Episodios

  • Miles Pattenden, "Electing the Pope in Early Modern Italy, 1450-1700" (Oxford UP, 2017)

    Miles Pattenden, "Electing the Pope in Early Modern Italy, 1450-1700" (Oxford UP, 2017)
    May 2 2025
    Jana Byars talks to Miles Pattenden about his book, Electing the Pope in Early Modern Italy, 1450-1700 (Oxford UP, 2017), just about to be released in paperback. This study offers a radical reassessment of the history of early modern papacy, constructed through the first major analytical treatment of papal elections in English. Papal elections, with their ceremonial pomp and high drama, are compelling theater, but, until now, no one has analyzed them on the basis of the problems they created for cardinals: how were they to agree rules and enforce them? How should they manage the interregnum? How did they decide for whom to vote? How was the new pope to assert himself over a group of men who, until just moments before, had been his equals and peers? This study traces how the cardinals' responses to these problems evolved over the period from Martin V's return to Rome in 1420 to Pius VI's departure from it in 1798, placing them in the context of the papacy's wider institutional developments. Miles Pattenden argues not only that the elective nature of the papal office was crucial to how papal history unfolded but also that the cardinals of the fifteenth to eighteenth centuries present us with a unique case study for observing the approaches to decision-making and problem-solving within an elite political group. We also talk about the process in light of the upcoming Conclave and the election of a new pope. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/christian-studies
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    54 m
  • Timothy Twining, "The Limits of Erudition: The Old Testament in Post-Reformation Europe" (Cambridge UP, 2024)

    Timothy Twining, "The Limits of Erudition: The Old Testament in Post-Reformation Europe" (Cambridge UP, 2024)
    May 1 2025
    The history of early modern biblical scholarship has often been told as a teleological narrative in which a succession of radical thinkers dethroned the authority of the sacred word. The Limits of Erudition: The Old Testament in Post-Reformation Europe (Cambridge UP, 2024) tells a very different story. Drawing on a mass of archival sources, Timothy Twining reconstructs the religious, cultural, and institutional contexts in which the text of the Old Testament was considered and contested throughout post-Reformation Europe. In so doing, this book brings to light a vast array of figures from across the confessional spectrum who invested immense energy in studying the Bible. Their efforts, it shows, were not disinterested, but responded to pressing contemporary concerns. The Limits of Erudition employs a novel conceptual framework to resurrect a world where learning mattered to inquisitors and archbishops as much as to antiquaries, and in which the pursuit of erudition was too important to be left to scholars. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/christian-studies
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    1 h y 10 m
  • Christy Cobb and Katherine A. Shaner, "Ancient Slavery and Its New Testament Contexts" (Eerdmans, 2025)

    Christy Cobb and Katherine A. Shaner, "Ancient Slavery and Its New Testament Contexts" (Eerdmans, 2025)
    Apr 30 2025
    The institution of slavery permeated the ancient world, such that the realities of slavery and its long shadows pervade the New Testament and other early Christian texts. Yet enslavement remains an under-taught aspect of the context of the New Testament and early Christianity, leaving pastors, laypersons, and neophyte college students alike to fill knowledge gaps about enslaved persons, enslavers, living and laboring conditions, and much more with partial information, assumptions, or a range of highly technical and specialized monographs. Ancient Slavery and Its New Testament Contexts (Eerdmans, 2025), co-edited by Christy Cobb and Katherine A. Shaner, takes on these issues, introducing readers to the textures, complexities, and material realities of slavery in the Greco-Roman world. International scholars with a range of expertise, from New Testament and early Christian studies to classics, theology, ethics, and more, contribute to a tapestry of introductory themes, topics, and interpretive frameworks with a wealth of literary, inscriptional, pictorial, and theoretical evidence from the material culture of Roman antiquity in this significant volume. Dr. Cobb and Dr. Shaner joined the New Books Network to initiate important conversations that they hope will continue in religious studies classrooms, schools of theology and divinity, and local church small group settings. Christy Cobb (Ph.D., Drew University, 2016) is Associate Professor of Christianity at the University of Denver. She is the author of Slavery, Gender, Truth and Power in Luke-Acts and Other Ancient Narratives (Palgrave Macmillan, 2019) and has also co-edited a volume entitled Sex, Violence, and Early Christian Texts (Lexington Books, 2022). Dr. Cobb is also a member of the editorial board for the Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion, and her research and teaching interests include slavery, gender, sexuality, Acts, and Apocryphal Acts. In her recreational time, Christy enjoys reading novels, crafts, and spending time with her nine-year-old son in Denver. Katherine A. Shaner (Th.D., Harvard University Divinity School, 2012) is Associate Professor of New Testament at the Wake Forest University School of Divinity. She is the author of Enslaved Leadership in Early Christianity (Oxford University Press, 2018) as well as numerous articles on slavery in the New Testament. Dr. Shaner is an ordained pastor in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) and regularly preaches and teaches in churches around the United States. In her free time, Katherine enjoys hiking in the mountains, reading historical fiction, cooking dinner for friends and spending time with snuggly dogs. Rob Heaton (Ph.D., University of Denver, 2019) hosts Biblical Studies conversations for New Books in Religion and teaches New Testament, Christian origins, and early Christianity at Anderson University in Indiana. He recently authored The Shepherd of Hermas as Scriptura Non Grata: From Popularity in Early Christianity to Exclusion from the New Testament Canon (Lexington Books, 2023). For more about Rob and his work, or to offer feedback related to this episode, please visit his website at https://www.robheaton.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/christian-studies
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    1 h y 12 m
  • Donald S. Prudlo, "Stimulus Pastorum: A Charge to Pastors" (St. Augustine's Press, 2022)

