Moses and the Magistrate: a Study in the rise of Protestant Legalism

P. D. L. Avis

doi:10.1017/S0022046900045978

Moses and the Magistrate: a Study in the rise of Protestant Legalism

Published online by Cambridge University Press: 25 March 2011

P. D. L. Avis

Show author details

P. D. L. Avis: Affiliation:
Westcott House, Cambridge

Article contents

Extract
References

Get access

Rights & Permissions

Extract

‘It is now disputed at every table’, declared Whitgift in 1574, ‘whether the magistrate be of necessity bound to the judicials of Moses’. Edwin Sandys told Bullinger of Zürich in the previous year that it was being maintained, to the great trouble of the Church, that ‘The judicial laws of Moses are binding upon Christian princes, and they ought not in the slightest degree to depart from them’. Though often neglected by historians as an important factor in the Reformation, the question of the validity of the Old Testament judicial (as opposed to moral or ceremonial) law frequently arises in the writings of the Reformers, and their various answers made no slight impact on the course of events. It bears directly on Henry VIII's divorce and the bigamy of Philip of Hesse; the treatment of heresy and the possibility of toleration; the persecution of witches; usury and iconoclasm; Sabbatarianism and the rise of the ‘puritan’ view of the Bible as a book of precedents, and the corresponding shift to legalism in Protestant theology. The question is also of fundamental relevance to the thought of the Reformers on natural law, the godly prince and magistrate, and the so-called ‘third use of the law’. This article is an attempt to survey, up to the end of the sixteenth century, the various interpretations of the Mosaic penal and civil laws, with particular reference to the development of legalistic tendencies after Luther.

Type: Articles
Information: The Journal of Ecclesiastical History , Volume 26 , Issue 2 , April 1975 , pp. 149 - 172

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022046900045978 [Opens in a new window]
Copyright: Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1975

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

^{page 149 note 1} Works, ed. Parker Society, Cambridge 1851–3 (hereafter cited as PS.), iii. 576.

^{page 149 note 2} Zurich Letters, PS., i. 294f.

^{page 149 note 3} See Lecler, J., Toleration and the Reformation, 2 vols, Eng. Trans., London 1960Google Scholar; Bainton, R. H., Sebastian Castellio, Concerning Heretics (1554), New York 1935Google Scholar; Studies on the Reformation, London 1963.Google Scholar

^{page 149 note 4} See Paulus, N., Hexenwahn und Hexenprozess, Freiburg im Breisgau 1910Google Scholar; Lea, H. C., Materials Towards a History of Witchcraft, 3 vols, Philadelphia 1939Google Scholar-; Trevor-Roper, H. R.The European Witchcraze of the 16th and 17th Centuries, Penguin 1969Google Scholar; Burr, G. L., ‘New England's Place in the History of Witchcraft’, Proceedings of the American Antiquarian Society, NS., XXI (1911).Google Scholar

^{page 149 note 5} Bainton, , ‘The Bible in the Reformation’, The Cambridge History of the Bible: the West from the Reformation to the Present Day, Cambridge 1963.Google Scholar

^{page 149 note 6} See Yule, G., ‘Continental Patterns and the Reformation in England and Scotland’, Scottish Journal of Theology, XXII (1969)Google Scholar. An exception to the general neglect of the controversy over the Mosaic judicial law is , C. H. and George, K., The Protestant Mind of the English Reformation 1570–1640, Princeton 1961Google Scholar, where, however, it is described as ‘one of the most curious and distressing features of clerical legal theory’, and ascribed to ‘the clerics’ peculiarly intense Scripturalism, their bookish isolation from the real issues of social fact’ (231).

^{page 149 note 7} See Lang, A., ‘The Reformation and Natural Law’, Eng. Trans., Princeton Theological Review, VII (1909), and bibliographies for individual Reformers, below.Google Scholar

^{page 150 note 1} Among the voluminous literature, see Ebeling, G., ‘On the doctrine of the Triplex Usus Legis in the theology of the Reformation’, Eng. Trans., Word and Faith, London 1963Google Scholar; Elert, W., The Christian Ethos, Eng. Trans., Philadelphia 1957, 294–303Google Scholar; Law and Gospel, Philadelphia 1967Google Scholar; Sick, H., Melanchthon als Ausleger des alten Testaments, Tübingen 1959, 38ffGoogle Scholar; Heintze, Gerhard, Lathers Predigt von Gesetz und Evangelium, Munich 1958.Google Scholar

^{page 150 note 2} Bainton, Castellio, 15; Lecler, i. 37f.

