Monasteries and the Care of Souls in Late Antique Christianity
Monasteries and the Care of Souls in Late Antique Christianity
In Monasteries and the Care of Souls in Late Antique Christianity, Paul C. Dilley explores the personal practices and group rituals through which the thoughts of monastic disciples were monitored and trained to purify the mind and help them achieve salvation. Dilley draws widely on the interdisciplinary field of cognitive studies, especially anthropology, in his analysis of key monastic 'cognitive disciplines', such as meditation on scripture, the fear of God, and prayer. In addition, various rituals distinctive to communal monasticism, including entrance procedures, the commemoration of founders, and collective repentance, are given their first extended analysis. Participants engaged in 'heart-work' on their thoughts and emotions, which were understood to reflect the community's spiritual state. This book will be of interest to scholars of early Christianity and the ancient world more generally for its detailed description of communal monastic culture and its innovative methodology.
- Demonstrates the central significance of monitoring and regulating thoughts in the early monastic care of souls, exploring institutional procedures and personal practices
- Makes use of cognitive studies to enlighten our understanding of key monastic activities, including meditation, prayer, and the fear of God
- Analyses a number of important early Coptic texts, many of which are offered in English for the first time, alongside more familiar works in the Greek and Latin monastic traditions
Reviews & endorsements
'Paul C. Dilley provides an authoritative account of how early cenobitic monks acted on their hearts and minds to achieve virtue and thus salvation. Based on deep knowledge of the primary sources and informed by perspectives from cognitive theory, this innovative, original, and clear book will appeal to historians of the emotions as well as scholars of early Christianity, monasticism, and the history of spirituality. An impressive achievement.' David Brakke, The Ohio State University
'Monasteries and the Care of Souls in Late Antique Christianity is a brilliant study of the training of monks. It brings new insights from anthropology and cognitive science to explain how these monks set out to remake the deeply human mind. It offers a fascinating and intimate account of the process of becoming a monk that has much to teach us about the monks of period - and about religious practice today.' Tanya Marie Luhrmann, Stanford University, California
'Dilley's work serves as an excellent resources for scholars in the field of Christianity and Christian monasticism in the Late Antique Middle East, as well as for psychological historians. It is painstakingly detailed, very skillfully written, and recreates - as well as possible within its constraints - the emotional, spiritual, and cognitive process by which postulants gained a monastic theory of mind and were transformed into the monks and nuns of Late Antiquity.' Reading Religion
'… Dilley's monograph makes a valuable contribution to the field of the history of emotions … The study is therefore to be highly recommended to researchers in the fields of history of emotions as it intersects with religious studies and classics.' Eduard Iricinschi, EHCS Journal
Product details
September 2017Hardback
9781107184015
360 pages
235 × 158 × 23 mm
0.66kg
Available
Table of Contents
- Part I. Evaluating Postulants: Introduction to Part I
- 1. Discerning motivation I: status and vocation
- 2. Discerning motivation II: trials of commitment
- Part II. Cognitive Disciplines: Introduction to Part II
- 3. Scriptural exercises and the monastic soundscape: writing on the heart
- 4. Learning the fear of God
- 5. Prayer and monastic progress: from demonic temptation to divine revelation
- Part III. Collective Heart-Work: Introduction to Part III
- 6. The lives (and minds) of others: hagiography, cognition, and commemoration
- 7. Shenoute and the heart of darkness: rituals of collective repentance
- Conclusion.
