Clerical Roles Research Articles

The Boundaries of Charity: Cistercian Culture and Ecclesiastical Reform, 1098-1180 by Martha G. Newman

772book reviews and the role of women, and investigations of the manifestations of popular piety with their pagan overtones and of heretical movements, in particular of Bogomilism. The methodology is synthetic, solidly based on the primary sources, often effectively summarized, and supported by a thorough and conscientious weighing -up of secondary sources. The book is an exceUent introduction to a very wide variety of topics and writers, presented with objectivity, sensitive appraisal , and admirable clarity. Despite the wide sweep and complex narrative the overaU theme remains dominant and rises in intensity and interest as the work proceeds.The author is helped partly by the great work of his predecessors (especiaUy the French Assumptionists like Paul Gautier and Jean Darrouz ès), partly by his British contemporaries (outstanding works developing Ln greater depth some of the topics treated here have appeared recently from the pens of Paul Magdalino and Rosemary Morris). The writer is primarily a historian, and theologians should not expect a speculative analytic approach. He also suffers from a blind spot as far as liturgy is concerned. OccasionaUy one may question certain assumptions, e.g., the downplaying of the role of clerics in education, or the importance given to some sources, like Neophytos of Cyprus. Certain themes cry out to be investigated further, such as the work of Balsamon, who surely deserves a book to himseU. Again, some patterns are read into a series of events which are not seU-evident, as when the Church is cast in a somewhat sinister power role in relation to baptism and marriage. But the overall judgment cannot be in doubt: the author has confirmed his mastery in the field of Byzantine studies, and this volume is to be welcomed as a great work. Joseph A. Munitiz Campion Hall, Oxford The Boundaries of Charity: Cistercian Culture and Ecclesiastical Reform, 1098-1180. By Martha G. Newman. [Figurae: Reading Medieval Culture.] (Stanford: Stanford University Press. 1996. Pp. xx, 388. $49.50.) The Cistercian Order in the twelfth century has often seemed paradoxical: an order whose leaders preached retreat from the world at the same time as they became involved in many of the major poUtical and ecclesiastical events of the period, an order based on radical poverty whose houses became very wealthy. Scholars once spoke of a conflict between"ideal"and"reality,"in the assumption that within its first two or three generations members of the Order, faced with pressing poUtical and economic reaUties, were forced to abandon their earlier ideals. Within the last ten years or so, however, it has come to be understood that this approach both creates an artificial "ideal" which in many ways owes more to twentieth-century concepts ofwithdrawal and poverty than to twelfth- book reviews773 century concepts, and necessitates postulating "decadence" in a period, the second haU of the twelfth century, when Cistercian prestige was in fact at its highest. Martha Newman, building on this earUer work, carries it further by incorporating for the first time Cistercian theology into a discussion of the monks' political and economic activities. Her central, eminently convincing argument is that the ways that the monks interacted with the world around them can best be understood as the product of the monasteries' internal culture.This culture, she points out, was created in a constant dialogue with the cultures of the secular aristocracy and of the developing schools, because new Cistercian converts came to the cloister not as boys but as young knights or scholars. Thus Newman suggests that Cistercian culture should be seen not as a complete rejection of the physical world but rather as an attempt to redeem and reform that world. Just as theological discourses on the Song of Solomon by men like Bernard of Clairvaux used the language ofphysical love to describe the love between God and His people, so the Cistercians used the unity created both between monks within a house and between the individual houses of the Order to serve as a model for what the world might strive to be. The primary element of this Cistercian culture, according to Newman, was caritas, the love (or "charity" of the title) that tied together monks, dUferent houses, and indeed the whole Christian...

