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Early Pyrrhonism As a Sect of Buddhism? a Case Study in the Methodology of Comparative Philosophy
Comparative Philosophy Volume 9, No. 2 (2018): 1-40 Open Access / ISSN 2151-6014 www.comparativephilosophy.org EARLY PYRRHONISM AS A SECT OF BUDDHISM? A CASE STUDY IN THE METHODOLOGY OF COMPARATIVE PHILOSOPHY MONTE RANSOME JOHNSON & BRETT SHULTS ABSTRACT: We offer a sceptical examination of a thesis recently advanced in a monograph published by Princeton University Press entitled Greek Buddha: Pyrrho’s Encounter with Early Buddhism in Central Asia. In this dense and probing work, Christopher I. Beckwith, a professor of Central Eurasian studies at Indiana University, Bloomington, argues that Pyrrho of Elis adopted a form of early Buddhism during his years in Bactria and Gandhāra, and that early Pyrrhonism must be understood as a sect of early Buddhism. In making his case Beckwith claims that virtually all scholars of Greek, Indian, and Chinese philosophy have been operating under flawed assumptions and with flawed methodologies, and so have failed to notice obvious and undeniable correspondences between the philosophical views of the Buddha and of Pyrrho. In this study we take Beckwith’s proposal and challenge seriously, and we examine his textual basis and techniques of translation, his methods of examining passages, his construal of problems and his reconstruction of arguments. We find that his presuppositions are contentious and doubtful, his own methods are extremely flawed, and that he draws unreasonable conclusions. Although the result of our study is almost entirely negative, we think it illustrates some important general points about the methodology of comparative philosophy. Keywords: adiaphora, anātman, anattā, ataraxia, Buddha, Buddhism, Democritus, Pāli, Pyrrho, Pyrrhonism, Scepticism, trilakṣaṇa 1. INTRODUCTION One of the most ambitious recent works devoted to comparative philosophy is Christopher Beckwith’s monograph Greek Buddha: Pyrrho’s Encounter with Early Buddhism in Central Asia (2015). -
Adiaphora, Luther and the Material Culture of Worship Andrew Spicer
Adiaphora, Luther and the Material Culture of Worship Andrew Spicer During the seventeenth and eighteenth century, English merchants and travellers to Germany and the Baltic were surprised by the pre-Reformation furnishings that remained in the Lutheran churches they visited, particularly commenting on the altarpieces, organs and statues.1 The survival of these aspects of late medieval worship has been attributed to the so-called ‘preserving power’ of Lutheranism. Significant numbers of images, ecclesiastical plate and vestments together with altarpieces remain even to this day through having been retained by Lutheran congregations.2 Recent scholarship, however, has acknowledged that this material culture has not always survived without some adaptation to accord with the needs of Lutheran worship.3 Furthermore, it has been questioned whether ‘preservation’ or ‘survival’ are the appropriate terms to refer to these items associated with pre-Reformation worship but with which the Lutheran faithful continued to engage.4 Adiaphora has become a convenient term to explain the retention of this ecclesiastical material culture, particularly in relation to religious art and images, within the Lutheran tradition.5 Adiaphora, a Greek term, had its origins in classical philosophy but had been adopted by the some of the Church Fathers. The meaning of the concept gradually evolved so that by the late middle ages, it had come to refer to things that were permitted because they had neither been divinely commanded nor prohibited, as determined by the New Testament. These were matters, which were not regarded as necessary for salvation. It was this understanding of the term that was applied by the Reformers in the early sixteenth century. -
The Development of Congregational Polity and Early Governance in Watertown, Massachusetts”
“The Development of Congregational Polity and Early Governance in Watertown, Massachusetts” Charter Day Talk - September 12, 2009 - Rev. Mark W. Harris Anyone who wishes to understand early town government and town meetings in Massachusetts needs to know about the form of church government that the early Puritan settlers described as, “One, Immutable, and Prescribed in the Word of God.” (1) The authority for their chosen form of Ecclesiastical organization was the Bible, and the Puritans set forth in the Cambridge Platform of 1648 that “the parts of church-government are all of them exactly described” there. Here was a sharp division between Puritan and Anglican, for the Puritan could not find in the book of Acts or the letters of Paul any reason to justify a hierarchal system of bishops, or cardinals, or popes. The Puritan structure of organization has typically been described as congregational polity, because the congregations were intended to be a reflection of the primitive Christian churches which were small cells of independent believers. (2) By 1648 nearly thirty years had passed since the first settlers had arrived in Plymouth. The Westminster Confession, a theological platform, had arrived in the colonies from England, and by and large, there was agreement among the Puritans in matters of faith. Fifty churches had been gathered in the four colonies - Plymouth, Massachusetts Bay, New Haven and Hartford. The Synod in Cambridge, which held its first session in 1646, was called by the General Court to formally structure the polity of the New England churches. Some of the English authorities had hoped to Presbyterianize the congregations, and while the theological agreement made it a fortuitous time to regularize church polity in the New World, the Puritans had no desire to capitulate to a system that did not, in their view, conform to texts from scripture. -
