Bonds of Secrecy

Bonds of Secrecy
Author :
Publisher : University of Pennsylvania Press
Total Pages : 361
Release :
ISBN-10 : 9780812296846
ISBN-13 : 0812296842
Rating : 4/5 (46 Downloads)

Book Synopsis Bonds of Secrecy by : Benjamin A. Saltzman

Download or read book Bonds of Secrecy written by Benjamin A. Saltzman and published by University of Pennsylvania Press. This book was released on 2019-09-30 with total page 361 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How beliefs about human and divine secrets informed medieval ideas about the mind and shaped the practices of literary interpretations What did it mean to keep a secret in early medieval England? It was a period during which the experience of secrecy was intensely bound to the belief that God knew all human secrets, yet the secrets of God remained unknowable to human beings. In Bonds of Secrecy, Benjamin A. Saltzman argues that this double-edged conception of secrecy and divinity profoundly affected the way believers acted and thought as subjects under the law, as the devout within monasteries, and as readers before books. One crucial way it did so was by forming an ethical relationship between the self and the world that was fundamentally different from its modern reflex. Whereas today the bearers of secrets might be judged for the consequences of their reticence or disclosure, Saltzman observes, in the early Middle Ages a person attempting to conceal a secret was judged for believing he or she could conceal it from God. In other words, to attempt to hide from God was to become ensnared in a serious sin, but to hide from the world while deliberately and humbly submitting to God's constant observation was often a hallmark of spiritual virtue. Looking to law codes and religious architecture, hagiographies and riddles, Bonds of Secrecy shows how legal and monastic institutions harnessed the pervasive and complex belief in God's omniscience to produce an intense culture of scrutiny and a radical ethics of secrecy founded on the individual's belief that nothing could be hidden from God. According to Saltzman, this ethics of secrecy not only informed early medieval notions of mental activity and ideas about the mind but also profoundly shaped the practices of literary interpretation in ways that can inform our own contemporary approaches to reading texts from the past.


Bonds of Secrecy Related Books

Bonds of Secrecy
Language: en
Pages: 361
Authors: Benjamin A. Saltzman
Categories: Literary Criticism
Type: BOOK - Published: 2019-09-30 - Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

How beliefs about human and divine secrets informed medieval ideas about the mind and shaped the practices of literary interpretations What did it mean to keep
Bond of Secrecy
Language: en
Pages: 195
Authors: Saint John Hunt
Categories: History
Type: BOOK - Published: 2013-01-01 - Publisher: Trine Day

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

A father’s last confession to his son about the CIA, Watergate, and the plot to assassinate President John F. Kennedy, this is the remarkable true story of St
Cain's Legacy
Language: en
Pages: 290
Authors: Jeanne Safer
Categories: Psychology
Type: BOOK - Published: 2012-01-03 - Publisher: Basic Books

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Bonds between brothers and sisters are among the longest lasting and most emotionally significant of human relationships. But while 45 percent of adults struggl
The Brotherhood of Freemason Sisters
Language: en
Pages: 262
Authors: Lilith Mahmud
Categories: Social Science
Type: BOOK - Published: 2014-03-28 - Publisher: University of Chicago Press

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

This “stupendous ethnography of female Freemasonry in Italy” reveals the fascinating paradox of elitism and exclusion experienced by “female brothers” (
Doctors
Language: en
Pages: 352
Authors: Karen Steward
Categories: Adhesions
Type: BOOK - Published: 2007-01-01 - Publisher: E.L.M. Publishing, Incorporated

DOWNLOAD EBOOK