The Monastic World - a 1,200 Year History (Andrew Jotischky, 2024)

I liked this a lot though a few sections dragged. 

Palestine, Egypt, East - early days - mentor/initiate relationships. A lot of freelancing away from episcopal control. Some supported by local populations (the Stylite). The desert as a place of cleansing and retreat - echoing Jesus’s 40 day trial.

Western Europe comes later - quickly evolves into more of a relationship with aristocracy (most of the monks are from the aristocracy) and royalty. Sons or daughters without another place to go. A way to retain control over assets (principally land) that otherwise might well revert to the king. Quickly evolves to control by the bishops and/or the king (these also were tied together).  Adept abbots might be able to play off bishops, king, aristocracy and retain control.

As Western Europe evolves, huge chunk of recruits come as “oblates” - they never knew any other life than the monastery. 

Benedict, Monte Cassino, his Rule.  A major and enduring set of reforms, widely adopted and more or less followed.

Ireland - never in the Roman Empire. Yet lots of monks and they filter back to Western Europe.

Waves of reform over the centuries as folks perceive the monasteries get too wealthy and worldly.  Francis of Assisi and mendicant orders - more urban.

I kept thinking there are similarities between monasteries and today's NGO's. Public/private, a way for the wealthy to squirrel away funds and control, a way for the rulers to share in the same, all while appearing to support worthy causes. Jobs for members of the granting family and/or the royal family were common. Including control. Tax advantaged. Reformers would show up to purify things, but reversion followed inevitably. The larger the monastery, the more potential for material gain, the greater likelihood of people seeking it.

But that’s not to say there weren’t a lot of folks seeking a genuinely ascetic, prayerful lifestyle.

The ideal of the monk-as-laborer, perhaps even self-sufficient - didn’t work well and monasteries typically had enough lay “brothers” to do the actual work. Choir monks were freed up for their work of prayer and worship, plus (often coming from aristocracy) they often weren’t suited to labor anyway. 

Vikings, Magyars, other raiders as threats. Monasteries typically near coast or river and had portable valuables.  Favorite targets, rough years for the monks.

Other forms of raiders emerge post-Reformation and later - England closes down/seizes all monasteries. French Revolution. Russian Revolution.

Cluny 

Cistercians 

Bernard of Clairvaux

Heloise and Abelard

Because of the need to own land to pay the monastery bills, management needed to be basically professional in nature, yet the abbot often was someone promoted from within (sometimes an oblate - meaning someone raised from childhood in the monastery) with pretty much zero relevant experience.

There was violence depicted in Eco's “The Name of the Rose” - this book describes that there plenty of violent incidents in the monasteries.  Strong opinions in close quarters; valuable assets and a leading or at least important role in the larger community; incidents not common but not unheard of. 

This focuses on Christianity though other religions have monks. Christian monastaries not prominent but not dead. We visit one outside Magog in Quebec province. 

Gospels according to Matthew and Luke (60-95 AD)

I re-read chunks of the Bible from time to time just because.  Inherently interesting; foundational no matter one's religious persuasion; and these still resonate given the emphasis on them during my growing-up years.

Dominion - The Making of the Western Mind (Tom Holland, 2019)

(525 pages) (Gift from PJr/Nedda)

At outset:  useful survey of Christian thinkers, leaders, interaction with Jews, Muslims, what came to be called pagans, atheists.

Main thesis appears to be that Christianity deeply affects the worldview of 21st century folks in the West.  Not shocking; makes a lot of sense; not sure if widely appreciated anymore.  

As author recounts, Christianity's dominance of the West doesn't have a parallel in history.

I had always associated this development very heavily with Constantine in 312 - and no doubt this was important.  Brought Christianity into the mainstream, gave it an imperial model (centralized control, hierarchy; Council of Nicea).

But I was struck how distant that was from what happened quite a bit later in the West.  Rome a hollowed-out dump centuries after 312. The papacy a haven for, at best, well-meaning provincials.  

Then along comes Gregory the Great (pope from 590-604). Charlemagne's needs (he's crowned in 800). This kind of thing really solidified the build-out in the West.

