Focusing on Gisbertus Voetius’s views on God, freedom, and contingency, Andreas J. Beck offers the first monograph in English that is entirely devoted to the theology of this leading figure of early modern Reformed scholasticism.

First published in 1646, Spiritual Desertion offers comfort and consolation to believers whose circumstances cause them to wonder if God has abandoned them. Reformation leaders Gisbertus Voetius and Johannes Hoornbeeck demonstrate that the anxiety of doubting believers is proof that God has not abandoned them; rather, it is evidence of the work of the Spirit in their hearts.

This book examines the thinking of several Reformed theologians on theological issues that are, historically or by content, related to philosophy. Three Dutch authors from successive generations are considered in particular: Gisbertus Voetius (1589-1676), Petrus van Mastricht (1630-1706), and Anthonius Driessen (1684-1748). A diversity of issues in Christian doctrine is discussed. These include the relationship between theology and philosophy, creation, Divine providence, the human being, and Divine and natural law. By reconstructing the views of these three theologians, this book highlights similarities and differences within Reformed orthodoxy, both in doctrine and in relation to philosophy. The changes that thus become visible also suggest that biblical Christianity outlives the philosophical apparatus by whose assistence it is explained.

The Crisis of Causality deals with the reaction of the Dutch Calvinist theologian Gisbertus Voetius (1589-1676) to the New Philosophy of René Descartes (1596-1650). Voetius not only criticised the Cartesian idea of a mechanical Universe; he also foresaw that shifting conceptions of natural causality would make it impossible for theologians to explain the relationship between God and Creation in philosophical terms. This threatened the status of theology as a scientific discipline. Apart from a detailed analysis of the Scholastic and Cartesian notions of causality, the book offers new perspectives on related subjects, such as seventeenth-century university training and the Cartesian method of science. It will be of great importance to any student of seventeenth-century intellectual history, philosophy, theology and history of science.

This study presents the religious factor in the development of a separatistic group identity among the forebears of the Afrikaners during the Dutch colonial period of South African history. Dutch Reformed covenant theology and baptism practice rooted in the thousand generation covenant theory helped to shape this self-understanding. It traces the basic developments of covenant theology in the Netherlands during the period and demonstrates how these concepts were conveyed to colonial South Africa. The dominant strain of covenantal thought treated the entire community as redeemed and called to be separate. It was presented through a variety of means through which virtually every colonist was exposed. This study offers a balanced historical approach to the role of theological concepts in the colonial roots of Afrikaner group identity. It answers traditional scholarship in the field which either directly identify the concepts behind the development of apartheid with Calvinist theology or, more recently, deny that the Reformed faith had any role in the development of apartheid ideology until the twentieth century.