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Scripture focus
For the law having a shadow of good things to come, and not the very image of the things...
Hebrews 10:1 KJV
At a glance
What did Jonathan Edwards mean by seeing the whole universe as full of 'images of divine things'?
He meant that everything in nature and history, not only Old Testament events, functions like a word in a divine language pointing beyond itself to Christ and redemption.
Summary of the chapter
Christian typology traditionally read Old Testament persons and events ('types') as God-given foreshadowings of New Testament realities ('antitypes') — Adam prefiguring Christ, the Passover lamb prefiguring the cross. Edwards embraced this inherited method but radically extended it, treating the entire 'system of nature' itself as, in his words, 'the voice of God to intelligent creatures,' so that trees, rivers, seasons, and historical events could function as genuine, God-given signs of spiritual and redemptive realities.
McClymond and McDermott stress that Edwards carefully distinguished this typology from mere allegory. Allegory, rooted in Platonic and Alexandrian Jewish interpretation, treats a text's abstract meaning as more real than its historical setting; typology, as inherited from the Reformers and refined by Edwards, insists that the type is a genuinely historical reality that God himself instituted to foreshadow a later, historical fulfillment. Edwards devoted whole notebooks — Images of Divine Things, Types of the Messiah, and Types — to tracing these connections across creation.
The underlying conviction, as scholar Stephen Daniel notes, is that for Edwards communication is the very condition of created existence: things are, in a sense, God's words, and creation itself is 'a book waiting to be read' — so that ignoring their significance is not a neutral option but itself a form of sin.
Key points
- Edwards inherited the traditional Christian distinction between 'types' (Old Testament foreshadowings) and 'antitypes' (their New Testament fulfillment).
- He radically extended typology beyond Scripture to treat the entire natural world as a God-given 'language' of signs pointing to spiritual and redemptive realities.
- Edwards carefully distinguished typology, rooted in real historical events instituted by God, from Platonic allegory, which detaches meaning from history.
- He devoted entire notebooks — Images of Divine Things, Types of the Messiah, and Types — specifically to elaborating this typological vision.
- Scholar Stephen Daniel's insight that communication is 'the condition... of being' for Edwards means creation itself functions like a book meant to be read for God's glory.
A line worth remembering
The whole outward creation, which is but the shadow of beings, is so made as to represent spiritual things.
McClymond & McDermott The Theology of Jonathan Edwards, ch. 8
Related Scripture
- Colossians 2:17
- 1 Corinthians 10:11
- Romans 1:20
- John 1:29
For reflection and discussion
- Where in the natural world have you sensed something pointing beyond itself to a spiritual reality, as Edwards believed all creation does?
- What is the difference between saying a Bible story is historically true and also says something more, versus reducing it to a mere abstract lesson?
- How might treating creation as 'a book waiting to be read' change the way you pay attention to the world around you?
These notes are an original UECF.NET study companion and are not a reproduction of the book. Read the full chapter — chapter 8, “Typology: Scripture, Nature, and All of Reality” — in The Theology of Jonathan Edwards by Michael J. McClymond and Gerald R. McDermott (Oxford University Press, 2012).