And the scope was incredible.  Bishops, priests, monks, nuns, eventually across literally every country in Europe.  Create major feast days and also saint's days to cover every day of the calendar year.  Create prayers specific to the hours of each day; separate prayers for each day; the idea of confession, tithing.  Cradle to grave sacraments. The Curia. It grows and grows.

(I was struck by this going through my parent's house recently (part of the estate process) - all the Catholic church residuum lingering into their childhoods and beyond.)

As to the importance of Christianity's effect on Western world view - of course - but I thought some of Holland's argument rested on the contradictions that pop up in Christianity (or any religion, for that matter). St. Paul talking about only needing to follow the law as written on the heart; but then detailed regulations.  St. Paul talking about treating women equally, and then backing off.  Jesus saying the poor will always be with us, and also that the rich should give away their goods, and the parable of the savvy investor - which strand dominates?  The existence of the contradictions allows Holland to claim everything, including contradictory thrusts, flows from Christianity.  Hmm.

Unabashed praise for good things from Christianity, which were real - respect for individual, importance of monogamous marriage, concern for the poor - yes of course so many hypocrites and grand failures, but these were revolutionary concepts that took root for the first time.  Refreshing that someone is willing to say so.

The Triumph of Christianity - How a Forbidden Religion Swept the World (Bart D. Ehrman, 2018)

(294 pages)

Book club selection (via me; session held (via Zoom) February 21, 2021).

Re-read of a book first read in 2019, here's what I wrote then.

Notes from this time:

• Be honest - most or all probably wondering why I picked this.  Kind of disjointed; in part the author seems to be rationalizing his own spiritual journey.
• I didn't pick it to support a particular religion, or the idea that religions end up being very convenient for secular purposes.
• The selection is for my usual reasons.  Best way to process current news cycle is to ignore the current news cycle as much as possible, while learning as much as possible about history.  Then things that seem unprecedently difficult or dangerous turn out to be anything but. 
• When looking for books on history, I'm looking for ones that offer up a few ideas I wasn't previously seeing.  For its shortcomings, this book fits the bill.
• For better or worse, western civ is dominated by Christianity.  Other parts of the world deeply affected.  Seems useful to know how that happened, and how some of the key elements got launched.
• Jesus was a loser.  Jews were losers.  Jesus's followers were losers.  Provincial dorks.  No money.  No military (unlike say Islam).  Nothing written down, no "orthodoxy."  No central authority.  How did this possibly grow from a few dozen to many millions (with little growth in first century or two)?  
• Paganism as just "living" - something everyone did (except the Jews).  Relatively unstructured.
• Christianity as radical in so many ways

            --incorporating ethics into religion

            --even if lip service too often - unprecedented idea that each individual is equal before God

            --exclusivity - zero sum game - for the first time, a convert to the new religion means one less member of the old religion.  Threatening to the older religion.

            --hellfire!  Heaven!  Ups the stakes immensely.  Pascal's wager makes sense.

            --perceive a Duty to "save" third parties

• Old religions constantly adding new deities - minimizes conflict.  Monotheism + exclusivity + heaven/hell + duty to save + doctrinal debates = recipe for all sorts of religious conflict.
• Constantine - Rome - centralized authority.  What a path it set the church on.
• Nicene creed - 325 A.D.   The whole point was "one God" - now are there three?  Heretics - three persons in one God!  Etc.
• Challenges where a charismatic founder (see also Muhammed) writes down nothing and provides little or no structure. What are presented as sacred writings were prepared by others decades, hundreds of years later.
• No grand synthesis.  Some ideas.  Hopefully useful as you process western art, literature; think about religion as part of private and public life.

The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Volume II (Edward Gibbon, 1776)

(592 pages)

Volume 2 of 3 (Volume 1 addressed here).

I continue to very much enjoy Gibbon's writing (both substance and style).  And it's impressive to consider how well his work has held up after near 250 years.

This volume circles back to consider the conduct of the Roman government towards Christianity starting with Nero, and continues with general overview until just a few years past the final separation of the Eastern and Western empires (364 AD).