^{page 150 note 3} Ibid., i. 60.

^{page 150 note 4} De Civ. Dei, XIX, xvii, Eng. Trans., Edinburgh 1872; cf. Calvin, Institutes, IV. XX. 16. For Augustine and coercion see Ep. xciii; Lecler, i. 53ff; Brown, P., Augustine of Hippo, London 1967, 236ff.Google Scholar; Religion and Society in the Age of St. Augustine, London 1972, 260ff., 301ff.Google Scholar; Markus, R. A., Saeculum: History and Society in the Theology of St. Augustine, Cambridge 1970, 35f.Google Scholar, 134ff.; Bainton, Castellio, 21ff.

^{page 150 note 5} Lecler, i. 42.

^{page 150 note 6} Ibid., 61f.

^{page 150 note 7} Summa Theologica, II, ii, Q. 11, Art. 4; Lecler, i. 84ff.

^{page 151 note 1} Op. cit., II, i. Q,. 99, Art. 2, Resp.

^{page 151 note 2} Ibid., Art. 4, Resp.

^{page 151 note 3} Ibid., Q. 100, Art. 11, Resp.

^{page 151 note 4} Ibid., Q.. 103, Art. 3f.

^{page 151 note 5} Ibid., Q.. 104, Art. 3, Resp.

^{page 151 note 6} Carlovingian legislation invoked Mosaic authority for the execution of magicians, ‘quos divina lex irretractabiliter punire jubet’: Lea, op. cit., 138.

^{page 151 note 7} Eells, H., The Attitude of Martin Bucer toward the Bigamy of Philip of Hesse, Yale, 1924, 184f.Google Scholar

^{page 152 note 1} Lea, op. cit., 138, 1078ff.; Bainton, Studies, 141, 216. For the imperial laws concerning Jews see Nijenhuis, W., Ecclesia Reformata, Leiden 1972, 26ff.Google Scholar

^{page 152 note 2} The main texts are: The Estate of Marriage (1522); Temporal Authority: to what extent it should be obeyed (1523); Lectures on Deuteronomy (1524-); Against the Heavenly Prophets (1525); How Christians Should Regard Moses (1525); On Marriage Matters (1530); Galatians (1535) Against the Sabbatarians (1538); On the Jews and their Lies (1543); together with the Prefaces to the Old Testament and the exposition of Psalm 82 (1530). See also Schlink, E., The Theology of the Lutheran Confessions, Eng. Trans., Philadelphia 1961, 67ff.Google Scholar; Cranz, F. E., An Essay on the Development of Luther's Thought on Justice, Law, and Society, Harvard 1959, 105ff.Google Scholar; Bornkamm, H., Luther and the Old Testament, Eng. Trans., Philadelphia 1969Google Scholar; Bainton, Studies, 20ff. See also, 154 n. 6. I have not been able to consult Gerdes, Hayo, Luthers Streit mit den Schwärmern um das rechte Verstandnis des Gesetze Mose, Göttingen 1955.Google Scholar

^{page 152 note 3} Ebeling, art. cit., 75; Luther's Works, St. Louis and Philadelphia 1955- (cited as LW), xxxiv. 114ff.; xlvii. 84.

^{page 152 note 4} Bornkamm, op. cit., 135; LW., xxix. 193f.

^{page 152 note 5} LW, xl. 92.

^{page 152 note 6} Cited Bornkamm, op. cit., 146, from the Table Talk.

^{page 153 note 1} LW., xlvii. 79ff.; Schlink, op. cit., 71f.

^{page 153 note 2} LW., xxvi. 363f.

^{page 153 note 3} Ibid., xlvii. 78, 66.

^{page 153 note 4} Ibid., xxxv. 167; xl. 98.

^{page 153 note 5} Ibid., xl. 90; xlvii. 272.

^{page 153 note 6} Ibid., xxxv. 170f., cf. 164ff.

^{page 153 note 7} Cited Bainton, ‘The Bible in the Reformation’, 15.

^{page 153 note 8} Luther to Spalatin, 1524, Werke, Weimarer Ausgabe 1883- (cited as WA), Br., iii. 254.

^{page 154 note 1} Bainton, op. cit., 18f., 29f.; cf. LW., xl. 85ff., 93, 97; Schlink, op. cit., 72.

