The Republic of the Seven United Provinces offers the rather special case of a state which called itself mono-confessional and Protestant while at the same time organising the civic community along the lines of religious toleration; this was sometimes from conviction and at other times from political expediency. The tension between these two aspects of collective life and its representation – confessional co-existence in a state that claimed to be Calvinist – explains the contrasting images of the United Provinces that we find in both contemporary and more recent literature. The variety of solutions adopted in the different provinces, reputed to be autonomous where religion was concerned, adds still more to the opacity of the general picture.

Perceptions of religious diversity

Over the centuries, the Dutch Republic has forged for itself the solid reputation of being a model of religious toleration, in the European historical consciousness. However, on closer observation, we realise that this reputation is based on hindsight, at a time when there was a publicly recognised Church (publieke kerk), with its rights and privileges, flanked by confessional groups possessing their own structure but condemned either to a secondary role or even to near-secret worship. At the beginning, the ‘Dutch model’ was rather an a-typical solution to religious problems that were arising throughout Europe in similar terms.