Locke on Religious Toleration

Edwin Curley

doi:10.18290/rf2204.6

Edwin Curley University of Michigan, USA, Emeritus Professor of Philosophy

Keywords: Locke, Augustine, religious toleration, Christian exclusivism

Abstract

The paper analyses and criticizes Locke’s arguments for religious toleration presented in his Letter concerning Toleration. The author argues that the epistemology Locke developed in his Essay concerning Human Understanding made a more constructive contribution to the case for toleration.

References

Baer, Yitzhak. A History of the Jews in Christian Spain. 2 vols. Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America, 1966.

Carroll, James. Constantine’s Sword: The Church and the Jews, A History. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2001.

“Controversies on Christology (Patristic),” in New Catholic Encyclopedia. 2nd ed. 15 vols. Thomson Gale, Catholic University of America: Detroit–Washington, DC, 2002–2013.

Curley, Edwin. “Sebastian Castellio’s Erasmian Liberalism.” Philosophical Topics 31 (2004): 47–73.

Curley, Edwin. “Skepticism and Toleration: The Case of Montaigne.” Oxford Studies in Early Modern Philosophy 2 (2005): 1–33.

Curley, Edwin. “‘I Durst Not Write So Boldly,’ or How to Read Hobbes’ Theological-Political Treatise.” In Hobbes e Spinoza, edited by Daniela Bostrenghi, introduction by Emilia Giancotti, 497–593. Naples: Bibliopolis, 1992.

Kamen, Henry. The Spanish Inquisition: A Historical Revision. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1965.

“Lateran Councils,” in New Catholic Encyclopedia. 2nd ed. 15 vols. Thomson Gale, Catholic University of America: Detroit–Washington, DC, 2002–2013.

Lea, Henry Charles, A History of the Inquisition of Spain. New York: Macmillan, 1922.

Locke, John. A Letter concerning Toleration Humbly Submitted &c. Translated by William Popple. London, 1689.

Locke, John. A Letter concerning Toleration. Edited by Mario Montuori. The Hague: M. Nijhoff, 1963.

Locke, John. An Essay concerning Toleration and Other Writings on Law and Politics, 1667–1683. Edited by J. R. Milton and Philip Milton. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2006.

Locke, John. Epistola de Tolerantia: A Letter on Toleration. Latin text edited with a preface by Raymond Klibansky. English translation with an introduction and notes by J. W. Gough. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1968.

Locke, John. The Reasonableness of Christianity. Edited by John C. Higgins-Biddle. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1999.

Marshall, John. John Locke, Resistance, Religion and Responsibility. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994.

Netanyahu, Benzion. The Origins of the Inquisition in Fifteenth Century Spain. New York: Random House, 1995.

Walker, D. P. The Decline of Hell: Seventeenth-Century Discussions of Eternal Torment. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1964.