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At the beginning of the seventeenth century, Landgrave Moritz of Hesse-Kassel (1572–1632) introduced Calvinism into his territory under the heading "Points of Improvement." The points of improvement concerned 1) the prohibition of discussion of the person of Christ, 2) "supplementing" the Ten Commandments with the explicit mention of the prohibition of images, 3) the abolition of images in church buildings, 4) the breaking of the bread in the Lord's Supper. This was followed by a long-lasting dispute by means of publication between the theologians at the universities in Marburg and Giessen. In these publications, the now common terminology of denominations, "Lutheran," "Calvinist," and "Reformed," were used in polemical distinction as controversial terms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the diverse responses and potential scholarly paths stemming from the study of Calvinist non-hymnic revival poems in Awakening Verse. Topics include the complexities of evangelical poetics as they intersect with Indigenous and Black Atlantic writers, the significance of formal poetic choices in the context of evangelical revival, and the broader cultural impact and scholarly extensions of revival poetry studies.

This article traces the changing semantics of drunkard in English during the first half of the seventeenth century. Combining methods of "distant reading" (made possible by the Early English Books Online--Text Creation Partnership) and the "close reading" of didactic printed materials, it shows how this venerable Middle English word became unusually prevalent and ideologically charged in the six decades after the ascension of James VI and I to the English throne. Key to these developments was the newmonarch's Counterblaste to Tobacco (1604), in which James I at once delineated a capacious concept of drunkard as someone who simply liked drinking, rather than became demonstrably drunk, and confirmed the consumption of tobacco and alcohol as an appropriate subject for the burgeoning printed "public sphere." The article suggests that the separation of drunkard from drunkenness proved very useful for ministers and moralists concerned with the moral and economic consequences of unnecessary and "superfluous" consumption for individuals, households, and communities. Resorting to populist and didactic genres like pamphlets, sermons, dialogues, and treatises, writers ranging from the Calvinist John Downame to the regicide John Cook deployed the category of the drunkard to critique not only English drinking habits but also social and economic practices more generally. In pushing the concept so hard, however, reformers inevitably rubbed against more conventional notions of "civil society" and the sociable practices constituting it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

According to Ellen Charry's critique of modern theology, theology has become too theoretical and intellectual. However, from its beginning, theology has aimed at comforting believers. In that light, this article seeks to recuperate the consolation of theology. In order to do that, it explores how John Calvin and missionaries to Korea of the 20th century defined theology as a source of comfort and used theology to solace the suffering believers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz's account of European settler colonialism in the United States notably focuses on Calvinist communities as a primary catalyst in rationalizing land seizure, identifying covenantal theology as supporting settler claims to sovereignly held indigenous lands. This article argues that while she rightly identifies a correspondence between divine providence and a settler colonial logic of replacement, a vertical orientation, her analysis of theology as settler colonialism can be completed through a recourse to a rhetorical and literary analysis of Calvin's Institutes. That is, settler colonialism also possesses a horizontal component, a logic of replicability that describes the temporal and spatial movement of settler colonialism. To make this argument I turn to Michelle Sanchez and Ford Lewis Battles' respective explorations of literary genre and the language of accommodation. My analysis points to how Calvin's covenantal theology can conjure the "imagined community" that is then embodied as settler colonialism. I end by suggesting that further careful articulation of the nexus between theology and settler colonialism is necessary for us to reckon the present and ongoing possibilities of inhabiting space and sharing life together, settler and indigenous alike. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the Lutheran community in Prague after the issuance of Rudolf II's Majestätsbrief in 1609, detailing the establishment of Lutheran churches, the religious diversity in Prague, and the Lutheran-Bohemian Brethren relations. It examines the Lutheran community's composition, their interactions with religious groups, and the Lutheran clergy's role in fortifying faith, engaging in education, and countering the teachings of other denominations like the Jesuits and Calvinists.

