This volume deals with the Federal theology of Johannes Cocceius, who lived in the seventeenth century (1603-1669). German by birth, he taught at Bremen, Franeker and Leiden, where he was Professor of Theology (1650-1669). As foremost biblical interpreter he sought to formulate a Covenant theory which described all of human history by introducing the structure of consecutive covenants or foedera. The book poses a surprising alternative to the readings of earlier scholarship on Cocceius by its careful presentation of the pneumatological components of the doctrine of covenants. Cocceius'...

What does it really mean, to know God? What are the grounds for knowing God, what feeds that knowledge, and what is really known? In his search for answers to these questions, in two panels the author paints for us a clear picture of what Calvin and Barth had to say about knowing God: Calvin against the background of pre-modern culture, Barth in response to a post-Kantian culture inclined to agnosticism. Between them, like a hinge between the two panels, we find the philosophy of Kant. The two epochal theological figures are placed next to each other, but without this being at the expense of...

This book provides, for the first time, an exhaustive discussion of the Franciscan production of texts of religious instruction during the later medieval period (c. 1210-c. 1550). In eight chapters, it introduces the reader to the most important Franciscan sermon cycles, the Franciscan guidelines for living the life of evangelical perfection, the many Franciscan novice training manuals, the Franciscan catechisms and confession manuals, the Franciscan output of liturgical handbooks, the large number of Franciscan texts containing more wide-ranging forms of religious edification, and Franciscan...

This book, newly revised and updated, examines the Eastern Church's theology of icons chiefly on the basis of the acta of the Seventh Ecumenical Council of 787. The political circumstances leading to the outbreak of the iconclast controversy in the eighth century are discussed in detail, but the main emphasis is on the theological arguments and assumptions of the council participants. Major themes include the nature of tradition, the relationship between image and reality, and the place of christology. Ultimately the argument over icons was about the accessibility of the divine. Icons were...

This book considers John Calvin's interpretation of the Pauline epistles, discussing his interpretive method and the link between biblical interpretation and correct doctrine. It introduces a division between doctrinal hermeneutics and textual exegetical rules clarifying Calvin's relationship to the antecedent and subsequent traditions. The book portrays Calvin as a theologian for whom the doctrinal and exegetical tasks cohered, especially in the context of the Church in the Reformations. The first section presents the division between hermeneutical principles and exegetical rules,...

Based on extensive archival research, this study casts new light on the Inquisition in northern Italy during the Renaissance. It focuses on some representative inquisitors and their principal pursuits - the prosecution of heretics, Waldensians and Judaizers, and witch-hunting.

Focusing upon the extraordinary circumstances of the production of the editio princeps of the Syriac New Testament in 1555 and establishing a reliable history of that edition, this book offers an new account of the origin of Syriac studies in Europe and a fresh evaluation of Catholic Orientalism in the sixteenth century. The reception of Syriac into the West is shown to have been characterised, under the influence of Egidio da Viterbo and Postel, by a Christian Kabbalistic world-view which also determined the reception of other Oriental languages. The companion volume The...

John Wyclif's modern critics have found little in his works that justified his fame by the standards of intellectual history. This book reconstructs Wyclif's discourse on the theological and political consequences of his radically new insight into the integrity of man and nature as regards the good, free and beautiful life, communicated to his contemporary scholastic and lay audience. His theological, legal and political vision of the opportunity to restore original justice through the spiritual reality and sanctity of persona humana in every man as well as in the community by the law of love...

Focusing on the theme of property and community, this study offers a new account of the origins of fifteenth-century Observant reform in the monasteries and canonries of the southern Empire. Through close readings of unpublished texts, it traces how ideas about reformed community emerged, both beyond and within the religious orders, in the era of the Council of Constance. Focusing on reform among monks and canons in Bavaria and Austria to 1450, it then shows how those ideas were applied in practice, through reforming visitation and through a devotional culture steeped in the "new piety" of...

Wer sich der Erforschung des reformierten Protestantismus widmet, setzt sich mit einer komplexen Bewegung auseinander: Religiose, theologische und kulturelle Traditionen werden kritisch reflektiert, bisweilen verworfen oder aber in neuer Interpretation weitergefuhrt. Politische und soziale Veranderungen zeitigen gravierende Konsequenzen fur Einzelne wie fur ganze Landschaften. Gewollt oder ungewollt bleiben dabei Veranderung und Beharrung eng ineinander verwoben. Historians recognize that the field of reformed Protestantism is multi-faceted: religious, theological and cultural traditions are...