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Although most accounts of Christian encounters with Muslims in the period between the eleventh and thirteenth centuries pay particular attention to conflict and violence, a body of hagiographical texts emanating from monastic circles points to a different kind of approach. In this article I foreground three examples of Italo-Greek saints' lives from the tenth and early eleventh centuries in which the saints in question treat Muslims whom they encounter as potential converts, and explain to them the tenets of Christian theology. These texts are examined as precursors of the Cluniac 'dossier' compiled about Abbot Maiolus's encounter with Muslims in the 990s. Two of the three saints' lives were translated from Greek into Latin, one in the late eleventh, the other in the late twelfth century. The motives for and circumstances of these translations are discussed in light of growing hostility towards the Islamic world during the period of the crusades. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abtract: In the Gospel of John, Jesus declares himself to be the way to the Father; in the First Apocalypse of James, Jesus explains exactly what this way entails. This article analyzes how 1 Apoc. Jas. uses the Johannine christological themes of identity, death and ascension and makes them applicable for human salvation. The identity of Jesus as a son of the Father, as opposed to the inhabitants of the world/cosmos, his autonomous death that conquers cosmic evils, and his immediate ascension and fleshly return are all Johannine motifs that are reformulated in 1 Apoc. Jas. Jesus reveals to James that he too is a son of the Father, and James must declare this identity during his postmortem journey through the celestial toll-collectors. He must not fear his impending stoning as, like other martyrdom literature, the martyr is immune to earthly concerns, and the real challenge lies in the cosmic sphere. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The sixth-century Rule of Benedict became a foundational text for the practice of Christian monasticism in medieval Europe, but its utility extended outside of the monastery as well. In the Carolingian period church prelates repurposed parts of this influential monastic handbook for the purpose of pastoral care. In the decades around 800 CE, excerpts from the rule appeared in several composite manuscripts made for the instruction of parish priests and by extension their lay audiences. Benedict's fourth chapter on the "Instruments of Good Works" was deemed particularly useful in the context of preaching to lay people not only because of its ecumenical message to love God and one's neighbor but also due to its formulaic and repetitive idiom. This study examines the redeployment of extracts of the Rule of Benedict for the cura animarum in Carolingian parishes with particular attention to the role of Bishop Theodulf of Orléans (ca. 760-821) in disseminating Benedict's teachings beyond the walls of the cloister. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Hrabanus Maurus's Commentary on Matthew provides a lens through which to view the centrality of biblical studies to Carolingian reform initiatives. The commentary sits amid a burst of interest inMatthew's Gospel in the first quarter of the ninth century. It also occupies a central place in Hrabanus's program for clerical education and renewal. Hrabanus imagined the work as a user-friendly reference guide or introductory text and structured the commentary with highly sophisticated and complementary indexing, organizing, and searching features to privilege ease of use. Hrabanus's design allows for quick appreciation and simple interpretation of the Gospel's overall narrative structure, its principal episodes, and its individual verses. Moreover, Hrabanus took painstaking effort to document the numerous patristic sources upon which he drew in building the commentary, as well as to acknowledge when he contributed thoughts of his own. The manuscript record, epistolary remarks, sermon texts, and literary references -- including in the vernacular -- testify to broad dissemination and use of the commentary by Hrabanus's network of patrons, peers, and students across Frankish Europe. Attention to the structure, content, and influence of the commentary expands scholarly appreciation of Hrabanus's genius beyond his achievements as an abbot and bishop or as a prolific biblical exegete, to include resourcefulness and practicality in teaching. Moreover, the study illumines the close association Carolingian leaders saw between biblical studies and broader cultural renewal along with the networks connecting leaders across the Frankish world as they reflected upon and promoted reform. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper will examine the narrative of Salmān al-Fārisī/"the Persian" and his conversion to Islam, as recounted in the eighth-century Sīra of Ibn Isḥāq, as a lens into the laudatory interpretation of Christian monasticism by early Muslims. This account of Salmān al-Fārisī (d. 656 CE), an original Companion (ṣaḥābī) of the Prophet Muḥammad, vividly describes his rejection of his Zoroastrian heritage, his initial embrace of Christianity, and his departure from his homeland of Isfahan in search of a deeper understanding of the Christian faith. This quest leads the young Persian on a great arc across the Near East into Iraq, Asia Minor, and Syria, during which he studies under various Christian monks and serves as their acolyte. Upon each master's death, Salmān is directed toward another mystical authority, on a passage that parallels the "monastic sojourns" of late antique Christian literature. At the conclusion of the narrative a monk sends Salmān to seek out a "new Prophet who has arisen among the Arabs." The monks, therefore, appear to be interpreted as "proto-Muslims," as links in a chain leading to enlightenment, regardless of their confessional distinction. This narrative could then suggest that pietistic concerns, shared between these communities, superseded specific doctrinal boundaries in the highly fluid and malleable religious culture of the late antique and early Islamic Near East. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The early centuries in the history of Christian asceticism, and of monasticism to which it gave rise, invite a short and accessible overview. The present article aims to supply this. It relies on a very large sampling of texts, mostly hagiographic. As ascetics are there to be seen described by contemporaries and near-contemporaries, they share many traits which can be grouped under principal headings and frequency of mention. A statistical profile emerges, presented under numerous headings and totals which in turn indicates the ascetics' most salient aims and acts, and helps to explain the course of development of their institutions. The findings challenge a still-famous and almost universally accepted overview offered by Peter Brown (1971). This the present article seeks to replace at the outset, through calling in question Brown's methodological assumptions, and second, in its closing pages, through challenging Brown's picture of the holy man in other, more factual points. