Richard Hooker on the Limits of Scripture and the Extent of Natural Reason

There has been much debate in recent years over whether the late sixteenth-century English theologian Richard Hooker should be seen as inside or outside the bounds of mainstream Reformed orthodoxy. In particular, it has recently been argued that, contrary to a previous scholarly consensus, Hooker did not reject the distinctive Reformed doctrine of Scripture as autopistos. This paper argues that an analysis of Hooker’s understanding of the different types of laws and their functions, and his views of the positive capacities of postlapsarian human reason, indeed place him outside of contemporary Reformed orthodoxy on those issues, including a rejection of key aspects of autopistos. However, on other points he remained within that tradition.