The present study examines the dilemma of the Calvinists living in Transcarpathia (which became part of the Soviet Union in 1946) that arose following its annexation to the Soviet Empire. The problem was caused by the fact that among the Protestant denominations in the Soviet Union in 1946-47, only Evangelical Christians-Baptists (ECB) had state registration, i.e. a legal operating licence. The study aims at revealing the dialectics of the dilemma arising among the Calvinists, according to which, in order to survive, they should either align with the ECB (i.e. imperial expectations) or, alternatively, even take the risk of termination and maintain their denominational separation. In addition, the research brings insights into how the choice of the Calvinists was influenced by the denominational autonomy and national traditions that had been enjoyed until then. The state authorities would have provided a chance for an easier and routine-like solution of the problem and classify the nearly 80,000 Reformed community members in Transcarpathia as ECB. However, the case generated an unexpected problem even in the Soviet bureaucratic system as the denominational affiliation was also linked to the issue of nationality. Therefore, at the state level, it was a problem of both a religious belief and national belonging. Likewise, the study highlights the extent to which the response of the religious minority in the present case was about religious affiliation and ethnicity. Finally, the present paper considers how the state’s primary project had ultimately changed when exploring the dilemma and what conclusions and outcomes it entailed.

In eighteenth-century Ireland, there were two competing historiographical traditions, fighting to tell their story of the Church of Ireland's doctrinal heritage, as outlined in its confession, the Thirty-Nine Articles, which were formulated in the sixteenth-century Church of England. Article XVII: Of Predestination and Election—the most controversial article—contained no reference to the "reprobate." Mainstream Anglican clergymen, who taught an Arminian soteriology, cited this omission as proof that the sixteenth-century framers had not intended Article XVII to be read in a Calvinist light. These "Caroline" historians also stressed the importance of the Laudian reforms of the 1630s, when the Irish Church's original, ultra-Calvinist confession, the 1615 Articles, were virtually (but not officially) rescinded in favor of the English Church's allegedly un-Calvinist confession, the Thirty-Nine Articles. There was, however, another, resolutely Protestant historiographical tradition, stressing the Irish Church's doctrinal links with the continental Reformation. Proponents of this tradition argued that the Thirty-Nine Articles needed to be read in the light of the 1615 Articles, which, they claimed, remained an authoritative confession in the Irish Church. This essay explores how contemporaries interpreted and reinterpreted the Thirty-Nine Articles, thereby illuminating the ways in which the historiography of the Reformation was shaped by politico-theological concerns in eighteenth-century Ireland. It displays the eighteenth century as a fundamental period of transition, in which a largely dormant historiographical tradition was revived in the Irish Church by a small but growing faction of evangelicals, who sought to write Calvinism back into the history of their denomination. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Renaissance & Reformation / Renaissance et Réforme is the property of Iter Canada and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Renaissance & Reformation / Renaissance et Réforme is the property of Iter Canada and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Theology & Morality / Teologia I Moralmosc is the property of Uniwersytetu im. Adama Mickiewicza (IH UAM) and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The quest for the identification of the fruitless branch has been an enduring theological battleground between the Calvinists and the Arminians who argue as to whether or not the removal of the fruitless branch indicates the loss of eternal salvation. Using a qualitative approach, this study sought to examine the various interpretations on the eternal security of the believer with a focus on three phrases in the passage namely; έν εμοι, (in me) and airo (cut off) and μείναΤε εν έμοί (abide in me). Findings show that the analogy of the vine is a critique to the belief of once saved, forever saved because of the use of "in me" and the "cutting off' of the fruitless branch which cannot happen without a prior linkage to the stem of the vine. Since the fruitless branch can only represent one of the various views, it is recommended that fruitfulness should be the key to one's walk with the Lord to avoid eternal separation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article analyses the failed Dutch Religious Peace of 1578 through the lens of security. As Wayne te Brake recently argued in Religious War and Religious Peace in Early Modern Europe, creating security for all parties is key for an effective religious peace. In the sixteenth century, communal security was deemed a collective responsibility. In practice this meant that religious peace – suppressing and preventing violence and threats between Protestants and Catholics – was framed as a matter of preserving the common peace. Theological questions were dissimulated or kept out of peace settlements. In 1578, the religious peace proposed that Catholics and Calvinists were to live in the Netherlands side by side, each allowed to worship publicly. Some 27 Dutch towns introduced this religious peace. Yet the municipal magistrates mostly did so reluctantly and generally declined to share political power, thus contributing to its failure. Moreover, there were different, conflicting conceptions at work concerning the common peace, as well as regarding how to keep it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reports about the Minister's Wooing's Calvinist Sentiment The Secular Versus Secularization. Topics including Peter Coviello and Jared Hickman jocularly point out in their reference to A Christmas Carol, for all the claims that we need no longer attend to the secularization thesis, like Jacob Marley's ghost, it refuses to die, haunting American literary studies even though there is "no doubt" that we have moved beyond its parameters.

