Fill the Earth and Subdue it

Biblical Warrants for Colonization in Seventeenth Century England

Bibliographic Data

ID9315801
AuthorsPeter Harrison (0000-0002-4048-2409, Bond University, corresponding author)
Year2005
Volume29
Issue1
Pages3-24
Publication date2005-02-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of Religious History (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0022-4227 • E-ISSN: 1467-9809
PublisherWiley (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1111/j.1467-9809.2005.00258.x
OpenAlexW2072007383
LanguageEN
Citations received10

The importance of conceptions of natural law in early-modern debates about the legitimacy of colonization is well known. The role played by specific arguments drawn from Scripture is less recognized. In seventeenth century England the biblical injunction to “fill the earth and subdue it,” along with the account of the Exodus and the occupation of “the promised land,” informed debates about the origins of private property, and was directly relevant to developing conceptions of indigenous property rights and the legitimacy of dispossession. Although there were powerful economic and evangelical incentives for the establishment of foreign plantations in the early-modern period, these were strongly reinforced, in the English context at least, by particular readings of Old Testament narratives

Aesthetics · Archaeology · Art · Colonization · Context (archaeology · Epistemology · Indigenous · Legitimacy · Literature · Narrative · Period (music · Political science · Politics · Property (philosophy · Colonialism, slavery, and trade · Ecology · Historical Economic and Social Studies · History · Law · Philosophy

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