Church and Society in Byzantium under the Comneni, 1081-1261 by Michael Angold

BOOK REVIEWS771 to the disadvantage of Jews. He intelligently disagrees with some of the other authors of the volume, especially Moore, arguing against (p. 224 n. 1 1) "the interchangeabiUty ofpersecuted outgroups."For the late thirteenth-century western Mediterranean, David Abulafia analyzes the interconnected causes of oppression of Muslims and Jews. OUvia Remie Constable shows that one area in which the three faiths could co-operate was in slaving on the Spanish frontier.This tracked shifts in power: in the eighth century most slave buyers were Muslim orJewish, in the thirteenth, Christian. The final part of the book contains three articles rethinking boundaries.The exposition of Christian doctrine in the first, by Langmuir studying the origins of persecution ofJews in Christian theological development, is far from accurate. Both book and otherwise very suggestive article have considerable analysis in which anxieties and doubts express themselves in aggressiveness: one might be forgiven for thinking this as much a psychological reading of a contemporary history department as of medieval Christendom.The second and third essays, Richard Kieckhefer on saints, witches, and necromancers, and Edward Peters on exegesis, examine the question of what inteUectuaI exploration of Christianity was possible, and how boundaries were set. Kieckhefer evokes the clerical underworld of holy necromancy, and Peters gives a weU-informed account of the struggle over the definition of the boundaries of tradition in high medieval theology . Glenn W Olsen The University of Utah Church and Society in Byzantium under the Comneni, 1081-1261. By Michael Angold. (NewYork: Cambridge University Press. 1995. Pp. xvi, 604. $89.95.) This massive work of over 600 pages is an ambitious overview of the inner history and development ofthe Greek-speaking Orthodox Church during a crucial century and a haU in the Middle Ages: the period begins with the accession of the great emperor Alexius I Comnenus (1081) and closes with the recapture of Constantinople from the Latins in 1261.The title "Church and Society" indicates the parameters ofthe study: the Church is constantly viewed in relation to the civU society in which it flourished.Thus relations with the Emperor, with the government and leading families, and with the bulk ofthe population are recurring themes. Indeed the vital question that surfaces throughout the book is that of the Emperor's role in the Church, and students of the Anglican estabUshment will find much to ponder in this sustained attempt by the Byzantine Emperors to "harness the authority of the Church" by adopting the role of epistemonarkhes ("overseeing [supreme?] ruler"). Of particular interest are the studies ofthe writings of several key bishops, the survey ofmonasticism during this period, an original attempt to assess the influence ofcanon law on marriage 772BOOK REVIEWS and the role of women, and investigations of the mamfestations of popular piety with their pagan overtones and of heretical movements, in particular of BogomUism. The methodology is synthetic, solidly based on the primary sources, often effectively summarized, and supported by a thorough and conscientious weighing -up of secondary sources. The book is an exceUent introduction to a very wide variety of topics and writers, presented with objectivity, sensitive appraisal , and admirable clarity. Despite the wide sweep and complex narrative the overaU theme remains dominant and rises in intensity and interest as the work proceeds.The author is helped partly by the great work of his predecessors (especiaUy the French Assumptionists like Paul Gautier and Jean Darrouz ès), partly by his British contemporaries (outstanding works developing in greater depth some of the topics treated here have appeared recently from the pens of Paul Magdalino and Rosemary Morris). The writer is primarily a historian, and theologians should not expect a speculative analytic approach. He also suffers from a blind spot as far as Uturgy is concerned. Occasionally one may question certain assumptions, e.g., the downplaying of the role of clerics in education, or the importance given to some sources, like Neophytos of Cyprus. Certain themes cry out to be investigated further, such as the work of Balsamon, who surely deserves a book to himseU. Again, some patterns are read into a series of events which are not seU-evident, as when the Church is cast in a somewhat sinister power role...

What Are the Clergy For?

What Are the Clergy For?

Wills as Religious Propaganda: The Testament of William Tracy

Wills have become one of the most widely used sources for students of the English Reformation. There has been an ever increasing literature tracing testators' religious beliefs, the role and influence of scribes and clerics, the various copies and manifestations of a particular testament and the often formulaic character of this legal document. Little attention has been paid by students of wills to the polemical and propagandistic qualities of such documents and rightly so, for most testators exhibited greater concern for property than polemics.

