The Legends Of The Holy Harlots

Download or read book The Legends of the Holy Harlots written by Andrew M. Beresford and published by Tamesis Books. This book was released on 2007 with total page 186 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An introduction to the legends of Saints Thaïs and Pelagia, together with critical editions of the five Castilian redactions. The legends of the holy harlots, Thaïs and Pelagia, are two of the most controversial accounts of female sanctity to have circulated in Spain during the Middle Ages. In this book, which reviews the origin and development of theircults, the author reconsiders the relationships that have traditionally been thought to exist between them and three of the other so-called prostitute saints: Mary Magdalene, Mary of Egypt, and Mary the niece of Abraham. This is accompanied by an evaluation of the five Castilian versions of the two legends and their Latin sources, followed by a reading of their thematic and structural significance, with particular emphasis paid to the ways in which the twowomen renounce their sins and embark on the slow and agonizing path of redemption. The book is completed by critical editions of the five Castilian versions. ANDREW M. BERESFORD lectures in Spanish at the University of Durham.

Download or read book Holy Harlots in Medieval English Religious Literature written by Juliette Vuille and published by Boydell & Brewer. This book was released on 2021-04-16 with total page 298 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: First comprehensive investigation of the major significance of female sinners turned saints in medieval literature.

Download or read book Legends of the Holy Rood written by Morris and published by . This book was released on 1871 with total page 706 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Women from the Golden Legend written by Emma Gatland and published by Boydell & Brewer Ltd. This book was released on 2011 with total page 267 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book examines one collection of saints' lives, or sanctorals, and the twenty-five female saints witnessed therein. Included in the study are transcriptions of twenty-two previously unedited lives.

Download or read book Promiscuous Grace written by Sonia Velázquez and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2023-06-02 with total page 243 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Theologians, poets, artists, and laypeople alike have been fascinated by Saint Mary of Egypt's legend since it was first recorded in the seventh century. Mary's prominence is religious and symbolic, encompassing sin and sanctity, the excesses of nymphomania and asceticism, the charms of nubile youth and the wrinkles of old age. In Promiscuous Grace, scholar of religion Sonia Velázquez thinks with Saint Mary of Egypt about what beauty has to do with holiness. With an archive spanning medieval Spanish poetry, Baroque paintings, a seventeenth-century hagiographic drama, and Balzac's treatment of Saint Mary in Le chef-d'oeuvre inconnu, Velázquez argues for the relevance of the appeal to the senses and the importance of the surface in religious texts. She draws on insights from philosophy, literary history and theory, and religious, visual and gender studies, and pays close attention to the texture of the words and images that make the legend of Saint Mary of Egypt come alive and remain relevant today"--

Download or read book Harlot or Holy Woman? written by Phyllis A. Bird and published by Penn State Press. This book was released on 2020-01-16 with total page 315 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Harlot or Holy Woman? presents an exhaustive study of qedešah, a Hebrew word meaning “consecrated woman” but rendered “prostitute” or “sacred prostitute” in Bible translations. Reexamining biblical and extrabiblical texts, Phyllis A. Bird questions how qedešah came to be associated with prostitution and offers an alternative explanation of the term, one that suggests a wider participation for women as religious specialists in Israel’s early cultic practice. Bird’s study reviews all the texts from classical antiquity cited as sources for an institution of “sacred prostitution,” alongside a comprehensive analysis of the cuneiform texts from Mesopotamia containing the cognate qadištu and Ugaritic texts containing the masculine cognate qdš. Through these texts, Bird presents a portrait of women dedicated to a deity, engaged in a variety of activities from cultic ritual to wet-nursing, and sharing a common generic name with the qedešah of ancient Israel. In the final chapter she returns to biblical texts, reexamining them in light of the new evidence from the ancient Near East. Considering alternative models for constructing women’s religious roles in ancient Israel, this wholly original study offers new interpretations of key texts and raises questions about the nature of Israelite religion as practiced outside the royal cult and central sanctuary.

Download or read book Picturing the 'Pregnant' Magdalene in Northern Art, 1430-1550 written by Penny Howell Jolly and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-12-05 with total page 293 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Examining innovations in Mary Magdalene imagery in northern art 1430 to 1550, Penny Jolly explores how the saint’s widespread popularity drew upon her ability to embody oppositions and embrace a range of paradoxical roles: sinner-prostitute and saint, erotic seductress and holy prophet. Analyzing paintings by Rogier van der Weyden, Quentin Massys, and others, Jolly investigates artists’ and audiences’ responses to increasing religious tensions, expanding art markets, and changing roles for women. Using cultural ideas concerning the gendered and pregnant body, Jolly reveals how dress confirms the Magdalene’s multivalent nature. In some paintings, her gown’s opening laces betray her wantonness yet simultaneously mark her as Christ’s spiritually pregnant Bride; elsewhere ’undress’ reconfirms her erotic nature while paradoxically marking her penitence; in still other works, exotic finery expresses her sanctity while celebrating Antwerp’s textile industry. New image types arise, as when the saint appears as a lovesick musician playing a lute or as a melancholic contemplative, longing for Christ. Some depictions emphasize her intercessory role through innovative pictorial strategies that invite performative viewing or relate her to the mythological Pandora and Italian Renaissance Neoplatonism. Throughout, the Magdalene’s ambiguities destabilize readings of her imagery while engaging audiences across a broad social and religious spectrum.