The Psalms Commentary of Gilbert of Poitiers


Book Description

This book makes available to scholars the unpublished proto-scholastic "Commentary on the Psalms," composed by one of the outstanding figures of the early twelfth century, Gilbert of Poiters (Gilbert Porreta). The commentary had its origins in the atmosphere of experimentation which characterized the schools of Laon, Chartres and Paris in the first decades of the century. Its unique "mise en page," its methodology and its connection to other texts - especially glossed classical texts, the "Glossa ordinaria" and the writings of Peter Lombard - are explored. Gilbert's "Commentary" is a text critical for the understanding of the development of the discipline of theology in the twelfth century schools.




Inspiration and Authority in the Middle Ages


Book Description

Inspiration and Authority in the Middle Ages rethinks the role of prophecy in the Middle Ages by examining how professional theologians responded to new assertions of divine inspiration. Drawing on fresh archival research and detailed study of unpublished manuscript sources from the twelfth to fourteenth centuries, this volume argues that the task of defining prophetic authority became a crucial intellectual and cultural enterprise as university-trained theologians confronted prophetic claims from lay mystics, radical Franciscans, and other unprecedented visionaries. In the process, these theologians redescribed their own activities as prophetic by locating inspiration not in special predictions or ecstatic visions but in natural forms of understanding and in the daily work of ecclesiastical teaching and ministry. Instead of containing the spread of prophetic privilege, however, scholastic assessments of prophecy from Peter Lombard and Thomas Aquinas to Peter John Olivi and Nicholas Trevet opened space for claims of divine insight to proliferate beyond the control of theologians. By the turn of the fourteenth century, secular Italian humanists could lay claim to prophetic authority on the basis of their intellectual powers and literary practices. From Hugh of St Victor to Albertino Mussato, reflections on and debates over prophecy reveal medieval clerics, scholars, and reformers reshaping the contours of religious authority, the boundaries of sanctity and sacred texts, and the relationship of tradition to the new voices of the Late Middle Ages.




Psalms in Community


Book Description

The Psalms, initially shaped by the experience of Israel, have expressed religious impulses of both Jews and Christians across the centuries. Essays from a spectrum of disciplines demonstrate how the Psalms have functioned over time in these communities of conviction.




Honorius Augustodunensis, Exposition of Selected Psalms


Book Description

The abbreviated Psalms commentary by Honorius Augustodunensis (ca. 1070 - ca. 1140)-a redaction of his own, much larger commentary on the entire Psalter-participates in a long tradition of Christian interpretation of the Book of Psalms. A prolific author closely associated with Anselm of Canterbury, Rupert of Deutz, and Gilbert of Poitiers, Honorius wrote a massive commentary on the Psalms when the so-called "school of Laon" was at work on the Glossa ordinaria. Honorius's work shares the academic interest of that school, while simultaneously serving the devotion of the Benedictine Reform. His Exposition of Selected Psalms highlights a tripartite division of the Psalter, even as it discovers in the psalms an apocalypticism fitting to the Church in its last age.




The Place of the Psalms in the Intellectual Culture of the Middle Ages


Book Description

The Psalms were an important part of the education, daily life, and spiritual development of medieval clerics and monks, and they had a significant impact on lay culture as well. The Place of the Psalms in the Intellectual Culture of the Middle Ages surveys their influence, giving a unique window into the intellectual, spiritual, and emotional culture of the period.




Peter Lombard. 1


Book Description

The first general study of Peter Lombard (c. 1100-1160) in a century, this book places Peter's thought in the context of the intellectual debates of his time in the effort to understand the substance of Lombardian theology and the reasons why his principal work, the Sentences , immediately became a classic of early scholastic theology with a durable influence, doing more to shape the education of university theologians and philosophers than any other work of systematic theology for the next four centuries. Attention is paid to the sentence collection as a genre of theological literature, the problem of theological language with which Peter and his contemporaries wrestled, and his contribution to early scholastic biblical exegesis as well as to the development of his systematic theology in the Sentences .




The Psalms as Christian Worship


Book Description

This commentary uniquely combines a verse-by-verse exposition of the Hebrew text of selected Psalms with a history of their interpretation in the Church from the time of the apostles to the present. / Bruce K. Waltke begins the collaboration by first skillfully establishing the meaning of the chosen psalms through careful exegesis in which each text is interpreted in light of its historical backgrounds, its literary form, and the poet’s rhetoric. James M. Houston then exposits each text’s relevance in conjunction with the Church’s interpretation of it throughout her history. To further the accuracy of this interpretation, he commissioned fresh translations of numerous Latin and Middle English texts. / The authors’ purpose in creating this volume was not merely to produce a masterful commentary. Rather, they wished to aid in enriching the daily life of the contemporary Christian and to deepen the church’s community. Waltke and Houston here bring together the two voices of the Holy Spirit — heard infallibly in Scripture and edifyingly in the Church’s response — in a rare and illuminating combination.




Rethinking the School of Chartres


Book Description

Deftly translated by Claude Paul Desmarais, Rethinking the School of Chartres provides a narrative that is critical, passionate, and witty.




Abelard and Heloise


Book Description

This is a brief, accessible introduction to the lives and though of two of the most controversial personalities of the Middle Ages. Their names are familiar, but it is their "star quality" argues Mews, that has prevented them from being seen clearly in the context of 12th-century thought--the task he has set himself in this book.




Abelard and Heloise


Book Description

A brief, accessible introduction to the lives and thought of two of the most controversial personalities of the Middle Ages. Abelard and Heloise are familiar names. It is their "star quality," argues Constant Mews, that has prevented them from being seen clearly in the context of 12th-century thought - that task he has set himself in this book. He contends that the dramatic intensity of these famous lives needs to be examined in the broader context of their shared commitment to the study of philosophy.




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