John Donne about order, obedience and preaching

About the author:

Sergey V. Kondratiev, Dr. Sci. (Hist.), Professor, Department of History and World Politics, University of Tyumen; skondratiev@utmn.ru; ORCID: 0000-0002-9861-5032

Abstract:

The High Church, clergies and royal power in Pre-revolutionary England were concerned with free and unlimited preaching. The article is focused on the sermon preached by John Donne in 1622 which supported the Royal policy aimed to bound preaching as a tool of verbal communication with parishioners. John Donne, following King James I, calls upon to use the catechism consisting of 39 articles and the two books of Homilies. Donne is standing up for the existing order and calls the subjects for obedience. In his sermon John Donne touched upon the 20th verse of Chapter 5, Book of Judges, which was the beginning point of his next discourse. The preacher and poet describes in details his understanding of the concept of order. He was for uniformity in the sphere of faith and worship. John Donne emphasized that the order implied the unity of the head and members, the King and subjects, the ruler and parishioners based on the obedience to decrees of power.

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