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A Common Enterprise: Law And The Connection Between Civil And Heavenly Realms In The Writings Of John Calvin, Kenneth L. Townsend

Concordia Law Review

The common ends that once united spiritual and civil realms have been privatized as those ends have come to be seen as controversial and plural, rather than unifying and common. Acknowledging the diversity of ends resulted in increased attention to uniform rules. Since there was no longer agreement about what teloi mattered for society, law gradually lost its aspirational features and became simply a way to limit and punish uncivil and criminal behavior.

The formal separation, but ultimate unity, of civil and heavenly spheres, of norm with vision, articulated by Calvin, allowed him to be both idealistic and realistic about …