“To Sey or Thinke Otherwise”: Ordinary Theology and Facing Death in Late Medieval Norfolk
Journal Title: Religions - Year 2018, Vol 9, Issue 3
Abstract
This article explores how Jeff Astley’s work on ordinary theology can enrich historical study of late medieval lay religion. Ordinary theology provides scholars with a new set of vocabulary and methodological approaches for accessing the religious discourses of “everyday” Christians and allows medievalists in particular to reach beyond contested labels for lay belief. The article begins with a discussion of the promises and limitations of Astley’s theories for historians of religion and concludes with a test case of how they might guide future research, through a quantitative and qualitative analysis of 152 wills from fifteenth-century Norfolk. The results highlight the diversity of beliefs about the afterlife and associated doctrines among medieval laypeople even as they demonstrated commitment to orthodox Christianity and their local parishes.
Authors and Affiliations
Louisa Foroughi
Post-9/11: Making Islam an American Religion
This article explores several key events in the last 12 years that led to periods of heightened suspicion about Islam and Muslims in the United States. It provides a brief overview of the rise of anti-Muslim and anti-I...
Beyond Christian Nationalism: How the American Committee on Religious Rights and Minorities Made Religious Pluralism a Global Cause in the Interwar Era
During the 1920s and 1930s, the American Committee on Religious Rights and Minorities offered a potent challenge to the view of the United States as a Christian nation. The Protestant, Catholic, and Jewish members of t...
Validity and Reliability of a Revised Scale of Attitude towards Buddhism (TSAB-R)
The empirical properties of a revised 24-item instrument called the Thanissaro Scale of Attitude towards Buddhism (TSAB-R) designed to measure Buddhist affective religiosity are described. The instrument was tested on...
“Getting Along” in Parkchester: A New Era in Jewish–Irish Relations in New York City 1940–1970
The history of conflict between New York City’s Irish Americans and east European Jews dates back to the close of the 19th century. They disputed over jobs, union memberships, housing, and frequently over politics. The...
Does Religiosity Predict Suicidal Behavior?
Research was reviewed on whether self-report measures of religiosity were a protective factor against suicidal behaviors. It was found that scores on Francis’s measure of religiosity was negatively associated with non-...