Lyman Abbott
Lyman Abbott was an influential American theologian, journalist, and editor born on December 18, 1835, in Roxbury, Massachusetts. He faced early challenges, losing his mother at a young age and being raised by relatives while his father ran a school. Abbott pursued higher education, earning a bachelor's degree from New York University in 1853, and ventured into law and journalism, including a role at the New York Times. His theological journey led him to ordination in the Congregational Church in 1860, where he began a pastoral career amid the Civil War's divisive climate.
Returning to New York in 1865, Abbott shifted focus towards public affairs and social issues, advocating for war refugees and later editing the magazine American Freedman. He became a prominent figure in journalism through his editorship of the Illustrated Christian Weekly and the Christian Union, the latter of which he transformed into a more secular publication while addressing pressing social issues like industrialization and urban poverty. Abbott's influence extended to his leadership at Plymouth Congregational Church and his advocacy for social reform, though some of his views, particularly regarding Native American policies, have drawn criticism. He continued to write extensively, leaving behind a legacy that includes a significant body of work until his death on October 22, 1922.
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Lyman Abbott
Congregationalist Theologian
- Born: December 18, 1835
- Birthplace: Roxbury, Massachusetts
- Died: October 22, 1922
Biography
Lyman Abbott was born in Roxbury, Massachusetts, on December 18, 1835, to Jacob Abbott and Harriet Vaughan Abbott. Following the death of his mother in 1842, Abbott was raised by aunts in Farmington, Maine, while his father ran a school in New York. At age thirteen, when his father offered Abbott a choice of a college education or financial support in starting a business, he chose to study at New York University, where he received a bachelor’s degree in 1853. Soon he was employed as an apprentice in a law firm founded by his two elder brothers, Benjamin and Austin; he also worked as a journalist for the recently founded New York Times. Abbott was admitted to the bar in 1856, and the next year married Abby Frances Hamlin (1837-1907).
In the late 1850’s, under the spell of the noted clergyman Henry Ward Beecher and the guidance of Abbott’s own uncle, the Rev. John South Carolina Abbott, Abbott began to study theology. In March, 1860, he was ordained in the Congregational Church. The same month, he was assigned to a church in Terre Haute, Indiana, where for four years he served a parish that was deeply divided by the Civil War.
Abbott’s life turned decisively toward public affairs and journalism following his return to New York in 1865. He served as executive secretary of a multi-denominational committee formed to aid war refugees, and then became editor of a monthly publication, American Freedman. At the same time, he continued as the pastor of a small Manhattan church but resigned when his wife fell ill with tuberculosis.
From the couple’s new home in Cornwall, New York, Abbott soon expanded his journalistic activities and also began to write books on religious topics. In 1871, he became editor of a new magazine, the Illustrated Christian Weekly. His regular column in the publication, titled “Outlook,” was theologically conservative but socially progressive. This column set the stage for his assuming the editorship of Henry Ward Beecher’s Christian Union in 1876. In 1887, upon the elder man’s death, Abbott also assumed Beecher’s position as leader of one of the most noted churches in the United States, Plymouth Congregational Church in Brooklyn. Abbott held the post until 1898.
Under Abbott’s capable direction, the Christian Union became both more popular and more secular. Notably, it called attention to problems of industrialization and urban poverty, paralleling the almost simultaneous photographic efforts of the journalist Jacob Riis who, like Abbott, became a friend and political ally of Theodore Roosevelt, the future president.
Not all Abbott’s views on social and political matters were equally well-considered. His influence was felt in the much- discredited Dawes Act of 1887, which prescribed measures that in subsequent years were to damage Native American communities. His scores of articles and thirty-one books ranged perhaps too widely for many of them to have lasting value and influence, and his publication Christian Union, renamed in 1893 as Outlook, slowly declined in journalistic independence. Abbott continued as its editor, though with a reduced schedule, until his death on October 22, 1922.