Jesus Nazarenus Legislator
Adam Boreel and the Rationality of Christian Religion against the De Tribus Impostoribus
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This article examines the manuscript, entitled Jesus Nazarenus Legislator, written by Adam Boreel against the De Tribus Impostoribus. The analysis focuses on three main aspects of the manuscript. First, I give some information about De Tribus Impostoribus. Second, I trace the history of the writing of Boreel’s book. To this end, I will mainly take into consideration the correspondences of Henry Oldenburg and John Worthington. Last, I show that Boreel postulates a rational Christian religion and that he places emphasis on the practical aspects of this religion. For this reason, all humankind can accept it. In conclusion, I will sum up the results obtained from my analysis of the Jesus Nazarenus Legislator; I will also suggest that Boreel’s ideas could be read in light of the discussion on adiaphora in the Christian religion.
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3
Ibid., 116–117.
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6
Ibid., 120–147.
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7
Ibid., 148–155.
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12
Born in Bremen in 1619, Oldenburg studied theology and spent most of his life in England, where he created, with his lifelong patron Robert Boyle, an enormous network of scientific, philosophical, and theological contacts throughout Europe. He died in 1677. See: R.K. Bluhm, “Henry Oldenburg, F.R.S. (1615–1677)”, Notes and Records of the Royal Society 15(1) (1960), 126–183; Alfred Rupert Hall and Marie Boas Hall, ed., The Correspondence of Henry Oldenburg, 13 vols. (Madison, 1965–1981); Marie Boas Hall, Henry Oldenburg: Shaping the Royal Society (Oxford, 2002); Omero Proietti, Agnostos Theos: il carteggio Spinoza-Oldenburg (1675–1676) (Macerata, 2006).
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15
Ibid., 116. Hall’s English translation of the Latin letter is a little confusing. He translates, “that God appoints no one but himself to be the legislator”. However, if we look at the Latin letter it is easy to perceive that the translation is not completely correct. In Latin, Oldenburg wrote “nec ullum a Deo, nisi Sesum nostrum, constitutum esse totius humani generis legislatorem” (ibid., 115). I think that Sesum is an incorrect transcription of Jesum. Therefore, God appoints no one but Jesus to be the ruler of all humankind. Hall’s translation could be accurate only if Sesum means sese, but I do not think that this is the case.
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16
Ibid., 116.
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17
Ibid., 143.
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18
Born in Elblag, Poland, in 1600, Hartlib was a central figure in the English intellectual world of the seventeenth century. From the 1630s, he started to build an enormous network of contacts around himself, with intellectuals from all over Europe: the so-called Hartlib circle. He was a lifelong friend of John Dury, who probably introduced Boreel to him. For most of his life he lived in London, where he died in 1662. See: G.H. Turnbull, Samuel Hartlib: With Special Regard to his Relation to Jan Comenius (London, 1919); Charles Webster, ed., Samuel Hartlib and the Advancement of Learning (Cambridge, 1970); Mark Greengrass, Michael Leslie and Timothy Raylor, ed., Samuel Hartlib and Universal Reformation: Studies in Intellectual Communication (Cambridge, 2002); Mark Greengrass, “Samuel Hartlib”, in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford, 2004).
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22
Born in Edinburgh in 1596, Dury was a Calvinist minister who tried to find some means to reunify Christianity. He died in 1680. See: Joseph Minton Batten, John Dury, Advocate of Christian Reunion, (Chicago, 1944); Ernestine van der Wall, “Three Letters by Menasseh ben Israel to John Durie”, Nederlands Archief voor Kerkgeschiedenis, 65 (1985), 46–64; Ernestine van der Wall, “Without Partialitie Towards All Men: John Durie on the Dutch Hebraist Adam Boreel”, in Van den Berg, Jewish-Christian Relations (see above, n. 13), 145–151; Kenneth Gibson, “John Dury’s Apocalyptic Thought: A Reassessment”, The Journal of Ecclesiastical History, 61(2) (2010), 299–313.
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25
Ibid., 406.
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29
Ibid., 259.
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30
Ibid., 271.
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Jesus Nazarenus Legislator
Adam Boreel and the Rationality of Christian Religion against the De Tribus Impostoribus
In: Church History and Religious CultureSearch for other papers by Francesco Quatrini in
Current site
Google Scholar
PubMed
This article examines the manuscript, entitled Jesus Nazarenus Legislator, written by Adam Boreel against the De Tribus Impostoribus. The analysis focuses on three main aspects of the manuscript. First, I give some information about De Tribus Impostoribus. Second, I trace the history of the writing of Boreel’s book. To this end, I will mainly take into consideration the correspondences of Henry Oldenburg and John Worthington. Last, I show that Boreel postulates a rational Christian religion and that he places emphasis on the practical aspects of this religion. For this reason, all humankind can accept it. In conclusion, I will sum up the results obtained from my analysis of the Jesus Nazarenus Legislator; I will also suggest that Boreel’s ideas could be read in light of the discussion on adiaphora in the Christian religion.
| All Time | Past 365 days | Past 30 Days | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Abstract Views | 90 | 39 | 7 |
| Full Text Views | 9 | 0 | 0 |
| PDF Views & Downloads | 12 | 0 | 0 |
