renouncing his views and converting to the Catholic faith. He subsequently went to Rome and begged Pope Alexander VII for forgiveness, retracting his earlier views formally. Following this La Peyrère became a lay member of the Oratory of Jesus in Paris and lived out the rest of his life, from 1659 until 1676. The sincerity of his conversion was later questioned. Pierre Bayle, for example, published a letter in which his religious superior wrote that he "was always writing books that ... would be burned as soon as the good man died." La Peyrère was influenced by Thomas Hobbes and was an influence on Baruch Spinoza. In his later life La Peyrère was an influence on fellow Oratory of Jesus member, Richard Simon, who has been called "father of the higher criticism". See also Sabbatai Zevi Ibn Wahshiyya William Hamilton Reid Jean Astruc Critics: Thomas Burnet Edward Stillingfleet References External links 1596 births 1676 deaths 17th-century French people French librarians French Zionists French Calvinist and Reformed theologians Huguenots Conversos French people of Portuguese-Jewish descent Converts to Roman Catholicism from Calvinism Forerunners of Zionism