“This passage can also be read differently …?:” How Jews and Christians censored Hebrew texts in early modern Modena

This article focuses on the impact exerted by the promulgation of the Index of Prohibited Books by Clement VIII in 1596 on the Jews in early modern Modena. In order to explore diverse cultural perspectives among Jews and Christians, it considers how they read, interpreted, and censored controversial passages in the commentary of Rashi (Solomon ben Isaac of Troyes, 1040–1105) on the Pentateuch. It shows parallels between censorship and the expurgation of Hebrew books, as well as the physical ghettoization and expulsion of Jews from Italian cities enacted by Church authorities, on the one hand, and political and cultural negotiations conducted by the Jews themselves, on the other. Just as the city could be protected from Jewish pollution only through the segregation and expulsion of Jews, so too could the Catholic community be effectively shielded from the contamination of Jewish blasphemies only through banning the Talmud and expurgating other Jewish texts. At the same time, Jews developed means of self-vindication, including a straightforward defense of the principal tenets of Judaism and a stratagem of avoiding discussions that referred to the superiority of Jews over Christians in some interpretations of Rashi. These methods enabled Jews to engage in social and political negotiations with Church and ducal institutions.     

The Brest Bible and other Polish translations of the Bible in the poetical works of Erazm Otwinowski

Abstract

Polish antitrinitarians of the sixteenth century (also known as Polish Brethren and later as Socinians) rejected some of the most fundamental dogmatic beliefs of traditional Christianity. However, while their Church emerged as the result of a split in the Reformed Church, they still used the Brest Bible to read not only the Old Testament (the antitrinitarian translation of Szymon Budny was controversial and rarely accepted by the Brethren), but also the New Testament. This situation is discussed here using the example of Erazm Otwinowski, a major antitrinitarian poet. His two major poetical works are based on various biblical passages. In his Parables of Our Lord Jesus Christ there is considerable evidence that he used both the Brest Bible and the first edition of the New Testament translated by his antitrinitarian friend, Marcin Czechowic. However, it is also possible that he used Jakub Wujek's Catholic version, even if strongly contested in Czechowic's polemical works.     

The typology of the converso in Isaac Abravanel’s biblical exegesis

Isaac Abravanel commented on conversos in the course of his writings. There is an uncanny resemblance between what he writes and documents produced by the Inquisition that present conversos as at least ambivalent about their new religion and sometimes even ironic in their expressions. While reserving judgment about the verisimilitude of the Inquisitional text, it is clear that this picture of ambivalence suited Abravanel—nor was he alone in adopting it—who wished to view conversos as integral to the Jewish collective and its fate. They would return to Judaism to fulfill their role in the history of redemption in the times of the Messiah.     

Pierre De Bérulle (1575–1629) and the renewal of Catholic spiritual life in France

Pierre de Bérulle, founder of the Oratoire de Jésus (commonly known as the Oratoire de France), is a leading figure in the renewal of the Catholic Church in France in the first half of the seventeenth century. He is generally regarded as the founder of the French School of Spirituality (École française de spiritualité), though this term has been much criticised in recent years. He is often described as a ‘reformer’ of the Church in France, but this is a half-truth which obscures his real originality; he certainly shared the aims of those striving to create a clergy which would be better educated, more morally upright and more pastorally sensitive and zealous; but above all else he was concerned with the spiritual renewal of the clergy and with the Church in France generally. Lastly, he has often been accused of wishing to create chiefly, if not exclusively, a spirituality of the priesthood and to work for the ‘sanctification’ of the clergy. But his work and ideas must be seen here in a broader perspective, for Bérulle and his disciples shared with St Francis de Sales the aim, expressed in his Introduction à la vie devote (1608), of creating and promoting a spirituality available to all Christians. This article examines his conception of the Oratory, which he intended to be an intermediary between the religious orders and the secular clergy, his spiritual theology, what I have called his ‘spiritual pedagogy’, and his influence in France and elsewhere.     

Silent Disagreement: Microinteractional Solutions to Moral Dissent Among Catholic Converts

How do converts manage their disagreements with religious teachings? Previous literature on religious dissent has largely focused on church members advocating change or apostatizing, solutions largely unavailable to initiates. Based on six months of ethnographic observations in a Catholic conversion class and 21 in‐depth interviews with converts, sponsors, and teachers, I demonstrate how microinteractional norms encourage an atmosphere of silence around disagreement. I then show how initiates explain this conflict avoidant response by justifying their doubt, engaging in a process of hierarchical deference, in which initiates call upon the top‐down structure of the Catholic Church to defer control upward, and faulting human imperfection rather than the institution itself. While “culture wars” debates of the past two decades have investigated a purported moral polarization of the American public, this study contributes to a growing literature on how the moderate majority negotiates disagreements between their beliefs and religious teachings.     

