Evil Lords and the Devil

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sumi Shimahara
Keyword(s):  
Ninth Century ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Biblical Commentaries ◽  
Political Principles ◽  
The Devil

Perceptions of tyranny are also the subject of this chapter, which discusses the ways in which terms deriving from the root ‘tyran-’ were employed in biblical commentaries and other sources of the Carolingian era. The chapter shows that eighth- and ninth-century authors developed a distinct discourse on tyranny by blending pagan and patristic views with their own ethical-political principles. Carolingian conceptions of tyranny were grounded in considerations pertaining both to legality and to morality, with vice, eschatological concerns, and the association with the devil playing as important a role as issues of illegitimacy, usurpation, or malfeasance. These conceptions were moreover fairly elastic, as related terms not only had a wide connotative range but were also used to describe a variety of abusive behaviors of a royal, secular, or ecclesiastical origin.

The Devil's Tabernacle

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anthony Ossa-Richardson
Keyword(s):  
Ancient Greek ◽  
Cultural Impact ◽  
Early Modernity ◽  
The Enlightenment ◽  
Ancient Religion ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Historical Identity ◽  
European Thought ◽  
The Devil ◽  
Huge Variety

This is the first book to examine in depth the intellectual and cultural impact of the oracles of pagan antiquity on modern European thought. The book shows how the study of the oracles influenced, and was influenced by, some of the most significant developments in early modernity, such as the Christian humanist recovery of ancient religion, confessional polemics, Deist and libertine challenges to religion, antiquarianism and early archaeology, Romantic historiography, and spiritualism. The book examines the different views of the oracles since the Renaissance—that they were the work of the devil, or natural causes, or the fraud of priests, or finally an organic element of ancient Greek society. The range of discussion on the subject, as he demonstrates, is considerably more complex than has been realized before: hundreds of scholars, theologians, and critics commented on the oracles, drawing on a huge variety of intellectual contexts to frame their beliefs. A central chapter interrogates the landmark dispute on the oracles between Bernard de Fontenelle and Jean-François Baltus, challenging Whiggish assumptions about the mechanics of debate on the cusp of the Enlightenment. With erudition and an eye for detail, the book argues that, on both sides of the controversy, to speak of the ancient oracles in early modernity was to speak of one's own historical identity as a Christian.

A Short Survey of Yemeni Sufism from Its Inception up to the Thirteenth Century

2009 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-19
Author(s):  
Muhammad Aziz
Keyword(s):  
Cultural History ◽  
Thirteenth Century ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Ninth Century ◽  
Mountainous Area ◽  
Economic Activities ◽  
Short Survey ◽  
The Status ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Intellectual Activities

This paper analyzes the historical conditions of Yemen’s Sufi movement from the beginning of Islam up to the rise of the Rasulid dynasty in the thirteenth century. This is a very difficult task, given the lack of adequate sources and sufficient academic attention in both the East and theWest. Certainly, a few sentences about the subject can be found scattered in Sufi literature at large, but a respectable study of the period’s mysticism can hardly be found.1 Thus, I will focus on the major authorities who first contributed to the ascetic movement’s development, discuss why a major decline of intellectual activities occurred in many metropolises, and if the existing ascetic conditions were transformed into mystical tendencies during the ninth century due to the alleged impact ofDhu’n-Nun al-Misri (d. 860). This is followed by a brief discussion ofwhat contributed to the revival of the country’s intellectual and economic activities. After that, I will attempt to portray the status of the major ascetics and prominent mystics credited with spreading and diffusing the so-called Islamic saintly miracles (karamat). The trademark of both ascetics and mystics across the centuries, this feature became more prevalent fromthe beginning of the twelfth century onward. I will conclude with a brief note on the most three celebrated figures of Yemen’s religious and cultural history: Abu al-Ghayth ibn Jamil (d. 1253) and his rival Ahmad ibn `Alwan (d. 1266) from the mountainous area, andMuhammad ibn `Ali al-`Alawi, known as al-Faqih al-Muqaddam (d. 1256), from Hadramawt.

scholarly journals The Farmer's Law

1910 ◽  
Vol 30 (1) ◽  
pp. 85-108 ◽  
Author(s):  
Walter Ashburner
Keyword(s):  
Ninth Century ◽  
Difference Of Opinion ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Legislative Activity ◽  
The Government

The origin of the little code for the government of Byzantine agriculturists, which is known in the manuscripts as the Farmer's Law (νόμος γϵωργικός), has occasioned some difference of opinion among the learned men who have dealt with it. The greatest authority on Byzantine law, Zachariä von Lingenthal, changed his mind on the subject. He began by thinking it the work of a private hand—the compiler of the Appendix Eclogae—and assigning it to the eighth or ninth century (Historiae Juris Graeco-Romami Delineatio, p. 32). It was put together, in his opinion, partly from the legislation of Justinian and partly from local custom. According to his last view (Geschichte des Griechisch-römischen Rechts, 3rd ed. pp. 249 sqq.) it is a product of the legislative activity of the emperors Leo and Constantine and was enacted about the year 740 A.D.