^{page 154 note 2} LW., xxxiv. 112f.; Watson, P. S., Let God Be God, London 1947, 111. Troeltsch's misconception of Luther's view of the Decalogue, and its relation to ‘the Protestant ethic’ is still influential: The Social Teaching of the Christian Churches, Eng. Trans., London 1931, ii. 503ff.Google Scholar

^{page 154 note 3} LW., xii. 44; cf. xl. 98; Cranz, op. cit., 108.

^{page 154 note 4} Bornkamm, op. cit., 125.

^{page 154 note 5} LW., xlvii. 89f.; cf. xxvii. 355: ‘Natural law, the written law, and the law of the Gospel … differ not so much in their function as in the interpretation of those who falsely understand them … Therefore there in one law which runs through all ages, is known to all men, is written in the hearts of all people, and leaves no one from beginning to end with an excuse, although for the Jews ceremonies were added and the other nations had their own laws, which were not binding upon the whole world, but only this one, which the Holy Spirit dictates unceasingly in the hearts of all’ (1519).

^{page 154 note 6} See McNeill, J. T., ‘Natural Law in the Thought of Luther’, Church History, X (1941)Google Scholar; Arnold, F. X., Zur Frāge des Naturrechts bei Martin Luther, Munich 1937, 47–56Google Scholar; Cranz, 105ff.; Schloemann, M., Natürliches und Gepredigtes Gesetz bei Luther, Berlin 1961.CrossRef Google Scholar

^{page 155 note 1} McNeill, art, cit., 227.

^{page 155 note 2} Cf. LW., xlv. 128: ‘love and natural law with which all reason is filled’. Cf. xxvii. 348. This applies only to the Earthly Kingdom, which is reason's proper sphere. For Luther on reason, love and the Two Kingdoms, see Wingren, G., Luther on Vocation, Eng. Trans., Philadelphia 1957Google Scholar (= The Christian's Calling, Edinburgh 1958)Google Scholar. Gerrish, B. A., Grace and Reason, London 1962Google Scholar, cites: reason is ‘the soul of law and mistress of all laws’ (12f.).

^{page 155 note 3} Bornkamm, op. cit., 124f.; Cranz, op. cit., 108.

^{page 155 note 4} Cf. d'Entrèves, A. P., Natural Law, London 1951, 69f.Google Scholar

^{page 155 note 5} Bainton, Studies, 20ff.

^{page 155 note 6} LW., xiii. 61f.

^{page 155 note 7} Lecler, op. cit., i. 162.

^{page 155 note 8} Ibid.; cf. WA, l. 12.

^{page 156 note 1} LW., xlv. 273ff.

^{page 156 note 2} Cited Lea, op. cit., 422.

^{page 156 note 3} Eells, Attitude, 35f., 211f. See also Faulkner, , ‘Luther and the Bigamous Marriage of Philip of Hesse’, American Journal of Theology, XVII (1913), 213ff.Google Scholar

^{page 156 note 4} LW., xlv. 23f.

^{page 156 note 5} Ibid., xlvii. 269ff.

^{page 156 note 6} Ibid., xxvi. 448; XXXV. 166f.; xl. 98; Bornkamm, op. cit., 123.

^{page 156 note 7} LW., xlv. 96ff.

^{page 157 note 1} Corpus Reformatorum (cited as CR), xxi. 687; Hildebrant, F., Melanchthon: Alien or Ally?, Cambridge 1946Google Scholar; Kisch, Guido, Melanchthons Rechts-und-Soziallehre, Berlin 1967, 102ff.Google Scholar

^{page 157 note 2} Lecler, op. cit., i. 252; Bainton, Castellio, 58.

^{page 157 note 3} CR. ii. 526; Eells, Attitude, 36. For the Reformers' attitudes to Henry VIII's divorce, see also the material collected by Burnet, The History of the Reformation of the Church of England, ed. Pocock, , Oxford 1865, i. 148ffGoogle Scholar. Scarisbrick, J. J., Henry VIII, London 1968Google Scholar, in his treatment of the canon law of the divorce, dismisses the question of the judicial laws with some impatience: ‘Henry's proponents … talked at length of the differences between natural and positive, moral and judicial laws—which proved little’ (231).

^{page 157 note 4} CR., xxi. 201.

^{page 157 note 5} Ibid., 198f.

^{page 157 note 6} Hildebrant, op. cit., 39; Ebeling, op. cit., 62f., 74.

^{page 158 note 1} CR., ii. 31.

^{page 158 note 2} CR., xxi. 1007.

