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A Summary of “Images of Catharism and the Historian's Task”

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 July 2009

George H. Shriver
George H. Shriver
Affiliation:
Professor of church history in Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary, Wake Forest, North Carolina.
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Extract

Only four decades ago one of the present leading medievalists in this country was not allowed to write a dissertation in the area of Catharism. In turning down the request, the director referred to the paucity of sources for undertaking such a study. In view of the materials currently available one nearly finds it unbelievable that such a delimited area of research has been given so much attention in the interim, in the manuscript finds, translation work, and multifold secondary source interpretations which have touched on everything from sex to song to diet! And whenever a topic in the field of history edges out biblical studies, contemporary theology, and the latest witless fad in religion in Time (the whole religion section, no less), perhaps it can be said that that topic has indeed arrived. Sparkling brilliance has been added to Catharism in the studies of the likes of Runciman, Söderberg, Borst, Dondaine, Manselli, Roché Nelli, Russell, and Wakefield. And yet, as is obvious, there are still unanswered questions and the necessity for continuing scholarship which will engage even more facets of Catharism.

Type
Research Article
Information
Church History , Volume 40 , Issue 1 , March 1971 , pp. 48 - 54
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1971

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References

1. Lynn White, Jr. shared this interesting piece of information with his seminar in the summer of 1969 at the Southeastern Institute of Medieval and Renaissance Studies, Chapel Hill, N.C. He was the young graduate student forbidden to write on the Catharists at Harvard.

2. For an excellent summary see Daniel, Walther, “A Survey of Recent Research on the Albigensian Cathari,” Church History: Studies in Christianity and Culture, 34 (June, 1965), 146ffGoogle Scholar. Notations will be brief in this summary with the knowledge that this Walther article and the Wakefield volume afford extensive bibliographical assistance in relation to any part of the Catharist story.

3. As illustration, see Rene, Nelli, Ecritures Cathares (Paris, 1968)Google Scholar and the amazing translation project by Wakefield, and Evans, , Heresies of the High Middle Ages (New York, 1969).Google Scholar

4. See Noonan, John T., Contraception (Cambridge, 1965), p. 179ff.Google Scholar

5. Among others, cf. Denis de, Rougemont, Love in the Western World (New York, 1956), passim.Google Scholar

6. Time, April 28, 1961, p. 54.Google Scholar

7. The Medieval Manichee (Cambridge, 1947).Google Scholar

8. La religion des Cathares (Uppsala, 1949).Google Scholar

9. Die Katharer (Stuttgart, 1953).Google Scholar

10. See Walther, passim.

11. ibid., 164–5.

12. L'Église Romaine et les Cathares Albigeois (Arques, 1957).Google Scholar

13. La vie quotidienne des Cathares, 1969.

14. Dissent and Reform in the Early Middle Ages (Los Angeles, 1965).Google Scholar

15. Heresies of the High Middle Ages (New York, 1969).Google Scholar

16. “The Changing Past” in Frontiers of Knowledge (New York, 1956), p. 77.Google Scholar

17. Machina Ex Deo (Cambridge, 1968), pp. 9–10.Google Scholar

18. See Jeffrey, Russell's fine essay, “Interpretations of the Origins of Medieval Heresy,” Mediaeval Studies, 25 (1963), 26ff.Google Scholar For a ludicrous (though taken seriously by certain grass-roots folk) example see Carroll, J. M., The Trail of Blood (Lexington, 1931), passim.Google Scholar

19. Cf. Jacques, Madaule, The Albigensian Crusade (New York, 1967).Google Scholar

20. The Making of a Counter Culture (New York, 1968), p. 42.Google Scholar

21. Dissent and Reform…, p. 188ff.Google Scholar

22. Heresy in the Later Middle Ages (New York, 1967), II, 446, n. 1.Google Scholar

23. See Madaule, op. cit., passim, for example.

24. See Were Ancient Heresies Disguised Social Movements? (Phil., 1966).

25. ibid.., p. v.

26. See Russell, , “Interpretations of the Origins.‥”, 33.Google Scholar

27. Op. cit., 100.

28. Op. cit., 9.

29. ibid.., 10.

30. See Georges de, Lagarde, La naissance de l'esprit laique (Paris, 1956), I, 82ff.Google Scholar

31. Lynn White, Jr., for one, shares this opinion, though with more confidence in far Eastern filiation than I am willing to admit. For instance he sees the tenet of reincarnation as “presumably” received from India. See his Machina Ex Deo, p. 92.Google Scholar

32. See Wakefield, , #57, p. 468ff. for the complete liturgy.Google Scholar

33. I am indebted to Samuel S. Hill for these three descriptive elements.

34. See Wakefield, , #50, p. 323ff. Moneta is rather exercised to point out just which church is the true church in Catholic reaction. Also see #60 (A) from the Catharist side.Google Scholar

35. Wakefield, , #60 (A), p. 596ff.Google Scholar

36. Ibid., passim and especially #59.

37. See Runciman, passim.

38. Georges, Crespy, From Science to Theology (Nashville, 1968), p. 112.Google Scholar

39. See Walther, p. 163ff.

40. History of Christian Thought (New Tork, 1968), p. 149.Google Scholar

41. Wakefield, , #15, pp. 135–36.Google ScholarNigg, W., The Heretics (New York, 1962), p. 189Google Scholar, erroneously takes one of these paragraphs out of context and makes of it a compliment by Bernard of the Catharists. In context, it is an attack on the hypocrisy of the Catharists. Also see Wakefield, , #38, p. 240ff.Google Scholar

42. Wakefield, , #49, p. 302ff.Google ScholarAlso see #50, p. 308ff.Google Scholar

43. Machina Ex Deo, p. 101.Google Scholar

44. Ibid., p. 102.

45. See Daniel, Walther's fine article, “Were the Albigenses and Waldenses Forerunners of the Reformation?,” Andrews University Seminary Studies, vol. 6, no. 2, 181ff.Google ScholarAlso see Lagarde, , I, 86.Google Scholar

46. Lynn, White, Machina…, p. 179.Google Scholar