Medieval Heresy: Popular Movements from the Gregorian Reform to the Reformation (Paperback)

~ (Author) "Heresy, and the horror it inspires, intertwines with the history of the Church itself..." (more)
Key Phrases: lay chalice, eucharistic heresy, wandering preaching, Holy Spirit, New Town, Roman Church (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

For the third edition, this comprehensive history of the great heretical movements of the Middle Ages has been updated to take account of recent research in the field.

Product Details

• Paperback: 504 pages
• Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell; 3 edition (September 9, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0631222766
• ISBN-13: 978-0631222767
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 6 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #918,742 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Readable Overview of Heretical Theology, November 16, 2001

By	Lisa J. Steele (Bolton, MA USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Medieval Heresy (Paperback)

Lambert's _Medieval Heresy_ provides a surprisingly readable overview of the major European heretical movements of the Middle Ages. Readers interested in Church history and the development of Catholic and Protestant theology will find useful insights. Historical heresies also have a surprising resonance with modern charismatic cults.
To cover the vast array of major heretical movements over several centuries, the book assumes a basic grounding in medieval history and culture. It is readable without such a grounding, but may be more confusing.
A short glossary of heretics is provided. A timeline of major events would have been useful.

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A Good Book to Have, November 9, 2003

By A Customer

Lambert's book manages to cover a large amount of history in readable and helpful manner. It is a great introduction into the heresies of the medieval period.

This is really an introductory work - one comes to know the major heresies about at the time, as well as how the Church attempted to deal with the situation and how the secular governments reacted. For those of us trying to get a start into the field, this book is most helpful. Not only does it give you an overview of the topic, but the amount of citation is extremely useful for further study. The short glossary is also helpful in keeping straight the various groups being mentioned.

Another benefit of this work is how it manages to avoid falling into an unfortunately typical problem - the genuflecting to heresy. While some historians tend to fall into seeing the heretics as wonderful, creative, populist bodies cruelly put down by the oppressive, corrupt, arrogant, mean, etc., etc. Church, Lambert thankfully takes a much more distanced and objective look at the matter. He relates who, what, when, where, and offers some discussion on why, without falling into the worship of the "wretched of the earth."

If there would be any critique, it would be the lack of a time table to keep the various groups organized in time (for the benefit of the reader). But, it doesn't really warrant a star marked off (oh, if only one could put in four and a half stars). This work is readable and easily accessable. Anyone interested in this topic or time period should pick this book up, whether academic or interested layperson. Highly recommended.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars An account of holy zeal to suppress religious initiative, January 24, 2008

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

What kinds of religious initiative were meritorious, and which could get you the death penalty? Lambert explores where that line lay, and who crossed it. On the one hand, popes like Innocent III (1198-1216) looked for ways to encourage initiative by both clergy and lay people. He spoke of empowering three orders of religious workers -- the clerics, monastics, and associations of married men, who would live with their families while spreading the Gospel. This "third order" of married men, Innocent advised, should be allowed to extol moral behavior, but they must leave all teaching of holy doctrine to the clergy. With that fine distinction, Innocent hoped to renew the church while retaining full control. The two goals, of course, tended to conflict.

Lambert shows how it was not enemies of Christianity, but the "over-enthusiasts", like the Waldensian lay preachers' movement, or the "Peace of God" movement, who the church most commonly condemned. The Peace of God movement, which called on laypeople to organized prayer for an end to warfare, was condemned for violating the proper division of religious labor: the priests and monastics were to lead prayers, and laypeople to do secular work.

Obviously demand was growing among ordinary believers for a share in the spiritual life of monastics, and a share in the pastoral responsibility of priests. But as Lambert shows, the church's response was less to encourage than to punish that initiative -- as if religious power was a finite resource which the clergy must hoard to itself. In that case, it seemed that the church's official goal was less to spread religion than to monopolize it. A dominator church displayed greater zeal for enforcing an upper limit to spiritual growth, than it did for uplifting the socially "sub-normal".