^{page 158 note 3} Lang, art. cit., 182; Hildebrant, op. cit., 59.

^{page 158 note 4} CR., xiv. 829. Cf. the similar statement in the Apology of the Augsburg Confession: ‘Christ's kingdom is spiritual; it is the knowledge of God in the heart, the fear of God and faith, the beginning of eternal righteousness and eternal life. At the same time it lets us make use of the legitimate political ordinances of the nation in which we live, just as it lets us make use of medicine or architecture, food or drink or air. The Gospel does not introduce any new laws about the civil estate, but commands us to obey the existing laws, whether they were formulated by heathen or by others, and in this obedience to practice love. It was mad of Carlstadt to try to impose on us the judicial laws of Moses': The Book of Concord, ed. and trans. Tappert, , Philadelphia 1959, 222f.Google Scholar

^{page 158 note 5} CR., xii. 473f.; Lang, art. cit., 180ff.

^{page 158 note 6} CR., i. 733f. (1525), cf. 731.

^{page 158 note 7} Bromiley, G. W., Zwingli and Bullinger (Library of Christian Classics, cited as LCC, xxiv), London 1953, 29Google Scholar. The basic texts are: Of Divine and Human Righteousness, (CR, lxxxix.) and Of True and False Religion, (CR., xc. 706ff.). See also Schmid, H., Zwinglis Lehre von der gottlichen and menschlichen Gerechtigheit, Zurich 1959Google Scholar; Kreutzer, J., Zwinglis Lehre von der Obrigkeit, Stuttgart 1909Google Scholar; Walton, R., Zwingli's Theocracy, Toronto 1967.Google Scholar

^{page 159 note 1} Walton, op. cit., 158ff.

^{page 159 note 2} CR., c. 401f.

^{page 159 note 3} Ibid., xc. 707.

^{page 159 note 4} Ibid.

^{page 159 note 5} Doumergue, E., Jean Calvin: Les hommes et les choses de son temps, Lausanne 1917, v. 462f.; Schmid, 93ff.Google Scholar

^{page 160 note 1} Paulus, 150; Kreutzer, 13ff.

^{page 160 note 2} CR., c. 391, 404.

^{page 160 note 3} See Eells, Attitude; Nijenhuis; Koch, K., Stadium Pietatis: Martin Bucer als Ethiker, Neukirchen 1962Google Scholar; Müller, J., Martin Bucers Hermeneutic, Gutersloh 1965, 150ff.Google Scholar; Lang, A., Puritanismus und Pietismus, Darmstadt 1941, 25ff.Google Scholar; Pauck, W., Das Reich Gottes auf Erden: Utopie und Wirklichkeit, Berlin and Leipzig 1928, 21ff., 33f.Google Scholar; Hopf, C., Martin Bucer and the English Reformation, London 1946, 107f.; 122f.Google Scholar; Common Places of Martin Bucer, ed. Wright, D. F., Appleford 1972Google Scholar. T. F. Torrance has drawn attention to the love motif in Bucer, Kingdom and Church, Edinburgh 1956, 82ff., 87f.

^{page 160 note 4} Wright, 303.; cf. Koch, 65ff.; Lang, Puritanismus, 25ff.

^{page 160 note 5} Koch, 66, cf. ‘Verbum Dei, Euangelium Domini nostri Jesus Christi hoc est, lex Dei explicatior et dilucidior’ (67). See also Stephens, W. P., The Holy Spirit in the Theology of Martin Bucer, Cambridge 1970, 93ff.Google Scholar

^{page 160 note 6} Eells, Attitude, 23.

^{page 160 note 7} Pauck, 23.

^{page 160 note 8} In relation to Henry VIII's divorce see Eells, Martin Bucer, Yale 1931, 125. For Bucer's radical teaching on marriage and divorce, see also Koch, 140ff.; Hopf, 107ff.; Wright.

^{page 161 note 1} Stephens, 96; Lang, Puritanismus, 25f.

^{page 161 note 2} LCC, xix. London 1969, 378.

^{page 161 note 3} Müller, 151 (not included in LCC edition of De Regno Christi).

^{page 161 note 4} Wright, 412. Cf. ‘Cumque melior institutio Reipublicae ea quam Dominus dedit per Moschen a nemine inveniri possit, et illa puniri et tolli sontes praecipiat: verae ac germanae charitatis opus erit, secundum illas Dei leges in sceleratos animadvertere’: cited Wendel, Calvin, the Origins and Development of his Religious Thought, Eng. Trans., Fontana 1965, 202.