Pedagogies of piety: Comparing young observant Muslims and Christians in the Netherlands

In this article, I compare the active religious engagement found among many of today's young Dutch Muslims and Christians. I show that such comparison requires a move beyond the separate frameworks through which these groups are commonly perceived, found both in widely shared public discourses (‘allochthons’ versus ‘autochthons’) and in academic research (minority studies versus the sociology of religion). In their stead, this comparative analysis examines in what ways both groups give shape to observant religious practice in the shared context of contemporary Dutch society. Based on ethnographic fieldwork, I show that young Christians as well as Muslims participate in social settings of religious pedagogy, where they are encouraged to attain, sustain and improve personal piety in today's pluralist Dutch society. Such social participation does not preclude, but rather comes together with a strong emphasis on reflexivity and authenticity.     

Some Spiritually Significant Reasons for Gay Attraction to (Anglo-)Catholicism

Abstract

This qualitative study based on interviews with Anglican gay men suggests spiritually significant reasons for which many gay men in England, including gay Evangelicals, are attracted to Anglo-Catholicism or, more largely, to Catholic forms of spirituality. Catholic spirituality is more aware of the body and helps some of these men to make Christian sense of their sexual desires. The Catholic tradition also provides them with alternative patterns to the heteronormative ‘church family’ model of community life that Evangelical churches, in particular, like to offer. As a consequence Catholic spirituality may appear to be better equipped than its Protestant counterpart to help the interviewees re-imagine their place as gay men at the heart of the Church with a gift to offer.     

Four chapters in the history of crypto-Judaism in Brazil: the case of the northeastern New Christians (17th–21st centuries)

The present work examines the history of a group of New Christians who were imprisoned by the Portuguese Inquisition between 1730 and 1740 in the northeastern Brazilian Captaincy of Paraíba. Our purpose is to assess the importance of Jewish interventions to the maintenance or resurgence of Jewish practices and Jewish identity among Portuguese conversos. Our point of departure is a discussion of three specific periods in the history of the New Christians of the Brazilian northeast: First, a period during which an openly-professing and Jewish community existed legally in Pernambuco under Dutch rule (1630–1654); second, the post-Dutch period, when a crypto-Jew who was not related to the group and harbored a stronger faith than its members, revived crypto-Jewish practices and instilled a crypto-Jewish identity among them. Third, we examine a much more recent period, beginning in the 1970s, in which historiography itself has played a central role in causing the local resurgence of crypto-Judaic practice and identity. We attempt to demonstrate that, contrary to the claims of traditional historiography on conversos, the Judaic practices and beliefs of the descendants of the Iberian Jews who converted to Christianity during the fifteenth century did not survive or reappear as a consequence of an uninterrupted cultural transmission of Jewish precepts; rather, these beliefs and practices survived because of external influences that the New Christians experienced in the course of their history.     

Being against,being with: <Emphasis Type="Italic">Marrano</Emphasis> self-identification in inquisitorial Spain (Sixteenth–Eighteenth Centuries). An essay

By the end of the sixteenth century, the economic situation and the Iberian Union (1580–1640) pushed hundreds of Portuguese conversos (New Christians of Jewish descent) to emigrate to Spain. This influx led to a revival of crypto-Judaism and a resurgence of inquisitorial proceedings against conversos. This essay examines the process of identity construction among those crypto-Jews or marranos, both as individuals and as a group. Crypto-Judaism was more related to a social practice than a theological corpus; it was based on a culture of mobility (geographical, socio-economic) that constantly reshaped the markers of difference. Crypto-Jews were mainly those who wanted to be, and were, perceived as such through opposition to an “Other”—sometimes the Jew of the Diaspora (the nação), sometimes the Catholic Old Christian, sometimes the image of themselves that they saw reflected back from those around them. But the fear of betrayal or unmasking, stimulated by the Inquisition and exacerbated by the great mobility of the conversos, was also foundational to their identity. It gave the marrano group, despite its great religious and socio-economic diversity, the characteristics of certain secret societies where shared solidarities and collective identity are fundamental.     

“Leaving it to God” Religion and Spirituality among Filipina Immigrant Breast Cancer Survivors

Many Filipinos have a powerful adherence to Catholicism. However, little is known about spirituality and religious involvement of Filipina Americans who have been diagnosed with breast cancer. Ten (n = 10) in-depth qualitative interviews with Filipina immigrant breast cancer survivors identified prayer to be the most common religious practice, followed by prayers by others and spiritual support from the Catholic Church. These findings can help clinicians and researchers understand the role of spirituality and religion in providing comfort and support for Filipina immigrant breast cancer patient as they face the stress of diagnosis and treatment.     

