Early Celtic Christianity (Celtic Interest) [Paperback]

Brendan Lehane (Author)

Book Description

Series: Celtic Interest | Publication Date: November 1995

This lively and original account of early Celtic Christianity - which was of far greater importance in the development of Western culture than we commonly realize - is told against the background of European history of the first seven centuries A.D. It focuses on the lives of Saints Brendan, Columba, and Columbanus, who lived active and effective lives in the cause of the early Church. Brendan, one of the founding fathers of Christianity in Ireland, was known in legend as a voyager and was thought to have reached the Western Hemisphere long before the Vikings. Columba took Celtic Christianity to Scotland and helped to re-establish it in Wales and in the North and West of England. Columbanus was the great Irish missionary to continental Europe, where he and his followers helped to convert the heathen invaders from the East. When Rome, in the person of St. Augustine, Pope Gregory's apostle to the Angles, penetrated again to England, a showdown between Roman and Celtic Christianity was inevitable. The dramatic confrontation occurred at the Council of Whitby in 664. Rome, with its organization and authority, won, and Celtic Catholicism went into eclipse. But some of its influence persisted all over Europe, and it had a large share in shaping the culture that ultimately emerged from the dark ages. This book's fascination is the picture that it gives of the movements of peoples, the shaping of new countries, and the development of ideas during those too-little-known centuries.

--This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"An enchanting book... This account of Celtic homogeneity as expressed in three great men, whose interior journeys led them outwards, far from Ireland their home, to bring to England, to Scotland, and to Europe civilization and sanctity, is a delight." Anne Freemantle

"...an enlightening book. Three men of genius have been taken out of their legend and given historical status. And by showing what two of them did in the most obscure period of European history, post-Roman and Merovingian Gaul, Lehane has made us more knowledgeable about these times." Padraic Colum

"... a welcome addition to the existing books about this ever fresh and virile, and often unashamedly magical, Early Celtic World. It makes for absorbing reading." Ann Moray --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

About the Author

Brendan Lehane (b. London 1931) studied at Eton College and King's College, Cambridge. Founder of Image Magazine, he was also been feature editor of Town Magazine, and contributed articles for magazines in England, Ireland and the USA. --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

Product Details

• Paperback: 240 pages
• Publisher: Constable (November 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0094744904
• ISBN-13: 978-0094744905
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.3 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.9 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,533,494 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

39 of 39 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars This is a good book!, August 27, 1997

By 

John L. Edwards - See all my reviews

This review is from: Early Celtic Christianity (Celtic Interest) (Paperback)

I read this book prior to Cahill's "How the Irish Saved Civilisation" which is better known due to its run on the bestseller list. I found that reading this book first was a good choice, because its deep background made Cahill's book a better read. In fact, "Early Celtic Christianity" proved to be an excellent read because it allowed a friend (a Cahill reader) and I to compare and contrast the two different views of this interesting point in history. Largely about the same era, this book focuses particularly on three of the more important saints of Ireland -- Brendan, Columba, and Columbanus, and because of this has the distinct advantage of being able to concentrate on some of the smaller details of their lives, and how that effected the turning points of the day, including the christianization of Scotland and the controversial Council at Whitby. While Cahill tends to be more secular and political in his approach, Lehane is more religiously and historically oriented, leading to a more intimate view of the culture. I also found it refreshing that he was careful to present well documented materials as facts and rumors and legends as theories, rather than muddying the two together. It invites you to make your own decisions on how to interpret. A good read all around. A great second read for those who enjoyed Cahill.

If you have read neither book, I recommend both, making this one the first. It presents a firmer foundation (in my humble opinion) and gives Cahill's quicker and lighter view of Columbanus a strong background.

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A challenge to fullness from the far shore of ancient Christianity, February 15, 2008

By 

Brian Griffith (Toronto, Canada) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Early Celtic Christianity (Paperback)

Lehane proves a good, entertaining guide to the Celtic Church in its creative centuries of independence. His account highlights a fresh, innovative movement of self-motivated evangelists, which at first owed little or nothing to the state church of the Roman empire. In Ireland, the first native Christians assumed it natural to have female priests and bishops. They set up "double monasteries" of both men and women, and the head of the whole monastery was often a woman. So in 664, the council of Whitby took place in a Celtic double monastery, with both sexes under direction of Abbess Hilda.

Lehane explores the social world and accomplishments of this great religious movement. Then he shows how its open spirit came to clash with the imperial church's requirements for control over women and other subordinates. In Lehane's account the dreams of the old Celtic Church seem to come alive and challenge our imagination.

-author of Correcting Jesus

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars A more complicated read., April 7, 2008

By 

John Gardner "Speedbump" (Arizona, USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Early Celtic Christianity (Paperback)

The author goes into greater detail discussing the history of Celtic Christianity than some of his peers. With historical documentation being limited, he uses some supposition, but uses it well.

I'd make it the second book that I read on the subject, after, possibly, "Celtic Christianity" by Joyce.