The possibility of religious freedom: Natural law in ancient Greek, medieval Muslim, and early Christian sources

This dissertation examines whether and how theories of unwritten and natural law can provide a better basis for religious freedom than prevailing concepts. I argue first that the fundamental problem of religious freedom is the perennial conflict of human and divine law. I then present theories of unwritten and natural law, including those present in Sophocles' Antigone, Ibn Rushd's Middle Commentary on Aristotle's Rhetoric, and Tertullian's various writings, arguing that expanding our notion of law to incorporate such theories can mediate the human and divine law and provide a rich foundation for religious liberty, even in modernity's pluralism.