Marion opens chapter three with a wonderful discussion of silence. As Marion observes, the greatest difficulty with silence is understanding what silence says—e.g., there are many and varied silences such as a silence of contempt or a silence of reverence etc. “Silence, precisely because it does not explain itself, exposes itself to an infinite [...]

Marion agrees with the basic contours of Heidegger’s critique of onto-theo-logy,[1] which for our purposes may be summarized as follows: (1) God or the divine principle is understood or thought in terms of Being, which means that God or the divine principle is wholly immanent; (2) God or the divine principle functions as both the [...]

In this series of posts I interact with selected moments from Jean-Luc Marion’s work, God Without Being. This is not an area of expertise, as I have only read one other book by Marion, Being Given: Toward a Phenomenology of Givenness, and a few articles on Marion. However, I find Marion’s work [...]

As we saw in part two, Edmondson finds Muller’s proposal for the structure of the 1559 Institutes wanting. However, Edmondson believes that Muller’s insight that the Institutes be read in a developmental relation with Calvin’s commentaries is no doubt on the mark. This leads Edmondson to look in books I and II for traces [...]

Edmondson builds his case on three central developments in the structure of the 1559 Institutes: “(1) Calvin’s separation of the material concerning our knowledge of God the Creator in Book I from the material concerning our knowledge of God the Redeemer in Book II, his account of this separation, and the place of [...]

In his recent article, “The Biblical Historical Structure of Calvin’s Institutes,” Stephen Edmondson argues that the final form of the 1559 Institutes reflects a biblical historical (narrative) structure due to the influence of Calvin’s commentary work on the structure of the Institutes. Richard Muller has of course written a number of essays on the [...]

By Michael VendselIn part VI, we saw that Turretin and Vermigli both agree that while essential liberty is an inalienable feature of human nature, that is perfectly consistent with our being morally corrupt and capable at best of a formal obedience.
Similar as they were, however, Turretin and Vermigli were operating in significantly different intellectual contexts. [...]

By Michael Vendsel
Turretin takes up the question of God’s providence in Topic 6 of the Institutes. The most important questions under that topic for our purposes here are questions 1, 3, and 6 - the nature of providence, the extent of providence, and the relationship between providence and free will.
Question 1 deals with the nature [...]

By Michael Vendsel
Having drawn these distinctions (i.e., between necessity of consequence and necessity of the consequent—see part IV), Vermigli proceeds to consider the question of free will in light of them. “Our actions have no intrinsic necessity,” he writes. “Willing is of its own nature (as God created it) mutable and flexible to either side.”[1] [...]

By Michael Vendsel
As was mentioned in part III, Vermigli distinguishes between intrinsic and extrinsic necessity. The former is due to the internal constitution and nature of a thing, and the latter is that which is imposed on the thing from outside and has nothing to do with its nature and constitution. Intrinsic necessity is [...]

By Michael VendselVermigli discusses the providence of God in chapter 15 of part I of his Loci Communes. He begins by discussing the Greek and Hebrew notions of providence, noting that the word literally means foresight or foreknowledge. The Christian concept, however, involves more than that:
“Divine providence includes not only the knowledge of the divine [...]