Part 1 Ancient origins: beginnings; Jesus; Christ; Christians; churches; martyrs; Christian empire; holiness; faith and reason; power. Part 2 Historical transitions: Christendom; hierarchy; objects; scholars; mystics; heretics; Mary; Renaissance; Reformation; Europe. Part 3 Global transformations: new world; holy Russia; American Zion; African prophets; Asian heavens; Hindu Christians; Christian cargo; Holocaust; Cold War; new world order.
DAVID CHIDESTER is Professor of Comparative Religion at the University of Cape Town. He is the author of many award-winning books (American Academy of Religion Award for Excellence) on Christianity and Comparative Religion.
"'A model of condensation without simplification' - J.M Coetzee 'Clear and balanced. A triumph of compression... invaluable as a work of reference for students' - Karen Armstrong, Times 'A new and ambitious concept in presenting Christian history...a triumph. Never before, I suspect, has this cavalcade of thinkers been presented in a manner which so successfully combines depth, breadth, and succinctness' - Gerard Noel, Catholic Herald"
In doing a global religious history, Chidester (comparative religion, Cape Town Univ.) says he is pursuing his responsibilities as a historian with the ethics of a novelist in the interest of telling a good story. And he does. This historical overview, rather than adhering to a strictly encyclopedic telling, focuses on local detail and specific individuals in order to illuminate larger, more global events. For example, his Holocaust chapter begins with Kant and Schleiermacher, whose philosophical and romantic anti-Semitism gave rise to the musical nationalism of Wagner and, ultimately, the pagan political religion known as Nazism. The chapter on Mary succinctly explains the Rosary, the development of the Marian cult, and the reasons it flourished in a manner that should prove informative to Protestants and Catholics alike. Well written and researched, this is smart stuff. Highly recommended for religion and history collections looking for a work that anchors modern sensibilities to ancient ideas.DSandra Collins, Duquesne Univ. Lib., PA Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.
It takes a brave author to write this kind of history, where every chapter, in some cases every sentence, requires passing through territory that has been analyzed, debated, deconstructed and reassembled for 2,000 years. Yet Chidester (professor of comparative religion at Cape Town University) is up to the task, providing a readable, objective sweep of Christian history that reflects an admirable knowledge of the details without ever losing sight of the larger currents. He takes the reader through three epochs: from the birth of Christianity in 1st-century Roman Palestine to the 4th century, when Christianity was the imperial cult; from the fall of Rome through the Reformation; and from the discovery of the New World to today's New World Order. Perhaps necessarily, his most intriguing chapters come in the final third of the book, where there is less familiar material to explore, though each of the first two sections offers a lucid summary of current scholarship. In the chapter on Asia, his description of the fracture between Thomas Christians in India (who took on the trappings of elite Hindi culture) and 16th-century Portuguese missionaries, laden as it was with issues of class as well as theology, has great relevance for today's debates over inculturation. Specialists will find omissions and oversimplifications, but Chidester has braved their scorn, and the reader seeking a broad understanding of Christianity's evolution will be grateful. (Dec.) Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.
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