Saints and Sinners in Early Christian Ireland
Moral Theology in the Lives of Saints Brigit and Columba
By (author) Katja Ritari
In this volume, Katja Ritari shows how a theological reading of hagiography works towards gaining a fuller understanding of the complexity of issues that can be addressed in a hagiographical narrative and of the aims of the medieval authors. The three texts examined in this study belong to the earliest stratum of hagiographical writing in Ireland and thus provide evidence of the formation of an Irish Christian society. This work presents a fresh look at the earliest Lives of saints Brigit and Columba concentrating on moral theology through the image of an ideal Christian and his or her antithesis. In hagiography, the saint is presented as the paragon of perfect Christian behaviour, but the moral message concerning ideal Christian living can also be conveyed through the minor characters which populate the Lives as companions of the saint, and as witnesses and receivers of the effects of his or her miracles. This study is groundbreaking because it turns attention towards the portrayal of these characters, especially towards the lay people whose role in hagiography has thus far been neglected in scholarly studies. The topic of this study- a good Christian life- is a fundamental spiritual and theological question that has relevance to all Christians. It is a central question to the formation of a Christian identity and its soteriological significance makes it a focal theological issue.
- By (author) Katja Ritari
Other Titles in this Series
The ‘Universal Prayer’ in the Ancient Latin Liturgies. Patristic Evidence and Liturgical Texts
Volume 56
Seeking the Face of God
The Reception of Augustine in the Mystical Thought of Bernard of Clairvaux and William of St Thierry
Volume 11
Inventio meditativa
The Rhetoric and Hermeneutics of Meditation in Hugh of Saint-Victor, Guigo II, and Bonaventure of Bagnoregio
Volume 58
Friendship as Ecclesial Binding
A Reading of St. Augustine's Theology of Friendship from his In Iohannis Euangelium Tractatus
Volume 48
Analogical Identities
The Creation of the Christian Self: Beyond Spirituality and Mysticism in the Patristic Era
Volume 28
‘The Letter Killeth’
Redeeming Time in Augustine's Understanding of the Authority of Scripture
Volume 51
The Christian Topography of Early Islamic Jerusalem
The Evidence of Willibald of Eichstatt (700-787 CE)
Volume 2
Through the Bone and Marrow
Re-examining Theological Encounters with Dance in Medieval Europe
Volume 45
Removing Masculine Layers to Reveal a Holy Womanhood
The Female Transvestite Monks of Late Antique Eastern Christianity
Volume 13
The Spirit, the World and the Trinity
Origen's and Augustine's Understanding of the Gospel of John
Volume 40
‘The loss of a minute is just so much loss of life’
Edward Robinson and Eli Smith in the Holy Land
Volume 39
Computus and its Cultural Context in the Latin West, AD 300-1200
Proceedings of the 1st International Conference on the Science of Computus in Ireland and Europe, Galway, 14-16 July, 2006
Volume 5
Similar Books
A Companion to Christianity and Sport in Europe and North America (19th-21st centuries)
Volume 1: Western and Eastern Europe
A Connecting Polemic in the Medieval Mediterranean
The Correspondence of Leo III and Ê¿Umar II
Volume 6
Ars Prophetica
Theology in the Poetry of Twentieth-Century Hebrew Poets Avraham Halfi, Shin Shalom, Amir Gilboa, and T. Carmi
As Messianism Turns to Heresy
The Regenstein Chair Lectures On Lurianic Kabbalah and Shabbatai Tzevi at Hebrew Union College - Cincinnati
Creating the Woman in Antiquity
Proceedings of the 16th Melammu Workshop, Innsbruck, 2–3 June 2022
Volume 13
Cultic Kisses
Fruitful Encounters Between Deities and Humans. Festschrift for Angelika Berlejung on the Occasion of Her 65th Birthday
De/colonizing Theologies
Glocal Histories, Contemporary Challenges, Theoretical Reflections
Volume 4
Drunk the Potion, No Whit Charmed
The Doctrine of Pure and Perfect Souls from Iamblichus to Damascius
Extracanonical Traditions and the Holy Land
Texts, Rituals, and Material Culture in Late Antique Palestine
Fear, Fear of God, God-Fearers
Philological and Historical Perspectives on the World of Ancient Judaism and Christianity
Gender and Iconography in Antiquity
Femininities, Masculinities, Ambiguities, and Beyond in the Ancient Levant, Near East, and Mediterranean