Biography[edit]

Early life[edit]

David Brainerd on horseback. He travelled over 3000 miles on horseback as a missionary.[1]

Brainerd preaching in the open-air to Native Americans.

David Brainerd was born on April 20, 1718 in Haddam, Connecticut, the son of Hezekiah, a
Connecticut legislator, and Dorothy. He had nine siblings, one of whom was Dorothy's from a
previous marriage. He was orphaned at the age of fourteen, as his father died in 1727 at the
age of forty-six and his mother died five years later.[2]
After his mother's death, Brainerd moved to East Haddam to live with one of his older sisters,
Jerusha. At the age of nineteen, he inherited a farm near Durham, but did not enjoy the
experience of farming and so returned to East Haddam a year later to prepare to enter Yale.
On 12 July 1739, he recorded having an experience of 'unspeakable glory' that prompted in
him a 'hearty desire to exalt [God], to set him on the throne and to "seek first his Kingdom"'.
[3]
This has been interpreted by evangelical scholars as a conversionexperience.[4]

Preparing for ministry[edit]

Two months later, he enrolled at Yale. In his second year at Yale, he was sent home because
he was suffering from a serious illness that caused him to spit blood. It is now believed that he
was suffering from tuberculosis, the disease which would lead to his death seven years later.
When he returned in November 1740, tensions were beginning to emerge at Yale between the
faculty staff and the students as the staff considered the spiritual enthusiasm of the students,
which had been prompted by visiting preachers such asGeorge Whitefield, Gilbert
Tennent, Ebenezer Pemberton and James Davenport, to be excessive. This led to the college
trustees passing a decree in 1741 that 'if any student of this College shall directly or indirectly
say, that the Rector, either of the Trustees or tutors are hypocrites, carnal or unconverted men,
he shall for the first offense make a public confession in the hall, and for the second offense be
expelled'. On the afternoon of the same day, the faculty had invited Jonathan Edwards to
preach the commencement address, hoping that he would support their position, but instead
he sided with the students. In the next term, Brainerd was expelled because it was said that he
commented that one of his tutors, Chauncey Whittelsey, 'has no more grace than a chair' and
that he wondered why the Rector 'did not drop down dead' for fining students perceived as
over-zealous.[5] He later apologized for the first comment, but denied making the second. [6]
This episode grieved Brainerd, especially as a recent law forbade the appointment of ministers
in Connecticut unless they had graduated from Harvard, Yale or a European institution,
meaning that he had to reconsider his plans.[7] In 1742, Brainerd was licensed to preach by a
group of evangelicals known as 'New Lights'. As a result, he gained the attention of Jonathan
Dickinson, the leading Presbyterian in New Jersey, who unsuccessfully attempted to reinstate
Brainerd at Yale. Instead, it was therefore suggested that Brainerd devote himself to
missionary work among the Native Americans, supported by the Society in Scotland for
Propagating Christian Knowledge. He was approved for this missionary work on 25 November
1742.[8]

Entering mission[edit]
On 1 April 1743, after a brief period serving a church on Long Island, Brainerd began working
as a missionary to Native Americans, which he would continue until late 1746 when worsening
illness prevented him from working. In his final years, he also suffered from a form of
depression that was sometimes immobilizing and which, on at least twenty-two occasions, led
him to wish for death. He was also affected by difficulties faced by other missionaries of the
period, such as loneliness and lack of food.[9]
His first missionary task was working at Kaunameek, a Housatonic Indian settlement near
present-day Nassau, New York, twenty or thirty miles from missionary John Sergeant who was
working in Stockbridge, Massachusetts. Brainerd remained there for one year. During this
period he started a school for Native American children and began a translation of the Psalms.
[10]

Subsequently, he was reassigned to work among the Delaware Indians along the Delaware
River northeast of Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, where he remained for another year, during which
he was ordained by the Newark Presbytery.[10] After this, he moved to Crossweeksung in New
Jersey, where he had his most fruitful ministry. Within a year, the Indian church at
Crossweeksung had 130 members, who moved in 1746 to Cranbury where they established a
Christian community.[11]
In these years, he refused several offers of leaving the mission field to become a church
minister, including one from the church at East Hampton on Long Island. He remained
determined, however, to continue the work among Native Americans despite the difficulties,
writing in his diary:

'[I] could have no freedom in the thought of any other circumstances or business in life: All my
desire was the conversion of the heathen, and all my hope was in God: God does not suffer
me to please or comfort myself with hopes of seeing friends, returning to my dear
acquaintance, and enjoying worldly comforts'.[12]

