10 The Reformed theology of Thomas Hobbes
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Mark Goldie
Abstract
Thomas Hobbes was a theologian. The scholarship of the past generation has established that fact, wresting him from the presumption that his Leviathan was atheistic and marked a radical secular break with the Christian religion. But what kind of theologian was he? This chapter takes a late work for its case study, An Answer to Dr Bramhall (1668), in which Hobbes positions himself within the tradition of Reformed and magisterial Protestantism and attacks an eminent Arminian and Laudian bishop. Hobbes wrote his treatise in the midst of a crisis in Restoration England in which the newly re-established Church of England, and its regime of uncompromising conformity in worship and doctrine, were coming under scrutiny and attack. Theology therefore abutted upon ecclesiastical politics. The chapter explores Bramhall’s charges against Hobbes and the latter’s rebuttals; Restoration critiques of the episcopate; Hobbes’s substantive theology and his efforts to provide historical credentials for his heterodox positions; and his ‘sociology’ of the priestly perversion of religion. Finally, the chapter assesses the extent to which Hobbes’s claims to Protestant orthodoxy were plausible.
Abstract
Thomas Hobbes was a theologian. The scholarship of the past generation has established that fact, wresting him from the presumption that his Leviathan was atheistic and marked a radical secular break with the Christian religion. But what kind of theologian was he? This chapter takes a late work for its case study, An Answer to Dr Bramhall (1668), in which Hobbes positions himself within the tradition of Reformed and magisterial Protestantism and attacks an eminent Arminian and Laudian bishop. Hobbes wrote his treatise in the midst of a crisis in Restoration England in which the newly re-established Church of England, and its regime of uncompromising conformity in worship and doctrine, were coming under scrutiny and attack. Theology therefore abutted upon ecclesiastical politics. The chapter explores Bramhall’s charges against Hobbes and the latter’s rebuttals; Restoration critiques of the episcopate; Hobbes’s substantive theology and his efforts to provide historical credentials for his heterodox positions; and his ‘sociology’ of the priestly perversion of religion. Finally, the chapter assesses the extent to which Hobbes’s claims to Protestant orthodoxy were plausible.
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Front Matter i
- Contents v
- Notes on contributors vii
- Acknowledgements ix
- List of abbreviations x
- Introduction 1
- I Ecclesio-political and liturgical contests 19
- 1 Contests, contexts, and the boundaries of conformity in early modern England 21
- 2 Protestant jurisdictionalism and the nature of Elizabethan puritan nonconformity 44
- 3 Cathedrals, the Reformed, and the Elizabethan Church 71
- 4 Sir Francis Hastings, Jacobean nonconformity, and the House of Commons, 1604–10 97
- 5 Zachary Crofton, the Restoration Church of England, and the dilemmas of partial conformity, 1662–65 117
- II Reformed conformist theology and ecclesiology 139
- 6 Justifying faith and faith as a virtue in the theology of Richard Hooker 141
- 7 The best religion? The revived ambitions of the Reformed conformist establishment, 1637–40 157
- 8 The Reformed conformist tradition, 1640–62 179
- 9 Edward Reynolds and the making of a presbyterian bishop 199
- 10 The Reformed theology of Thomas Hobbes 222
- 11 Reformed orthodoxy as conformity in the post-Restoration Church of England 245
- Afterword 263
- Index 271
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Front Matter i
- Contents v
- Notes on contributors vii
- Acknowledgements ix
- List of abbreviations x
- Introduction 1
- I Ecclesio-political and liturgical contests 19
- 1 Contests, contexts, and the boundaries of conformity in early modern England 21
- 2 Protestant jurisdictionalism and the nature of Elizabethan puritan nonconformity 44
- 3 Cathedrals, the Reformed, and the Elizabethan Church 71
- 4 Sir Francis Hastings, Jacobean nonconformity, and the House of Commons, 1604–10 97
- 5 Zachary Crofton, the Restoration Church of England, and the dilemmas of partial conformity, 1662–65 117
- II Reformed conformist theology and ecclesiology 139
- 6 Justifying faith and faith as a virtue in the theology of Richard Hooker 141
- 7 The best religion? The revived ambitions of the Reformed conformist establishment, 1637–40 157
- 8 The Reformed conformist tradition, 1640–62 179
- 9 Edward Reynolds and the making of a presbyterian bishop 199
- 10 The Reformed theology of Thomas Hobbes 222
- 11 Reformed orthodoxy as conformity in the post-Restoration Church of England 245
- Afterword 263
- Index 271
