The Calvinist InternationalSimon is a PhD candidate at the Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities, University of Queensland. He resides in Geelong, Victoria with his wife and four children.
In De Civitate Dei 11.25, Augustine makes an observation which, while obvious in some ways, is a profound corrective to man’s basic tendency to look for wisdom everywhere but the true source. He notes first that if we were self-deriving, then so would our wisdom. But we are not, for we are created. Now if our […]
This is a brief follow up to my post on the uses of the word religio. Alan Jacobs has made some interesting observations about Peter Harrison’s Territories of Science and Religion and the reification of terms. He writes the following over at The New Atlantis: One of the chief themes of Peter Harrison’s recent book The […]
Althusius’ two kingdoms doctrine, as outlined in chapter XXVIII of the his Politca methodice digestica, has further knock-on effects for his political science than what I discussed in my previous post. Immediately following the instructions about the civil magistrate and freedom of conscience, Althusius explains that the prudent ruler will ‘abstain from persecutions’ of sects which […]
In his lengthy discussion of the Decalogue in Institutes of the Christian Religion, Calvin expresses a dual truth; that we are to love all mankind without exception, and that those who are tied more closely to us should benefit from our special loving attention. I do not deny that the more closely a man is linked […]
James 1:27 does typically give Christians some grief: how can “true religion” be properly equated with making charitable stop-overs to orphans? In an incisive discussion on the historical relationship between the terms religion (religio) and science (scientia) in his Territories of Science and Religion, Peter Harrison makes clear that we typically misunderstand the import of the […]
In his Politca methodice digestica Johannes Althusius makes the following observation about the spiritual nature of faith, warning the civil magistrate not to assume control over what is solely God’s jurisdiction: A magistrate in whose realm the true worship of God does not thrive should take care that he not claim imperium over that area of the […]
In chapter 25.4 of De Civitate Dei, Augustine says the following about the the different but related goods of the two cities of God and Man: It would be incorrect to say that the goods which this city [the City of Man] desires are not goods, since even that city is better, in its own human […]