Ecclesiology of the Anglican Communion: Rediscovering the Radical and Transnational Nature of the Anglican Communion
A (New) Ecclesiology of the Anglican Communion: Rediscovering the Radical and Transnational Nature of the Anglican Communion Guillermo René Cavieses Araya Submitted in accordance with the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy The University of Leeds Faculty of Arts School of Philosophy, Religion and History of Science February 2019 1 The candidate confirms that the work submitted is his own and that appropriate credit has been given where reference has been made to the work of others. This copy has been supplied on the understanding that it is copyright material and that no quotation from this thesis may be published without proper acknowledgement. © 2019 The University of Leeds and Guillermo René Cavieses Araya The right of Guillermo René Cavieses Araya to be identified as Author of this work has been asserted by Guillermo René Cavieses Araya in accordance with the Copyright, Design and Patents Act 1988. 2 Acknowledgements No man is an island, and neither is his work. This thesis would not have been possible without the contribution of a lot of people, going a long way back. So, let’s start at the beginning. Mum, thank you for teaching me that it was OK for me to dream of working for a circus when I was little, so long as I first went to University to get a degree on it. Dad, thanks for teaching me the value of books and a solid right hook. To my other Dad, thank you for teaching me the virtue of patience (yes, I know, I am still working on that one). -
MASSACHUSETTS: Or the First Planters of New-England, the End and Manner of Their Coming Thither, and Abode There: in Several EPISTLES (1696)
University of Nebraska - Lincoln DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln Joshua Scottow Papers Libraries at University of Nebraska-Lincoln 1696 MASSACHUSETTS: or The first Planters of New-England, The End and Manner of their coming thither, and Abode there: In several EPISTLES (1696) John Winthrop Governor, Massachusetts Bay Colony Thomas Dudley Deputy Governor, Massachusetts Bay Colony John Allin Minister, Dedham, Massachusetts Thomas Shepard Minister, Cambridge, Massachusetts John Cotton Teaching Elder, Church of Boston, Massachusetts See next page for additional authors Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/scottow Part of the American Studies Commons Winthrop, John; Dudley, Thomas; Allin, John; Shepard, Thomas; Cotton, John; Scottow, Joshua; and Royster,, Paul Editor of the Online Electronic Edition, "MASSACHUSETTS: or The first Planters of New- England, The End and Manner of their coming thither, and Abode there: In several EPISTLES (1696)" (1696). Joshua Scottow Papers. 7. https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/scottow/7 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Libraries at University of Nebraska-Lincoln at DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln. It has been accepted for inclusion in Joshua Scottow Papers by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln. Authors John Winthrop; Thomas Dudley; John Allin; Thomas Shepard; John Cotton; Joshua Scottow; and Paul Royster, Editor of the Online Electronic Edition This article is available at DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln: https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/ scottow/7 ABSTRACT CONTENTS In 1696 there appeared in Boston an anonymous 16mo volume of 56 pages containing four “epistles,” written from 66 to 50 years earlier, illustrating the early history of the colony of Massachusetts Bay. -
The Limits Upon Adiaphoristic Freedom: Luther and Melanchthon1 Bernard J
THE LIMITS UPON ADIAPHORISTIC FREEDOM: LUTHER AND MELANCHTHON1 BERNARD J. VERKAMP Vincennes University, Indiana HEN LUTHER and his principal spokesman, Philip Melanchthon, Wlaunched their attack against the many ecclesiastical laws and regulations which had cropped up over the centuries, it was not so much a matter of attacking the traditions in themselves as it was an attempt to restore the doctrine of solafideism, which in their opinion the traditions had severely jeopardized. Once that doctrine was fully appreciated, Luther wrote, the Christian would "easily and safely find his way through those myriad mandates and precepts of popes, bishops, monas teries, churches, princes, and magistrates."2 As it turned out, that way, according to both Luther and Melanchthon, was an adiaphoristic via media. But whether such a path was as "easily and safely" to be discerned as Luther thought, may be doubted; for, as a matter of fact, the adiaphoristic freedom championed by the two Wittenberg Reformers was closely circumscribed by "limits" from without and within, which, because of their subtlety and complexity, could be and not infrequently were overlooked. In what follows, it will be my intention to show exactly what those limits are. I will begin by trying to establish the outer boundaries, or, in other words, the precise locus of the adiaphorism proffered by Luther and Melanchthon. At its sixth session the Council of Trent declared: "Si quis dixerit, nihil praeceptum esse in Evangelio praeter fidem, cetera esse indifferentia, ñeque praecepta, -
