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"A magnificent history of doctrine."—New York Review of Books "In this volume Jaroslav Pelikan continues the splendid work he has done thus far in his projected five-volume history of the development of Christian doctrine, defined as 'what the Church believes, teaches, and confesses on the basis of the word of God.' The entire work will become an indispensable resource not only for the history of doctrine but also for its reformulation today. Copious documentation in the margins and careful indexing add to its immense usefulness."—E. Glenn Hinson, Christian Century "This book is based on a most meticulous examination of medieval authorities and the growth of medieval theology is essentially told in their own words. What is more important, however, then the astounding number of primary sources the author has consulted or his sovereign familiarity with modern studies on his subject, is his ability to discern form and direction in the bewildering growth of medieval Christian doctrine, and, by thoughtful emphasis and selection, to show the pattern of that development in a lucid and persuasive narrative. No one interested in the history of Christianity or theology and no medievalist, whatever the field of specialization, will be able to ignore this magnificent synthesis."—Bernhard W. Scholz, History "The series is obviously the indispensable text for graduate theological study in the development of doctrine, and an important reference for scholars of religious and intellectual history as well. . . . Professor Pelikan's series marks a significant departure, and in him we have at last a master teacher."—Marjorie O'Rourke Boyle, Commonweal … (more)
An excellent analysis of the development of doctrine during the medieval period, even if those involved in the developments would eschew such a concept.
Pelikan does well at providing an understanding of the perspective of the medieval theologians and the confines in which they worked. He works through disputations about the Augustinian syntheses of the faith and explains how Scholasticism did what it could to provide a comprehensive synthesis of all the issues that came before them.
Full of citations and references to primary and secondary literature, this is a must read for understanding medieval Christian doctrine. ( )
"A magnificent history of doctrine."—New York Review of Books "In this volume Jaroslav Pelikan continues the splendid work he has done thus far in his projected five-volume history of the development of Christian doctrine, defined as 'what the Church believes, teaches, and confesses on the basis of the word of God.' The entire work will become an indispensable resource not only for the history of doctrine but also for its reformulation today. Copious documentation in the margins and careful indexing add to its immense usefulness."—E. Glenn Hinson, Christian Century "This book is based on a most meticulous examination of medieval authorities and the growth of medieval theology is essentially told in their own words. What is more important, however, then the astounding number of primary sources the author has consulted or his sovereign familiarity with modern studies on his subject, is his ability to discern form and direction in the bewildering growth of medieval Christian doctrine, and, by thoughtful emphasis and selection, to show the pattern of that development in a lucid and persuasive narrative. No one interested in the history of Christianity or theology and no medievalist, whatever the field of specialization, will be able to ignore this magnificent synthesis."—Bernhard W. Scholz, History "The series is obviously the indispensable text for graduate theological study in the development of doctrine, and an important reference for scholars of religious and intellectual history as well. . . . Professor Pelikan's series marks a significant departure, and in him we have at last a master teacher."—Marjorie O'Rourke Boyle, Commonweal
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The dominant force in the culture of the Middle Ages was the church, without which it is impossible to comprehend medieval life and thought. The Growth of Medieval Theology (600-1300) is an account of how, beginning with the seventh century, the faith of the medieval church—what it believed, taught, and confessed—evolved from the heritage of the church fathers, developing into forms of doctrine that are still characteristic of Western Christianity. This third volume of Jaroslav Pelikan's The Christian Tradition opens with a description of the integrity of the Catholic tradition as reflected in the doctrinal emphases of the seventh and eighth centuries when the theological synthesis wrought by Augustine of Hippo dominated the teaching of the church. In his second chapter Pelikan explains how that system came into question in the ninth century, the age of Charlemagne, which reopened such issues as the Trinity and the person of Christ, the sacraments and the Virgin Mary, and predestination. These controversies became the critical focus of the centuries that followed, eventually forming the battleground of the Reformation. Pelikan argues in chapter 3 that the tenth and eleventh centuries formulated an interpretation of Christ the Redeemer that Roman Catholicism, both medieval and modern, shares with large parts of Protestantism. Chapter 4, in contrast, demonstrates how the theological achievements of the twelfth century—involving the saints and the sacraments—form a part of medieval church doctrine that Protestants later wholly or partly rejected, but that the Roman Catholic church and Eastern Orthodoxy still largely have in common. Though the Roman church and Catholic faith dominated the Middle Ages, they did meet with opposition; in chapter 5 Pelikan examines other doctrinal conflicts. Finally, in chapter 6, Pelikan considers the great theologians of the thirteenth century not as philosophers, but as men of the church, summarizing for their own time, and for the future, the doctrinal development of the preceding centuries. The Growth of Medieval Theology presents the history of medieval church doctrine as the theme of an entire volume and places it in the context of earlier Western and simultaneous Eastern developments covered in the first two volumes of The Christian Tradition. From jacket flaps.
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