As with Volume 1 - much discussion about the various emperors and the way responsibilities were split.  Major characters included Constantine and his sons; Julian (something of a philosopher-warrior, sought to restore paganism).  Battles go on in both east and west; barbarians and adjacent empires or nations get rowdy; successful emperors seem to rise up sufficiently regularly to hold things together reasonably well.  But not always.  Toward the end of this volume - some of the large-scale wars with Persia that contributed to the mutual exhaustion of Rome and Persia prior to the emergence of Islam.

The discussions about Christianity in this context are pretty interesting.  Many elements for Gibbon resonate with this discussion - where the author was focused on the death of Jesus and the few ragtag followers in place at that time - yet Christianity grew into a powerful worldwide institution - how??  Gibbon pretty staunchly (if somewhat covertly, given that he desired to get published) anti-clerical, anti-organized church - so I try to read him with that in mind.

While Christianity clearly was making some strides, so much of it comes back to Constantine.  Like Mohammed (discussed here), Jesus didn't leave behind a comprehensive written roadmap - later generations (in many cases "very" later!) did that - perhaps they were divinely inspired, perhaps other considerations mattered.  Christianity had some maddeningly tricky concepts - main example being how to define the relationship between "three persons in one God" - not addressed in the Gospels or other early writings.  Arians - known forever as "Arian heretics" after 325 - the best-known not-orthodox (as it turned out) variant.  Various groups in various geographies had various interpretations - and they definitely annoyed one another, but some coexistence seemed to be the norm.

But now there is an emperor with minimal theological background but intense interest in getting everyone on the same page - Council of Nicea, 325 - now there's the imperial juice to define heretics, and make life miserable for them.

And with the imposition of a Roman/imperial superstructure for the church - gobs of money at stake - but not for the not-orthodox clergy.  This of course encouraged intense competition for bishoprics.  Venality arises early, it didn't wait until the Reformation - already imperial Rome found it necessary to pass laws preventing "spiritual adviser" priests from taking huge bequests from wealthy Romans (typically female it seems).

Constantine generally revered for legitimizing Christianity's position in the Roman empire, but wow, was the Roman administrative structure really a good thing for Christianity?   Folks occupying what I'll call "offices" in the 4th century church adopted the outlook and mannerisms of the imperial government.  Not to mention, look what attempted enforcement of orthodoxy has achieved.

Gibbon has an interesting discussion about the difference between the church in the east and the west - he describes the westerners as essentially too rude in the sense that they (recent or present barbarians depending on one's viewpoint) lacked a history of parsing theology minutiae, and thus tended to adopt what was put in front of them by the leadership.  In the east - endless energy to fight about nuances of the nature of the Father, Son, Holy Spirit, and so much else.  We end up with various sub-groups within Christianity to this day, all originating from the eastern church.

Julian was an interesting character - not a willing emperor - preferred hanging around as a philosopher in Athens - but became highly effective, including in battle.

The March of Folly - From Troy to Vietnam (Barbara Tuchman, 1984)

(411 pages)

Somewhat similar to this collection by the same author - she writes a number of essays each interesting in its own right, the puts them in a book and seeks to bind them together by a theme that feels a little forced.  But each is valuable, and the whole is much worth reading.

Four essays here -

First she reviews the "folly" of the Trojans in accepting the Greek gift.  I was reading this concurrently with the Odyssey, and hadn't recalled that the Trojan horse story is recounted in the Odyssey (not the Iliad).  Also hadn't recalled the role of Laocoon, and the serpent-y events that inspired the famous statues.  Cassandra's gift/curse.

Next - she discusses the Renaissance popes and the events just prior to the Reformation.  I've oft read about the sale of indulgences but she provides an interesting discussion here; the idea of expanding the market by ruling that indulgences can benefit poor souls in purgatory - profitable!  Also interesting to think about this book about the early Church, and just how far the Church of Rome strayed from its roots by this era.  Consequences of Constantine. 

Third is a section reviewing the "folly" of the British government in dealing with the colonists - the view that independence was not inevitable.  Lots of detail from the British perspective, most of it new.  I do like that she points out that Britain wasn't "ruined" by loss of the colonies - instead Britain advanced to its apogee - mistaken belief that colonies enrich the mother country - individual entrepreneurs can and do make out quite fabulously (especially if armed with government-sanctioned monopoly) but mother country as a whole doesn't seem to profit.

