Medieval Reception of the Prophets

The chapter explores reception of the prophets in the context of broader questions about the Bible in medieval culture. The introduction complicates the legacy of the term “medieval.” It then examines a significant aspect of the medieval mentalité , the perception of biblical time as simultaneously punctiliar and linear, as key to understanding the interplay between Old Testament prophets and medieval society. The chapter argues that the prophets intersected with three contested areas of medieval society. First is the unstable meaning of the term “Bible,” which was always glossed, included apocryphal traditions, and was often abridged. Second is the uneasy relation between study of the Bible in the newly formed universities and the authority of Patristic exegesis. Third is the role of the prophets in the complex, fraught relation between Jews and Christians in medieval Europe. Examples from art, architecture, liturgical drama, polemic, and legend explore prophetic traditions in these three areas.

Ancient history · Archaeology · Art · Context (archaeology) · Drama · Epistemology · Exegesis · Legend · Literature · Meaning (existential) · Medieval studies · Middle Ages · Old Testament · Relation (database) · Biblical Studies and Interpretation · Classics · Historical and Linguistic Studies · History · Philosophy · Reformation and Early Modern Christianity · Bible · Bible, criticism, interpretation, etc., o. t. prophets · Criticism, interpretation