The Background Of Calvin’s Thoughts

Every age, God will raise up certain people who will become church leaders in their day, to be witnesses of God through the truth of God's word. Their presence did not only appear suddenly, but also through a long process of life and education. In this article, we will explore about The Background of Calvin’s Thoughts, whose influence has revealed the world of theology to this day. Calvin was not only influenced by France Humanism but also medieval Theology at that time. Voluntarism was a popular theology in Calvin era. Calvin received only education in theology from medieval tradition on the first stage of his studies because he never studied theology at university. Calvin’s method which was used to build his theology is inseparable from his studying in Civil Law in Orleans. His studying in Orleans has changed Calvin to be a good jurist and he used his skill later in Geneva to compile codifications of legislation and regulation for Church and government in Geneva. In addition to regulation of life, Calvin also noticed the purity of Christian faith teaching.

The Extent of Christ’s Work from the Early Church to Gottschalk

This chapter begins by observing the important precedent that patristic and medieval theology played in the development of Protestant theology, especially in Britain during the early modern period. It observes that early modern debates regarding the extent of Christ’s atoning work were, in many ways, grounded on the catholicity of one’s position. More important, this chapter surveys John Davenant’s own understanding of the history of the doctrine as it was exposited and debated in the patristic and medieval period. The final section of the chapter focuses on the so-called Lombardian formula and the scholastic consensus on the extent of Christ’s death.

Introduction

The debate between Luther and Erasmus was basically about to what degree, if any, a sinner can freely prepare him/herself for the reception of divine grace. When rejecting the bull of Pope Leo X, Luther had used an exaggerating deterministic or necessitarian theological language which alarmed Erasmus. Erasmus concentrated on the application of God’s grace into the human situation “from below”; Luther, on the contrary, focused on the theocentric nature of grace “from above.” Erasmus promoted the commonly accepted rational view of Late Medieval Catholic soteriology: “to those who do what they can God does not deny his grace,” God’s justice requires that he necessarily grant grace to anyone who freely prepares him/herself to receive it, while Luther spoke the language of Biblical realism: Although human will is free in relation to the natural world, the human being is captivated by the overwhelming power of unfaith, sin, and Satan, being incapable of changing his/her ultimate psychic orientation. In his criticism Luther rehabilitated Augustine’s teaching on the radical limits of human freedom and on the Pneumatological dynamism of divine grace, the view neglected in Medieval theology. Research on Luther’s The Bondage of the Will has not recognized the strong Pneumatological and Trinitarian accent of his theology. Instead, the contradiction between Luther and Erasmus has been explained in philosophical terms such as free will, determinism, necessity, and predestination; this has not revealed the true nature of the profoundly theological conflict between the two “forms of Christianity.” The work at hand makes critical comments on Luther research of the last hundred years and launches the task of a detailed and thorough systematic-theological analysis of the major treatise of Luther.

Visual Theory

This chapter provides an overview and assessment of Dante’s use of medieval visual theories in his writings. It first surveys his use of the medieval Aristotelian tradition of visual theory in the Convivio, and discusses his reliance on other models of vision in the Vita nova and Rime, including those found both in medical writings and in the works of other poets. The chapter then discusses how, in the Commedia, Dante incorporates a variety of other late medieval discourses about vision into his narrative. Dante does this—it is argued—in carefully structured and stratified ways that often reveal his characteristic syncretism. The poet continues to use neo-Aristotelian theory but also draws upon a rich body of material on seeing found in medieval theology, contemplation, and Biblical exegesis. Particular attention is paid to how these multiple traditions inform the presentation of Dante-character’s own visual experiences throughout the poem.

