Nicholas of Cusa and the Making of the Early Modern World

Simon J. G. Burton is John Laing Senior Lecturer in Reformation History at the University of Edinburgh. He works on late medieval and early modern theology, with a particular focus on universal reform, and has published widely in this area. Joshua Hollmann (PhD, McGill University) is Associate Professor of Theology and Chair of the Theology Department at Concordia College-New York. He is the author of The Religious Concordance: Nicholas of Cusa and Christian-Muslim Dialogue (Brill, 2017). Eric M. Parker received his PhD from the School of Religious Studies, McGill University. His dissertation focused on the moral theology of the Cambridge Platonist, Peter Sterry, noting his use of Nicholas of Cusa’s method of coincidence as a means of shaping human character.

Acknowledgements

List of Illustrations

Abbreviations

Notes on Contributors

Nicholas of Cusa: The Life of a Reformer

 Simon J.G. Burton, Joshua Hollmann, and Eric M. Parker



Introduction: Nicholas of Cusa and Early Modern Reform: towards a Reassessment

 Simon J.G. Burton, Joshua Hollmann, and Eric M. Parker



Part 1

Reformatio Generalis: Ecclesiastical Reform



1 A Difficult Pope: Eugenius IV and the Men around Him

 Thomas M. Izbicki and Luke Bancroft

2 The Reform of Space for Prayer: Ecclesia primitiva in Nicholas of Cusa and Leon Battista Alberti

 Il Kim

3 “Papista Insanissima”: Papacy and Reform in Nicholas of Cusa’s Reformatio Generalis (1459) and the Early Martin Luther (1517–19)

 Richard J. Serina, Jr.

4 Nicholas of Cusa and Paolo Sarpi: Copernicanism and Conciliarism in Early Modern Venice

 Alberto Clerici



Part 2

Coincidentia Oppositorum: Theological Reform



5 Nicholas of Cusa and Martin Luther on Christ and the Coincidence of Opposites

 Joshua Hollmann

6 Ignorantia Non Docta: John Calvin and Nicholas of Cusa’s Neglected Trinitarian Legacy

 Gary W. Jenkins

7 Nicholas of Cusa and Pantheism in Early Modern Catholic Theology

 Matthew T. Gaetano



Part 3

Explicatio Visionis: Reform of Perspective



8 The Notion of Faith in the Works of Nicholas Cusanus and Giordano Bruno

 Luisa Brotto

9 “The Sacred Circle of All-Being”: Cusanus, Lord Brooke, and Peter Sterry

 Eric M. Parker

10 Varieties of Spiritual Sense: Cusanus and John Smith

 Derek Michaud

11 Motion, Space, and Early Modern Re-formations of the Cosmos: Nicholas of Cusa’s Anima Mundi and Henry More’s Spirit of Nature

 Nathan R. Strunk



Part 4

Mathesis Universalis: Reform of Method



12 Cusanus and Boethian Theology in the Early French Reform

 Richard J. Oosterhoff

13 Nicholas Cusanus and Guillaume Postel on Learning and Docta Ignorantia

 Roberta Giubilini

14 The Book Metaphor Triadized: the Layman’s Bible and God’s Books in Raymond of Sabunde, Nicholas of Cusa and Jan Amos Comenius

 Petr Pavlas

15 “Squaring the Circle”: Cusan Metaphysics and the Pansophic Vision of Jan Amos Comenius

 Simon J.G. Burton

16 Cusanus and Leibniz: Symbolic Explorations of Infinity as a Ladder to God

 Jan Makovský



Epilogue: Ernst Cassirer and Renaissance Cultural Studies: the Figure of Nicholas of Cusa

 Michael Edward Moore



Index