Histories of Heresy in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries: For, Against, and Beyond Persecution and Toleration

by J. Laursen (Editor)

Overview

Toleration of differing religious ideas exists in parts of the contemporary world, but it is still not clear how this came about. Recent work has uncovered the enormous importance one branch of historiography has had in bringing about such tolerance as we have: histories of heresy. This book brings together experts in this field in order to attempt to map out the contours and features of the influence of these histories on early modern and modern conceptions of toleration. Perhaps by showing heretics and heresies to be more benign than once thought, these histories could tease tolerance from the intolerant. The essays in this book attempt to piece together the intentions and effects of key works from this literature in the promotion or rejection of toleration in theory and practice.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780312294045
Publisher:	Palgrave Macmillan US
Publication date:	07/17/2002
Edition description:	2002
Pages:	290
Product dimensions:	5.51(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.03(d)

About the Author

JOHN CHRISTIAN LAURSEN is Professor of Political Science at the University of California at Riverside. He is the author of The Politics of Skepticism in the Ancients, Montaigne, Hume, and Kant, editor of New Essays on the Political Thought of the Hugenots, and editor of Religious Toleration: "The Variety of Rites" from Cyrus to Defoe.

Table of Contents

Introduction; J.C.Laursen Argument and Rhetoric against Heresy in Thomas Edward's Gangraena ; S.Basu Gabriel Naude's Apology for Great Men Suspected of Magic ; M.Horowitz Hobbes on Heresy; M.P.Thompson Between History and Politics: Limborch's Historia Inquisitionis ; L.Simonutti The Public Context of Heresy: Maimbourg, Byle, and Le Clerc; S.Jenkinson Francis Lee and the French Prophets: The History of Montanism ; S.Searl-Chapin The History of Heresey in Clandestine Philosophical Manuscripts; A.McKenna The Trinity as Heresy; M.Mulsow Two Jewish Heresies: Spinozism and Sabbatianism; R.Popkin Gibbon and the History of Heresy; J.G.A.Pocock Heinrich Corrodi's Critical History of Chiliasm ; S.Zurbuchen The Enlightened Orthodoxy of the Abbe Pluquet; P.Coleman Heresey in the Encyclopedie d'Yverdon; C.Donato The Abbe Nicolas-Sylvestre Bergier and the History of Heresy; K.H.Doig

Editorial Reviews

"...fourteen stimulating essays...of interest to scholars and graduate students working in early modern intellectual history." - Andrew C. Thompson, History: Reviews of New Books

From the Publisher

Laursen (political science, U. of California, Riverside) introduces 14 papers exploring why histories of heresies were written in the 17th and 18th centuries and how this diverse subgenre influenced understanding of the term "heresy." These histories either attacked or supported tolerance toward such alleged Christian heresies or "enthusiasms" as magic, Catharism, and Montanism, or the Jewish heresies of Spinozism and Sabbatianism (all defined in the glossary). Other essays discuss defensive writings of heretics and defenders such as Hobbes, and a counter-history of the Trinity as heresy. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

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