    Donald S. Prudlo, "Stimulus Pastorum: A Charge to Pastors" (St. Augustine's Press, 2022)
    Apr 29 2025
    The work of St. Bartholomew of Braga, O.P. (1514-1590) appears here in English for the first time despite its long and enduring influence in ecclesiastical circles. His meditations on the office of pastor have provided critical insight bishops since their initial circulation and have helped form the most famous among them, including Bartholomew's proteges Charles Borromeo. Pope Paul VI ordered a copy of Bartholomew's work to be distributed among the Catholic bishops at the Second Vatican Council. Donald Prudlo's translation--Stimulus Pastorum: A Charge to Pastors (St. Augustine's Press, 2022)--situates St. Bartholomew of the Martyrs in his historical context as a lynchpin of Catholic Reform and affirms him as a figurehead of pastoral administration even in our own times. A beautiful read, and Don discusses why every new bishop should have a copy, and every cardinal entering the conclave should keep Bartholomew's counsel in his discernment. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/christian-studies
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    30 m
  • John Van Maaren, "The Gospel of Mark's Judaism and the Death of Christ as Ransom for Many" (Mohr Siebeck, 2025)

    John Van Maaren, "The Gospel of Mark's Judaism and the Death of Christ as Ransom for Many" (Mohr Siebeck, 2025)
    Apr 26 2025
    Does the Gospel of Mark reflect a post-Jewish, Gentile Christianity? Perhaps not. John Van Maaren says the Gospel of Mark should be read as an expression of first-century Judaism. Tune in as we speak with John Van Maaren about his recent book, The Gospel of Mark’s Judaism and the Death of Christ as Ransom for Many (Mohr Siebeck, 2025). John Van Maaren earned his PhD from McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada (2019), and is currently FWF ESPRIT postdoctoral fellow, University of Vienna, Austria. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/christian-studies
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    30 m
  • Udi Greenberg, "The End of the Schism: Catholics, Protestants, and the Remaking of Christian Life in Europe, 1880s-1970s" (Harvard UP, 2025)

    Udi Greenberg, "The End of the Schism: Catholics, Protestants, and the Remaking of Christian Life in Europe, 1880s-1970s" (Harvard UP, 2025)
    Apr 25 2025
    Reconciliation between Europe's Protestants and Catholics led to a new era of Christian collaboration. Why did these erstwhile foes end their schism and begin to make peace? In this riveting study, Udi Greenberg shows that ecumenism grew out of a shared desire to protect against perceived threats to Christian life. The End of the Schism: Catholics, Protestants, and the Remaking of Christian Life in Europe, 1880s-1970s (Harvard UP, 2025) overturns conventional wisdom about this revolutionary change by showing that the cause was not growing mutual tolerance but solidarity against the threats of socialism, feminism, and liberation movements. By working together Christians could defend their dominance in European life by maintaining and reinforcing the inequality inherent in Christian hierarchical order. Peacemaking between the confessions was accelerated by the rise of the Nazis, when Christian denominations debated their relations to each other and to nationalism, and was further pressed by the Cold War and decolonization, when Catholic and Protestant authorities formally declared each other "brethren in faith". Working together, Catholics and Protestants designed Europe's economic policies, regulated its sexual practices, and shaped postwar relationships with the Global South. This coalition of Christians has grown more cohesive over time as they leveraged their alliance to maintain influence across a politically fractured Europe. Related: Listen to the New Books Network interview with Udi Greenberg about The Weimar Century: German Emigres and the Ideological Foundation of the Cold War Author recommended reading: The Question of Unworthy Life: Eugenics and Germany's Twentieth Century by Dagmar Herzog Hosted by Meghan Cochran Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/christian-studies
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    1 h y 14 m
  • Las G. Newman, "To Die in Africa’s Dust: West Indian Missionaries in Western Africa in the Nineteenth Century" (Langham, 2024)