Bibliotheca Sacra
Tlte American Republic. 135 ART I C LEV Ill. THE AMERICAN REPUBLIC AND THE DEBS INSURRECTION. BY MR. Z. SWIFT HOLBROOK. THE American Republic is the fruitage of a religious inspiration. Our democratic institutions, ollr notions of lib erty and equality, had their origin with men who practised every form of self-denial, that they might be free from hie rarchical authority and worship God according to the dic tates of conscience. They were not men, like the colony that landed at Jamestown in 1607, moved by the spirit of adventure or by the desire to acquire,-both worthy and useful passions when subordinated to higher ends,-but they came to an unknown land, braving the perils of the sea and enduring the privations incident to such a perilous journey, that they might have freedom to worship God. To what extent these men had caught the inspiration of Luther and had given it a new interpretation, need not here be traced; but the age was one of discovery, of hero ism, of adventure, of awakened intellect,-giving the world the revival of faith, hope, and learning. It was the Eliza bethan Age in literature. It was the period of the centuries when, freed from the bonds of ecclesiastical authority, indi vidualism burst the barriers which had restrained it, and men took on new conceptions of liberty and of individual worth. Man as an individual, a unit, free and independent in his re lations to the unseen, and bound by social compacts only because thus his individualism found higher freedom and fuller .development,-this was the conception that inspired [Jan. -
By Alan D. Strange
MJT 14 (2003) 57-97 JONATHAN EDWARDS AND THE COMMUNION CONTROVERSY IN NORTHAMPTON by Alan D. Strange JONATHAN EDWARDS CAME to Northampton, Massachusetts in 1727 to serve as assistant pastor to his renowned maternal grandfather, Solomon Stoddard. He and his grandfather agreed on most things, including what it meant to be a true Christian. Stoddard taught that a saving work of the Holy Spirit was necessary for one to be a true Christian and to be admitted to heaven.1 Edwards agreed with this and taught the same throughout his life.2 Stoddard also taught that whether or not someone had experienced such a saving work of the Holy Spirit was not necessarily discernable by others. Because the saving work of the Holy Spirit remained ultimately undetectable, Stoddard taught that anyone who agreed with the doctrines of Christianity and was moral in life could partake of Holy Communion, whether they professed such a saving work or not.3 Edwards came to disagree with this and argued that 1Many examples of this from Stoddard’s preaching and writing might be adduced. See his Safety of Appearing in the Righteousness of Christ (Northampton: S. & E. Butler, 1804; rpt., Morgan, PA: Soli Deo Gloria, 1995), 161-261, and The Tryal of Assurance (a lecture-day sermon preached by Stoddard in Boston on July 7, 1698, published there by B. Green and J. Allen), 6-7. 2Edwards’s emphasis on the necessity of a saving work of the Holy Spirit is such a pervasive theme that the entirety of his corpus demonstrates his unshakeable conviction of the necessity of “A Divine and Supernatural Light Immediately Imparted to the Soul by the Spirit of God …” as seen in Wilson M. -
Sederi VIII (1997) NEW ENGLAND PURITANS: ‘THE LORD’S Free PEOPLE’ 77 the Puritan Need of Liberty
New England Puritans: “the Lord’s FREE People” Susana M. Jiménez Placer UNIVERSIDAD DE SANTIAGO DE COMPOSTELA The relationship between Puritanism and the concept of liberty has been controversial since the very origin of this religious sect in the XVIth. century. The Puritan defence of the dignity of the individual contributed to the dissolution of the feudal system in Great Britain and constituted one of the basic pillars in the development of capitalistic and parliamentary systems: during the 17th. century the growing middle-class saw the basis for a new social and political order in this doctrine that proposed the “integral sanctification of ordinary life” (Taylor 221) and labour as the only means to serve God and obey his calling. But the Puritan sect was not homogeneous: the main branch within this religious group was constituted by Presbyterian Puritans, who defended the model of a “comprehensive, national but Calvinistic church tightly disciplined from the centre” (Brogan 44), with membership enforced by the state and ruled by “a hierarchy of governing bodies, from the national assembly down through the regional classis to the presbytery of the parish church, consisting of the minister and elders” (Miller 2). The existence of clear disagreements concerning church organization among Puritans became evident in the 17th. century: some followers of the Puritan ideal proposed a congregational1 model based on a free covenant with God. According to their model each church was particular and each congregation had the power to choose -more or less democratically- their ministers and elders. Membership was voluntary: only those willing to enter into the covenant with God could become members of the congregation. -