The Clerical Character in George Eliot’s Fiction by Oliver Lovesey

REVIEWS Oliver Lovesey, The Clerical Character in George Eliot’s Fiction (Victoria, B.C.: English Literary Studies Monograph Series, No. 53, University of Vic­ toria, 1991). 135. $8.50 (paper). Despite its many interesting observations, this book is too short to cover adequately its twin topics, the characterization and the character of the cleric in Eliot’s novels. The arguments often lack depth and coherence, and are undermined by a disturbing number of misquotations and misreadings. Lovesey begins by surveying the history of religion in England, the his­ tory of the cleric and of his literary representation, the changes in the critical reception of Eliot, and the development of “the conception of literary char­ acter” (16). The chapters that follow cover the characterization methods that make Scenes of Clerical Life an anatomy rather than a typology; “the relationship of the character of the cleric to history, especially the history of Dissent, and religious belief” (36) in Adam Bede and Silas Mamer; the relationship of the cleric to women in The Mill on the Floss; the cleric’s sense of self in Romola and Felix Holt; and the cleric as professional in Middlemarch. Analysis of character is interwoven with discussion of char­ acterization, and therefore of genre, since characterization includes “the delineation of a character’s ‘role’ in narrative” (7). In the final chapter, on Daniel Deronda, Lovesey brings character and characterization together by interpreting Deronda as “one of the best examples of Eliot’s natural priest” (113), and by asserting the “mediating, priestly function” of the narrator (98). This summary imposes a coherence that the book itself lacks— for in­ stance, it is only in this last chapter that mediation is emphasized as part of the clerical role — and it omits many intriguing points briefly raised but not developed, like the tendency for clerics to be seen as barren, and as men better suited to other careers. Theoretical perspective is often fragmentary, sometimes taking the form of a remark wedged into a pre-existing argument: a “nevertheless” on page 43, for instance, seems to connect not with Weber’s words just quoted, but with the sentence before that; on page 105, by making Eng lish Stu d ie s in C a n a d a , 19, 1, March 1993 “this disclosure” refer to Mirah’s discovery mentioned two sentences earlier, Lovesey brackets Said’s intervening comment on imperialism. The reader’s willingness to work through such awkwardness is likely to be severely reduced by the discovery of numerous anomalies ranging from trivial typographical errors to what appear to be wilful misrepresentations of Eliot’s text. “The lower classes, says Mr. Brooke, need the ‘bridge of religion’ ([Middlemarch, Penguin edn.] 41)” (93): this is Lovesey’s rendering of “all men needed the bridle of religion” (emphasis added). “In ‘the rich central plain of what we are pleased to call Merry England’ ( [Silas Marner, Penguin edn.] 53), Aaron says, ‘there need nobody run short o’ victural’ . . . ” (55): the misspelling of “victuals” is a minor offence compared to this conjoining of the narrator’s words on page 53 with Aaron’s remark which (as Lovesey does not tell us) comes from page 198. Sometimes a whole argument is built on a series of misreadings, as in the presentation of Dr. Kenn as Maggie’s confessor in The Mill on the Floss. Quoting the description of Kenn as “a human being who had reached a firm, safe strand, but was looking with helpful pity towards the strugglers still tossed by the waves” ([Penguin edn.] 553), Lovesey likens Kenn to Christ walking on the water, an unlikely analogy since Christ walked from the shore to his disciples’ boat, and then stilled the waves. Lovesey refers to this in­ cident as an “ ‘implicit revelation’ {[Mill] 554)” of Kenn to Maggie (63); but the phrase on page 554 refers to Maggie’s revelation of herself to Kenn. Maggie does not plan “to go back and ‘confess everything’ ( [Mill] 605) to Dr. Kenn” (64); her words are: “they will believe me — I will confess ev­ erything— Lucy will believe me . . . .” The “moral reinforcement” referred to (64) is envisaged as coming not from Dr. Kenn but from “those...