^{page 161 note 5} Eells, Attitude, 26ff., 78ff.

^{page 161 note 6} Nijenhuis, 24, 44f.

^{page 162 note 1} Koch, 74f., cf. 69, 219. For the application to usury, see Hopf, 122ff.

^{page 162 note 2} Koch, 218f. (n. 59f.).

^{page 162 note 3} Ibid., 69.

^{page 162 note 4} Torrance, 87f.

^{page 162 note 5} LCC, xix. 377, cf. 320ff. Cf. ‘the imperial law which at no point diverges from God's law’: Wright, 410.

^{page 162 note 6} Eells, Attitude, 40.

^{page 162 note 7} Koch, 185.

^{page 162 note 8} Eells, Martin Bucer, 16, 26f.

^{page 163 note 1} Troeltsch, i. 347, cf. 257ff.

^{page 163 note 2} Ibid, 347f.

^{page 163 note 3} See Little, D., ‘Calvin and the Prospects for a Christian Theory of Natural Law’, Norm and Context in Christian Ethics, eds. Outka, and Ramsey, , London 1969.Google Scholar

^{page 163 note 4} Psalms, ed. Calvin Translation Society (cited as CTS), Edinburgh 1843-, i. 318ff. See also Doumergue, iv. v; Wendel; Monter, E. W., Calvin's Geneva, New York 1967Google Scholar, 150ff.; Bohatec, J., Calvins Lehre von Staat und Kirche, Breslau 1937Google Scholar; Baur, J., Gott, Recht und Weltliche Regiment im Werke Calvins, Bonn 1965Google Scholar. For an attempt to clear Calvin of later Reformed and Puritan legalism, see Rolston, H., John Calvin Versus the Westminster Confession, Richmond Virginia 1972.Google Scholar

^{page 163 note 5} Cf. Institutes, II, ii.; IV, xx, 14; Bohatec, 15.

^{page 163 note 6} Monter, 152f. See also his Studies in Genevan Government (1536–1605), Geneva 1964, 57–83, 117ff.Google Scholar

^{page 164 note 1} Pentateuch, CTS, ii. 75.

^{page 164 note 2} Doumergue, v. 699; Baur, 82ff.

^{page 164 note 3} Calvin's Commentaries, ed. , D. W. and Torrance, T. F., Edinburgh 1959- (cited as CC), i. 209. Cf. LW., xxiii. 310ff.; Wright, 411.Google Scholar

^{page 164 note 4} Bohatec, 14ff.; Baur, 36f.; Wendel, 201f.; Doumergue, v. 667.

^{page 164 note 5} II Corinthians, CC., 45; cf. Galatians, CC., 67.

^{page 164 note 6} Doumergue, v. 681.

^{page 164 note 7} Institutes, IV, xx, 14, 16 (trans. Beveridge).

^{page 164 note 8} Ibid., 15.

^{page 164 note 9} Ibid., 16. Cf. Bohatec 27ff.; Baur, 59ff., 83.

^{page 165 note 1} For Calvin and natural law, see Bohatec, 27ff.; Baur, 47ff., 71ff.; Lang, ‘The Reformation and Natural Law’, 193. Lang is criticised by Doumergue, v. 465ff.

^{page 165 note 2} Bainton, Castellio, ad. lib.; Lecler, i. 226–232, 263, 350ff.; ii. 76; and, for the Anabaptists, Ibid., i. 179, 191.

^{page 165 note 3} Hinrichs, Carl, Luther and Müntzer: ihre Auseinandersetzung über Obrigkeit und Widerslandsrecht, Berlin 1952, 31f.Google Scholar, 172ff.; and for Müntzer's use of the Old Testament, Rupp, E. G., Patterns of Reformation, London 1969, 240, 260.Google Scholar

^{page 165 note 4} Ibid., 102ff., 123–131.

^{page 165 note 5} Ibid., 133; Williams, G. H., LCC, xxv. 47f.; The Radical Reformation, London 1962, 53f.Google Scholar

^{page 165 note 6} For Münster, see e.g., Cohn, N., The Pursuit of the Millennium, London 1970, 252ff. and bibliography.Google Scholar

^{page 165 note 7} Decades, PS, i. 209ff.; ii. 255.

^{page 165 note 8} Ibid., i. 342.

^{page 165 note 9} Ibid., i. 209ff., 412f.

^{page 165 note 10} Paulus, 162ff.

^{page 165 note 11} Decades, ii. 217–236.

