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Orthodoxy, rationalism and the world in eighteenth-century Holland

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 March 2016

J. Van Den Berg
J. Van Den Berg*
Affiliation:
free University of Amsterdam
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Extract

As far as the protestant countries are concerned the eighteenth century, the ‘age of reason’, might as well be called ‘the age of revival’. On the one hand, we meet with a strong desire to escape the snares of this world by concentrating upon the mysteries of salvation: the road to sanctity is a narrow road, to be trodden in fear and trembling. On the other hand there are those for whom this world is a world full of new and unexpected possibilities, a world to be explored and to be made instrumental to the fulfilment of the divine plan with regard to the development of humanity in its secular context. Naturally, also in the eighteenth century ‘sanctity’ and ‘secularity’ were not seen as in themselves mutually exclusive concepts. While many revivalists looked forward to the enlightenment of this world by the knowledge of God, many men of the enlightenment saw before them the prospect of the sanctification of the world by the combined influences of reason and revelation. Some of the fathers of the enlightenment - notably Locke and Leibniz - were essentially committed to the cause of Christianity, while on the other hand protagonists of the pietist and revival movements such as Francke and Edwards cannot in fairness be accused of an anti-rational attitude and of a lack of interest in the well-being of this world. Nevertheless, within the circle of eighteenth-century protestant Christianity there were conspicuous differences with regard to the evaluation of and the attitude towards the world in which the Christian community, while living in the expectation of the kingdom, still had to find its way and its place.

Type
Research Article
Information
Studies in Church History , Volume 10: Sanctity and Secularity: The Church and the World , 1973 , pp. 173 - 192
Copyright
Copyright © Ecclesiastical History Society 1973

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References

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84 I thank dr M. van Beek, Amstelveen, for his kind assistance with regard to linguistic problems.