scholarly journals Geloof en kennis in die Heidelbergse Kategismus

2013 ◽  
Vol 47 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarel P. Van der Walt

Die wyse waarop die noue band tussen geloof en kennis verstaan moet word, figureer huidig steeds in teologiese debatte. In hierdie artikel word die verband wat deur vraag en antwoord 21 van die Heidelbergse Kategismus tussen geloof en kennis getrek word, bestudeer. In reaksie op die skolastiek van die laat-Middeleeue toe verintellektualisering van geloof besonder beklemtoon is, het die Reformasie ’n klaarblyklike gebalanseerde nuansering van die verband tussen geloof en kennis tot gevolg gehad. Veral Calvyn het ’n besondere bydrae hiertoe gelewer en het ’n bepaalde invloed gehad op die formulering van geloof se kenniselement. Dit het ruimte gebied waarbinne Ursinus en die res van die betrokke kommissie hierdie unieke verband kon vasvang in die Kategismus as konfessie. Die Skrifgronde hiervoor is Hebreërs 11:1, 3 sowel as Jakobus 2:19. Albei hierdie Skrifdele dien as bewysgronde om die kennisaspek van geloof te begrond. Hierdie artikel dui aan hoe die Kategismus bogenoemde Skrifgronde verreken om geloof as voorwetenskaplike kennis te beskryf. Die kenniselement van geloof is die voorveronderstelling wat die eksegeet by die aanvang van sy wetenskaplike aktiwiteit op die tafel wil plaas. Hierdie voorwetenskaplike kennis dien ter ondersteuning van wetenskaplike teorievorming.The way in which the close relation between faith and knowledge should be understood, is still very prominent in current theological debates. This article studies the connection that is being described between faith and knowledge by question and answer 21 of the Heidelberg Catechism. In response to the scholasticism of the late Middle Ages with its particular emphasis on the knowledge element of faith, the time of the Reformation apparently brought a more balanced view on the relationship between faith and knowledge thanks to specifically Calvin who had a certain influence on the formulation of faith’s knowledge component. This gave to Ursinus and the rest of the commission responsible the breeding ground to capture this unique relationship into the Catechism as confession. Scriptural grounds for this relationship are found in Hebrews 11:1, 3 and James 2:19. Both these passages serve as basis for the knowledge aspect of faith. This article shows how the Catechism discounts these Scriptural passages to describe faith as a pre-scientific element in the scientific process. The knowledge-element of faith is the presupposition which the exegete wants to place on the table. This pre-scientific knowledge serves as support for the formulation of scientific theories.

1986 ◽  
Vol 25 (97) ◽  
pp. 1-18 ◽  
Author(s):  
Steven G. Ellis

Much more so than in modern times, sharp cultural and social differences distinguished the various peoples inhabiting the British Isles in the later middle ages. Not surprisingly these differences and the interaction between medieval forms of culture and society have attracted considerable attention by historians. By comparison with other fields of research, we know much about the impact of the Westminster government on the various regions of the English polity, about the interaction between highland and lowland Scotland and about the similarities and differences between English and Gaelic Ireland. Yet the historical coverage of these questions has been uneven, and what at first glance might appear obvious and promising lines of inquiry have been largely neglected — for example the relationship between Gaelic Ireland and Gaelic Scotland, or between Wales, the north of England and the lordship of Ireland as borderlands of the English polity. No doubt the nature and extent of the surviving evidence is an important factor in explaining this unevenness, but in fact studies of interaction between different cultures seem to reflect not so much their intrinsic importance for our understanding of different late medieval societies as their perceived significance for the future development of movements culminating in the present.


1969 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 22-47
Author(s):  
Theodor Brodek

The relationship of the lay community to clerical institutions during the Middle Ages and especially in the pre–Reformation Era has long been a subject of methodical investigation. It has, however, proven extremely difficult to gain reliable evidence regarding subjective attitudes towards the clergy. Once the basic literary sources have been culled, further elucidation of the development of attitudes on the part of the majority of the people tends to become vague and hesitant or to rely on post hoc explanations. In this brief study, I have experimented with a statistical approach to the problem by tabulating the records of donations to three church institutions of the Lahngau in order to be able to trace, if at all possible, the evolution of attitudes which they reflect. I have, furthermore, attempted to test the hypothesis that the subjective attitudes of a social class towards a church institution are partially conditioned by the effective power exercised on the institution in question at the local level by the donor group.


Author(s):  
Şener Aktürk

Based on a critical reading of three recent books, I argue that the exclusion of Jews and Muslims, the two major non-Christian religious groups in Europe and the Americas, has continued on the basis of ethnic, racial, ideological, and quasi-rational justifications, instead of or in addition to religious justifications, since the Reformation. Furthermore, I argue that the institutionally orchestrated collective stigmatization and persecution of Jews and Muslims predated the Reformation, going back to the Fourth Lateran Council under Pope Innocent III in 1215. The notion of Corpus Christianum and Observant movements in the late Middle Ages, the elective affinity of liberalism and racism in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and the divergence in religious norms at present are critically evaluated as potential causes of ethnoreligious exclusion.