Death[edit]
In November 1746, he became too ill to continue ministering, and so moved to Jonathan
Dickinson's house in Elizabethtown. After a few months of rest, he travelled to Northampton,
Massachusetts, where he stayed at the house of Jonathan Edwards. Apart from a trip to
Boston in the summer of that year, he remained at Edwards's house until his death the
following year.[11] In May 1747, he was diagnosed with incurable consumption; in these final
months, he suffered greatly. In his diary entry for 24 September, Brainerd wrote:
'In the greatest distress that ever I endured having an uncommon kind of hiccough; which
either strangled me or threw me into a straining to vomit'.[13]
During this time, he was nursed by Jerusha Edwards, Jonathan's seventeen-year-old daughter.
The friendship that grew between them was of a kind that has led some to suggest they were
romantically attached.[14]He died from tuberculosis on 9 October 1747, at the age of 29. He is
buried at Bridge Street Cemetery in Northampton, next to Jerusha, [15] who died in February
1748 as a result of contracting tuberculosis from nursing Brainerd. [16] His gravestone reads:
Sacred to the memory of the Rev. David Brainerd. A faithful and laborious missionary to the
Stockbridge, Delaware and Sasquehanna TRIBES OF INDIANS WHO died in this town.
October 10, 1747 AE 32.[17]

Legacy[edit]
Impact on the church and mission[edit]

Brainerd's tomb in Northampton.

He made a handful of converts, but became widely known in the 1800s due to books about
him.[18] His Journal was published in two parts in 1746 by the Scottish Society for Promoting
Christian Knowledge.
Much of Brainerd's influence on future generations can be attributed to the biography compiled
by Jonathan Edwards and first published in 1749 under the title of An Account of the Life of the
Late Reverend Mr. David Brainerd. Edwards believed that a biography about Brainerd would
have great value and set aside the anti-Arminian treatise he was writing (later published
as Freedom of the Will) in order to create one.[19] The result was an edited version of Brainerd's
diary, with some passages documenting Brainerd's despair removed. [20] It gained immediate
recognition, with eighteenth-century theologian John Wesley urging: 'Let every preacher read
carefully over the Life of David Brainerd'.[21] The most reprinted of Edwards's books, it has never
been out of print and has thus influenced subsequent generations, mainly because of
Brainerd's single-minded perseverance in his work in the face of significant suffering. Clyde
Kilby summarised Brainerd's influence as being based on the fact that, 'in our timidity and our

shoddy opportunism we are always stirred when a man appears on the horizon willing to stake
his all on a conviction'.[22] From the eighteenth century, missionaries also found inspiration and
encouragement from the biography. Gideon Hawley wrote in the midst of struggles:
'I need, greatly need, something more than humane [human or natural] to support me. I read
my Bible and Mr. Brainerd's Life, the only books I brought with me, and from them have a little
support'.[23]
Other missionaries who have asserted the influence of Jonathan Edwards's biography of
Brainerd on their lives include Henry Martyn, William Carey, Jim Elliot,[24] and Adoniram Judson.
[20]

A new edition, with the Journal and Brainerd's letters embodied, was published by Sereno E.
Dwight at New Haven in 1822; and in 1884 was published what is substantially another
edition, The Memoirs of David Brainerd, edited by James M Sherwood. Brainerd's writings
contain substantial meditation on the nature of the illness that eventually led to his death and
its relation to his ties with God.
David Belden Lyman (18031868), missionary to Hawaii, was one of many in nineteenthcentury America that named their son after David Brainerd (David Brainerd Lyman, 183336,
and another David Brainerd Lyman, 18401914).

Impact on higher education[edit]

Brainerd's life also played a role in the establishment of Princeton College and Dartmouth
College. The 'College of New Jersey' (later Princeton) was founded due to the dissatisfaction of
the New York and New Jersey Presbyterian Synods with Yale; their expulsion of Brainerd and
subsequent refusal to readmit him was an important factor in driving individuals such
as Jonathan Dickinson and Aaron Burr to act on this dissatisfaction. Indeed, classes began in
Dickinson's house in May 1747, while Brainerd was recovering there. Dartmouth
College originated from a school founded by Eleazar Wheelock for Native Americans and
colonists in 1748, and Wheelock had been inspired by Brainerd's example of Native American
education.[25]
Despite Brainerd's expulsion from Yale, the University later named a building after him
(Brainerd Hall at Yale Divinity School), the only building on the campus to be named after a
student who was expelled. David Brainerd Christian School was also named after him.

Archival Collections[edit]
The Presbyterian Historical Society in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, has papers for David
Brainerd that consist of a letter by Brainerd (c. 1743) to Rev. Joseph Bellamy and notes
concerning Brainerds published works by Rev. Arthur Bennett, an Anglican clergyman.

See also[edit]

Moses Tunda Tatamy (ca. 16901760), the first Native American baptized by Brainerd.

