and tracts, of which
The Holy War ranks next to
The Pilgrim's Progress in popularity. A passage from Part Two of
The Pilgrim's Progress beginning "Who would true Valour see" has been used in the hymn "
To be a Pilgrim".
The Scottish philosopher David Hume used Bunyan to illustrate the
idea of a "standard of taste" in aesthetic matters: 'Whoever would
assert an equality of genius and elegance between Ogilby and Milton, or
Bunyan and Addison, would be thought to defend no less an extravagance,
than if he had maintained a mole-hill to be as high as Teneriffe, or a
pond as extensive as the ocean.' (Hume, "Of the Standard of Taste",
originally published in his Four Dissertations (1757).)
Works
- A Few Sighs from Hell, or the Groans of a Damned Soul, 1658
- A Discourse Upon the Pharisee and the Publican, 1685
- A Holy Life
- Christ a Complete Saviour (The Intercession of Christ And Who Are Privileged in It), 1692
- Come and Welcome to Jesus Christ, 1678
- Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners, 1666
- Light for Them that Sit in Darkness
- Praying with the Spirit and with Understanding too, 1663
- Of Antichrist and His Ruin, 1692
- Reprobation Asserted, 1674
- Saved by Grace, 1675
- Seasonal Counsel or Suffering Saints in the Furnace – Advice to Persecuted Christians in Their Trials & Tribulations, 1684
- Solomon's Temple Spiritualized
- Some Gospel Truths Opened, 1656
- The Acceptable Sacrifice
- The Desire of the Righteous Granted
- The Doctrine of the Law and Grace Unfolded, 1659
- The Doom and Downfall of the Fruitless Professor (Or The Barren Fig Tree), 1682
- The End of the World, The Resurrection of the Dead and Eternal Judgment, 1665
- The Fear of God – What it is, and what is it is not, 1679
- The Greatness of the Soul and Unspeakableness of its Loss Thereof, 1683
- The Heavenly Footman, 1698
- The Holy City or the New Jerusalem, 1665
- The Holy War
– The Losing and Taking Again of the Town of Man-soul (The Holy War
Made by Shaddai upon Diabolus, for the Regaining of the World), 1682
- The Life and Death of Mr Badman, 1680
- The Pilgrim's Progress, 1678
- The Strait Gate, Great Difficulty of Going to Heaven, 1676
- The Saint's Knowledge of Christ's Love, or The Unsearchable Riches of Christ, 1692
- The Water of Life or The Richness and Glory of the Gospel, 1688
- The Work of Jesus Christ as an Advocate, 1688