Author(s):  
Christoph Winzeler

Abstract„In the Name of God the Almighty!“, Swiss constitutional law on religions - balancing and apeacing in historic tradition. From the 16th century onwards, the Reformation and its consequences have influenced the development of the Swiss Confederation. During the late Middle Ages, the Confederation had been struggling to find its way as a system of treaties within a growing number of Cantons. The Reformation divided the Cantons in two ‚camps‘, both trying to defeat each other on the battlefield, which resulted in four successive Peace Treaties (‚Landfriedensbünde‘). 1847 there was a last civil war between the conservative or catholic ‚camp‘ and the liberal or protestant majority. From 1848 until 1973, the Federal Constitution contained discriminations against catholics, including a probihition of the Jesuits. In 2009, under changed circumstances, a new religious discrimination was introduced into the Constitution: the ban on minarets. Islam is now making a way through Swiss history comparable to that of Catholicism in the 19th century. Yet the law of the Cantons, developed over the centuries, provides for adequate instruments to cope with the challenges of the 21st century.


Author(s):  
Kathryne Beebe

Observant reform is central to the religious, social, cultural, economic, and political changes fundamental to late medieval Europe. However, modern scholars have traditionally devoted scant attention to it, focusing instead on pre-1300 religious movements or the changes of the Reformation. Yet in the past two decades, more work focusing on the ‘Observance Movement’ has begun to remedy that neglect. This chapter highlights the essential questions and issues that drive recent studies, such as property, the involvement of women and the laity, and resistance to reform. It evaluates the current challenges presented by the conceptualization of an emerging field and argues that while greater collaboration between scholars and the production of basic overviews are needed, we should also strive to understand those who professed or embodied Observant ideals not just from the viewpoint of our own labels and concepts, but also to understand them in their own terms.


1985 ◽  
Vol 54 (2) ◽  
pp. 176-187 ◽  
Author(s):  
William J. Courtenay

One of the most pressing needs in the field of medieval biblical studies is for an adequate historical overview of developments in the late Middle Ages. One of the pioneers, the late Beryl Smalley, never fully achieved the intended sequel to her magisterial Study of the Bible in the Middle Ages, although her English Friars and Antiquity was an excellent beginning, particularly for the early fourteenth-century English group. Other surveys end with Nicholas of Lyra, skip from the thirteenth century to the Reformation, or give only the most cursory attention to the late medieval period.2 And yet the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries were rich in biblical commentaries, and scholars, have long considered a more precise understanding of developments in that period to be essential for an adequate appreciation of the character and significance of biblical commentaries in the early sixteenth century.


2020 ◽  
Vol 134 ◽  
pp. 39-59
Author(s):  
Louis Sicking

Zuiderzee towns in the Baltic. ‘Vitten’ and ‘Vögte’ – Space and urban representatives in late-medieval ScaniaThe Scania peninsula in the southwest of present-day Sweden was one of the most important trading centres of medieval Northern Europe due to the seasonal presence of immense swarms of herring which attracted large numbers of fishermen and traders. Streching back from the beach of Scania were the so-called vitten, which the traders, grouped by region or city, held as their own, legally autonomous trade settlements, from the Danish King. Initially, these were seasonal trading colonies that were occupied only for the duration of the fair, which began in August and ended in November. In the late Middle Ages the vitten developed into miniature towns, modest off-shoots from the traders‘ mother city. The presence on a small peninsula (c 50 km2) of so many fishermen and merchants who did business together and came from different cities could easily have led to tensions and conflict. What was the relationship between the spatial arrangement of the vitten at Scania and the urban representatives of the vitten, the so-called vögte or governors? This question is addressed by focusing on the vitten of the Zuiderzee towns. Their vitten, among which were numbered those of eastern Zuiderzee cities like Kampen and Zutphen as well as those of western cities like Amsterdam, Brielle and Zierikzee, were part of the Hanse. However, the vitten of these cities have been virtually neglected in historiography. The territorial or local-topographical development of these vitten was characterized by regional concentration: the Zuiderzee vitten were located close or adjacent to one another. The new vitten of Zierikzee and Amsterdam bordered on that of Kampen. Traders from cities and towns without their own vitte were housed in a vitte of a neighboring city: those of Deventer and Zwolle, for instance, in the vitte of  Kampen, those of Enkhuizen and Wieringen in the Amsterdam vitte and those from Schouwen island in the vitte of Zierikzee. The vitten of the eastern Zuiderzee towns were founded at the beginning of the fourteenth century, that is on average half a century earlier than those of the western Zuiderzee towns. The count of Holland and Zealand initially appointed the Zierikzee vogt or governor for all his subjects. Later on, the cities in his counties then had their own governors, first appointed by the count, later by the city (with or without the count‘s approval). The development of the representation of Holland and Zeeland towns in Scania differs from what was characteristic of the eastern Zuiderzee towns. Neither the Count /Duke of Guelders nor the bishop of Utrecht (as overlord of the Oversticht) attempted to interfere with the individual towns‘ governors or the vitten. The trend towards territorialisation in Scania was unmistakable. Although foreign traders, by reason of their origins, were subject to the jurisdiction of their mother city (the personality principle), a fact reflected in the responsibility of the vogt for the citizens in question, they were also increasingly spatially limited in Scania. This was a consequence of the limited space available, of the pursuit of control over one’s own community, and of the goal of allowing different urban groups to live together peaceably, prevent conflicts and guarantee the conduct of international trade. In this way the vitten, in particular those of the Zuiderzee towns that were further away from their mother cities, can be understood as urban colonies overseas.


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