Bridging the Divide

Abstract

Women who consider themselves traditional or conservative in the context of religious practice often experience tremendous conflicts regarding the integration of same-sex emotional and sexual feelings with their religion and spirituality. Current religious teachings about homosexuality make this combination difficult as only heterosexual sexuality within marriage is permitted in most orthodox faiths. Further, the way that spirituality and sexuality are conceptualized as opposing dichotomous categories (e.g., body vs. soul) presents women with a framework where integration does not seem possible. Observant women who come to psychotherapy often experience tremendous distress, guilt, depression, and even suicidality due to the conflict between their sexual feelings and religious doctrine. Relieving the distress, and resolving the conflicts while honoring the emotional complexity of sexual feelings, spirituality, and religious orthodoxy can present tremendous dilemmas for the practitioner as well as the client. Using the example of psychotherapy of an Orthodox Jewish woman who integrated same-sex desire into her life, this article describes psychotherapy process and alternative ways of viewing spirituality and sexuality that permit possible resolutions for clients.     

Contemporary Catholic Perspectives on Christian–Muslim Relations in Sub-Saharan Africa: The Case of Tanzania

Taking into consideration that Christians and Muslims in sub-Saharan Africa live intermingled in family, clan or ethnic groups, this article takes cognizance of the effect of the teachings of each tradition about their own identity and their perception of the other. It also seeks to take into account the Roman Catholic principles of inter-religious dialogue as enunciated by the Second Vatican Council in the documents Nostra Aetate and the Declaration on the Relation of the Church to Non-Christians, as well as Unitatis Reintegratio, the Decree on Ecumenism, and Dominus Iesus. In view of the fact that these are seen as a source of tension, the question arises as to whether they are being interpreted correctly or applied in the spirit intended.     

Satanism in Britain today

It has been alleged that 10 per cent of the population of Britain are Satanists who conspire (perhaps influenced by a real Devil) to corrupt and blaspheme against everything godly, good or socially valued. This paper discusses the views and activities of self‐identified Satanists in Britain, especially the Temple of Set, the Church of Satan, the Order of the Nine Angles and Dark Lily. It also comments on ad hoc, adolescent and multi‐generational Satanism. Satanism is a series of techniques for allowing individuals to affirm, develop and express themselves, and to do what they wish to do in the context of a spirituality. It does not require belief in the Satan of the Christian pantheon although thriving on the sinister image and the hostility it can evoke in Christians and the media. Satanism is an adversarial form of self‐religion.     

Religious transition: beliefs and life histories of some Canadian Anglo Catholics

There are a range of communities within the Anglican communion that seek to maintain a more orthodox or Catholic emphasis. One of these is the Traditional Anglican Communion. In 2009 the Vatican announced a special accommodation to allow these Anglicans to enter the Catholic Church and to retain key aspects of their Anglican usage and practice. As such many of these communities have sought to formalise their links with Rome. At this important historical juncture this study utilises a qualitative narrative approach to explore the life histories of members of a small community of Canadian Traditional Anglicans. It explores in detail the salient beliefs of these individuals and as such contributes to the growing discourse on the importance of beliefs in the sociology of religion.     

What makes a saint? A Lincoln case study in the communion of the local and the universal Church

Within the curtilage of Lincoln Cathedral lie buried the remains of three very different people to whom sainthood has been attributed: Saint Hugh, Bishop of Lincoln (d.1200); 'Little Saint Hugh' (d.1255), a child maliciously alleged to have been murdered by the local Jewish community; and Edward King (d.1910), Anglican Bishop of Lincoln. Hugh is a saint of the Catholic Church, commemorated by Catholics and Anglicans; 'Little Saint Hugh' was for a short while acclaimed by local people as a saint but never officially recognised as one; Edward King is commemorated by Anglicans but not formally recognised as a saint. The marked difference of approach to the attribution of sainthood between local Christians and Catholic Church authorities, as well as between Catholics and Anglicans, is illustrated by this case study, which raises important ecumenical questions: 'What makes a saint?’, ‘How are non-Catholics to regard the Roman Catholic procedure for beatification and canonisation?’, ‘To what extent can there be fully ecumenical calendars of local saints?’, ‘Does beatification offer a way forward by which Catholics may recognise the holiness of non-Catholic Christians?’     