Copyright of Tiempos Modernos is the property of Tiempos Modernos and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The mid-seventeenth century turn to moralism in English Protestant theology – exemplified here by 'Ignorance' in Bunyan's Pilgrim's progress – involved a clear rejection of the Calvinistic doctrine of the 'internal testimony' of Scripture. The upshot was the emergence of a religious impulse that emphasised the salience of a 'rational account' of Scripture's credibility. The shift is conventionally traced through Richard Hooker, William Chillingworth and the Cambridge Platonists. Hooker was, however, more Calvinist and Chillingworth more Laudian than has been recognised. The Cambridge Platonists and their 'latitudinarian' successors emerged from and were shaped by puritan culture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the Dutch Republic, the Reformed Church enjoyed the exclusive religious use of church buildings. Formerly, these churches had belonged to Catholics, who were forced to establish their own (semi-clandestine) places of worship known as schuilkerken or huiskerken. As such, Reformed Protestant and Catholics each had their own religious infrastructure and competing sacred spaces. Employing a comparative perspective and a conceptual distinction between churches as legal, sacred and social spaces, this article studies the myriad of relationships between Catholics, their former (parish) churches, and their schuilkerken. It argues that clandestine Catholic churches were never able to replace parish churches completely since the latter continued to be used by Dutch Catholics to exercise legal rights, express and forge social hierarchies, and at times even to practise their faith. While the existence of competing sacred spaces could cause confessional strife and signifies a degree of segregation, at the same time the enduring ties between Catholics and their former churches indicate a level of confessional integration in seventeenth-century Dutch society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article offers information on the "Allegory of Joris Hoefnagel's friendship with Johannes Radermacher" artwork by Flemish painter Joris Hoefnagel. It further discusses an interaction between the Antwerp artist and merchant Joris Hoefnagel and his longstanding friend and fellow Calvinist, the humanist and international merchant Johannes Radermacher; and acknowledging difference within friendship in the form of a 'feminine side'.

Copyright of Renaissance & Reformation / Renaissance et Réforme is the property of Iter Canada and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The article explore and explain the meaning and importance of concept of the perennial covenant between God and Man. It mentions synthesis and consummation of two centuries of Calvinist reflection upon this important and central topic of the Christian faith and sinners life and salvation by Jesus Christ, requiring of them faith in Him. It also mentions New Testament and perfect works and by the grace of God revealed in Jesus Christ.

