The Theological Origins of Modernity

Chicago: University of Chicago Press (2008)
  Copy   BIBTEX

Abstract

Exposing the religious roots of our ostensibly godless age, Michael Allen Gillespie reveals in this landmark study that modernity is much less secular than conventional wisdom suggests. Taking as his starting point the collapse of the medieval world, Gillespie argues that from the very beginning moderns sought not to eliminate religion but to support a new view of religion and its place in human life. He goes on to explore the ideas of such figures as William of Ockham, Petrarch, Erasmus, Luther, Descartes, and Hobbes, showing that modernity is best understood as a series of attempts to formulate a new and coherent metaphysics or theology. ''Bringing the history of political thought up to date and situating it against the backdrop of contemporary events, Gillespie's analyses provide us a way to begin to have conversations with the Islamic world about what is perhaps the central question within each of the three monotheistic religions: if God is omnipotent, then what is the place of human freedom?''

Links

PhilArchive



    Upload a copy of this work     Papers currently archived: 90,593

External links

Setup an account with your affiliations in order to access resources via your University's proxy server

Through your library

Similar books and articles

Review. [REVIEW]Jonathan Robinson - 2009 - The Thomist 73:514-519.
Origins of Modernity. [REVIEW]Wayne Cristaudo - 1991 - The Owl of Minerva 22 (2):237-240.
Luther and Modernity.David J. Kangas - 2010 - Epoché: A Journal for the History of Philosophy 14 (2):431-452.

Analytics

Added to PP
2016-02-07

Downloads
4 (#1,426,245)

6 months
2 (#668,348)

Historical graph of downloads
How can I increase my downloads?