Jews, Christians, and the endtime in early modern Germany

This paper examines some of the ways in which early modern German literary culture portrayed Jewish visions of the endtime. Christians employed notions of Jewish deceit to undermine the meaning of Jewish messianism, reshaping the signs of the endtime to carry a far more sinister meaning. Christian writers transformed Jewish messianic claimants into predictable precursors of the Antichrist and mocked Jewish beliefs as the delusions of a nation of deceived deceivers. Notions of Jewish deceitfulness complicated Christian expectations concerning Jewish conversion at the end of time. The Christian perception of Jews as inherently deceitful encompassed all components of the early modern views of Jews and the Jewish religion. Early modern German literary works devoted to the theme of vain Jewish messianic expectations combined with the literature of the Antichrist, turning the demonic Antichrist who would appear at the endtime into the person the Jews expected as their messiah. Failed Jewish messianic movements played right into Christian literary and theological discourse on the Jewish endtime and provided historical confirmation for what would have otherwise seemed like an absurd polemical exaggeration. This revised version was published online in August 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Mexican Jewish? A conversation with Ilan Stavans

Mexican Jews are at a crossroads. Their history reaches back to after 1492, when a number arrived as conversos, crypto-Jews, and New Christians. The Holy Inquisition was founded in Mexico in 1535, with Bishop Juan de Zumárraga. Twenty-nine “deviants” were executed during this period. Ashkenazic and Sephardi Jews arrived at the end of the nineteenth century and the first decades of the twentieth, followed by a wave of refugees of the Second World War. Today the Jewish community is made up of Orthodox Jews, exiled Israelis, and others. With democracy a messy affair, the government unable to ascertain its authority, and the drug cartel in an intense battle for power and territory, their position is delicate at best. Ilan Stavans is arguably the most prominent Mexican Jew inside and out. In books like On Borrowed Words (2001), Return to Centro Histórico (2010), and El Iluminado (2012), as well as in movies such as My Mexican Shiva (2007), directed by Alejandro Springall and based on his story “Morirse está en hebreo,” he has reflected on the dilemmas—cultural, political, and religious—facing this minority of close to 40,000 in a national population of 115 million. This conversation took place in April 2014.     

Political pluralization and the declining scope of religious authority in Argentina’s 1960s: the case of Cristianismo y Revolución

ABSTRACT

The transformation of global Catholicism during the Second Vatican Council affected the Argentinean Church. Argentinean Catholics became involved in different sides of the political discussion. While some supported a dictatorial regime, others thought the end of the dictatorship and a fair society could only be achieved through a revolution. In that context, we explore Mark Chavez’s idea of secularization as the decline of religious authority. The magazine Cristianismo y Revolución (CyR) is a case which allows us to see this process displayed. Different Catholic actors, independently of the Church’s structure, claimed Catholic beliefs to support opposing political positions. However, religion remains an important element of the public sphere in contemporary Argentina.     

Christian Supersessionism,Zionism, and the Contemporary Scene

Postliberal theology has been a topic of considerable theological debate over the past few decades. In his 2011 book Another Reformation, Peter Ochs deploys a postliberal theological model for the purpose of developing a sophisticated understanding of the future of interreligious relations. Ochs argues that postliberal theology is a reparative theology focusing on alleviating human suffering. He argues that the Christian idea of supersessionism may be the most challenging for Christians to confront as they explore avenues for making interreligious dialogue more effective. Ochs critiques the Mennonite theologian John Howard Yoder's understanding of Zionism as Jewish Constantianism for being an instance of an ostensibly postliberal theology losing its way. In this essay, I offer a critique of Ochs's reading of Yoder, claiming that Yoder's view actually mirrors an important intra‐Jewish debate about the relationship between political power and piety, and retrieves an ingenious contribution of both early Judaism and early Christianity that is effaced in today's growing Constantinian approach to Christian imperialism and Jewish nationalism.     

The myth of the Jewish origins of philosophy in the Renaissance: from Aristotle to Plato

The myth of the Jewish origins of philosophy and science is an ancient tradition dating from the Hellenistic period. It originated with pagan scholars, as part of the Greek-Hellenistic myth of the eastern origins of wisdom. Hellenistic-Jewish scholars acquired this theme from them, developed it further and transmitted it to the Church Fathers. In time, this myth achieved great popularity among Jews, Christians, and Muslims. Aristotle’s prominence in medieval culture gave rise to traditions claiming that he studied with Jewish sages and was deeply impressed and influenced by Jewish books. Some of these traditions even maintain that he converted to Judaism, or was born a Jew. Although stories about the Judaized Aristotle continued to circulate, many accounts of the Jewish sources of Plato also began to appear in various forms among Christian and Jewish scholars. Stories about Plato proliferated especially following the decline of the Aristotelian-Averroist tradition, when kabbalistic-hermetic influences were first discernible in the writings of Ficino and Pico della Mirandola in the late Quattrocento.