By Lynda L. Coon (NHC Fellow, 2004–05) In Dark Age Bodies Lynda L. Coon reconstructs the gender ideology of monastic masculinity through an investigation of early medieval readings of the body. Focusing on the Carolingian era, Coon evaluates the ritual and liturgical performances of monastic bodies within the imaginative landscapes of same-sex ascetic communities in northern Europe. … Continued
By Bart D. Ehrman (NHC Fellow, 2009–10; 2018–19) Bart D. Ehrman, the New York Times bestselling author of Jesus, Interrupted and God’s Problem reveals which books in the Bible’s New Testament were not passed down by Jesus’s disciples, but were instead forged by other hands—and why this centuries-hidden scandal is far more significant than many scholars are willing to admit. A … Continued
By Debora Kuller Shuger (NHC Fellow, 1987–88) When attempting to globally divide ideas into orthodox and subversive categories, it is not always clear what precisely is subversive to the dominant ideology and vice versa. Going against recent trends in English Renaissance studies, Deborah Shuger examines orthodox, rather than subversive, methods of thought in the English … Continued
By Raymond Van Dam (NHC Fellow, 1986–87) Cappadocia had long been a marginal province in the eastern Roman empire, high on a rugged plateau in central Asia Minor and hardly influenced by classical Greek culture. But during the fourth century emperors visited repeatedly as they traveled between Constantinople and Antioch. In Cappadocia they met provincial … Continued
By Karen Halttunen (NHC Fellow, 1994–95) Confronting murder in the newspaper, on screen, and in sensational trials, we often feel the killer is fundamentally incomprehensible and morally alien. But this was not always the popular response to murder. In Murder Most Foul, Karen Halttunen explores the changing view of murder from early New England sermons read at the … Continued
By Caroline Bruzelius (NHC Fellow, 2003–04) Friars transformed the relationship of the church to laymen by taking religion outside to public and domestic spaces. Mendicant commitment to apostolic poverty bound friars to donors in an exchange of donations in return for intercessory prayers and burial: association with friars was believed to reduce the suffering of … Continued
By Richard C. Trexler (NHC Fellow, 1997–98) In Reliving Golgotha, Richard Trexler brings an important new perspective to religious spectacle in an engrossing exploration of the annual passion play at Iztapalapa, the largest and poorest borough of Mexico City. After tracing the history of European passion theater, Trexler examines the process by which representations of the passion were … Continued
Translated by E. P. Sanders (NHC Fellow, 1993–94)
Edited by Norman Kretzmann (NHC Fellow, 1992–93) and Eleonore Stump (NHC Fellow, 1999–00) Among the great philosophers of the Middle Ages Aquinas is unique in pursuing two apparently disparate projects. On the one hand he developed a philosophical understanding of Christian doctrine in a fully integrated system encompassing all natural and supernatural reality. On the … Continued
By Behnam Sadeghi (NHC Fellow, 2010–11) This pioneering study examines the process of reasoning in Islamic law. Some of the key questions addressed here include whether sacred law operates differently from secular law, why laws change or stay the same and how different cultural and historical settings impact the development of legal rulings. In order … Continued