The Reformation of the medieval Christian (Catholic) Church promoted a lot of spiritual forces and streams. As the Reformation received the external character of the orthodox doctrine, these forces and flows gradually separated from the main stream given by Luther and Melanchthon, turning eventually into semilegal, marginal areas. Nevertheless, we can talk about the serious influence that these trends asserted over the formation of the spiritual image of Germany and Europe. Thus, as a result of an extremely complex historical situation of the making of a new spirit of Germany (and, therefore, at the very heart of contemporary Europe at that time), the ideas of Luther and Melanchthon won, which some historians call “biblical orthodoxy”, as since then such ecclesiastical system has arisen and maintained in Christian (Lutheran and Protestant) Church, which is based not on tradition, but solely on the authority of Scripture. Henceforth all theological education have based on the principle of a new kind of “orthodoxy Code”, which displays all dogmas and provisions of its faith from the letter and spirit of the Bible. The teaching of Luther in its essential content expressed and disclosed in one of the early Reformation-theological works, “On Freedom of a Christian” (1520), essentially presents the spirit of the mystical teachings of Meister Eckhart and the author of “German Theology”. The soul, says Luther, must communicate directly with God, and it is this communication (“Unity”) is able to create a truly religious life, “Christian Freedom”. In fact, the Reformation here follows the path of the German mystics of the 14th and 15th centuries – Eckhart, Tauler, Suso, – and from the “spirit of German mysticism” it paves the further way for the whole development of theology and philosophy. The most significant representative of a new philosophy in Germany (according to Hegel – “Herald of the principle of idealism” in the history of philosophy), Jacob Boehme (1575–1624) entered on the path given by the Reformation. The article examines and analyzes the activities of the two main representatives of radical pietism of the late 17th – early 18th centuries, faithful followers of Boehme – Q. Kuhlmann (1651–1686) and J.G. Gihtel (1638–1710). It is shown how they were trying to reform the Christian Church in Germany, in Europe and in Russia, and their contribution to the spread of new philosophical ideas of J. Boehme.
Key words: J. Boehme, theosophy, radical pietism, Q. Kuhlmann, J.G. Gichtel.
About the author
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Фокин Иван Леонидович – доктор философских наук, профессор кафедры международных отношений Санкт-Петербургского политехнического университета Петра Великого; 195251, г. Санкт-Петербург, Политехническая ул., 29; iwan.phokin@mail.ru
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