The Determination of Man

Johann Joachim Spalding and the Protestant Enlightenment

Bibliographic Data

ID5306283
AuthorsMichael Printy (0009-0007-9156-6139, corresponding author)
Year2013
Volume74
Issue2
Pages189-212
Publication date2013-04-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of the History of Ideas (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0022-5037 • E-ISSN: 1086-3222
PublisherProject MUSE (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1353/jhi.2013.0010
OpenAlexW2003123335
LanguageEN
Citations received2
References cited8

This article uses Johan Joachim Spalding's Bestimmung des Menschen (1748) to explore the transformation of German Protestantism in the second half of the eighteenth century. The text was at once a philosophical and religious meditation about the senses, the spirit, the nature of creation, and the immortality of the soul. The essay demonstrates how Spalding's text points to three central features of the Protestant Enlightenment: an apologetical effort attempting to show how Christianity is compatible with polite society, a vernacular idiom that appealed simultaneously to heart and mind, and an engagement with philosophical arguments about man's place in the world

Art · Christianity · Enlightenment · German · Immortality · Linguistics · Literature · Meditation · Politeness · Protestantism · Soul · Theology · Vernacular · American Constitutional Law and Politics · Philosophy · Reformation and Early Modern Christianity · Religion, Gender, and Enlightenment · Religious studies

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