Martin Žemla

Images of Light in the Work of Valentin Weigel: Metaphors or Metaphysics?

The Lutheran theologian and Paracelsian Valentin Weigel (1533–1588) is counted as one of the most influential German authors of the 16th century. In his theological and philosophical work, he was inspired by certain ideas and conceptions of a number of authors and sources, including the Bible, Boethius, Augustine, Hugh of St. Victor, medieval German Mysticism, Italian Renaissance Neo-Platonism, Nicolaus Cusa, Luther, Reformation heterodoxy, and Paracelsus. One of the recurring motifs in his work is the light and various images associated
with it. It is the aim of the present study to analyze whether there is coherent and deliberately used metaphysics of light in Weigel's work – as it was found in his sources, particularly in the work of Marsilio Ficino, who at this point also influenced the Paracelsian tradition –, or whether he uses these images rather as metaphorical instruments. Based on a comparison of relevant passages and fragments found in various texts of Weigel (the only one consistently dealing with the subject being the brief treatise De luce et caligine divina), I come to a double answer: 1. Weigel works with metaphysics of the Neo-Platonic (Augustinian, Boethean, Ficinian) style which can be reconstructed from his texts. 2. Nevertheless, as a theologian, he uses the motives of light primarily in a symbolic and metaphorical sense to underpin and interpret his spiritual and mystical ideas.

Keywords
Valentin Weigel; Metaphysics of Light; Metaphors of Light; German Mysticism; Neo-Platonism

Stefan Heßbrüggen

How and Why Philosophy Was First Called a System: Casmann against Hoffmann on Christian Wisdom and Double Truth

How and why did the notion of philosophy as a system evolve in Germany at the turn of the 16^th and 17^th centuries? Otto Casmann's Modesta Assertio (1601) provides new answers to this question. Casmann, Clemens Timpler's predecessor as professor in Steinfurt refers to other 'like-minded philosophers' (nostrates) who believe that philosophy is a 'structured system of the liberal arts'. Casmann himself states that philosophy is a 'structured unity of erudite wisdom'. The text is part of the debate between Daniel Hoffmann and the Reformed philosophers about the relation between philosophy and theology. It can be made plausible that Hoffmann himself was Casmann's target. The paper shows that a 'structured unity of erudite wisdom' presupposes harmony between theological insights and the findings of philosophy. Thus the earliest discussions of philosophy
as a system were meant to immunise Reformed philosophy against Hoffmann's attempt to revive Lutheran anti-philosophy.

Keywords
Otto Casmann; Daniel Hoffmann; Bartholomaeus Keckermann; Clemens Timpler; System; Definition of philosophy

Jana Černá

Homo Admirans in a New, More Spacious World: the Theme of Dignity in the Ibero-American Context in the Sixteenth Century

The study concerns the theme of human dignity in the sixteenth-century Ibero-American environment. It indicates parallels and motifs of these treatises congruent with contemporary European works about human dignity (Pico, Manetti, Ficino) as well as their specifics. Fascination with what the discovery of the New World meant for the growth of human dignity and gnoseological optimism is considered to be a specific feature. Particular Spanish treatises about the dignity of man (Pérez de Oliva, Vives, Salazar) are examined as well as discursively diversified contemporary texts of Ibero-American provenance which connect the theme of human dignity with the discovery of the New World (Gómara, Hernández, Huerta).

Keywords
Human dignity; New World; Spanish philosophy; Gnoseological optimism

Aneta Kubalová

„Aller Menschen Ordnung seye man gehorsam zu leisten schuldig."
Matthias Hoë von Hoënegg and his Sermons Related to Lusatia and Silesia during the Thirty Years War

The essay deals with the political preaching activity of Matthias Hoë von Hoënegg (1580–1645), the main court Lutheran preacher in Dresden. At the beginning of the Thirty Years War, Saxon elector Johann Georg I, despite of his Lutheran confession, decided to support the Emperor in the war campaign in Upper and Lower Lusatia and Silesia. Matthias Hoë, as his close friend and court preacher, through these sources supported the political strategies of the Saxon elector and explained his stance on the Bohemian Revolt and the Bohemian Confederation. The main argument of his sermons is the duty of the obedience to the landlords. He explained, why it was very important to obey Roman Emperor and used this reason for justification of the political loyalty of the Saxon elector Johann Georg I.

Keywords
Lutheran; Sermons; Matthias Hoë von Hoënegg; Saxony; Elector

Hana Ferencová

"Who remained, turned their Religion": Bohemian Lands in the Travel Journal of John Swinton

The paper deals with the English travel journal The travels of three English gentlemen, from Venice to Hamburgh, being the Grand Tour of Germany, in the year 1734 written by John Swinton which was published in The Harleian Miscellany in the years 1745–46. Attention is drawn to the significance and value of this little-known
travelogue. The image of the Bohemian lands presented in the travelogue is discussed and the research focuses particularly on the representation of the religious conversion of the Bohemian lands in the seventeenth century and its consequences from the perspective of an eighteenth-century English traveller as an external observer coming from Western Europe.

Keywords
Travel; Traveller; English; Bohemia; Bohemian lands; 18th Century; John Swinton; Conversion