Virgil the Grammarian and Bede: a preliminary study

2006 ◽  
Vol 35 ◽  
pp. 7-21 ◽  
Author(s):  
Damian Bracken
Keyword(s):  
Early Medieval ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Preliminary Study ◽  
Biblical Commentaries

AbstractThe chapters in Bede's De temporum ratione begin with an etymology for the name of the subject to be examined. Sources and analogues for some have not hitherto been identified. This article shows that some of these etymologies of words for the divisions of time come ultimately, though perhaps not directly, from bk XI of Virgil the Grammarian's Epitomae. These accounts of the origins of calendrical and cosmological terms wound their way through early western computistical works and eventually into Bede's De temporum ratione. The article identifies examples of Virgil's influence on anonymous early medieval biblical commentaries and discusses their significance as pointers towards their place of composition.

The Deposit of Monastic Faith: The Carolingians on the Essence of Monasticism

2013 ◽  
Vol 49 ◽  
pp. 74-86
Author(s):  
Renie Choy
Keyword(s):  
Ninth Century ◽  
First Century ◽  
Classic Work ◽  
Precise Statement ◽  
Love Of Learning ◽  
Monastic Life ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Twenty First Century ◽  
External Form

We live in an age wary of admitting that any institution has an essence, and this has posed a dilemma for the study of monasticism. Until relatively recently, historians of monasticism zealously sought out its timeless and immutable inner qualities rather than its many varieties. While acknowledging the changes in external form and circumstances, Adolf von Harnack’s Monasticism: Its Ideals and History (1881), Dom Morin’s L’Idéal monastique (1912), James Hannay’s The Spirit and Origin of Christian Monasticism (1903) and Herbert Workman’s The Evolution of the Monastic Ideal (1913) nevertheless pursued the stable qualities of monasticism which had survived the tides of time. Even in 1957 Jean Leclercq could still presume that monasticism had an ‘essence’, in a classic work translated into English under the title The Love of Learning and the Desire for God: A Study of Monastic Culture. To our twenty-first-century ears, such a monolith of a title, suggestive of the existence of a metahistorical ‘monastic ideal’, seems out of date. This essay approaches the subject of monastic historiography via an examination of Carolingian reflection on the monastic past, arguing that the significance of the ninth-century monastic programme lies in its effort to distil the entire received monastic heritage into a coherent and precise statement about the fundamental purpose of the monastic life. So we ask the question: when Eigil described Boniface and Sturm as spending a day away in a ‘sweet discussion about the life and manners of monks’, what exactly did he think they were talking about?

A Short Survey of Yemeni Sufism from Its Inception up to the Thirteenth Century

2009 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-19
Author(s):  
Muhammad Aziz
Keyword(s):  
Cultural History ◽  
Thirteenth Century ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Ninth Century ◽  
Mountainous Area ◽  
Economic Activities ◽  
Short Survey ◽  
The Status ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Intellectual Activities

This paper analyzes the historical conditions of Yemen’s Sufi movement from the beginning of Islam up to the rise of the Rasulid dynasty in the thirteenth century. This is a very difficult task, given the lack of adequate sources and sufficient academic attention in both the East and theWest. Certainly, a few sentences about the subject can be found scattered in Sufi literature at large, but a respectable study of the period’s mysticism can hardly be found.1 Thus, I will focus on the major authorities who first contributed to the ascetic movement’s development, discuss why a major decline of intellectual activities occurred in many metropolises, and if the existing ascetic conditions were transformed into mystical tendencies during the ninth century due to the alleged impact ofDhu’n-Nun al-Misri (d. 860). This is followed by a brief discussion ofwhat contributed to the revival of the country’s intellectual and economic activities. After that, I will attempt to portray the status of the major ascetics and prominent mystics credited with spreading and diffusing the so-called Islamic saintly miracles (karamat). The trademark of both ascetics and mystics across the centuries, this feature became more prevalent fromthe beginning of the twelfth century onward. I will conclude with a brief note on the most three celebrated figures of Yemen’s religious and cultural history: Abu al-Ghayth ibn Jamil (d. 1253) and his rival Ahmad ibn `Alwan (d. 1266) from the mountainous area, andMuhammad ibn `Ali al-`Alawi, known as al-Faqih al-Muqaddam (d. 1256), from Hadramawt.