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is somewhat rare to be able to analyze the membership of an early medieval women's religious community in any detail. Sant Joan de Ripoll, which operated from the late ninth century until 1017 at modern-day Sant Joan de les Abadesses in Catalonia, provides not just this opportunity but the even rarer chance to evaluate the nuns' command of writing, by means of a single original charter of 949 that several of them signed autograph. This article argues that the signatures of these nuns indicate that they had in fact been taught to write before joining the nunnery. They are thus a source for female lay, rather than religious, literacy in this time and area. Consolidating this, the article provides a prosopography of the known nuns derived from the other charters of the nunnery's part-surviving archive, including tracing some of their careers beyond the 1017 dissolution of the house. This shows that the members of the comital family who had founded the house and provided several of its abbesses were not otherwise frequent among the nuns; rather, the nunnery recruited from the local notables in its neighborhoods, to whose interest in female literacy these signatures therefore testify. Such support could not prevent the closure of the house, however, and the article closes with a reflection on the agency available to the nuns in a political sphere dominated by male, secular interests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores how communities of female religious within the English sphere of influence in Ireland negotiated their survival, firstly in the aftermath of the Henrician dissolution campaigns of the late 1530s and 1540s and thereafter down to the early 1640s. It begins by examining the strategies devised by women religious in order to circumvent the state’s proscription of vocational living in the aftermath of the Henrician suppression campaigns. These ranged from clandestine continuation of conventual life to the maintenance of informal religious vows within domestic settings. It then moves on to consider the modes of migration and destinations of Irish women who, from the late sixteenth century onwards, travelled to the Continent in pursuit of religious vocations, an experience they shared with their English counterparts. Finally, it considers how the return to Ireland from Europe of Irish Poor Clare nuns in 1629 signalled the revival of monastic life for women religious on the island. The article traces the importance of familial and clerical patronage networks to the ongoing survival of Irish female religious communities and highlights their role in sustaining Catholic devotional practices, which were to prove vital to the success of the Counter-Reformation mission in seventeenth-century Ireland. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The First Crusade is one of the most intensively researched events of the Middle Ages, yet, paradoxically, the manuscript source base for the letters from the expedition is almost entirely unexplored and represents an exciting new avenue of investigation for crusade studies. This article publishes the texts of three new manuscript witnesses of First Crusade letters and explores their regional reception and transmission as a form of "scribal crusading" - that is, monastic participation in the crusades from behind cloister walls. The findings of this article reveal an extremely significant, but previously underappreciated, collective impulse among German monastic communities in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries to participate in the crusading movement through the copying of First Crusade letters. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aquinas and Barth both describe the Christian life in light of who God is and how God acts, rather than with a primary concern for morality or apologetics. They differ in that Aquinas describes a single, essentially monastic, and normative form of discipleship that, because it cannot be taken up by most Christians, issues in practice in a two-tier conception of the Christian life. By contrast, Barth's account of vocation individualises the call to each Christian so that it is possible for everyone to lead the Christian life equally well yet in very diverse ways. For this reason, and because our true relation to God is hidden, even to ourselves, we may conclude that it is dangerous to make negative judgement as to anyone's standing before God -- and therefore their relative standing in the church, too -- based upon a view of the normative form of the Christian life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Hrabanus Maurus's De institutione clericorum is a masterpiece of clerical formation, emblematic of the Carolingian Renewal and esteemed by thinkers throughout the Middle Ages. In the third book, Hrabanus juxtaposes Augustine's teachings in De doctrina christiana with Gregory the Great's instruction in the Regula pastoralis to craft an original case for a close connection between wisdom and moral life in priestly training. Hrabanus's effort concretizes long-standing concerns of Carolingian reformers reiterated in landmark reform documents from the late eighth and early ninth centuries. Moreover, throughout his life, Hrabanus periodically returns to his work on priestly formation for words and ideas to undergird subsequent efforts at integrating education with pastoral practice in a variety of genres, including his model sermons, his encyclopedic commentary, and his handbook for missionary conversion. In addition to highlighting Hrabanus's individual genius as one who adroitly applies traditional authorities in novel ways to contemporary problems, this study illumines the crucial role played by monasteries like Fulda as engines for the Carolingian reform. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The article discusses the theological method of William of St. Thiery. It is noted that this theologian's purpose is to develop a theological contention that engages the reader with God with the sole motive of uniting the intellectual, pastoral and worship facets of theological education. His contribution in theology can help deepen an Anglican way of spirituality and challenge new monastic communities to engage with theology.