Fourth is a discussion of the folly in Vietnam - so resonant with today's Middle East/Afghanistan errors.  More of a focus on World War II and the French days - that part was new to me.  The other aspects have been covered pretty well via the Ken Burns documentary, I also liked this book quite a bit.

The Triumph of Christianity - How a Forbidden Religion Swept the World (Bart D. Ehrman, 2018)

(294 pages)

I wouldn't say I loved the book, but I definitely would recommend it.  Author gives some ideas on how to think about the period between Jesus's ascension to heaven and the late Roman empire.

Interesting discussion about what it meant to be a "pagan" to those who were pagans.  The term didn't exist.  Religion wasn't organized with any hierarchy (though priests or temple officials had varying degrees of authority and/or respect).  There wasn't really any contrasting religious approach (except a few Jews who didn't fit the prevailing narrative) - everyone just knew that it was appropriate and helpful (or at least not harmful) to observe the various rituals, mostly sacrifices.  Multiple gods - generally with supra-human characteristics - and always room to accommodate more gods.  Religion didn't really involve ethics - mostly cult sacrifices - ethics were thought of separately.

Which helps explain why Christianity was so disruptive.  Its adherents rejected all the other gods and were willing to be martyrs - this level of intensity was unusual, and attention-grabbing.  And conversion was a zero-sum game for the first time - one more Christian meant one less "pagan".  A future of religious wars lay ahead - so much more at stake in this new religious construct.

Author talks at length about how early Christianity - mostly lacking any hierarchy - a religion for losers, mostly populated by losers (though always some upper class devotees) - managed to get traction.  St. Paul was absolutely critical to the process - hard to imagine how the religion would have spread without him.  The miracle stories were compelling.  But Jesus of course had written down nothing - so many details to sort out - so much disagreement - including basic things like the relationship between the Father and the Son.  How to determine which interpreters of Jesus's life were correct?  How to determine which fill-in-the-blanks for things not addressed by Jesus were correct, and authored by whom?  Amazing that anything coherent was finalized.  Reminiscent of the discussion in this book about how the Koran and related writings evolved.

Lots of discussion of Constantine - no matter how one interprets his conversion in 312, the consequences were huge.  Including the council at Nicea in 325 (to this day we use the Nicene creed), where Constantine learned that getting theologians on the same page was even more difficult than ordering around soldiers or administrators.

But now the wheels are in motion for a hierarchical structure for the church that significantly echoes the Roman imperial structure - yuck.  Bishops gaining temporal power . . . one can see the trajectory to behaviors that led to the Reformation.

Author also plays with some numbers - assuming x Christians 10 years after Jesus and growth rate of  y%, how many by 312?  Growth rate thereafter?  Again, it's interesting to think about going from a few hundred to millions over say three centuries.

He alludes to Gibbon's famous discussion about the effect of Christianity on Rome, which I happened to be reading at the same time.

In the Shadow of the Sword - The Battle for Global Empire and the End of the Ancient World (Tom Holland, 2012)

(473 pages)

Author's writing style is unusual - often it feels like rambling, but in the end it feels conversational.  And informative.

This book - focused on what we can call late antiquity - has a couple main threads.  The common theme is the rise of Islam just as Rome (eastern half ) and Persia dramatically declined.

One of the threads:  how did these previously "backward" Arab folk become perhaps the most successful imperialists of all time?  And so incredibly quickly?  Why did the existing power structures collapse so rapidly?  As also discussed in this very useful work - some key reasons included (1) Rome (meaning Constantinople) and Persia were duking it out for a protracted period just prior to the time of the Prophet, to the detriment (and exhaustion) of both; (2) Rome (still meaning Constantinople) was burning resources trying to salvage something in Italy and elsewhere in the West; and (3) severe plague struck both Constantinople and Persia.  Suddenly - centuries of global power were beaten down.

