Table Of Contentthe theological origins of modernity
Th e Th eological Origins
of Modernity
michael allen gillespie
Th e University of Chicago Press Chicago and London
Michael Allen Gillespie is professor of philosophy and
the Jerry G. and Patricia Crawford Hubbard Professor
of Political Science at Duke University and the author
of Hegel, Heidegger, and the Ground of History and
Nihilism before Nietzsche, both published by the
University of Chicago Press.
Th e University of Chicago Press, Chicago 60637
Th e University of Chicago Press, Ltd., London
© 2008 by Th e University of Chicago
All rights reserved. Published 2008
Printed in the United States of America
17 16 15 14 13 12 11 10 09 08 1 2 3 4 5
isbn-13: 978-0-226-29345-5 (cloth)
isbn-10: 0-226-29345-9 (cloth)
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Gillespie, Michael Allen.
Th e theological origins of modernity / Michael Allen
Gillespie.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
isbn-13: 978-0-226-29345-5 (cloth : alk. paper)
isbn-10: 0-226-29345-9 (cloth : alk. paper)
1. Philosophy, Modern. 2. Philosophy and religion.
I. Title.
b791.g55 2008
190—dc22
2007041303
Th e paper used in this publication meets the
minimum requirements of the American National
Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of
Paper for Printed Library Materials, ansi z39.48-1992.
Is this the Region, this the Soil, the Clime,
Said then the lost Arch-Angel, this the seat
Th at we must change for Heav’n, this mournful gloom
For that celestial light? Be it so, since he
Who now is Sovran can dispose and bid
What shall be right: fardest from him is best
Whom reason hath equall’d, force hath made supreme
Above his equals. Farewell happy Fields
Where Joy for ever dwells: Hail horrors, hail
Infernal world, and thou profoundest Hell
Receive thy new Possessor: One who brings
A mind not to be chang’d by Place or Time.
Th e mind is its own place, and in itself
Can make a Heav’n of Hell, a Hell of Heav’n.
What matter where, if I be still the same,
And what I should be, all but less than hee
Whom Th under hath made greater? Here at least
We shall be free; th’Almighty hath not built
Here for his envy, will not drive us hence:
Here we may reign secure, and in my choice
To reign is worth ambition though in Hell:
Better to reign in Hell, than serve in Heav’n.
milton, Paradise Lost, 1.242–63
contents
Preface ix
Introduction 1
1 Th e Nominalist Revolution and the Origin of Modernity 19
2 Petrarch and the Invention of Individuality 44
3 Humanism and the Apotheosis of Man 69
4 Luther and the Storm of Faith 101
5 Th e Contradictions of Premodernity 129
6 Descartes’ Path to Truth 170
7 Hobbes’ Fearful Wisdom 207
8 Th e Contradictions of Enlightenment and the Crisis
of Modernity 255
Epilogue 289
Notes 295
Index 363
preface
Ours is a visual age, and in the last twenty years two images have shaped
our understanding of the times in which we live. Th e fi rst was the fall of the
Berlin Wall and the second the collapse of the World Trade Center towers.
Th ese structures were not mere artifacts; they were also symbols deeply
embedded in the public psyche. Th e fi rst was the symbol of totalitarianism
and the Cold War confrontation between a free and an enslaved world; the
second the symbol of a liberal world unifi ed by the forces of globalization.
Th e fall of the Berlin Wall gave rise to a belief in a liberal future of peace
and prosperity that revived a faith in human progress that the catastrophic
events of the fi rst part of the twentieth century had almost extinguished.
Th e collapse of the Twin Towers, by contrast, kindled the fear of a rampant
new fanaticism that threatened our lives and civilization in an especially
insidious way. When the Wall came down, the future seemed to stretch
out before us like a broad highway leading to a modern world united by
commerce, the free exchange of ideas, and the proliferation of liberal gov-
ernment. Th is was to be the age of globalization, but a globalization that
was conceived as the spread of Western values and institutions to the rest
of the world. Science and technology would establish a realm of peace and
prosperity in which human freedom could be fi nally and fully realized.
With the destruction of the World Trade Center, globalization suddenly
appeared in a new light, not as a one-way street to modernity but as a com-
plex and confusing intersection of paved roads, dark alleys, and mountain
pathways. As a result, we ceased to look forward to a new golden age and
glanced instead over our shoulders and sideways into the out-of-the-way
places we imagined to be fi lled with dark fi gures waiting to attack us.
Th e attack on the World Trade Center thus called the modern project
into question, and it did so in a new and unsettling way. Th e perpetra-
tors seemed to be opposed to modernity not because it had failed to live
Description:I almost gave this book 4 stars not because there are flaws in the material itself, but because it was so good I was disappointed that a publisher would hold it back from the even-higher greatness it might otherwise have. What am I referring to? "Islam-and-the-West." Islam is a hot topic these days
