Theological Origins of Modernity

302 notes to pages 32–39
34. It was already apparent to Heinz Heimsoeth in 1922 that there was a clear connection
of the early Renaissance to Ockham. Heimsoeth, Th e Six Great Th emes of
Western Metaphysics and the End of the Middle Ages, trans. R. Betanzos (Detroit:
Wayne State University Press, 1994), 31. Th is connection has become increasingly
clear, especially in the history of science. See, for example, Alexander Koyré, From
Closed World to Infi nite Universe (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press,
1957); A. C. Crombie, Robert Grossete and the Origins of Experimental Science
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1953); and of course Blumenberg’s Legitimacy of
the Modern Age and Funkenstein’s Th eology and the Scientifi c Imagination.
35. Martin Luther, Th e Freedom of a Christian, in D. Martin Luthers Werke: Kritische
Gesamtausgabe, 67 vols. (Weimar: Hermann Böhlaus Nachfologer, 1883–1997),
7:61 (hereaft er cited as WA); Luther’s Works, 55 vols. (St. Louis and Philadelphia,
1955–75), 31:361 (hereaft er cited as LW). When citing the Weimar Ausgabe, I have
followed the standard scholarly convention by giving fi rst the volume:page.line.
Roman numerals indicate the fi rst or second part of a volume.
36. WA 7:49.7–19; LW 31:343.
37. Luther insists on the necessity of Scripture and rejects the extreme subjectivism
of the evangelicals who followed not the word of God but the illumination they
received in direct communion with God, their so-called inner light.
38. Heimsoeth argued that Eckhart represents the fi rst step toward an affi rmation of
creation. Six Great Th emes, 47.
39. I do not mean to assert in this way that all early modern materialists are atheists.
Indeed, the reverse is the case. It is their particular notion of God that provides
the assurance that he is irrelevant for their interpretation of nature. Charles Larmore
captures this view with his assertion that in modernity, “God is so great
he does not have to exist.” Larmore, Th e Morals of Modernity (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1996), 41.
40. Francis Bacon, Th e New Organon and Related Writings, ed. F. H. Anderson (New
York: Macmillan, 1960), 122.
41. Ibid., 12.
42. Ibid., 3.
43. Ibid., 47–66.
44. Ibid., 23, 29.
45. Ibid., 80, 90.
46. Ibid., 4.
47. Ibid., 23, 78, 118, 267.
48. Ibid., 5, 132. Funkenstein argues that this is the beginning of a new ideal of knowing
as construction. Th eology and the Scientifi c Imagination, 297.
49. Bacon, Th e New Organon, 29; see also 39.
50. Ibid., 13, 66, 119.
51. Ibid., 6, 112.
52. Ibid., 20, 22, 25, 95, 113.
53. Ibid., 23.
54. Ibid., 109.