The Federal Drinking Water Program: Friend or Foe?

The author believes the federal approach to regulating water quality is undesirable because it reacts to a problem rather than prevents it. State engineers are forced to assume a clerical role dictated by the US Environmental Protection Agency, instead of providing technical assistance that would prevent noncompliance. As technical assistance programs dwindle, more regulatory violations occur, creating the need for more enforcement action, which steals time from technical assistance efforts. In addition the US Environmental Protection Agency does not have enough money to support the regulations it promulgates. While Senator Henry Waxman (D‐California) castigates the USEPA and proposes exorbitant lead regulations, the states are crippled by a horrendous administrative workload. The author concludes that the federal government should be involved in drinking water program only to the extent of research and development of drinking water standards, leaving decisions on implementation and enforcement to the states. Or, the federal government should fund state programs to allow preventive health work over and above the federal agenda.

Patterns of clerical political behavior in postwar Iran, 1941–53

The advent of the Islamic Republic of Iran in 1979 has raised a number of important questions concerning the complex interrelationship between religion and politics in Iran and in Muslim societies in general. The clerical class, the ruhaniyyat,l because of the crucial role that it played in the revolution and its total dominance of the present Iranian political scene, has become a particular focus of interest. Despite the growing postrevolutionary literature on this subject, there is still little analysis available on many important aspects of clerical political behavior.2 What motivates the clergy to become involved in politics? What circumstances, religious as well as political, facilitate or forbid clerical political involvement? What factors determine the political orientations of the clergy? How do issues of political significance affect intra-clerical relationships? Another important shortcoming of the existing literature is the presence of a strong tendency to treat the clergy as basically a politically monolithic group, while historically there have existed different and distinct patterns of behavior within the Iranian clergy. The present paper attempts to provide some answers to the questions raised above through an analysis of the clerical role in the political developments of postwar Iran. More specifically, it focuses on the 194153 period which is particularly important since it reflects the interactions among various political forces, including the clerics, in a relatively free but highly charged political atmosphere. The goal here is to demonstrate the existence of different patterns of clerical political behavior which may be explained in terms of different sources of motivation for political action among various clerical groups. Also through an examination of the clerical politics in the nationalist era, the increasing involvement and influence of the clergy in the process of the revolution can be placed within the proper context of the changing religious and political circumstances. Furthermore, the experience of this period may shed some light on the roots of some of the major post-revolutionary developments, especially the tension between religious and nationalist political forces. To facilitate a more systematic analysis of the sources of variation in clerical political behavior, the following analytical framework will be utilized in this study.

A clerical role

Shock evidence has reached theNursing Standard office that nurses are being left way behind in the race to extend their roles.

La moelle de la prédication. Essai sur le prône politique dans l'Islam contemporain

This tentative interpretation on the political function of predication in contemporary Islam follows a double approach : a field survey (Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia, Egypt, and thé city of Marseille) and a general theory of monotheist religions : how, through the theses of M. Weber and E. Bloch on the junction of the religious and political fields, can the political function of a revolutionary religious discourse be understood? Using P. Bourdieu's hypotheses on the role of competitive clerics in the production of symbolic goods, the analysis of the "fundamentalist revival " (a debatable term) clarifies the functioning of the various groups' demands for salvation and legitimization through the reclaiming (by some of them) of a classic Muslim traditional technique: the da'wa, or the call for true religion, made in masques transformed by independent preachers into political meeting places.

Kyai and Japanese Military

During the second world war in Southeast Asia, the Japanese army tried to gain the support and cooperation of the people it occupies. In this case the policy becomes very important political Islam in Indonesia, and one prominent characteristic of Japanese politics is concerned with the role of Islamic clerics. But when he landed in Indonesia, the Japanese military has not formulated political Islam is to be implemented. Then immediately stated that the Japanese military government respect the religious population.DOI: 10.15408/sdi.v4i3.772