Jean Bodin (1530–1596) was born in Angers, France, and became a French jurist and political philosopher, member of the Parlement of Paris and professor of law in Toulouse. He is best known for his theory of sovereignty (see Divine Right of Kings).

Bodin lived during the Reformation, writing against the background of religious and civil conflict—particularly that, in his native France, between the (Calvinist) Huguenots and the state-supported Catholic Church. He remained a Catholic throughout his life but was critical of papal authority and was sometimes accused of crypto-Calvinism. Towards the end of his life he wrote a dialogue between different religions, including representatives of Judaism, Islam and natural theology, in which all agreed to coexist in concord.

His books divided opinion: some French writers were full of praise, while the later Scottish philosopher, Francis Hutchinson was his detractor, criticising his methodology.

In 1588 Bodin wrote the Latin work Colloquium heptaplomeres de rerum sublimium arcanis abditis. It is a conversation about the nature of truth amongst seven educated men each with a distinct religious or philosophical orientation—a natural philosopher, a Calvinist, a Muslim, a Roman-Catholic, a Lutheran, a Jew, and a skeptic.[1] The 1910 Encyclopedia Britannica states "It is curious that Leibnitz, who originally regarded the Colloquium as the work of a professed enemy of Christianity, subsequently described it as a most valuable production."