Christian Unity

It’s one of the most dramatic illustrations of the unsurpassability of the Christian era: During the Enlightenment, secular thinkers and Deists turned against the established churches. Their reason was that the churches interfered with their hope for the unity of the human race. As Guy Stroumsa puts it (A New Science, 35), “the religious unity of humanity was used by the deists as an argument against the established churches” (35)

He adds, “The discovery of the unity of humankind was also that of the plurality of cultural and religious forms. To be sure, the idea of religion could not but retain its essentially Christian parameters. Nonetheless, one can speak of an intellectual revolution, as the idea of divine revelation was embodied of its theological potency. . . . All [religions], including Christianity, were now perceived as so many variations on the single theme of natural religion.”

Early modern thinkers had to venture outside Christianity to discover a place where the Christian aspiration of human unity was being realized. Early modern thinkers felt they had to abandon the Christian Era to realize the hope of the Christian Era, which is a sign that, try as they might, they could not escape the Christian Era.