Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- Notes on contributors
- Introduction
- 1 Writing and the persecution of heretics in Henry VIII's England: The Examinations of Anne Askew
- 2 Anabaptism and anti-Anabaptism in the early English Reformation: defining Protestant heresy and orthodoxy during the reign of Edward VI
- 3 “Godlie matrons” and “loose-bodied dames”: heresy and gender in the Family of Love
- 4 Puritanism, Familism, and heresy in early Stuart England: the case of John Etherington revisited
- 5 A ticklish business: defining heresy and orthodoxy in the Puritan revolution
- 6 Thomas Edwards's Gangraena and heresiological traditions
- 7 “And if God was one of us”: Paul Best, John Biddle, and anti-Trinitarian heresy in seventeenth-century England
- 8 The road to George Hill: the heretical dynamic of Winstanley's early prose
- 9 Milton and the heretical priesthood of Christ
- 10 An Historical Narration Concerning Heresie: Thomas Hobbes, Thomas Barlow, and the Restoration debate over “heresy”
- 11 Defining and redefining heresy up to Locke's Letters Concerning Toleration
- 12 “Take heed of being too forward in imposinge on others”: orthodoxy and heresy in the Baxterian tradition
- Index
Introduction
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 20 February 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- Notes on contributors
- Introduction
- 1 Writing and the persecution of heretics in Henry VIII's England: The Examinations of Anne Askew
- 2 Anabaptism and anti-Anabaptism in the early English Reformation: defining Protestant heresy and orthodoxy during the reign of Edward VI
- 3 “Godlie matrons” and “loose-bodied dames”: heresy and gender in the Family of Love
- 4 Puritanism, Familism, and heresy in early Stuart England: the case of John Etherington revisited
- 5 A ticklish business: defining heresy and orthodoxy in the Puritan revolution
- 6 Thomas Edwards's Gangraena and heresiological traditions
- 7 “And if God was one of us”: Paul Best, John Biddle, and anti-Trinitarian heresy in seventeenth-century England
- 8 The road to George Hill: the heretical dynamic of Winstanley's early prose
- 9 Milton and the heretical priesthood of Christ
- 10 An Historical Narration Concerning Heresie: Thomas Hobbes, Thomas Barlow, and the Restoration debate over “heresy”
- 11 Defining and redefining heresy up to Locke's Letters Concerning Toleration
- 12 “Take heed of being too forward in imposinge on others”: orthodoxy and heresy in the Baxterian tradition
- Index
Summary
In 1694 the Quaker Benjamin Furly declared in a letter to John Locke that the word “heretic” was one of “the most pernicious words that have for 1000 years obtaind amongst mankind,” as it was used to “render odious … all honest … generous spirited men, that dare be so bold as to profess, and practise what they Judge to be their duty … how contrary … it be to … church slaves and all their enslaved followers, who would make free men … bow their necks to their doctrines, decrees, orders, injunctions, and constitutions.” For Furly, “The Bugbear of authority, Tradition, and the name of the Church is so sacred … That few people dare call in question the Doctrines which the holy church has taught for so many hundred years, or which their Learned and godly ministers have all along taught since the Reformation.” Furly called for people instead to examine theological doctrines for themselves with eyes which “should be opened to see,” declaring that the Reformation had thrown off “the Intollerable yoake of Romish slavery” because the “first reformers” had been willing to be “counted Hereticks” and had made “no bones of Trampling all under foot … [doctrines] which they found to be unreasonable and unscripturall.”
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- Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2006