    Las G. Newman, "To Die in Africa’s Dust: West Indian Missionaries in Western Africa in the Nineteenth Century" (Langham, 2024)
    Apr 24 2025
    Christian mission in the modern era has generally been conceptualized as a Western endeavor: “from the West to the rest.” The rise and explosive growth of world Christianity has challenged this narrative, emphasizing Christian mission as “from everywhere to everywhere.” Dr. Las Newman contributes to this revitalized perspective, interrogating our understanding of modern missions history by drawing attention to the role of African West Indians in the spread of Christianity in sub-Saharan Africa. This comparative study of three nineteenth-century missionary expeditions critiques common narratives around West Indian involvement in the missionary enterprise. In To Die in Africa’s Dust: West Indian Missionaries in Western Africa in the Nineteenth Century (Langham, 2024), Dr. Newman proposes that far from being misguided adventurers or nostalgic exiles, African West Indians were fueled by a quest for emancipation that was birthed in the crucible of Caribbean slave society. Acting as agents of the Western missionary enterprise, they nevertheless shaped an understanding of Christian mission as a force for justice and freedom that carried with it personal, religious, and socio-political implications. Dr. Newman argues that it was this conception, embraced and championed by African West Indians, that enabled the missionary project in Western Africa to survive, flourish, and ultimately take firm root in African soil. This study questions historical interpretations of the Western missionary endeavor, exploring the pivotal role of native agents in cross-cultural Christian mission and allowing readers to hear from marginalized voices as they tell their own stories of engagement, struggle, and liberation. Dave Broucek is a former mission worker in the West Indies and a mission educator and mission administrator. As a lifelong learner in the field of global mission, he values authors who tell the lesser-known stories of mission history and who provide critical reflection on the practice of Christian mission. He considers it a privilege to host authors such as Dr. Newman in a project to disseminate their work to a wider public. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/christian-studies
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    1 h y 33 m
  • Asa Simon Mittman, "Cartographies of Exclusion: Anti-Semitic Mapping in Medieval England" (Penn State UP, 2024)

    Asa Simon Mittman, "Cartographies of Exclusion: Anti-Semitic Mapping in Medieval England" (Penn State UP, 2024)
    Apr 24 2025
    From the battles over Jerusalem to the emergence of the “Holy Land,” from legally mandated ghettos to the Edict of Expulsion, geography has long been a component of Christian-Jewish relations. Attending to world maps drawn by medieval Christian mapmakers, Cartographies of Exclusion: Anti-Semitic Mapping in Medieval England (Penn State University Press, 2024) by Dr. Asa Simon Mittman brings us to the literal drawing board of “Christendom” and shows the creation, in real time, of a mythic state intended to dehumanize the non-Christian people it ultimately sought to displace. In his close analyses of English maps from the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, Asa Simon Mittman makes a valuable contribution to conversations about medieval Christian perceptions of Jews and Judaism. Grounding his arguments in the history of anti-Jewish sentiment and actions rampant in twelfth- and thirteenth-century England, Dr. Mittman shows how English world maps of the period successfully Othered Jewish people by means of four primary strategies: conflating Jews with other groups; spreading libels about Jewish bodies, beliefs, and practices; associating Jews with Satan; and, most importantly, cartographically “mislocating” Jews in time and space. On maps, Jews were banished to locations and historical moments with no actual connection to Jewish populations or histories. Medieval Christian anti-Semitism is the foundation upon which modern anti-Semitism rests, and the medieval mapping of Jews was crucial to that foundation. Dr. Mittman’s thinking offers essential insights for any scholar interested in the interface of cartography, politics, and religion in premodern Europe. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda’s interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts. Let's face it, most of the popular podcasts out there are dumb. NBN features scholars (like you!), providing an enriching alternative to students. We partner with presses like Oxford, Princeton, and Cambridge to make academic research accessible to all. Please consider sharing the New Books Network with your students. Download this poster here to spread the word. Please share this interview on Instagram, LinkedIn, or Bluesky. Don't forget to subscribe to our Substack here to receive our weekly newsletter. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/christian-studies
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    1 h y 6 m
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