Reviews for Religion in the Medieval West

The average rating for Religion in the Medieval West based on 2 reviews is 4.5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2021-03-31 00:00:00 Lucas Film It is really unfortunate that the second edition of this book should note that it is necessary for students of Medieval religion to start essentially from zero, but this is something that I have experienced as a teacher as well, "The first edition was designed to be read by students, many of whom had no detailed knowledge of the Christian faith, but most of whom were products of a Christian cultural tradition...[the second edition] is conprehensible to readers who have no knowledge of Christianity at all." (vii.) The churches and monasteries which dominate the landscapes of Western Europe are not even no longer active centres of faith or monuments to the past, but are seen as odd and foreign symbols which magically sprang up like mushrooms but have no living connection to the current inhabitants who are oblivious to their meaning or down-right hostile to their message. As such, much of this book reads like a little catechism of the Christian (Catholic) faith in the Middle Ages. I have no certainty of Professor Hamilton's religious persuation, but his doctoral supervisor was the famous convert and monk Dom David Knowles, and Hamilton's general sympathy for the religious views of the people in the Middle Ages makes the book enjoyable reading. So often modern scholarship resorts to vilifying the Middel Ages or worse, dismissing the religious beliefs as archaic or superstitious. Much of what Professor Hamilton states regarding religion in general in the Middle Ages, such as "the centrality and uniformity, together with a strong strain of puritanism, which have characterized the Catholic Church of the west since the reforms of the sixteenth-century were not dominant features of the medieval church...belief was almost universal, but religious observance much of the time was fairly minimal" (vii-viii) rings true and is confirmed by other classics, such as A Short History of the Western Liturgy and The Spanish Inquisition: A Historical Revision. Maury Williams, one of the best history professors I ever had the previlege of studying with, compared religion in the Middle Ages, not to uber-Catholic countries like Poland, but more like Latin-America, where Christianity is ubiquitous but simultanously a democratic process and not one imposed from above. Hamilton's book though does not delve deeply into the religious hierarchy, beliefs and popular practices, which is to be expected in a two-hundred page summary, but is also shot on footnotes and details. There is sufficient information and many illuminating examples, but at heart this remains an undergraduate introduction to Medieval Catholicism, and in many ways Catholicism and Christianity in general, unless one is a dyed in the wool Calvinist or Ultramontane Jansenist. The chapters illustrate the wide breadth: Part I The Western Church 1. Christian Belief 2. Sources of Authority 3. Church Organization I: The Secular Clergy 4. Church Organization II: The Regular Clergy 5. Church Survices 6. Ethical Teaching Part II The Practice of the Christian Life 7. Lay People's Knowledge of the Christian Faith 8. Sacraments and the Rites of Passage 9. Popular Devotions 10. The Quest for Perfection 11. Difficulties of Believing Part III The Diversity of Religious Experience 12. A Tradition of Dissent 13. Relations with the Eastern Churches 14. Paganism, Witchcraft and Ritual Magic 15. Contacts with other Religions

Review # 2 was written on 2008-11-04 00:00:00 Michael Bartosh A book that is both informative and entertaining! I learned quite a lot about some of the origins of modern Christian practice as well as learning quite a few things I didn't know about the Middle Ages in general. The author does jump around a bit and sometimes assumes the reader to just magically know what he is talking about, but with the informative value of the remainder of the book these few spots of incoherence can easily be forgiven.