Augustus Hopkins Strong

Augustus Hopkins Strong (3 August 1836 – 29 November 1921) was a Baptist minister and theologian who lived in the United States during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. His most influential book, ''Systematic Theology'', proved to be a mainstay of Baptist theological education.

Early life and education

Augustus Hopkins Strong was born on August 3, 1836, in Rochester, New York. He was a descendant of "Elder John Strong, of Northampton, Massachusetts." His grandfather was a "physician of considerable eminence", who moved from Warren, Connecticut, to Scipio, New York, in 1799, then to Rochester in 1821. His father, Alvah Strong, was the printer of such early Rochester newspapers as the ''Anti-Masonic Enquirer'', the ''Morning Advertiser'', and the ''Weekly Republican'', before becoming the longtime proprietor of '' The Daily Democrat''. Both his father and eldest uncle were deacons of the First Baptist Church of Rochester, and helped found the Rochester Theological Seminary (RTS), in 1850, the institution over which he would later preside. RTS would later become Colgate Rochester Crozer Divinity School.

Strong's younger brother, Henry A. Strong, was a successful businessman and philanthropist who served as Eastman Kodak's first president. His youngest uncle became a Forty-niner in the California Gold Rush, after losing both his wife and infant son. A first cousin twice removed, Theodore C. Achilles would later become a diplomat, another such cousin would marry Margaret Woodbury Strong, and a niece would marry George R. Carter.

After Strong graduated from Yale College in 1857, he took a year to travel Europe, before he began his theological studies at RTS.

Career

In August 1861, Strong was named pastor of First Baptist Church, Haverhill, Massachusetts. After his four-year pastorate there, became pastor of First Baptist Church, Cleveland, Ohio, from 1865 to 1872, and thereafter became president of RTS..

It was during his time as president that he wrote his ''Systematic Theology'', which was the main textbook of Protestant seminaries in North America. He received honorary doctorates from Rochester, Alfred, Brown, Bucknell, Princeton, and Yale Universities.

Personal life

Strong was married, and his eldest son was the American psychologist and philosopher Charles A. Strong.

He died on Tuesday, November 29, 1921 in Pasadena, California, after which his body was returned to Rochester, where he was laid to rest in the week following, at Mount Hope Cemetery on December 5, in his family's vault, after lying in state in Alvah Strong Hall at the Seminary. Among others, Strong was eulogized by Rush Rhees, then president of the University of Rochester, and by Clarence A. Barbour, a succeeding president of the Seminary.

Theology

Strong held to a form of inclusivism, that is, he believed that some people from non-Christian religions actually believe in the one true God, the God revealed in the Bible. Thus, it was Strong's view that their faith in God - to the limits of their knowledge and their rejection of the religion around them - constituted "an implicit faith in Christ."

Triadology

A.H Strong asserted that the unity of the trinity is not like the unity of three persons among men, since men have only a specific unity of nature, being one species. However, within God the persons of the trinity have a numerical unity of nature, having the same essence. Thus, he asserted that within God the undivided essence belongs equally to each of the three persons, the plurality of the Godhead being a plurality of personal distinctions and not a plurality of essence, the one essence having three modes of subsistence.

Strong asserted the eternal sonship of Christ to be scriptural. Stating that the Bible teaches both the doctrine of the eternal generation of the Son and the eternal procession of the Holy Spirit.

Atonement

Strong's Christology began with Christ's presence at the creation of the human couple. Christ's sacrifice for the human race was understood as a Divine sharing of human suffering, in particular the curse of original sin genetically passed through his mother, Mary. The curse of the genetic connection to Adam was prior to the sin that Christ voluntarily took as He died in the crucifixion.Aloisi, John. “Ethical Monism and Its Impact on Other Areas of Strong’s Theology.” ''Augustus Hopkins Strong and the Struggle to Reconcile Christian Theology with Modern Thought'', Boydell & Brewer, 2021, pp. 72–91
JSTOR website
Retrieved 16 June 2025.

Selected works

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References

External links

Guide to the Augustus Hopkins Strong Papers, Yale University

Works by A. H. Strong at CCEL
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Strong, Augustus Hopkins
1836 births
1921 deaths
Heads of universities and colleges in the United States
Baptist ministers from the United States
American Baptist theologians
Baptist writers
Religious leaders from Rochester, New York
Yale College alumni
Colgate Rochester Crozer Divinity School alumni
Colgate Rochester Crozer Divinity School faculty
Baptists from New York (state)