Nietzsche and Luther: Reading, Counter-Text, Hermeneutics

In what way is Nietzsche's infamous late aphorism, ‘God is dead’, related to a general attack on theology and its intellectual practices? In Twilight of the Idols, he remarks: ‘I'm afraid we're not rid of God because we still believe in grammar.’ Reason, he decries, has become mired in linguistic rules long determined by the requirements of scholastic philosophy, whether of medieval theology or of Immanuel Kant. Nietzsche dismisses these as die Sprach-Metaphysik (‘metaphysics of language’). In this essay I examine Nietzsche's attack on theology via his long-term struggle with the ideas of Luther, once the idol of Goethe's German enlightenment, and now, Nietzsche insists, its arch-enemy. To do this, I re-examine Luther's theology of language, especially in the early Lectures on Romans (1515–1516). Luther's own attack on scholasticism is founded on a theology of reading which has unexpected affinities with Nietzsche. By placing this in a revised genealogy of hermeneutics from Nietzsche to Heidegger, it is possible to see theology as less deterministic and metaphysical.

Dance Typologies

The opening chapter explores the relationship between medieval biblical interpretation and dance. The Vulgate was the urtext by which medieval authorities developed and justified their ideas concerning dance and its place in Christianity. Biblical glosses, as well as visual representations of the Bible, constructed the archetypes of sinful and holy dancers, thereby creating influential paradigms of Christian dancing bodies. Moreover, these exegetical strategies reveal particular political underpinnings of late medieval theology, including anti-Judaism, sacred kingship, and crusader ideology. The first section examines interpretations of Miriam and her dance of praise. The second section focuses on interpretations of the dancers around the golden calf and their idolatry. The third section explores interpretations of the dance of David, including its foreshadowing of the Passion of Christ and bolstering of the Crusades. The last section scrutinizes interpretations of the dance of Salome through the perspectives of sacrilege and misogyny.

Jesus Christ

Historical research has confirmed that there can be no doubt of the importance of Jesus Christ to Aquinas’ faith, devotion, and theological enterprise. This scholarship has exposed the faults of unsympathetic portrayals of his Christology as docetic or Monophysite, and presented his doctrine of the incarnation afresh, particularly by manifesting its distinctiveness in context and its maturation over time. In this way Aquinas’ Christology has been made available for reception in contemporary Christology in a way that goes beyond the recounting of the history of medieval theology. For those who share his confession of faith, the tasks of contemporary Christology can benefit from the enduring worth of many of his conclusions, the arguments employed, and his organization of material. Such a reception can retrieve a sense of fundamental continuity in Christology, of how Christ is unlike as well as like us, and of the bearing this has on our salvation.

Sixteenth-Century Reformed Reception of Aquinas

The knowledge of Aquinas’ works among Reformed authors of the sixteenth century varies widely from those, such as John Calvin, who rarely cite him, to Peter Martyr Vermigli, who received a doctorate in the via antiqua at Padua and drew heavily on Thomas even after his conversion to Reformed Protestantism. Martin Bucer initiates a trend in the 1530s of placing Thomas among the ‘sounder scholastics’ on account of his Augustinian soteriology. Leading Reformed theologians follow Bucer’s terminology and comparatively positive estimate of Thomas, even while polemicizing against medieval scholasticism and perceived Pelagian tendencies within late medieval theology. By the end of the sixteenth century Reformed theologians regularly cite Thomas favourably, albeit also eclectically. Aquinas’ influence on nascent Reformed orthodoxy, and to a lesser extent earlier theologians, is evident on a wide variety of topics, including prolegomena, biblical hermeneutics, the doctrine of God, predestination, humanity, free will, natural law, and Christology.

Nineteenth-Century Catholic Reception of Aquinas

In the second half of the eighteenth century, under the influence of the Enlightenment, Catholic theology had increasingly turned away from its scholastic tradition. A renewal of Thomist thought started in the first decades of the nineteenth century, especially from Italy. Its original concern was to overcome the modern philosophies that were perceived as endangering faith. From the middle of the century, the movement spread to other parts of Europe, gaining support of the Church’s magisterium under Pope Pius IX. In the wake of the encyclical Aeterni Patris (1879) written by his successor Leo XIII, neo-scholasticism made its final breakthrough in Catholic academic life. Subsequently, numerous Thomist-oriented textbooks were published and Thomist academies were founded throughout Europe. The critical edition of the works of Aquinas (Editio Leonia) marked the beginning of a period of intense historical research on medieval theology and philosophy.