Journal: Westminster Theological Journal
Volume: WTJ 81:2 (Fall 2019)
Article: Hyleke Gockinga (1723–1793): Catechist, Translator, And Commentator
Author: Adriaan Neele

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WTJ 81:2 (Fall 2019) p. 305

Hyleke Gockinga (1723–1793): Catechist,
Translator, And Commentator

Adriaan Neele

Adriaan Neele is Director of the Doctoral Program and Professor of Historical Theology at Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary in Grand Rapids, MI.

Hyleke Gockinga (1723–1793), the “Anna Maria Schuurman of Groningen,” is one of the famed but forgotten women of the early modern period of the Dutch Republic. Gockinga is absent in women’s studies, overviews of biblical interpretation, research on John Owen (1616–1683), and other encyclopedia and handbooks of Dutch history and late orthodoxy of Reformed Protestantism. This article offers for the first time a comprehensive overview of Gockinga’s life and work in an age of tolerance and evangelical enlightenment, including that of a catechist of the church, a translator of a Puritan work, and a commentator on the book of Genesis.

Introduction

Hyleke Gockinga (1723–1793), the “Anna Maria Schuurman of Groningen,” is one of the famed but forgotten women of the early modern period of the Dutch Republic. Gockinga is absent in women’s studies, overviews of biblical interpretation, research on John Owen (1616–1683), and other encyclopedia and handbooks of Dutch history and late orthodoxy of Reformed Protestantism.1 Gockinga’s comparison with Anna Maria van

WTJ 81:2 (Fall 2019) p. 306

Schurman (1607–1678) is reflected in her grave poem (graf gedicht),

Familiar with Greeks and Romans
And Arab and Brit and Gaul
Whose pure virtue and pure morals
No Christian will ever forget
An example without parallel
Was the noblewoman Hyleke Gockinga.2

Despite or thanks to the favorable association with the pious and learned van Schurman, a student of Gisbertus Voetius (1585–1676) at the university of Utrecht, and epitome of De pietate cum scientia conjugenda (On Piety joined with Academics), Gockinga’s life and work are worth examining—considering her context in political and intellectual history in the Dutch Republic, the state of religion at that time, her translations of religious works, and authoring a Bible commentary, as well as the lack of attention to her in varied scholarship.

Following the Dutch Golden Age of the seventeenth century, the Dutch Republic of the Seven United Provinces of the eighteenth century was in decline, whether real or perceived.3 The disaffection of the middle-class with the state of the economy corresponded to a growing estrangement with the ...

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