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In "The Jesuit Order as a Synagogue of Jews" the author explains how Christians with Jewish family backgrounds went within less than forty years from having a leading role in the foundation of the Society of Jesus to being prohibited from membership in it. The author works at the intersection to two important historical topics, each of which attracts considerable scholarly attention but that have never received sustained and careful attention together, namely, the early modern histories of the Jesuit order and of Iberian purity of blood concerns. An analysis of the pro- and anti-converso texts in this book (both in terms of what they are claiming and what their limits are) advance our understanding of early modern, institutional Catholicism at the intersection of early modern religious reform and the new racism developing in Spain and spreading outwards.
An examinination of the role that Catholic missionary orders played in the dissemination of accounts of Christian martyrdom in Japan. The author offers an overarching portrayal of the writing, printing, and circulation of books of “Japano-martyrology.”
In With Eyes and Ears Open: The Role of Visitors in the Society of Jesus, twelve historians examine important visitations in the history of the Society. After a thorough investigation of the nature and role of the “visitor” in Jesuit rules and regulations, ten visitations of missions and provinces—from Peru in the sixteenth century, to Ireland in the seventeenth, to the Zambesi mission and Australia in the twentieth—are considered. Visitors, appointed by the superior general in Rome, surveyed the situation for fidelity to the Jesuit way of life, resolved any problems, and recommended future paths, often to the disapproval of Jesuit hosts. One contribution concerns the canonical visitation of the non-Jesuit Francis Saldanha da Gama in 1758, which resulted in the expulsion of the Jesuits from Portugal in 1759.
In Jesuit Survival and Restoration leading scholars from around the world discuss the most dramatic event in the Society of Jesus's history. The order was suppressed by papal command in 1773 and for the next forty-one years ex-Jesuits endeavoured to keep the Ignatian spirit alive and worked towards the order's restoration. When this goal was achieved in 1814 the Society entered one of its most dynamic but troubled eras. The contributions in the volume trace this story in a global perspective, looking at developments in Europe, Asia, Africa, and the Americas.
In Jesuit Polymath of Madrid D. Scott Hendrickson offers the first English-language account of the life and work of Juan Eusebio Nieremberg (1595-1658), a leading intellectual in Spain during the turbulent decades of the mid-seventeenth century. Most remembered as a prominent ascetic in the neo-Platonic tradition, Nieremberg emerges here as a writer deeply indebted to the legacy of Ignatius Loyola and his Spiritual Exercises. Hendrickson convincingly shows how Nieremberg drew from his formation in the Jesuit order at the time of its first centenary to engage the cultural and intellectual currents of the Spanish Golden Age. As an author of some seventy-five works, which represent several genres and were translated throughout Europe and abroad, Nieremberg’s literary enterprise demands attention.
In An Overview of the Pre-suppression Society of Jesus in Spain, Patricia W. Manning offers a survey of the Society of Jesus in Spain from its origins in Ignatius of Loyola’s early preaching to the aftereffects of its expulsion. Rather than nurture the nascent order, Loyola’s homeland was often ambivalent. His pre-Jesuit freelance sermonizing prompted investigations. The young Society confronted indifference and interference from the Spanish monarchy and outright opposition from other religious orders. This essay outlines the order’s ministerial and pedagogical activities, its relationship with women and with royal institutions, including the Spanish Inquisition, and Spanish members’ roles in theological debates concerning casuistry, free will, and the immaculate conception. It also considers the impact of Jesuits’ non-religious writings.
Although Jesuit contributions to European expansion in the early modern period have attracted considerable scholarly interest, the legacy of José de Acosta (1540–1600) is still defined by his contributions to natural history. The Theologian and the Empire presents a new biography of Acosta, focused on his participation in colonial and imperial politics. The most important Jesuit active in the Americas in the sixteenth century, Acosta was fundamentally a political operator. His actions on both sides of the Atlantic informed both Peruvian colonial life and the Jesuit order at the dawn of the seventeenth century.
In Jesuit Superior General Luis Martín García and His Memorias, David Schultenover presents an account and interpretation of Martín’s memoir covering most of his sixty years, including candid reflections on church-state events and his personal life.