This essay explores the nature of Huguenot piety in the seventeenth century by making some comparisons with Scottish religious works. Élisabeth Labrousse comments that French Calvinists were unlike their English-speaking counterparts, especially with respect to conversion, which in Scotland and England drew deeply from the wells of human emotion. Because of the close contacts between France and Scotland, from long before the Reformation and thereafter embracing Calvinist divines, it is appropriate to make some comparisons between the two religious cultures. This article includes a description of those contacts, a review of the religious narratives produced by the two communities, and a consideration of issues including providence, religious anxiety and the role of "melancholy' and the use of the Bible, particularly the Psalms and the Song of Solomon. What emerges is a complex picture, though there is reason to believe that the differences between the two Calvinist cultures were not so great as has been suggested hitherto. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article reexamines Leonard Limosin's painted enamel "The Triumph of the Eucharist and of the Catholic Faith" (executed between 1561 and 1563) in the light of recent scholarship on the French religious wars and the social and political uses of the Eucharist. It argues that the enamel expresses the Guise family's frustration with Catherine de' Medici's accommodation of the Calvinists on the eve of the religious wars and exalts the family's defense of the body politic through its defense of the faith and the Eucharist. By presenting Antoinette de Bourbon, the mother of the Guises, in triumph, it opposes her to Catherine and her family and offers an early statement of the Guise family's claims to religious and political leadership. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Second Reformation in Brandenburg seriously differed from similar transformations in the other subjects of the Empire. The subjects of the Elector, John Sigismund, being Lutherans, were not compelled to switch to Calvinism, because Hohenzollern led tolerant policy. The article studies the role of John Bergius, who was a prominent ideologue of Calvinism and the leading court preacher of the Brandenburg Electors. Having received good education abroad, he laterly wrote many works on theology as an adherent of Irenism. The young theologian took part in the struggle against the Lutheran theologians and become the closest adviser of the Electors on religious matters. He defended the ideas of common root of Protestan theology and was for coorepation between the Lutherans and the Evangelists before the face of the Counter-reformation. The Brandenburg preacher developed the «constitutional theory of resistance», which justified the Emperor’s action in cooperation with the Catholic League as unleagel. The author shows that in these circumstances Lutheran theologians agreed to meet with Calvinist colleagues in Leipzig, during the Protestant princes convention. At this colloquium, thanks to the position of Bergius, it become possible to reach agreement on the most of issues. His late activity is also of high interest, because in 1630s he participated in the development of a new structure for the Brandenburg Church. Since 1640 Bergius being an adviser of th Elector Frederick William and participates in the colloquium in Thorne. He also was one of the authors of the final documents of the conferences in Leipzig and Thorne, which together with Confessio Sigismundi formed the official position of the Reformed Church of Brandenburg.

Copyright of Transsylvania Nostra is the property of Transsylvania Nostra Foundation and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The article discusses Faith and punishment: Inquisitions and Consistories Calvinists in the modern world, which includes Doris Moreno's for this edition Spanish and that it is necessary to see not only the methodological changes, also overcoming controversial views, uncritical products or pragmatic, and to see how the control mechanisms go beyond.

Can cultural differences affect economic change? Max Weber famously argued that ascetic Protestants' religious commitments—specifically their work ethic—inspired them to develop capitalist economic systems conducive to rapid economic change. Yet today, scholars continue to debate the empirical validity of Weber's claims, which address a vibrant literature in political economy on the relationship between culture and economic change. We revisit the link between religion and economic change in Reformed Europe. To do so, we leverage a quasi-experiment in Western Switzerland, where certain regions had Reformed Protestant beliefs imposed on them by local authorities during the Swiss Reformation, while other regions remained Catholic. Using 19th-century Swiss census data, we perform a fuzzy spatial regression discontinuity design to test Weber's hypothesis and find that the Swiss Protestants in the Canton of Vaud industrialized faster than their Catholic neighbors in Fribourg. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Luise von Hohenzollern-Hechingen übermittelte Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz 1704 einen Plan zur Gründung einer interkonfessionellen Akademie in Deutschland, die sich der Erziehung junger Mädchen katholischer, lutherischer und kalvinistischer Konfession widmen sollte. Sowohl das Dokument als auch Leibnizʼ Antwort an die Fürstin sind im Leibniz-Nachlass der Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Bibliothek in Hannover nicht mehr erhalten. Im vatikanischen Geheimarchiv findet sich eine Fassung, die Luise vorab an Clemens XI. gesandt hatte; daraus geht ihre eigentliche Absicht hervor, die darin bestand, die „Häretikerinnen" zum Katholizismus zu bekehren. Diese Initiative war alles andere als bedeutungslos, auch wenn die Kurie ihr ablehnend gegenüberstand. Der Plan gelangte nämlich durch Vermittlung des Lutheraners Anton Ulrich, Herzog von Wolfenbüttel, nach Rom und trug nicht wenig zu den 1709 schließlich erfolgreichen Versuchen bei, den Herzog zu bekehren. Im Anhang finden sich das von Luise übermittelte „Project" sowie die von der Kurie und dem Kölner Nuntius geführte Korrespondenz. In 1704 Luise von Hohenzollern-Hechingen sent Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz a project to establish an interconfessional academy in Germany aimed at educating Catholic, Lutheran and Calvinist girls. The text no longer survives in the Leibniz-Nachlass at the Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Bibliothek in Hannover, and Leibniz's reply to the princess has also been lost. The Vatican Secret Archive preserves the version previously sent by Luise to Clement XI, which reveals the true purpose of this foundation: the conversion of young heretics to Roman catholicism. The Curia judged Luise's proposal to be improper, but this does not make the event unimportant. The project had reached Rome with the patronage of the Lutheran Anton Ulrich, Duke of Wolfenbüttel, a circumstance that contributed to the start of manoeuvres for the Duke's conversion, an event that eventually occurred in 1709. The appendix contains the edition of the „Project" sent by Luise, together with the correspondence within the Curia and with the Nuncio of Cologne. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines how lay people brought preaching of the Word to their locality in early seventeenth-century Yorkshire and Lancashire by acting collectively to build chapels, raise funds for ministers' wages and provide fees and hospitality. A wide cross-section of society was willingly involved in this support, suggesting that enthusiasm for sermon-centred worship was not just the preserve of a godly few. It is proposed that this collective behaviour and its rhetorical representation could foster an inclusive sense of local identity. The importance of the personal style and skills of individual preachers in engendering support is also considered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Focuses on Calvinists' effort to urge magistrates to use the life of biblical Israel's King Josiah as a model and its significance for the political and cultural identity of Reformed Protestants across Europe during the 16th and 17th centuries. Hebraic patriotism; Josiah as religious reformer, iconoclast and destroyer of false religion, and territorial expansionist; Usage of God's relationship with Israel.