^{page 166 note 1} Ibid., 280ff.

^{page 166 note 2} Works, PS., ii. 323–331.

^{page 166 note 3} Ed. Cardwell, Oxford 1850, 47ff. For background see Spalding, J. C., ‘The Reformatio … and the furthering of discipline in England’, Church History, XXXIX (1970).Google Scholar

^{page 166 note 4} Works, i. 270–277.

^{page 166 note 5} Ibid., 273.

^{page 167 note 1} Strype, Life of Whitgift, Oxford 1822, i. 151.Google Scholar

^{page 167 note 2} Ibid., 152.

^{page 167 note 3} Ibid., iii. 225.

^{page 167 note 4} Ibid.

^{page 167 note 5} Rogers, The Catholic Doctrine of the Church of England: an Exposition of the XXXIX Articles, PS., 90, cf. 350.

^{page 167 note 6} Strype, ii. 13.

^{page 168 note 1} Ibid., 17.

^{page 168 note 2} Cf. Ibid., 20, 71; iii. 237.

^{page 168 note 3} See An Admonition to the Parliament, 1572, ed. Frere, and Douglas, , Puritan Manifestos, London 1954, 15, 113 and ad lib.Google Scholar

^{page 168 note 4} Cited Whitgift, i. 270. See also: Scott-Pearson, A. F., Thomas Cartwright and Elizabethan Puritanism, Cambridge 1925, 89f.Google Scholar; Lecler, ii. 390. Cartwright would not allow any priority to the New over the Old Testament in establishing Christian doctrine: ‘Now the Bible being continually to be studied, it may be doubted whether the Old or New Testament is principally to be laboured in. That for being the foundation of the other, and of greater capacity of doctrine to the deviding (mg. deciding) of all manner of controversies, This for the plainnesse or light of those points which are of greater strife in Christian Religion: For me, I think that an aequal study of them both is commended unto us … they are the two Breasts alike melch…:’ Cartwrightiana, ed. Peel, and Carlson, , London 1951, 110f.Google Scholar

^{page 168 note 5} George, 232.

^{page 168 note 6} Ibid.

^{page 169 note 1} Ibid., 233, citing Works, ii. 520.

^{page 169 note 2} Ibid., 229f., citing Works, i. 64; ii. 251f.

^{page 169 note 3} William Perkins, ed. I. Breward, Appleford 1970 599f. (= Works, iii. 639).

^{page 169 note 4} Lang, Puritanismus, 110 f.; Burr, 203ff.

^{page 169 note 5} Ibid., 206. Through puritan influence, Mosaic law was written into the constitutions of the New World, Ibid., (n. 41).

^{page 169 note 6} Works, ed. Laing, Edinburgh 1846, iii. 37f.

^{page 169 note 7} Ibid., v. 229ff., 224.

^{page 170 note 1} The Writings of Henry Barrow, 1587–1590, ed. Carlson, L. H., London 1962, 199; Lecler, ii. 392ff.Google Scholar

^{page 170 note 2} Barrow, 602.

^{page 170 note 3} Ibid., 599.

^{page 170 note 4} Ibid., 599f.

^{page 170 note 5} Ibid., 75.

^{page 171 note 1} Works, ed. Keble, Oxford 1845, iv, xi.

^{page 171 note 2} Ibid., III, x., 1–4. For a summary of Hooker's hierarchy of law, see Shirley, F. J., Richard Hooker and Contemporary Political Ideas, London 1949, 71–92Google Scholar. For Hooker and Aquinas, see Munz, P., The Place of Hooker in the History of Thought, London 1952, 49–59Google Scholar, 175–193. See also W. D. J. Cargill Thompson, ‘The Philosopher of the “Politic Society”: Richard Hooker as a Political Thinker’, in Studies in Richard Hooker, ed. Hill, W. Speed, Cleveland and London 1972Google Scholar. The present study confirms his view that ‘the sixteenth-century Reformers did not, as one school of modern historians has maintained, either reject or even substantially modify the traditional medieval concept of natural law’ (29). But it also documents why I cannot accept that Hooker's claim that the reformists would like to replace civil with Biblical law (Pref. viii., 4) was made ‘without a shred of evidence’ (15).

Article contents

Moses and the Magistrate: a Study in the rise of Protestant Legalism

Extract

Access options

References

Save article to Kindle

Save article to Dropbox

Save article to Google Drive

Reply to: Submit a response

Your details

You have entered the maximum number of contributors

Conflicting interests