Biblical Israel in the Ninth Century?

2007 ◽  
Author(s):  
PHILIP R. DAVIES
Keyword(s):  
Iron Age ◽  
Ninth Century ◽  
Biblical Narrative ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Critical History ◽  
Ancient Israel ◽  
United Monarchy ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Crucial Part

Most archaeologists of ancient Israel still operate with a pro-biblical ideology, while the role that archaeology has played in Zionist nation building is extensively documented. Terms such as ‘ninth century’ and ‘Iron Age’ represent an improvement on ‘United Monarchy’ and ‘Divided Monarchy’, but these latter terms remain implanted mentally as part of a larger portrait that may be called ‘biblical Israel’. This chapter argues that the question of ‘biblical Israel’ must be regarded as distinct from the kingdoms of Israel and Judah as a major historical problem rather than a given datum. ‘Biblical Israel’ can never be the subject of a modern critical history, but is rather a crucial part of that history, a ‘memory’, no doubt historically conditioned, that became crucial in creating Judaism. This realization will enable us not only to write a decent critical history of Iron Age central Palestine but also to bring that history and the biblical narrative into the kind of critical engagement that will lead to a better understanding of the Bible itself.

scholarly journals THE INFLUENCE OF ABBASID EMPIRE AND COMMUNITY NEEDS IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF ḤADĪTH LITERATURE AND ISLAMIC PROPHETOLOGY

2017 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ahmad Sanusi Azmi
Keyword(s):  
Significant Role ◽  
Ninth Century ◽  
Analytical Analysis ◽  
Community Influence ◽  
Community Needs ◽  
Arduous Task ◽  
Enormous Amount ◽  
The Subject

AbstractAt the time of Abbasid Empire, the Caliph’s court seems to give serious attention in safeguarding the prophethood of Muḥammad and supporting the development of ḥadīth literature. Not only had the Muslims scholar, his own Caliph also produced a work on Islamic Prophetology. Caliph al-Ma’mūn (d. 218/833) has been documented as one of the Abbasid Caliph that produced a work known as Risāla fī Aʿlām al-Nubuwwa. In fact, the Abbasid ruler were also identified as participating in ḥadīth discourse and praising for the ḥadīth colloquy. This actions clearly exhibit the court’s patronage of ḥadīth discourse. In his account, Ibn al-Samʿānī records that al-Manṣūr (d. 158/775), al-Rashīd (d. 193/809) and al-Ma’mūn (d. 218/833) were among the Abbasid Caliphate’s supporters who extolled the ḥadīth colloquium. This study aims to explore the Abbasid’s court and community influence on the development of ḥadīth discourse and Islamic Prophetology. The study is qualitative in nature, in which the researcher employed both critical and analytical analysis on Islamic sources related to the subject. It is indeed an arduous task to sift the enormous amount of Islamic sources, thus, this study is focuses on works produced within the ninth century as its parameter of study. The study in its finding confirms that the Abbasid court appears as playing significant role to safeguarding the prophethood of Muḥammad and expanding ḥadīth literature. The study also ascertains salient evidences bearing witnesses to Muslim and non-Muslim encounters concerning the prophethood of Muḥammad that contribute to the development of Islamic discourse on the subject.  

Early Accounts of Witchcraft, Sorcery, and Magic in Medieval Rus

2020 ◽  
pp. 15-25
Keyword(s):  
Eleventh Century ◽  
Ninth Century ◽  
European Russia ◽  
Historical Events ◽  
Men And Women ◽  
Narrative History ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Devil ◽  
Runic Inscriptions

This chapter discusses early accounts of witchcraft, sorcery, and magic in medieval Rus. “Rus” is the name given to the lands of the Eastern Slavs in the medieval accounts of the region that now comprises Ukraine, Belarus, and European Russia. Conventionally, the narrative history of Rus begins in the eighth or ninth century, when diverse Slavic, Baltic, Finnic, Turkic, and Scandinavian people settled the region. Along with some Arabic accounts, Scandinavian runic inscriptions, occasional mentions in European documents, and a few Byzantine Greek records, the main textual sources on Rus are historical chronicles written by Rus churchmen beginning in the late eleventh century. The excerpts in the chapter may narrate actual historical events, or they may reveal more about how their authors thought about their history and their present. In either case, they are good stories, and they show how these medieval authors thought about magic and sorcery, and about how those practices interacted with other issues of concern: with the paganism that remained active long after the formal conversion of Rus; with teachings about the devil and his wiles; and with ideas about men and women and their respective characteristics and proclivities toward sorcery.

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