Providence, Freedom, and the Will in Early Modern Reformed Theology

Too often scholars impose on the past modern terms and theories. This is particularly evident concerning discussions of divine sovereignty and human responsibility, where libertarian and compatibilist notions of freedom obscure older understandings of concurrence. Providence, Freedom, and the Will is one historian’s attempt to help us interpret early modern documents in context with attention to their theological and philosophical terminology. In it, Richard A. Muller investigates the Reformed approach to causality and governance as it relates to divine concurrence with creaturely or temporal causes. He examines treatments of grace and freedom concerning the capabilities of the will as a free cause, operating of its own accord. And he explains free choice in the light of traditional assumptions concerning faculty psychology and the way in which external objects are selected or rejected.

Publisher: Reformation Heritage Books
Type: Paperback
ISBN: 9781601789129

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Richard A. Muller is senior fellow for the Junius Institute for Digital Reformation Research and P. J. Zondervan Professor of Historical Theology Emeritus at Calvin Theological Seminary. He is the author of numerous books, including Divine Will and Human Choice, Grace and Freedom, and the multivolume Post-Reformation Reformed Dogmatics.

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“I always encourage my students, ‘Read everything that Richard Muller has written—study and learn from both his research and methodology.’ Providence, Freedom, and the Will in Early Modern Reformed Theology is no exception. Spanning a quarter of a century, Muller presents a series of studies that explore the relationship between divine sovereignty and human freedom with precision, rigor, and insight. No serious student of theology can afford to ignore this work.” — J. V. Fesko, Harriet Barbour Professor of Systematic and Historical Theology, Reformed Theological Seminary, Jackson, Mississippi