Discusses the experiences of Calvinist architects on constraint and repression concerning their doctrinal observance and expression during the Edict of Nantes. Tensions in system of belief; Spatial concerns and structural program of the ideal city of God; Significance of structures; Bernard Palissy's implementation of Calvin's strategies.

The article discusses issues related to resolving suffering through prosperity theology among U.S. Christians. Topics discussed include theological perspective of healing of sufferings by the grace of God, impact of false theology to the Christian community and prosperity theology as a corruption of a Calvinist idea describing the meaning and purpose of earthly prosperity.

A literary criticism of the novel "Austerlitz" by W.G. Sebald is presented in which the author discusses about Jacques Austerlitz, a survivor of the 1938 Jewish Kindertransport from central Europe to England. It discusses that in the novel, the emigrant boy Austerlitz has grown up thinking himself to be one Dafydd Elias, the adoptive son of Emrys Elias, a Welsh Calvinist evangelical preacher and his doomed, forlorn English wife, Gwendolyn.

The paper reconsiders the Weber Thesis of a linkage between Calvinism and capitalism. It first restates this sociological Thesis in terms of the Calvinist doctrine of predestination as its theological core and premise in virtue of being treated as the crucial religious factor of the spirit of modern capitalism. Consequently, it proposes that the Weber Thesis' validity and consistency depends on that doctrine, succeeding or failing as a sociological theory with the latter depending on whether or not it is unique in theological terms, as well as economic-social consequences. For that purpose, it reexamines and compares the Calvinist doctrine of predestination with the pre-Calvinist versions and infers that it is basically identical to or compatible with these. It then draws the implications for the Weber Thesis in respect of the degree of its validity or consistence. It concludes that the Weber Thesis likely is fail as a sociological-economic theory with the Calvinist doctrine of predestination to the extent that the latter is its theological ground and revealed not to be unique and new theologically and probably in terms of its societal effects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the sphere of ethics in the thought of the Dutch Calvinist statesman and theologian Abraham Kuyper. The first section establishes that Kuyper did consider ethics to be a sphere and what he believed it to be. The second section uses this outline of the sphere of ethics to elucidate the relationship between ethics and the state for Kuyper. It teases out three theses in Kuyper's work: (1) Ethics and the scope of the state stand in inverse (or negative) relationship. (2) Ethics and legal advancement stand in direct (or positive) relationship. (3) Ethics needs the state to help facilitate its own development throughout society. Taken together, I argue that the spheres of ethics and the state thus stand in mutually dependent (or reciprocal) relationship to, rather than "hermetically sealed off" from, one another. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]