Richard Henry Popkin

Karl A. Kottman

James E. Force

Matt Goldish

Over three hundred years ago, the paramount modern Catholic exegete, Cornelius a Lapide, S.J., wrote that the 25th of March, 2000, was the most likely date for the world to end. Catholic Millenarianism does not let the day pass without comment. Catholic Millenarianism offers an authoritative overview of Catholic apocalyptic thought combined with detailed presentations by specialists on nine major Catholic authors, such as Savonarola, Luis de León, and António Vieira. With its companion volumes, Catholic Millenarianism illustrates a hold apocalyptic concerns had on intellectual life, particularly between 1500 and 1900, rivaling and influencing rationalism and skepticism. Catholics do not ordinarily expect a messianic reign by earthly means. Catholic Millenarianism shows instead what is common to Catholic authors: their preoccupation with the relationship between linguistic prophecies and the events they foretell. This makes the perspectives offered as surprisingly diverse as their particular times, and the book itself interesting and worth repeated reading.

Catholic Millenarianism: From Savonarola to the Abbé Grégoire

Millenarianism and Messianism in Early Modern European Culture

This book has two purposes. The first is clearly historical, the second is more philosophical and interpretive. Its success in the former will be less arguable than its attainment of the latter. The contribution to the history of Spanish letters consists in critically establishing the fact that the sources of Fray Luis de Le6n's moral and spiritual thought are Hebraic and that he can be seen to stand as one in a long line of Christian Hebraists, both scholastic and humanist. His philosophical views are cast in an Hebraic tradition, not in an Hellenic one as supposed by nearly every other commentator. I have stressed the presence of a living Hebrew culture in Spain after 1492, and I have suggested that this and the Jewish parentage of Fray Luis are very significant. I have also identified an intellectual debt Fray Luis owed to non-Jewish Orientalists such as Egidio da Viterbo and Girolamo Seripando. But, even they learned from exiled Spaniards. I want to present Fray Luis as a most characteristic thinker in the world of Baroque Spain. I think most will agree with the picture I have outlined. The more audacious aspect is my wish to show the importance of the Jewish heritage as found in the literary and philosophical production of this remarkable genius. It is, of course, my contention that today know ledge about Fray Luis and what he stood for is extraordinarily important.

Karl A. Kottman

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