The Quest for Certainty in Early Modern Europe : From Inquisition to Inquiry, 1550–1700

Reflecting on humanity’s shared desire for certainty, this book explores the discrepancies between religious adherence and inner belief specific to the early modern period, a time marred by forced conversions and inquisition.

This interdisciplinary collection explores how the early modern pursuit of knowledge in very different spheres – from Inquisitional investigations to biblical polemics to popular healing – was conditioned by a shared desire for certainty, and how epistemological crises produced by the religious upheavals of early modern Europe were also linked to the development of new scientific methods. Questions of representation became newly fraught as the production of knowledge increasingly challenged established orthodoxies. The volume focuses on the social and institutional dimensions of inquiry in light of political and cultural challenges, while also foregrounding the Hispanic world, which has often been left out of histories of scepticism and modernity. Featuring essays by historians and literary scholars from Europe and the United States, The Quest for Certainty in Early Modern Europe reconstructs the complexity of early modern epistemological debates across the disciplines, in a variety of cultural, social, and intellectual locales.

"How was the early modern pursuit of knowledge in very different spheres conditioned by a shared desire for certainty? How did this desire in turn link the epistemological crises produced by the religious upheavals of early modern Europe with the development of new scientific methods? This volume recontextualizes the production of knowledge in the early modern period (1550-1700), focusing on the social and institutional dimensions of inquiry in light of political and cultural challenges. The collection explores how uncertainties about religious identities (and even the status of irreligion) challenged traditional modes of learning. As knowledge of all sorts was integrated into different traditions in a context of unprecedented religious questioning, institutions and texts sought new means of controlling and regulating "truth." Questions of representation became newly fraught as the production of knowledge increasingly challenged established orthodoxies."-- Provided by publisher