Abraham Kuyper: A Short and Personal Introduction
Overview
Richard Mouw was first drawn to Abraham Kuyper’s writings about public life in the turbulent 1960s. As he struggled to find the right Christian stance toward big social issues such as the civil rights movement and the Vietnam War, Mouw discovered Kuyper’s Lectures on Calvinism—and, with it, a robust vision of active Christian involvement in public life that has guided him ever since.
In this “short and personal introduction” Mouw sets forth Kuyper’s main ideas on Christian cultural discipleship, including his views on sphere sovereignty, the antithesis, common grace, and more. Mouw looks at ways to update—and, in some places, even correct—Kuyper’s thought as he applies it to such twenty-first-century issues as religious and cultural pluralism, technology, and the challenge of Islam.
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Get similar titles with the Abraham Kuyper Studies Collection (6 vols.).
- Presents a short and personal introduction of Kuyper’s main ideas
- Discusess Christian cultural discipleship
- Applies Kuyper’s thought to twenty-first century issues
- Kuyper’s Calvinism
- “Filling the Earth”
- Celebrating Many-ness
- The Spheres
- Cultural “Dykes and Dams”
- “Placing” Kuyper Politically
- A Third Way
- Spheres in the Bible?
- Politics and Creation
- The Church’s Place
- The Antithesis
- God’s “Excellent Gifts”
- Kuyperian Aggiornamento
- Race: Adding Another “Neo”
- Kuyper for Evangelicals
- World-Viewing
- Will the Bell Still Toll?
- Enhancing the Church’s Role
- Nurturing Cultural Patience
- Beyond “Christendom”
- When Spheres “Shrink”
- The Challenge of Islam
- A Kuyperianism “Under the Cross”
Top Highlights
“What Kuyper meant by a ‘sphere’ is pretty much what we have in mind when we talk about a person’s ‘sphere of influence.’ It is an arena where interactions take place, and where some sort of authority is exercised.” (Page 23)
“But at least two points have to be made in defense of what Kuyper and Bavinck are doing. One is that they are engaged in the kind of intellectual activity that gives life to much good theological reflection. This is the kind of thing that theologians—really good theologians—do. They go beyond the explicit statements of Scripture to explore larger patterns of coherence that can shed light on the patterns and implications of what the Bible explicitly says.” (Page 48)
“When we use the word ‘culture’ to apply to human realities, we are referring to the ways in which we human beings cultivate patterns and processes that give meaning to our collective interactions, as well as the things that we ‘grow’ as a result of those interactions.” (Page 6)
“A person’s worldview, they said, answers these four questions: Who am I? Where am I? What’s wrong? What is the remedy?1” (Page 90)
“what the Catholics call ‘the principle of subsidiarity.’” (Page 26)
This marvelous little book pulls off an astounding feat: though it is both compact and accessible, it also gives us the whole Kuyper. Too often we get Kuyper in slices: folks gravitate to a ‘side’ of Kuyper, adopting his theology of culture but neglecting his emphasis on the church, or picking up common grace but neglecting antithesis. But Mouw, with typical wit and warmth, introduces us to Kuyper in all his multifaceted richness. A gift for the next generation.
—James K. A. Smith, Gary and Henrietta Byker Chair in Applied Reformed Theology and Worldview, Calvin College
Part introduction to the principal loci of Kuyper’s theology of culture, part personal reflection on the legacy of neo-Calvinism, part Kuyperian aggiornamento for the twenty-first century, Rich Mouw’s book is a gem. Its engagement with Kuyper’s work is thoughtful and sympathetic, but also questioning and critical, a combination that makes this book a perfect entryway into Kuyper’s social thought.
—John Bowlin, Rimmer and Ruth de Vries Associate Professor of Reformed Theology and Public Life, Princeton Theological Seminary
Richard Mouw’s book does just what it is supposed to do: stimulate our thinking on subjects of consequence, quicken our interest in a mind many of us ought to know better, and improve already great concepts into ideas even better suited to our circumstances. That’s a lot to accomplish in a small book—of which genre Mouw must now be acknowledged a master.
—John Stackhouse, Sangwoo Youtong Chee Professor, Theology & Culture, Regent College
- Title: Abraham Kuyper: A Short and Personal Introduction
- Author: Richard Mouw
- Publisher: Eerdmans
- Print Publication Date: 2011
- Logos Release Date: 2014
- Pages: 148
- Era: era:Contemporary
- Language: English
- Resources: 1
- Format: Digital › Logos Research Edition
- Subject: Kuyper, Abraham, 1837-1920
- ISBNs: 9780802866035, 0802866034
- Resource ID: LLS:BRHMKYPRNTRDCTN
- Resource Type: Monograph
- Metadata Last Updated: 2022-09-29T22:19:57Z