And those factors do not belittle what the Arabs accomplished - the success is astonishing.  Author suggests that the idea that warriors dying in battle will achieve paradise was pretty much new with Islam - is that so?  I'm not aware of it on a wide scale previously, though certainly the idea appears later with the Crusaders.  (Not the key to Islam military success in those days anyway.)

Another thread - author explores the history of the Koran and its related religious texts - and goes into quite a bit of detail (some admittedly conjectural) that suggests, pretty strongly, that there is less direct connection between these documents and what may have been the Prophet's words than one might think.  For example - it appears that quite a lot of this material was written a couple centuries after the Prophet - with decided social/political considerations no doubt informing the writers.

He compares to the Old Testament - for a long time ascribed to Moses - but rigorous OT analysis reveals multiple authors, much of OT written much later, much of it speaking to specific contemporary political-social circumstances.  Sources that might permit similar analysis of Koran etc. generally have not been made available (or may not exist).  Intense self-criticism applied to the Bible; pretty much no culture of self-criticism as applied to Koran.

Oldest materials apparently don't emphasize the Prophet and raise questions about relative significance of Mecca/Medina; geographic sources seem to lie elsewhere (many farther north); it seems there was more borrowing of religious ideas than might be acknowledged if one wants to hold the position that everything was dictated to the Prophet by an angel (Gabriel as it turns out).  Discusses how Arabs were retained as mercenaries for both Roman and Persian, picking up lots of ideas (and serving in the north of the peninsula).  Jerusalem as an unlikely place of significance for Islam.

It's interesting to think about how religions get started - charismatic founder not writing things down; then the process of defining the religion plays out over a long period of time.  Christians fractious about theological details - Jesus certainly defined very little - but then with a Constantine - he can start ordering folks around - all of a sudden you have a Nicene Creed (325) - not that this ended the debates, but a structure was emerging after centuries.  Islam, Jews not really the same with this; author describes groups of scholars that develop materials (also centuries later!) and eventually gain control of the story (i.e. ultimately define the religion) - this is interesting if challenging to pin down.  Role of caliph in those days - combining temporal and spiritual leadership - confuses me.

Islam born in an atmosphere immediately permeated with local struggle/war and immediately expanding outward in an environment of conquest/war; and then needing to deal with handling subject peoples.  Christianity born with society's losers and core doctrines didn't get established from a war/conquest viewpoint; the warrior/imperial aspect really didn't launch until Constantine (312) (unfortunately it then seeped into the doctrinal).

And that is not to belittle the contents of the Koran or the Bible - these are pretty wonderful works no matter the provenance - it does suggest that it might be prudent to be a little less dogmatic on their contents!

Sometimes these "late antiquity" centuries feel rather lost . . . but there is lots of action . . . high points such as Constantine 312, Fall of Rome (in the west) 476, Hejira 622 . . . leading right to Tours 732 and Charlemagne 800 - and on it goes.

Bhagavad-Gita (between 5th and 2nd centuries BCE?)

(130 pages)

Wasn't familiar with this until Dharma sent us a link to a TED talk - in which a pretty engaging speaker sought to pull some lessons for current application - the talk was good enough to encourage me to read the entire work.

Which consists of 700 verses in the midst of a very long Hindu epic named Mahabharata.

Prince Arjuna is speaking to his charioteer Lord Krishna - though not recognizing him until later in the discussion.  The conversation takes place just before what is certain to be a major battle - Arjuna recognizes family and friends on the other side - despairs whether fighting is the right thing to do.  Lord Krishna explains why Arjuna should fight; speaks with compassion, insight, patience (and much much more); lets Arjuna make his own decision.

Useful thoughts throughout; many overlap, almost down to the word, with Bible passages.  I liked Krishna's way of advising to focus on what one can control without being overly concerned with the outcome; with doing one's duties well, choosing responsibilities wisely, in part to reciprocate for what's been given.

"See a bit of yourself in everything around you, and a bit of everything in you" - nice.

Some discussion of castes; need to figure out better how this fits in.

Martin Luther - Renegade and Prophet (Lyndal Roper, 2017)

(416 pp)

Martin Luther can't help but fascinate; it's the 500th anniversary of posting the 95 Theses; this book received favorable reviews; so it seemed like time to read more about him.  I much liked it.

