Authors:Lucinda Martin First page: 1 Abstract: Source: Volume 98, Issue 1, pp 1 - 29Histories of Early Modern religion in Europe typically contrast the activities of ordained theologians with those of laity. The thought and writings of the former usually constitute “theology” and those of the latter “piety.” The result has long been a divided history. Confessional church historians have written histories that were essentially genealogies of (male) officer holders, while scholars of folklore, culture or literature analyzed the contributions of laity. Since the so-called cultural turn, the contributions of laity as organizers, transmitters and patrons of Early Modern religious movements are being recognized. What has been less studied are the intellectual achievements of laity, many of whom possessed deep knowledge of theology, history, and ancient languages and played important roles in Early Modern religious history. This article provides an overview of the main issues and the development of lay theology in the period and argues for increased study of the phenomenon. PubDate: 2018-01-01T00:00:00Z
Authors:Jetze Touber First page: 31 Abstract: Source: Volume 98, Issue 1, pp 31 - 55In the seventeenth-century Dutch Republic, non-professional theologians articulated well-informed biblical interpretation, producing a lay theology that was unwelcome to representatives of the churches. Historians have long considered this lay theology as a manifestation of Early Enlightenment. It did not, however, necessarily result from the activities of rationalist philosophers usually associated with the Dutch Early Enlightenment, such as Benedictus de Spinoza (1632–1677). Equally important were the clergy’s efforts to educate laity in reading the Bible and contemplating divinity autonomously. This paper reconstructs the Dutch “culture of catechesis,” a collective effort to involve laity in reflection on religion and the Bible, dating back to at least the 1640s. Based on catechetical materials and their authors, this paper argues that the “culture of catechesis” had its roots in the Public Church itself, and that it contributed to lay theology, as much so as the outspoken programs of eccentric philosophers. PubDate: 2018-01-01T00:00:00Z
Authors:Elke Morlok First page: 56 Abstract: Source: Volume 98, Issue 1, pp 56 - 90This article explores the complex interweaving of kabbalistic and Christological concepts within the kabbalistic “teaching panel” (Lehrtafel) of Princess Antonia of Württemberg. The essay discusses the artwork in the context of visual representations of the ten sefirot, the divine attributes or vessels in Jewish mysticism. Executed as an altarpiece for the church in Bad Teinach in Southern Germany, the work integrates the sefirot into a pansophic concept that served devotional and educational purposes with a salvific goal. The article argues that, with the Lehrtafel, Antonia and her teachers created a devotional object that could be accessed by both regular Christian laity and experts who possessed deeper knowledge of Kabbalah. PubDate: 2018-01-01T00:00:00Z
Authors:Andreas Pietsch First page: 91 Abstract: Source: Volume 98, Issue 1, pp 91 - 110The article argues for a re-assessment of the widespread assumption that Friedrich Breckling should be considered the editor of the 1687/90 German edition of the works of the sixteenth-century “Familist” author Hiel. After discussing the evidence which had seemed to point towards such a role for Breckling, the article draws on unedited material to demonstrate that the Hiel edition should instead be ascribed to Loth Fischer. This sheds new light on the religious and intellectual attitudes of the heterodox Lutheran theologian Breckling. When compared to his contemporary Gottfried Arnold, Breckling not only questioned the contemporary boundaries of orthodoxy, but also re-negotiated them, integrating elements from older heterodox traditions. PubDate: 2018-01-01T00:00:00Z
Authors:Simon Grote First page: 111 Abstract: Source: Volume 98, Issue 1, pp 111 - 138The decline of “fanaticism” in eighteenth-century Germany, a myth propagated by self-proclaimed proponents of Enlightenment, continues to shape historians’ representations of the ascendancy of “religious” Enlightenment. To discredit this myth and suggest a means of replacing it, this essay departs from the conventional attention to university theology as a history of ideas and proposes adding a book-historical perspective. Its focus is the German Pietist theologian Joachim Lange (1670–1744). Condemned by critics as a “fanatic” by virtue of his alleged intellectual kinship with French Reformed theologian Pierre Poiret (1646–1719), Lange is best known today for his vehement and ultimately ineffectual opposition to Enlightenment’s theological standard-bearers at the University of Halle. But Lange’s kinship with Poiret was only partial, and the stark contrast between the careers of two of Lange’s textbooks reveals that although his theological star was falling by the 1730s, elements of Lange’s ostensibly outmoded theology continued to find an audience into the nineteenth century, through the enormous commercial success of his Latin grammar. PubDate: 2018-01-01T00:00:00Z
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