The Pilgrim’s Progress Is First Published,
February 18, 1678
“Read anything of [Bunyan’s] and you will see that it is almost like reading the Bible itself. He had read it till his whole being was saturated with Scripture; and, though his writings are charmingly full of poetry, yet he cannot give us his Pilgrim’s Progress without continually making us feel and say, ‘Why, this man is a living Bible!’”—C. H. Spurgeon
ngland has long dominated the literary arena of the west. Even on a global scale the nation can boast a long list of prolific and enduring classics that accrue interest and income to this very day. Among these giants one might think of Shakespeare, of Milton or Dickens, but there is one humble author and his work who has outsold them all over the centuries since his publication—John Bunyan and his Pilgrim’s Progress. Second only to the Bible, Pilgrim’s Progress was the most-read and best-beloved book during the first three hundred years of American colonial and national life—an allegory that surpassed all other art forms to touch lives all across a spectrum of ages and affluence, and forever permeate Christian culture with its iconic characters and enduring parables.
John Bunyan (1628-1688)
Unveiling of a John Bunyan Memorial during the Bunyan Celebration of June 10, 1874—engraving published in the Illustrated London News ten days later
From the saga’s opening line—“As I walked through the wilderness of this world…”—there is in the book an immediate and profound recognition of our strangeness in this transient life, reflective of its Puritan writer and evocative of the Biblical destiny to be strangers in a strange land. The lot of Bunyan’s main character—Christian, as he is aptly named—is not to passively await a homecoming but rather to run a race to its harrowing finish, to fight a constant battle that ends only in his literal death, to journey tenaciously toward a completeness we will not fully achieve this side of The Celestial City.
Detail of a commemorative stained glass window, showing John Bunyan
seeing a vision of Pilgrim’s Progress
Written by Bunyan during his twelve-year imprisonment for preaching without a license in churches that did not conform to Anglican supremacy and liturgy, Pilgrim’s Progress is a masterpiece, poignantly personal in its observations of the Christian life and struggle.
The cover art of a stunning 1891 facsimile edition of Pilgrim’s Progress, published by friend of Landmark Events Pastor Mark Liddle, and available through Ligonier Ministries
Initially Bunyan set out to write it as a simple explanation of how the Christian life is like a long pilgrimage, in which one’s initial salvation from the burden of sin and hell does not bring immediate or permanent peace in this life. Yet he kept coming up with more and more illustrations, inspired by his own protracted conversion and perhaps by those of the other Christians sharing his prison cell at the time.
A wax portrayal of John Bunyan writing Pilgrim’s Progress while in Bedford Jail
The ‘Bunyan Stained Glass Window’ in Tyndale Baptist Church, Bristol, England
He imagined the inclination to doubt as a formidable castle, despondency to be a quagmire, despair to be a cruel and tormenting jailer, and the appeals of this world to be like a raucous fair—each temptation so harmlessly (it seems at first) turned to by the pilgrim, only to barely make it out of them with his life, the key to freedom being always in Christian’s pocket—that is, prayer—though often forgotten entirely in the anguish of the trial itself.
Evangelist pointing out the Wicket Gate, from which point Christian must set out on his journey
Christian hearing the tales of saints gone before during a time of rest and refreshing at The Palace Beautiful
Some “Ill-favored ones”
Christian and Hopeful cross the River in their final push to the Celestial City
The inhospitable locales in Bunyan’s tale were populated by a variety of carefully drawn villains such as Obstinate, Pliable, Mr. Worldly-Wiseman, Atheist and Faint-Heart. Despite the fact that Christian was helped from time to time by a whole host of heroic characters—such as Evangelist, Faithful, Goodwill, Hopeful, Knowledge, Watchful, Sincere, and Little-Faith—the hapless pilgrim had to struggle through one difficulty or distraction after another, and often alone. Again and again he was forced to decide between compromise or faithfulness, between accommodation with the world or holy perseverance.
Four villains Christian meets along his way to the Celestial City: Pride, Arrogancy, Self-Conceit and Worldly-glory
Through all these dangers, toils and snares, he comes at last—as all good literature brings us—to a happy ending, one singularly Christian in its conclusion being the ending of his mortal life and the beginning of an eternal one. As Augustus M. Toplady wrote, the book describes “every stage of a Christian’s experience, from conversion to glorification”.
A map of Christian’s journey from the City of Destruction to the Celestial City, as published in an 1821 edition
Written in Bunyan’s own common, self-taught, coarsely-pattered prose—a far cry from the polite literary convention of the seventeenth century—the book was immediately embraced by the average reader, and almost as quickly by academics who acclaimed it as a triumph of literary inspiration. Even those Christians who chafed a bit at Bunyan’s staunch Puritan theology, readily identified with his beautifully-realized vision of life in this fallen world and the Christian’s call to action in it. Even John Owens, the great and elevated Puritan scholar who possessed the privilege of having the King’s ear, praised Bunyan’s work and contributed to its publication.
In the guise of an adventure story, Pilgrim’s Progress is a penetrating portrayal of the universal human experience, and it remains a cherished Christian classic because of that. As the literary critic Roger Sharrock said, “A seventeenth-century Calvinist sat down to write a tract and produced a folk epic of the universal religious imagination instead.”
A set of copper and bronze doors from Bunyan Meeting Church, Bedford, England, showing scenes from Pilgrim’s Progress in each panel
An artist’s whimsical engraving of John Bunyan dozing off at his desk and dreaming of what would become Pilgrim’s Progress
Image Credits: 1 John Bunyan (wikipedia.org) 2 Bunyan Day Celebration (wikipedia.org) 3 Window Detail (wikipedia.org) 4 Pilgrim’s Progress from Ligonier (wikipedia.org) 5 Wax Figure (wikipedia.org) 6 Stained Glass (wikipedia.org) 7 Evangelist (wikipedia.org) 8 Reading (wikipedia.org) 9 Ill-favored Ones (wikipedia.org) 10 Crossing the River (wikipedia.org) 11 Four Villains (wikipedia.org) 12 Map (wikipedia.org) 13 Bronze Doors (wikipedia.org) 14 “And I saw in a dream…”