Early modern thisworldliness arose from political instability, not scientific advance

Evidence

Given the social instability and political violence of early modern times, there is a continuous tension in baroque drama between the ideal of restoration and the fear of catastrophe. The emphasis on thisworldliness is a consequence of that tension. Skeptical detachment from all contestable beliefs was conducive to self-preservation. In a striking sentence Benjamin observes that even “The religious man of the baroque era clings so tightly to the world because of the feeling that he is being driven along a cataract with it.” — Talal Asad, Formations of the Secular, 316

Categorization

• XREF: Supports the reader’s core thread: Asad reading secularity as historically contingent and politically driven, complicating any Whig narrative of secular modernity as the natural triumph of knowledge over belief.
• DEEPTHINKING: Dense analytic move: turns ‘thisworldliness’ from a cognitive achievement into a survival response to violent instability, upending the default secularization narrative.