Reformation of the commonwealth. Thomas Becon and the politics of evangelical change in Tudor England. By Brian L. Hanson. (Reformed Historical Theology, 58.) Pp. 250 incl. 15 tables. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Reprecht, 2019. €90. 978 3 525 55454 8; 2198 8226

2021 ◽  
Vol 72 (3) ◽  
pp. 661-662
Author(s):  
Jonathan Reimer
2020 ◽  
pp. 1-172
Author(s):  
John F. Lingelbach

Three hundred years after its discovery, scholars find themselves unable to determine the more likely of the two hypotheses regarding the date of the Muratorian Fragment, which consists of a catalog of New Testament texts. Is the Fragment a late second- to early third-century composition or a fourth-century composition? This present work seeks to break the impasse. The study found that, by making an inference to the best explanation, a second-century date for the Fragment is preferred. This methodology consists of weighing the two hypotheses against five criteria: plausibility, explanatory scope, explanatory power, credibility, and simplicity. What makes this current work unique in its contribution to church history and historical theology is that it marks the first time the rigorous application of an objective methodology, known as “inference to the best explanation” (or IBE), has been formally applied to the problem of the Fragment’s date.


1956 ◽  
Vol 28 (2) ◽  
pp. 180-181
Author(s):  
Wallace T. MacCaffrey

The Library ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 21 (4) ◽  
pp. 477-497
Author(s):  
Jonathan Reimer

Abstract This article attributes four lost works to the literary corpus of the English clergyman and bestselling Tudor devotional author Thomas Becon (1512–1567): The Shelde of Saluacion, An Heauenly Acte, Christen Prayers and Godly Meditacions, and The Resurreccion of the Masse. It ascribes these texts to Becon in light of three types of corroborating evidence: contemporary attribution, parallels of content, and early publication history. These four lost works not only furnish a fuller picture of his literary output, but also provide new insights into his career, rhetoric, and theology. As Becon was the most popular evangelical devotional author writing in English during the sixteenth century, this analysis of his hitherto unattributed books makes a valuable contribution to the bibliography of Tudor England, especially during the transformative years of the Henrician, Edwardine, Marian, and Elizabethan Reformations.


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