Theological Education At the Dutch Universities in the Seventeenth Century: Four Professors On Their Ideal of the Curriculum

Abstract

AbstractDuring the seventeenth century the academic teaching of theology in the Dutch Republic was on a high level. The universities had first-rate professors at their disposal for the subjects taught at the time. In this article some treatises on theological education are discussed. The authors are the professors Antonius Walaeus, Gisbertus Voetius, Franciscus Burman, and Samuel Maresius. Walaeus, Voetius, and Burman wrote about the content of the curriculum and the ideal way of studying theology. They differ in outlook. Burman even advocates a critical attitude based upon a Cartesian principle. Precisely because of unorthodox ideas gaining ground Maresius voiced somber reflections on an assumed decline of the Dutch faculties of theology.