Heretics and Scholars in the High Middle Ages, 1000-1200 [Paperback]

Heinrich Fichtenau (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 1, 2000

The struggle over fundamental issues erupted with great fury in the 11th and 12th centuries. In this book, Henry Fichtenau turns his attention to a new attitude that emerged in Western Europe around the year 1000. This new attitude was exhibited both in the rise of heresy in general population and in the self-confident rationality of the nascent schools. Fichtenau shows how these two separate intellectual phenomena contributed to a mediaeval world that was never quite as uniform as might appear from our modern perspective. Fichtenau's panoramic survey opens with the new heretics with popular appeal in the early 11th century and ends with the hew heretics with scholarly appeal in the late 12th. He presents the spectrum of lay men and women, schoolmen, and members of religious orders who laboured to delve into the most basic questions of reality with passion and conviction. While he recognizes some fundamental conditions underpinning the rise of both heretical movements - particularly the Cathars - as well as Scholastics, he is careful to distinguish the fundamental differences among these groups. Central to these differences is how myth and textuality played a role in their beliefs, what tools they developed to analyze the language of myth (religious or philosophical), and why their speculations were allied with doubt about the mysteries inherent to mediaeval Christian faith. First published in German in 1991, "Heretics and Scholars of High Middle Ages" continues a grand tradition of scholarship on the intellectual history of the Middle Ages.

Editorial Reviews

Review

A book that should be read by all those interested in heresy as well as medieval theology. --Church History

Fichtenau has undertaken to write an extended essay on nonconformity in the twelfth century, and he has found it located in two primary notional regions: in popular heresy and in the arrogant rationality of the schools. . . [The book's] parts . . . are formidable, and any scholar will find stimulation in an essay written in a style both informative and provocative. . . . The result is an analysis of the twelfth century as fruitful and interesting as any of the much-touted medievalist products of the French school so much more readily translated into English than German works these days. --Steven Rowan, Speculum: A Journal of Medieval Studies

One of the most comprehensive documents of the history of Indian immigrants in the United States. Rangaswamy demonstrates full command of the history, culture, and linguistic profile of America's Indian community, offering both insiders and outsiders perspectives on issues of importance to immigrants. --Rajeshwari Pandharipande, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

Language Notes

Text: English (translation)
Original Language: German --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 376 pages
• Publisher: Pennsylvania State Univ Pr; Reprint edition (June 1, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0271020466
• ISBN-13: 978-0271020464
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 5.9 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,952,781 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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5.0 out of 5 stars Millennial shifts, April 19, 2006

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This review is from: Heretics and Scholars in the High Middle Ages, 1000-1200 (Paperback)

Fichtenau quotes William of Conches in the introduction: 'They prefer to remain ignorant rather than consult others, and when they know that someone is engaging in research, they shout that he is a heretic.' The charge of heresy was not uncommon in the late Middle Ages, that period of history that was precursor to both the Renaissance and the Reformation. However, as Fichtenau demonstrates, 'the medieval worldview was never as uniform as it might appear from the modern perspective.' In this broad historical period, perhaps the most contentious were the eleventh and twelfth centuries, a period that came after generations of relative stability and entered into crises of faith and innovations in science and technology.

One of the catalysts for this change was the growth of advanced schools, the forerunners of modern universities, where (not without difficulty and the more than occasional charge of heresy) new ideas and ways of thinking were introduced and developed. In Fichtenau's third section, 'The Realm of Reason', he looks at the early Scholastics (who were not immune from the charge of heresy) as well as other ideas that came out of both Platonic and Aristotelian philosophical schools. Fichtenau's first two section develop the religious and heretic ideas: specific heresies such as the Cathars, more general discussion about the genesis and development of heretical systems and communities, religious and philosophical mythological paradigms, and the use of the bible in these different ways.

One important element in all of this discussion, according to Fichtenau, is to remember that many of the elements lifted up for study out of medieval Europe in fact involved a small number of people. 'Catharism, Platonism, and religious spirituality were distinct phenomena. They did not define the twelfth century; indeed they are only associated with relatively small groups of individuals. That these modes of thought could coexist side by side, however, testifies to the unique niche occupied by this century in European history.' The diversity within the seeming uniformity of Christendom would become a permanent feature.

Fichtenau's work is scholarly rigourous, and the translation by Denise Kaiser very readable and engaging. There are extensive notes, a good index, and a useful select bibliography of primary and secondary works. This work both helps introduce and significantly deepens the understanding of a lesser-studied period of history in Western culture, in a fascinating way.