The message of the old testamentary Maccabees is martial and pernicious as well as already pointed out by Erasmus of Rotterdam. The circumstances in which the Maccabeean literature emerged are complex and have not yet been explored by scholars in all their details; even more complex is the history of its influence, the Wirkungsgeschichte in the sense Hans-Georg Gadamer has given to the term, a history which was to large extent a purely Christian one. The early Christians saw the Maccabees as prototypical martyrs. Later they discovered warrior heroes whose courage was the measure of whoever fought in the name of God or freedom: Saxons, Scots, or citizens of Cologne who rose up against their rulers. This history of influence is the focus of the essays collected in this book, which extend thematically and chronologically from the cult of martyrs in late antiquity to the time of the modern wars of liberation.
Gabriela Signori, PhD (1991), Habilitation (1999), is Professor of Medieval History in the Department of History and Sociology at the University of Konstanz, Germany, since 2006. From 2001 â 2006 she was Professor at the Westfaelische Wilhelms University of Muenster. Her main area of research is social history of late medieval towns: law, gender, culture and religion. She continuously publishes several monographs, volumes and papers.
Antiquity
Martyrdom, Violence, and Immortality: The Origins of a Religious Complex, Jan Assmann
The War of the Hasmoneans, Kai Trampedach
The Veneration of the Maccabean Brothers in Fourth Century Antioch: Religious Competition, Martyrdom, and Innovation, Johannes Hahn
The Cult of the Maccabees in the Eastern Orthodox Church, Albrecht Berger
Middle Ages
The Mother and Seven Sons in Late Antique and Medieval Ashkenazi Judaism: Narrative Transformation and Communal Identity, Daniel Joslyn Siemiatkoski
The Maccabees and the Battle of Antioch, Elizabeth Lapina
Hate Preachers and Religious Warriors: Violence in the Libelli de lite of the Late Eleventh Century, Oliver Münsch
The Maccabees as Role Models in the German Order, Henrike Lähnemann
The Reception of the Books of the Maccabees in the Hussite Reformation, Pavlina Rychterova and Pavel Soukup
Early Modern Period
The Renaissance of the Maccabees: Old Testament Jews, German Humanists, and the Cult of the Saints in Early Modern Cologne, David Collins
On the Path of the Maccabees? The Rhetoric of âHoly Warâ in the Sermons and Pamphlets of âPuritansâ in the Run-up to the English Civil War (1620-1642), Andreas Pecar
âIf to fall, for laws, religion, liberty, we fallâ: Georg Frideric Handelâs Maccabees Oratorios, Daniel Weidner
The Reception of an Unread Author: Zacharias Wernerâs âMother of the Maccabeesâ, Gabriel Stoukalov-Pogodin