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Calvinist Conformity in Post-Reformation England is the first modern full-scale examination of the theology and life of the distinguished English Calvinist clergyman Daniel Featley (1582-1645). It offers a comprehensive treatment of his two dozen published works and manuscripts and situates these works within their original historical context. The work uses Featley's career to trace the fortunes of Calvinist conformists--those English Calvinists who were committed to the established Church and represented the Church's majority position between 1560 and the mid-1620s--and offers a more nuanced perspective on the priorities and political maneuvers of these figures and the politics of religion in post-Reformation England.
List of contents
- Acknowledgements
- List of Abbreviations
- Note on Transcriptions and Translations
- Introduction
- Chapter 1 - The Formation of a Calvinist Conformist
- Chapter 2 - Regulating the Reformed Consensus: Chaplaincy, Licensing, and Censorship
- Chapter 3 - Anti-Catholicism: Scripture, Patristic Tradition, and Pastoral Polemicism
- Chapter 4 - English Reformed Soteriology: Countering Pelagianism, Arminianism, and Popery
- Chapter 5 - Pastoral and Practical Theology: Preaching, Piety, and Ecclesiastical Conformity
- Chapter 6 - Ecclesiology and Polity of an English Calvinist Conformist
- Chapter 7 - The 'Afterlife' of an English Calvinist Conformist
- Conclusion
- Appendix
- Bibliography
About the author
Greg A. Salazar is Assistant Professor of Historical Theology at Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary. His research was funded by scholarships and grants from the Lightfoot and Archbishop Cranmer funds at Cambridge University. He co-edited volume 6 of The Works of William Perkins (2018) and serves as Managing Editor for the Journal Studies in Puritanism and Piety,
Summary
Calvinist Conformity in Post-Reformation England is the first modern full-scale examination of the theology and life of the distinguished English Calvinist clergyman Daniel Featley (1582-1645). It explores Featley's career and thought through a comprehensive treatment of his two dozen published works and manuscripts and situates these works within their original historical context.
A fascinating figure, Featley was the youngest of the translators behind the Authorized Version, a protégé of John Rainolds, a domestic chaplain for Archbishop George Abbot, and a minister of two churches. As a result of his sympathies with royalism and episcopacy, he endured two separate attacks on his life. Despite this, Featley was the only royalist Episcopalian figure who accepted his invitation to the Westminster Assembly. Three months into the Assembly, however, Featley was charged with being a royalist spy, was imprisoned by Parliament, and died shortly thereafter.
While Featley is a central focus of the work, this study is more than a biography. It uses Featley's career to trace the fortunes of Calvinist conformists--those English Calvinists who were committed to the established Church and represented the Church's majority position between 1560 and the mid-1620s, before being marginalized by Laudians in the 1630s and puritans in the 1640s. It demonstrates how Featley's convictions were representative of the ideals and career of conformist Calvinism, explores the broader priorities and political maneuvers of English Calvinist conformists, and offers a more nuanced perspective on the priorities and political maneuvers of these figures and the politics of religion in post-Reformation England.
Additional text
Nothing about Featley's life and career should be taken at face value, not even the life produced by his nephew John! This is sad given that Featley himself has been noted as a key figure in the development of funeral sermons and lives in this period. Greg Salazar is to be congratulated on rescuing Daniel Featley for careful consideration.
