The genealogy is pretty clear: Pietist-leaning Collegiants, with affinities to the Anabaptists of the sixteenth century, influence the theological and political view of Spinoza, leading him to write a treatise where he defends two central Anabaptist/Pietist clams: a) he attacks the tyranny of the letter and b) he argues for a liberal political system in which everyone is free to hold whatever theological opinions he wishes.
Spinoza’s Tractatus is one of the earliest treatises on liberal polity, preceding Locke’s Letter Concerning Toleration by several decades. It is part of the invention of the liberal state, and it arises from Anabaptist/Pietist conceptions of piety and polity.
It is ironic, then, that some of the most vocal of today’s theological critics of liberalism work in an Anabaptist/Pietist framework.
YOU MIGHT ALSO LIKE
The Possibility of Possibility
"Might could” is a Southern expression meaning “maybe I could” or “I might be able to,” conveying…
The False Promise of No Contact
Around the time nineteen-year-old Alice began cutting ties with her family, she announced on social media that…
Moral Certitude and the Iran War
The current military engagement with Iran calls renewed attention to just war theory in the Catholic tradition.…
