Back to conference page. The tension between canon law and civil law is an inherent characteristic of the Western legal tradition. In the early modern period one of the scholarly tools developed by jurists to settle the dispute between the two laws was the legal genre called differentiae iuris civilis et canonici. These works consisted of the enumeration of various discrepancies between the two laws and the proposed solutions to them. Differentia e originated in the late medieval law but in the early modern period their method and scope changed radically.
The objective of this paper will be to examine how the ancient canon law principle of salus animarum supported the preference of canon law solutions over the civil law approach.
The investigation of selected issues from differentiae will show how the theological framework of canon law was implemented in the legal discourse on the basis of the salus animarum principle. There were at least three levels on which this principle interfered with particular differentiae.
Secondly, the salus animarum principle was regularly used as the backbone of the general rules established for the reconciliation between the conflicting norms as it was e. Thirdly, this principle was at times referred to in solving particular discrepancies between the two laws and in this case it served as one of the argumentative resources available for the scholars to support their claims.
The paper will present all these functions of the salus animarum principle for the early modern differentiae and will contribute to the overall understanding of the purpose of canon law in the past. The first Lutheran mission to India brought Lutheran theology in dialogue with Indian philosophy and religion. This paper discusses how Ziegenbalg, through his discussions with Brahmins over the theme of the soul, took part in ongoing discussions in Halle at the beginning of the eighteenth century.
