Interpreting the Kosmotheoros (1698). A historiographical essay on theology and philosophy in the work of Christiaan Huygens

Abstract

Christiaan Huygens' cosmological work Kosmotheoros (1698) has often been neglected in modern scholarship. This paper gives an overview of the existing academic literature on the Kosmotheoros and aims to offer an explanation for the work's problematic modern reception. Arguing for a more contextual approach to this work, some new directions will be suggested for a more comprehensive interpretation of the Kosmotheoros in connection to its intellectual and historical context, especially the late seventeenth-century theological, metaphysical, and philosophical debates on mechanistic philosophy. If studied more extensively, Huygen's Kosmotheoros can offer valuable new insights into his thought and specifically into his interactions with the theological and philosophical debates of his time.