Abstract

This paper presents Christian Wolff’s claim that philosophy, undertaken on the basis of a proper method, cannot contradict revealed religion. The paper first provides a context of Wolff’s banishment from Halle for holding views in conflict with religious doctrines. Next, it proceeds, on the basis of Wolff’s Discursus præliminaris de philosophia in genere prefixed to his 1728 Latin Logic, to explain the principles of Wolff’s method, and to show how his conception of method enables him to disallow the possibility of a genuine conflict between philosophical and religious dogmas. For Wolff, doctrinal conflicts between philosophy and revealed religion can only occur as a result of terminological disagreements, disagreements between dogmas and hypotheses, or disagreements between dogmas and theological misinterpretations. The actual conflict of dogmas, understood as religious or philosophical truths, Wolff holds to be impossible.