William Penn's Religious Tolerance And The Similarities And Differences Between Him And John Locke

Since the beginning of the Reformation, comparing with religious persecution, religious tolerance has became an universally acceptable attitude and measurement in dealing with the relationships between government and church, different faiths, different sects of one faith and the individual believer and the faith he believes in. In this process, the English Reformation has a profound influence in the development of religious tolerance since series of denominations and thinkers who advocate religious tolerance appeared at this time.This essay firstly attempts to investigate the reasons of religious persecution according to Penn through the combing of his works like No Cross, No Crown, the Great Case of Liberty of Conscience and the Framework of Government. The point was then turn to focus on the analysis of Penn's understanding of religious tolerance. He believes that "By Liberty of Conscience, we understand not only a mere liberty of the mind, in believing or disbelieving this or that principle or doctrine, but'the exercise of ourselves in a visible way of worship, upon our believing it to be indispensible required at our hands, that if we neglect it for fear or favor of any mortal man, we sin, and incur Divine wrath'...and consequently wholly independent of the secular affairs..."?What is more, he offered the practical rules in his Framework to secure this Liberty of Conscience which was often called as religious tolerance later.Comparing with John Locke, Penn's thoughts about religious tolerance shared the same goal while followed different ways in achieving this goal. Through this comparison, I find that political and economic conflicts and the differences in property are all reasons that contribute to the religious oppression. Moreover, these two thinkers have different interpretations to the people who should be tolerated and the limitation of tolerance.This kind of comparison and investigation seems especially necessary to understand the situation we live in considering the fact that religious pluralism, interfaith dialogue and religious tolerance have become most often discussed topics today. Through this effort, I then recognize that religious persecution will continue as it is a historical phenomenon that accompany with human history. But at the same time, religious tolerance is an inner goal men pursuit from perspective of religious tolerance in principle.In the nutshell, Penn's thoughts about religious tolerance from the three dimensions which I will discuss further in my thesis helps me in understanding religious tolerance as a typical mode he provided. Most importantly, it provides a unique viewpoint for me in clarify the meaning of religious tolerance and how to secure it which are two essential questions to the concept of religious tolerance.