Brainerd Mission to the Cherokee Indians (18171838)

David Brainerd Christian School (20022009), former middle and high school
in Chattanooga, Tennessee.

James Brainerd Taylor (18011829), maternal cousin of Brainerd; born Middle

Haddam, Connecticut; buried in HampdenSydney College Church cemetery,
Virginia; obelisk in Union Hill Cemetery, Middle Haddam, Connecticut, and Princeton
Cemetery of Nassau Presbyterian Church, Princeton, New Jersey; Lawrenceville
School (N.J), Princeton University and Yale Divinity School-educated Second Great
Awakening evangelist; primary founder of Princeton University's Philadelphian Society
of Nassau Hall (18251930, now called Princeton Evangelical Fellowship); one of some
20,000 Americans listed inAppletons' Cyclopdia of American Biography (6 vol., 1887
89). See John Holt Rice and Benjamin Holt Rice, Memoir of James Brainerd Taylor,
Second Edition (American Tract Society, 1833, online edition) and Fitch W. Taylor, A New
Tribute to the Memory of James Brainerd Taylor (John S. Taylor [no relation], 1838, online
edition). And I. Francis Kyle III, An Uncommon Christian: James Brainerd Taylor, Forgotten
Evangelist in America's Second Great Awakening (University Press of America, 2008,
Foreword by John F. Thornbury, contains the appendix "David Brainerd and James
Brainerd Taylor: A Comparative Chart"),Of Intense Brightness: The Spirituality of
Uncommon Christian James Brainerd Taylor (University Press of America, 2008, Foreword
by James M Houston, Epilogue by Peter Adam), God's Co-worker: 21st-century
Evangelism with Uncommon Christian James Brainerd Taylor (forthcoming, published
doctoral dissertation), Uncommon Christian Devotional: Living the Uncommon Christian
Life with James Brainerd Taylor (forthcoming) and Uncommon Christian Ministries' online
biographical sketch and timeline on Taylor
(http://www.UncommonChristian.com or http://www.JamesBrainerdTaylor.com ).

Notes[edit]
1.

Jump up^ 'Jonathan Edwards: A gallery of friends, foes & followers', Christian History
& Biography, 8 (1985).

2.

Jump up^ Piper, pp. 123-124.

3.

Jump up^ Piper, pp. 124-127.

4.

Jump up^ E.g. Piper, pp. 126, 131.

5.

Jump up^ Piper, pp. 127-128.

6.

Jump up^ Edwards, Jonathan. The Life and Diary of the rev'd. David Brainerd.
pp. Thursday, Sept. 14, 1743.

7.

Jump up^ Piper, pp. 128-129.

8.

Jump up^ Piper, pp. 129-130.

9.

Jump up^ Piper, pp. 133-145.

10.

^ Jump up to:a b Piper, p. 130.

11.

^ Jump up to:a b Piper, pp. 130-131.

12.

Jump up^ Quoted in Piper, p. 145.

13.

Jump up^ Quoted in Piper, p. 133.

14.

Jump up^ Piper, p. 138.

15.

Jump up^ David Brainerd at Find A Grave.

16.

Jump up^ Piper, p. 154.

17.

Jump up^ Quoted in Piper, p. 159. As Piper notes, the date of Brainerd's death, and
the age at which he died, are both incorrect on his gravestone.

18.

Jump up^ "Did You Know?". Christian History & Biography. 90: 2. Spring 2006.

19.

Jump up^ Pettit, p. 28.

20.

^ Jump up to:a b Noll, 'Jonathan Edwards'.

21.

Jump up^ Quoted in Piper, p. 131.

22.

Jump up^ Kilby, p. 202.

23.

Jump up^ Quoted in Piper, p. 132.

24.

Jump up^ Piper, pp. 131-132.

25.

Jump up^ Piper, pp. 156-157.

References[edit]

Grigg, John A., The Lives of David Brainerd: The Making of an American Evangelical
Icon (Oxford, OUP, 2009).

Kilby, Clyde, 'David Brainerd: Knight of the Grail', in Russell T. Hitt (ed.), Heroic
Colonial Christians (Philadelphia, 1966)

Nichols, Heidi L., 'Those exceptional Edwards women', Christian History & Biography,
77 (2003)

Noll, Mark, 'Jonathan Edwards: Christian history timeline - Passing the torch', Christian
History & Biography, 77 (2003)

Pettit, Norman, 'Prelude to mission: Brainerd's expulsion from Yale', The New England
Quarterly, 59 (1986), pp. 2850

Piper, John, Tested By Fire: The Fruit of Suffering in the Lives of John Bunyan, William
Cowper and David Brainerd (Inter-Varsity Press, 2001)