Abraham Kuyper

Abraham Kuyper (/ˈkaɪpər/ KY-pər; Dutch: [ˈaːbraːɦɑm ˈkœypər]; 29 October 1837 – 8 November 1920) was the prime minister of the Netherlands between 1901 and 1905, and an influential neo-Calvinist pastor and journalist. He established the Reformed Churches in the Netherlands, which upon its foundation became the second largest Reformed denomination in the country behind the state-supported Dutch Reformed Church.

In addition, he founded the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, the Anti-Revolutionary Party, and a newspaper. In religious affairs, he sought to adapt the Dutch Reformed Church to challenges posed by the loss of state financial aid and by increasing religious pluralism in the wake of splits that the church had undergone in the 19th century, rising Dutch nationalism, and the Arminian religious revivals of his day which denied predestination. He vigorously denounced modernism in theology as a fad that would die out. In politics, he dominated the Anti-Revolutionary Party (ARP) from its founding in 1879 to his death in 1920. He promoted pillarisation, the social expression of the anti-thesis in public life, whereby Protestant, Catholic and secular elements each had their own independent schools, universities and social organisations.

Abraham Kuyper was born on 29 October 1837 in Maassluis, Netherlands. His father Jan Frederik Kuyper served as a minister for the Dutch Reformed Church in Hoogmade, Maassluis, Middelburg and Leiden.

Kuyper was home-schooled by his father. The boy received no formal primary education, but received secondary education at the Gymnasium of Leiden. In 1855, he graduated from the Gymnasium and began to study literature, philosophy and theology at Leiden University. He received his propaedeuse in literature in 1857, and summa cum laude in philosophy in 1858. He also took classes in Arabic, Armenian and physics.

In 1862 he was promoted to Doctor in theology on the basis of a dissertation entitled "Disquisitio historico-theologica, exhibens Johannis Calvini et Johannis à Lasco de Ecclesia Sententiarum inter se compositionem" (Theological-historical dissertation showing the differences in the rules of the church, between John Calvin and John Łaski). In comparing the views of John Calvin and Jan Łaski, Kuyper showed a clear sympathy for the more liberal Łaski. During his studies, Kuyper was a member of the modern tendency within the Dutch Reformed Church.

In May 1862, he was declared eligible for the ministry, and in 1863, he accepted a call to become minister for the Dutch Reformed Church for the town of Beesd. In the same year he married Johanna Hendrika Schaay (1842–1899). They had five sons and three daughters. In 1864 he began corresponding with the anti-revolutionary MP Guillaume Groen van Prinsterer, who heavily influenced his political and theological views (see below).

Around 1866, he began to sympathise with the orthodox tendency within the Dutch Reformed Church. He was inspired by the robust reformed faith of Pietje Baltus, a single woman in her early 30s, the daughter of a miller. He began to oppose the centralization in the church, the role of the King and began to plead for the separation of church and state.

In 1867, Kuyper was asked to become minister for the parish in Utrecht and he left Beesd. In 1870 he was asked to come to Amsterdam. In 1871 he began to write for the De Heraut (The Herald).