Alberico Gentili and the Ottomans

This chapter offers a nuanced reading of Gentili's stance on the Ottoman empire, linking his doctrine of pre-emptive strikes with his stance on religion and theology and his alleged separation between theology and politics. It shows that Gentili — although indeed prepared to give politics a large degree of autonomy from religion in the vein of Bodin and other writers in the politiques tradition — was also at times committed to a strong biblical protestantism. It argues that Gentili, when taking positions close to Bodinian ideas of a strong separation between politics and theology, did so not...

This chapter offers a nuanced reading of Gentili's stance on the Ottoman empire, linking his doctrine of pre-emptive strikes with his stance on religion and theology and his alleged separation between theology and politics. It shows that Gentili — although indeed prepared to give politics a large degree of autonomy from religion in the vein of Bodin and other writers in the politiques tradition — was also at times committed to a strong biblical protestantism. It argues that Gentili, when taking positions close to Bodinian ideas of a strong separation between politics and theology, did so not primarily for reasons having to do with a non-theological ‘humanist’ tradition, but instead for reasons deriving from a body of fairly mainstream theological thought reaching back into the middle ages.