Four English Histories of the Pequod War
University of Nebraska - Lincoln DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln Zea E-Books in American Studies Zea E-Books 2020 Four English Histories of the Pequod War P. Vincentius John Underhill Lion Gardener John Mason Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/zeaamericanstudies Part of the American Studies Commons, Holocaust and Genocide Studies Commons, Indigenous Studies Commons, Military History Commons, and the United States History Commons This Book is brought to you for free and open access by the Zea E-Books at DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln. It has been accepted for inclusion in Zea E-Books in American Studies by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln. Four English Histories of the Pequod War P. Vincentius (1637) John Underhill (1638) Lion Gardener (1660) John Mason (1736) Four English Histories of the Pequod War P. Vincentius A True Relation of the Late Battell fought in New England, between the English, and the Salvages : With the present state of things there (1637) John Underhill Newes From America; or, A New and Experimentall Discoverie of New England; Containing, a Trve Relation of Their War-like proceedings these two yeares last past, with a Figure of the Indian Fort, or Palizado (1638) Lion Gardener Relation of the Pequot Warres [1660] John Mason A Brief History of the Pequot War: Especially of the memorable Taking of their Fort at Mistick in Connecticut in 1637 (1736) Zea Books Lincoln, Nebraska 2020 The historical works in this compilation are all in the public domain. Notes and commentary are available for reuse under a CC-BY license. -
MEMOIR of SAMUEL ENDICOTT with a Genealogy of His Descendants
- Boston ruoirc Liurwy Boston. MA 02116 — ^1 cA"? CS7I.E56 9£vV : Given By t William fiTroWn) n^n,ipUF- ndi tc£jt MEMOIR OF SAMUEL ENDICOTT WITH A Genealogy of His Descendants fcyA^TvCy L?/?z ^k^^?^ Samuel Kndicott, F.sc^ (176 3- 1828) From a silhouette noiu in possession of William Croivninshicld Endicott MEMOIR OF SAMUEL ENDICOTT WITH A GENEALOGY OF HIS DESCENDANTS By His Great-Grandson William Crowninshield Endicott The Younger BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS 1924 PRIVATELY PRINTED IN AN EDITION OF ONE HUNDRED AND TWENTY-FIVE COPIES $ XJ., I To the Memory of CLARISSA (CLARA) ENDICOTT Widow of GEORGE PEABODY Youngest Daughter of SAMUEL ENDICOTT AND Elizabeth Putnam, his Wife "Her children arise up and call her blessed." INTRODUCTION order to preserve a record of Samuel Endicott, Inof Elizabeth Putnam, his wife, and of their jive children , i" have written this Memoir in the hope that it may be ofinterest andan inspiration to their descend- ants. To me, and I doubt not to many of my generation, it was a great privilege to have known, for so long a period, my grandfather, William Putnam Endicott; my grandmother, Mrs. George Peabody; and my great-aunts, Mrs. Augustus Perry and Mrs. Francis Peabody. As I think of them I seem to see in my mind's eye people of dignity of character; of general cultivation; of extreme reticence; and ofgreat personal charm and beauty. They lived in a small community and all their interests were of necessity more or less centered around their homes. I am sure they represented what was best in the life of New England and set high ideals for those among whom they lived. -
Covenant Theology in Reformed Perspective
COVENANT THEOLOGY IN REFORMED PERSPECTIVE Collected essays and book reviews in historical, biblical, and systematic theology Mark W. Karlberg Wipf and Stock Publihsers 150 West Broadway, Eugene OR 97401 Made available electronically through Two Age Press Covenant Theology in Reformed Perspective By Karlberg, Mark W. Copyright©2000 by Karlberg, Mark W. ISBN: 1-57910-315-4 (For the bound printed version) Printed by Wipf & Stock Publishers, 2000. This book is reprinted electronially by Two Age Press on behalf of Wipf & Stock Publishers. The original bound copy by Wipf and Stock differs slightly in pagi- nation. Dedicated to my parents and aunt, Dorothy Bloser, For their spiritual discernment in the things of the Lord And their sacrifice in the struggle for the faith in our generation. Soli Deo gloria Permission to republish material was granted by: Calvin Theilogical Journal The Evangelical Quarterly Foundations Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society Trinity Journal The Westminster Theological Journal and by John Muether and Howard Griffith, editors, Creator, Redeemer, and Consummator: Essays in Biblical Theology Presented to Meredith G. Kline Collection of Articles CHAPTER ONE: “Reformed Interpretation of the Mosaic Covenant,” The Westminster Theological Journal 43 (1980) 1-57. CHAPTER TWO: “Reformation Politics: The Relevance of OT Ethics in Calvinist Political Theory,” Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 29 (1986) 179-91. CHAPTER THREE: “Moses and Christ: The Place of Law in Seventeenth-Centu- ry Puritanism,” Trinity Journal 10 NS (1989) 11-32. CHAPTER FOUR: “The Original State of Adam: Tensions in Reformed Theolo- gy,”The Evangelical Quarterly 59 (1987) 291-309. CHAPTER FIVE: “Covenant Theology and the Westminster Tradition,” WTJ 54 (1992) 135-52.