out with black and white reproductions of art from a range
of traditions, this book considers imagery relating to the
hunt, bullfight, martial arts, ball games, racing, and contests
of grace and beauty. It discusses the role of the sports hero
in culture and explains the relationship of the athlete to soci-
ety in general.
MARI WOMACK (2005)SPURGEON, CHARLES HADDON (1834–
1892), was an English Baptist popularly known as “the
prince of preachers.” The son and grandson of Congrega-
tionalist pastors, Spurgeon was converted in 1850 at a Primi-
tive Methodist chapel and joined a Baptist church in 1851.
At age sixteen, circumstances compelled him to preach un-
prepared in a cottage near Cambridge, England. Word of his
oratorical skill and evangelical fervor spread. He was called
to pastorates at Waterbeach (1852) and at New Park Street
Chapel in London (1854). His preaching attracted such large
crowds that it was necessary to rent public accommodations
seating up to ten thousand people. In 1861 the Metropolitan
Tabernacle was completed in London, and there Spurgeon
ministered until his death. By age twenty-two he had become
the most popular preacher of his day. He established several
institutions, including orphanages and a pastors’ college, the
latter being the matrix for the founding of numerous church-
es and Sunday schools.
Although throughout his career Spurgeon preached to
large audiences, his greatest immediate influence was
through his weekly published sermons, numbering 3,561,
which are estimated to have had more than a million regular
readers. These sermons eventually amounted to sixty-three
volumes, entitled New Park Street Pulpit (1855–1860) and
Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit (1861–1917). By 1899 more
than a hundred million copies of his sermons had been print-
ed in twenty-three languages. Among his many works was
the seven-volume The Treasury of David, a commentary on
Psalms. He also edited a monthly magazine, The Sword and
the Trowel, for twenty-seven years.
Spurgeon’s preaching was massive in scope and narrow
in doctrine. Staunchly Calvinistic, he was called by some
“the last of the Puritans.” From his earliest ministry until his
death, he consistently maintained the gospel of grace without
deference to increasingly influential high-church and liberal
teachings. In 1864 his sermon against “baptismal regenera-
tion” excited a hearty controversy that resulted in his with-
drawing from the Evangelical Alliance. During the last de-
cade of his life, Spurgeon fought against what he called the
“downgrade movement,” that is, the rise of higher criticism,
liberalism, and rationalism within Baptist circles in England.
So firmly were such views entrenched there that he withdrew
from the Baptist Union in 1887, remaining independent but
a Baptist until his death. Although he never sought contro-
versy, he never shied from it. In his own words, “Controversy
for the truth against the errors of the age is... the peculiar
duty of the preacher.”
Within the confines of a thoroughly evangelistic Calvin-
ism, Spurgeon’s works include such an enormous variety of
topics congenial to the mainstream of orthodoxy that his
writings, especially his sermons, have been valued by Chris-
tians of diverse creeds. While his influence, particularly in
evangelical circles, continued through the first half of the
twentieth century, in the 1960s interest in Spurgeon began
to grow. All sixty-three volumes of his sermons have been re-
printed, and more than 150 of his other writings are in print.BIBLIOGRAPHY
Spurgeon’s Autobiography, Compiled from His Diary, Letters, and
Records by His Wife, and His Private Secretary, 4 vols. (Lon-
don, 1897–1900), has long been out of print. An abridged
and supplemented edition has appeared in two volumes: vol.
1, The Early Years, 1834–1859 (London, 1962), and vol. 2,
The Full Harvest, 1860–1892 (Edinburgh, 1973). The stan-
dard biography is G. H. Pike’s The Life and Work of Charles
Haddon Spurgeon, 6 vols. (London, 1894). For an apprecia-
tion of Spurgeon by a noted German theologian, see Helmut
Thielicke’s Encounter with Spurgeon (Philadelphia, 1963).
DARREL W. AMUNDSEN (1987)SRI AUROBINDO SEE AUROBINDO GHOSE
S ́R ̄I VAIS:N:AVAS. The S ́r ̄ı Vais:n:ava Samprada ̄ya, one
of six major Hindu denominations devoted to Vis:n:u, is the
community of those who worship Vis:n:u (also called
Na ̄ra ̄yan:a) in conjunction with his consort S ́r ̄ı (Laks:m ̄ı), the
goddess of auspiciousness and prosperity, along with
Bhu ̄ dev ̄ı, the goddess of the earth, and N ̄ıla ̄, more generally
known by her Tamil name of Nappinai, the human wife of
the young Kr:s:n:a. The community is strongest in the South
Indian state of Tamil Nadu, but it also has many adherents
in the three other South Indian states and some in other parts
of India. Brahmans are strongly represented and have most
positions of leadership.
S ́r ̄ı Vais:n:avas are adherents of the philosophy of
Ra ̄ma ̄nuja and describe their theological position as Ubhaya
Veda ̄nta, “dual theology” or “theology of the two scriptures,”
for, in addition to regarding as authoritative the Vedas (in-
cluding the Upanis:ads) and other scriptures written in San-
skrit, the S ́r ̄ı Vais:n:avas consider sacred the Tamil hymns of
the poet-saints called the A ̄
̄lva ̄rs (those “immersed” in God)
and treat the long poem called the Tiruva ̄ymo
̄li as equal in
value to the Upanis:ads. Both divisions of the present com-
munity trace their spiritual lineage back to still earlier a ̄ca ̄ryas
(teachers), and then through Namma ̄
̄lva ̄r, the author of
the Tiruva ̄ymo
̄li, to the Goddess, S ́r ̄ı, and Vis:n:u-Na ̄ra ̄yan:a
himself.
The Sanskrit canon of the community includes, in addi-
tion to the Vedas, the two great epics, the treatises on social
morality and ritual, and the summary of the Upanis:adicS ́R ̄I VAIS:N:AVAS 8727