Lectures on CalvinismThis series of lectures was delivered by Abraham Kuyper at the Princeton Theological Seminary in 1898. Over the course of the lectures, he discusses Calvinism and the way it pertains to many aspects of life including politics, science, and art. According to Kuyper, Calvinism has a natural affinity for scientific investigation, because like scientific inquiry, Calvinism seeks to unify the cosmos under universal laws. Predestination, he says, proves that a set of laws exist to govern the world, and science is merely trying to figure them out. When it comes to art, Kuyper launches into a defense of Calvinism, which is often maligned as a religion that seeks to stamp out art and its significance. Readers will find here a thorough and elegant explanation of Calvinism and its particular outlook on life. Anyone wanting to know how the religion is unique among the many Christian sects will find it an enjoyable and informative read. Dutch theologian ABRAHAM KUYPER (1837-1920) was prime minister of the Netherlands from 1901 to 1905. He developed Neo-Calvinism, which emphasizes the sovereignty of Jesus over all mental pursuits and supports the idea that there exists a grace given by God to all things in order to sustain the continued unfolding of creation. Kuyper wrote a number of books including Conservatism and Orthodoxy (1870), The Social Question and the Christian Religion (1891), and Common Grace (1902). |
From inside the book
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Page 15
... question , in fact , that Calvinism , or some modification of its essential principles , is the form of religious faith that has been professed in the modern world by the most intelligent , moral , industrious , and freest of mankind ...
... question , in fact , that Calvinism , or some modification of its essential principles , is the form of religious faith that has been professed in the modern world by the most intelligent , moral , industrious , and freest of mankind ...
Page 23
... question answers itself . If you exclude from your concep- tions all reckoning with the Living God just as is implied in the cry , " no God no master , " you certainly bring to the front a sharply defined interpretation of your own for ...
... question answers itself . If you exclude from your concep- tions all reckoning with the Living God just as is implied in the cry , " no God no master , " you certainly bring to the front a sharply defined interpretation of your own for ...
Page 25
... question of faith at that time dominated every activity in public life . New history starts out from this faith , even as the history of our times starts from the unbelief of the French Revolution . What law this pulse - like movement ...
... question of faith at that time dominated every activity in public life . New history starts out from this faith , even as the history of our times starts from the unbelief of the French Revolution . What law this pulse - like movement ...
Page 26
... question which decides the tendency and the construction of our life . There is no uniformity among men , but endless mul- tiformity . In creation itself the difference has been established between woman and man . Physical and spiritual ...
... question which decides the tendency and the construction of our life . There is no uniformity among men , but endless mul- tiformity . In creation itself the difference has been established between woman and man . Physical and spiritual ...
Page 34
... questions the fact that the higher de- velopment , which we are now enjoying , we owe neither to Spain nor to Austria , nor even to the Germany of that time , but to the Calvinistic countries of the Netherlands and to England of the ...
... questions the fact that the higher de- velopment , which we are now enjoying , we owe neither to Spain nor to Austria , nor even to the Germany of that time , but to the Calvinistic countries of the Netherlands and to England of the ...
Contents
| 9 | |
| 41 | |
Calvinism and Politics | 78 |
Calvinism and Science | 110 |
Calvinism and Art | 142 |
Calvinism and the Future | 171 |
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Common terms and phrases
16th century absolute Anabaptism Anabaptist Arminians art-style artistic assert authority beautiful Calvinism Calvinistic Calvinistic confession Celts century character Christian circles common grace conception conscience consciousness contrary cosmos countries course created creation divine dogma domain dualism earth ecclesiastical eius religio energy entire eternal Europe existence fact faith France French Revolution fundamental glory God's hand heart heaven hierarchy higher Holy honor human idea ideal impulse influence Islamism lecture liberty life-system ligion Lutheran magistrate maintain majesty modern moral mystical nations nature Netherlands Normalists opposed ordinances organic origin Paganism Pantheism political present principle Protestantism question race realized Reformation regeneration religion religious remains result Roman Catholic Rome Romish sake scientific Scriptures sense social soteriological soul sovereign sovereignty sphere spiritual stand struggle theology things thought tion ture unity vinism whole William the Silent world-view worship
Popular passages
Page 87 - We, the people of the State of Illinois, grateful to Almighty God for the civil, political and religious liberty which He hath so long permitted us to enjoy, and looking to Him for a blessing upon our endeavors to secure and transmit the same unimpaired to succeeding generations...
Page 137 - ... cannot reach a different result, and would be insincere in his position as a scientific man, if he were to represent things in a different light. And therefore from a moral point of view, not thinking for a moment of such a man's responsibility in the judgment of God, nothing can be said against his personal stand-point, provided that, thinking as he does, he shows the courage to voluntarily leave the Christian church in all its denominations. If the character of the keen and unavoidable conflict...
Page 91 - Cahrinistic sense we understand hereby, that the family, the business, science, art and so forth are all social spheres, which do not owe their existence to the state, and which do not derive the law of their life from the superiority of the state, but obey a high authority within their own bosom ; an authority which rules, by the grace of God, just as the sovereignty of the State does.
Page 87 - AND WHEREAS it hath pleased the Great Governor of the World to incline the hearts of the legislatures we respectively represent in congress, to approve of, and to authorize us to ratify the said articles of confederation and perpetual union.
Page 99 - These three representations, which find so dangerous a nourishment in the ascendency of Pantheism, are death to our civil liberties. And Calvinism is to be praised for having built a dam across this absolutistic stream, not by appealing to popular force, nor to the hallucination of human greatness, but by deducing those rights and liberties of social life from the same source, from which the high authority of the government flows — even the absolute sovereignty of God. From this one \ source, in...
Page 83 - Let every soul be in subjection to the higher powers: for there is no power but of God; and the powers that be are ordained of God. Therefore he that resisteth the power, withstandeth the ordinance of God: and they that withstand shall receive to themselves judgement.
Page 86 - In truth, the circumstances of our revolution (as it is called) and that of France are just the reverse of each other in almost every particular, and in the whole spirit of the transaction.
Page 32 - Eternal, independently of priest or church. For the relation of man to man: the recognition in each person of human worth, which is his by virtue of his creation after the Divine likeness, and therefore of the equality of all men before God and his magistrate. And for our relation to the world: the recognition that in the whole world the curse is restrained by grace, that the life of the world is to be honored in its independence, and that we must, in every domain, discover the treasures and develop...
Page 87 - Our revolution and that of France are just the reverse of each other, in almost every particular, and in the whole spirit of the transaction." * This same Edmund Burke, so bitter an antagonist of the French revolution, has manfully defended your own rebellion against England, as "arising from a principle of energy, showing itself in this good people the main cause of a free spirit, the most adverse to all implicit submission of mind and opinion.
Page 101 - I not only deplore that one stake, but I unconditionally disapprove of it; yet not as if it were the expression of a special characteristic of Calvinism, but on the contrary as the fatal after-effect of a system...