A Jew, a Muslim, a Deist, et al Talk into a Barre: Bodin’s Polyphonic Toleration

• In Event: Democracy and Toleration in Early Modern Political Thought

Abstract

Written between 1588 and 1593, Jean Bodin’s Colloquium of the Seven about Secrets of the Sublime carries forward some of the central assertions about metaphysics and the world from his other works, but it departs from his other major works – be they on history (Method for the Easy Comprehension of History, 1566), on politics (The Six Books of the Republic, 1576), on witchcraft (The Demonmania of Witches, 1580), or on natural philosophy (Universae naturae theatrum, 1596) – most significantly in terms of its form, that of a fictional dialogue. The seven interlocutors of the dialogue, including a Jew, a Muslim, a deist, and various types of Christians all come together as friendly interlocutors for a days-long exploration of life, the universe, and everything. Arguably the central recurring theme and preoccupation of the dialogue is expressed succinctly by Coronaeus (the generous host of the days-long symposium): “…we must decide whether it is proper for a good man to talk about religion.” (p. 143) The dialogue ends with all parties agreeing that it is abhorrent to try to coerce others in matters of religion and we are told by the narrative voice that “afterwards they held no other conversation about religions, although each one defended his own religion with the supreme sanctity of his life.” (p. 471) The implication would seem to be that perhaps one ought not to discuss religion, even if one is truly good and learned. Yet, given that all the participants in the dialogue are presented as particularly virtuous and motivated purely “by a desire to learn” (p. 4) and they engage in a several-days-long discussion of religious matters, the action of the dialogue would appear to answer the question in the affirmative. Though Bodin was arguably rather consistent in advocating various forms of toleration throughout his works, the Colloquium’s dialogue form allows Bodin to re-present toleration as a virtuous model predicated on and enabling the preservation of difference that one ought to pursue. The seven voices of Bodin’s Colloquium, like the distinct and requisite seven notes of the traditional Western musical scale, can only perform their various polyphonic harmonies by virtue of their remaining distinctive notes, distinguishable one from the other. And though the Colloquium presents a model for humanist norms, practices, and background structures for internecine and interfaith dialogue that could be followed by sovereign states, it also enjoins the reader to avoid attempts to constrain, coerce, or otherwise demean any of one’s fellow citizen ‘notes,’ lest harmony become cacophony or, worse still, the unnatural silence of uniformity.

Author

• Catherine R. Power, Glendon College, York University