(Initially nervous because the author tries to differentiate this bio from the massive stack of extant Luther bios by claiming a focus on "psychological" factors - ugh - but other than a bunch of references to Luther's father, and a passing reference to Freud, this element didn't much get in the way.)

What to make of Luther?  Certainly in the early going he appears clear-thinking, engaging, earthy; vaguely (very vaguely) reminiscent of Napoleon personality traits (or perhaps Napoleon is just top of mind these days).  Luther also adept at public relations - very impressive in Luther's case given the newness of print technology.  As far as PR - in addition to the printers, Cranach's shop churned out those memorable drawings.

Shows lots of courage in those early days ("here I stand") - this at a time when protection of his local "elector" wasn't necessarily a sure thing.  He stood up to the church hierarchy and Charles V.

Yes there were plenty of Germans sick of the Italians, and getting pushed around by local bishops; and the corruption in the central Roman Catholic structure was pretty overwhelming at this time (as discussed here).  So while Luther no doubt benefited from timing (again reminiscent of the Napoleon/"great man" discussion/French Revolution timing), it certainly seems that a unique individual was required to push reforms forward.  For starters, being put to death was a huge risk.

Author does a good job of explaining why Luther was such an unlikely candidate for what he did - modest education, grew up in what was then a backwater in Germany.

Some much less positive traits emerge if not predominate as the years go by.  Seems that the lengthy confinement in the castle - for Luther's protection - took a toll.  Deeply anti-Semitic.  "Protestants" (not sure when that term came into usage) were taking different paths; Luther seemed to rather like his first/supreme role, and as the years went by was never able to work very well with others.  Too often didn't even engage in useful discussions - just said "the devil" was driving his foes (reminiscent of how "racism" or "fascism" is used today).  Combative, insulting, personal. 

Also became pretty conservative - again, after the castle episode - realized he needed the elector and his ilk to survive - spoke out against the Peasants War, and generally advised submission to authority.  Which - coming from him - was rather rich.

Married a nun - a nice touch - several children - described as a loving father.

Lots of debate over the "Real Presence" issue in the Eucharist - many Protestants wanted to say it was symbolic, Luther kept insisting on a literal Real Presence.  Divisive issue, hard to now imagine how much energy was expended on this.

Enduring contributions in hymns, German translation of the Bible.

Luther dies in 1546.  Lots of bloodshed ahead.

Brideshead Revisited (Evelyn Waugh, 1945, revised 1960)

Charles Ryder becomes close college friend of Sebastian Flyte - then develops relationships with Sebastian's family (wealthy English Catholics with their core estate named "Brideshead", where Ryder often visits).

The book starts with Ryder - in the British army in preparation for WWII - unexpectedly ending up at Brideshead, which had been taken for army use - this about 10 years after his last visit.  (The book also ends with him there.)

Not sure what to make of the "Catholic" angle here - clearly very important for the author, who had converted to Catholicism (interesting that he wasn't the only English author with this facet).  But it's hard to say that Catholicism was very uplifting as experienced or applied by the characters here - hmm.

Sebastian's sisters:  Julia and Cordelia.  His mother - who seemed to be hard to deal with.  His father - in Italy until end of the story.  His brother - an odd character.  Anthony Blanche.  Julia's husband - Rex.  Ryder's wife Celia - his career as an architectural artist.

I did like it well enough;kept pulling me along.

Gilead (Marilynne Robinson, 2004)

Book club selection (via NOC; session held December 18, 2016).

Minister based in western Iowa gets married late in life; impending heart trouble prompts him to write letters to his 7-year-old son - stuff the kid will read as an adult.  Great reviews; Pulitzer prize winner; but our group didn't seem to connect all that well to the book.  Including me - and I should have been the perfect audience for this.

The letter-writer's father and grandfather also were ministers; the grandfather was an ardent abolitionist, associated with John Brown and "bloody Kansas".  His brother came back from college professing atheism.

There are elegant passages; some of the story line around young Jack Boughton took some form; but too much meandering.  There were some interesting parallels across the generations - and between the letter-writer and Jack Boughton - not enough to drive my interest.