Defining Man as Animal Religiosum in English Religious Writing c. 1650–c. 1700
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Church History
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This article surveys the emergence and usage of the redefinition of man not as animal rationale (a rational animal) but as animal religiosum (a religious animal) by numerous English theologians between 1650 and 1700. Across the continuum of English protestant thought human nature was being re-described as unique due to its religious, not primarily its rational, capabilities. The article charts this appearance as a contribution to debates over man’s relationship with God; then its subsequent incorporation into the subsequent debate over the theological consequences of arguments in favor of animal rationality, as well as its uses in anti-atheist apologetics; and then the sudden disappearance of the definition of man as animal religiosum at the beginning of the eighteenth century. In doing so, the article hopes to make a useful contribution to our understanding of changing early modern understandings of human nature by reasserting the significance of theological debates within the context of seventeenth-century debate about the relationship between humans and beasts and by offering a more wide-ranging account of man as animal religiosum than the current focus on ‘Cambridge Platonism’ and ‘Latitudinarianism’ allows.
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MILLS, RJWCollections
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