The End of the World in Medieval Thought and Spirituality

This essay collection studies the Apocalypse and the end of the world, as these themes occupied the minds of biblical scholars, theologians, and ordinary people in Antiquity, the Middle Ages, and Early Modernity. It opens with an innovative series of studies on "Gendering the Apocalypse," devoted to the texts and contexts of the apocalyptic through the lens of gender. A second section of essays studies the more traditional problem of "Apocalyptic Theory and Exegesis," with a focus on authors such as Augustine of Hippo and Joachim of Fiore. A final series of essays extends the thematic scope to "The Eschaton in Political, Liturgical, and Literary Contexts." In these essays, scholars of history, theology, and literature create a dialogue that considers how fear of the end of the world, among the most pervasive emotions in human experience, underlies a great part of Western cultural production.

Eric Knibbs is a researcher at the Monumenta Germaniae Historica in Munich, Germany, and studies legal history, with special focus on the early medieval canonical tradition and the False Decretals of Pseudo-Isidore. Jessica A. Boon is Associate Professor of Religious Studies at UNC-Chapel Hill, USA, specializing in premodern Spanish mysticism and theories of embodiment. She has published The Mystical Science of the Soul: Medieval Cognition in Bernardino de Laredo's Recollection Method (2012) and numerous articles on Castilian visionaries. Erica Gelser is an independent scholar, USA, who specializes in devotional movements and the history of Christian thought, particularly with respect to later medieval Germany.

1. Introduction, Jessica A. Boon and Eric Knibbs.- 2. The Sobered Sibyl: Gender, Apocalypse and Hair in Dio Chrysostom's Discourse 1 and the Shepherd of Hermas, Mary R. D'Angelo.- 3. The Marian Apocalyptic of a Visionary Preacher: The Conorte of Juana de la Cruz, 1481-1534, Jessica A. Boon.- 4. The City Coming Down Out of Heaven (Rev. 21:10): Bologna as Jerusalem, Gabriella Zarri.- 5. Risen to Judgment: What Augustine Saw, Francine Cardman.- 6. Berengaudus on the Apocalypse, Eric Knibbs.- 7. Apocalypticism and Mysticism in Joachim of Fiore's Expositio in Apocalypsim, Bernard McGinn.- 8. Juan de Horozco y Covarrubias's Tratado dela verdadera y falsa prophecia (1588) and the Influence of Medieval Apocalyptic Traditions in Post-Tridentine Spain, James F. Melvin.- 9. The End of the World as They Knew it? Jews, Christians, Samaritans and Endtime Speculation in the Fifth-Century, Ross S. Kraemer.- 10. End Time at Hand: Innocent III, Joachim of Fiore, and the Fourth Crusade, Marcia L. Colish.- 11. The End of a Single World: The Sacrament of Extreme Unction in Scholastic Thought, Lesley Smith.- 12. Amorous and Religious "Apocalypses" in John Donne's Metaphysical Imagination, Angela Locatelli.