Jacob Treadwell Walden

Background

Jacob Treadwell Walden was born at Walden, Orange County, N. Y. , a town founded by his father. He was the son of Jacob Treadwell and Beulah Hoffman (Willett) Walden.

Education

After studying at St. James' College, Maryland, and at St. Paul's College, Long Island, in 1850 he entered the General Theological Seminary, New York. He graduated in 1853.

Career

He was ordained deacon by Bishop J. M. Wainwright, July 2, 1854, in Trinity Church, New York. In January 1855 he became assistant at Trinity Church, Newark, in February 1856 was put in charge of it, and there was ordained priest by Bishop G. W. Doane on May 19 of that year. In September 1857 he became rector of Christ Church, Norwich, Connecticut While here he published The Sunday School Prayer Book, a collection marked by more attention to the nature of children and by less rigorous theology than was common in most similar books of the period. In March 1863 he went to St. Clement's Church, Philadelphia, for which he secured the erection of a parish house and other improvements. He served on the committee appointed by the United States Sanitary Commission to investigate the treatment of Union prisoners, and is said to have drafted its report (Narrative of Privations and Sufferings of U. S. Officers and Soldiers while Prisoners of War, 1864). St. Clement's was involved in financial difficulties, however, and in 1868, conscious of his vestry's lack of confidence, Walden resigned. In February 1870 he was called to St. Paul's Church, Indianapolis. He at once took a prominent part in the church life of the city and the affairs of the diocese of Indiana. In 1871 he published Our English Bible and Its Ancestors, a series of parish lectures on the history of the English version and the need for a revision. In the appendix he argued that the New Testament word metanoia means "change of attitude" rather than "repentance for sin, " a subject to which he was to return in future publications. Although his work in Indianapolis seems to have been successful, he left in 1872, and in the next year became rector of St. Paul's, Boston. Compelled by ill health to resign in May 1876, for some years he lived and occasionally officiated in or near New York. Meanwhile, the essay on metanoia had appeared as an article in the American Church Review (July 1881), and in his An Undeveloped Chapter in the Life of Christ (1882). In 1882 he was called to St. Paul's, Minneapolis. Three years later he retired from the active ministry and subsequently spent several years in England. After his return in 1889 he divided his time between Boston, Massachussets, and Wonalancet, N. H. In 1896 an enlarged treatment of his favorite subject was published as The Great Meaning of Metanoia. Walden died in Boston.

Achievements

• He took a prominent part in the church life of Indianapolis and the affairs of the diocese of Indiana. In 1871 he published Our English Bible and Its Ancestors, a series of parish lectures on the history of the English version and the need for a revision. Walden's place in the development of the Episcopal Church lies in the part he played in the humanizing and liberalizing movement by which the broad church group grew out of the older evangelical.

Connections

He was twice married: first, in 1858, to Elizabeth Leighton Law, of Norwich, Connecticut, who died in 1883; and second, in 1885, to Grace Gordon of Boston. He was survived by two sons by his first wife.

Father:

Jacob Treadwell Walden

Mother:

Beulah Hoffman (Willett) Walden

Spouse:

Elizabeth Leighton Law

Spouse:

Grace Gordon