Reading the Bible in the Middle Ages

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For earlier medieval Christians, the Bible was the book of guidance above all others, and the route to religious knowledge, used for all kinds of practical purposes, from divination to models of government in kingdom or household. This books focus is on how medieval people accessed Scripture by reading, but also by hearing and memorizing sound-bites from the liturgy, chants and hymns, or sermons explicating Scripture in various vernaculars. Time, place and social class determined access to these varied forms of Scripture. Throughout the earlier medieval period, the Psalms attracted most readers and searchers for meanings. This books contributors probe readers motivations, intellectual resources and religious concerns. They ask for whom the readers wrote, where they expected their readers to be located and in what institutional, social and political environments they belonged; why writers chose to write about, or draw on, certain parts of the Bible rather than others, and what real-life contexts or conjunctures inspired them; why the Old Testament so often loomed so large, and how its law-books, its histories, its prophetic books and its poetry were made intelligible to readers, hearers and memorizers. This books contributors, in raising so many questions, do justice to both uniqueness and diversity.

Reviews

This is an excellent collection of essays demonstrating a wide variety of ways in which medieval people experienced and used Scripture. Particularly welcome is the consideration of audience and of the embedding of exegetical argumentation in wider political and personal aims. -- William T. Flynn, Lecturer in Medieval Latin, University of Leeds, UK
Unusually coherent and crisply written, displaying an impressive chronological and geographic range, this volume tell us who read the Bible, why, to what uses readers put it, and what versions they read. These essays will be of keen interest to scholars in many fields. -- Thomas F.X. Noble, Andrew V. Tackes Professor, University of Notre Dame, USA
[This] collection will offer medievalists of every stripe much food for thought and fodder for further research. * Catholic Historical Review *

Author Bio

Jinty Nelson is Emeritus Professor in the Department of History, King's College London, UK. She is a Fellow of the British Academy and has published extensively on early medieval Europe. Her research focus has been on kingship, government and political ideas, on religion and ritual, and increasingly on women and gender. Damien Kempf is a Senior Lecturer in Medieval History at the University of Liverpool, UK. His research focuses on the political and cultural history of medieval Europe (400-1200). He has recently published a new edition and an English translation of Paul the Deacons Liber de episcopis Mettensibus (2013).