"The Book of the Lover and the Beloved" by Ramon Llull is a profound exploration of love and spirituality, intertwining the themes of divine and human affection. Llull, a medieval philosopher and mystic, uses a dialogue format to delve into the nature of love, presenting it as a pathway to understanding God. The text reflects Llull's unique blend of philosophy, theology, and poetry, inviting readers to contemplate the relationship between the lover and the beloved as a metaphor for the sou...

For this new anthology, Anthony Bonner has chosen central texts from his acclaimed two-volume compilation Selected Works of Ramon Llull (Princeton, 1985). Available for the first time in an affordable format, these works serve as an introduction to the life and writings of the Catalan (properly, Majorcan) philosopher, mystic, and theologian who lived from 1232 to 1316. Founder of a school of Arabic and other languages, Llull was also a poet and novelist and one of the creators of ...

This volume contains two of Teresa's most popular works: The Way of Perfection and The Interior Castle.Shortly after writing The Book of Her Life for her confessor, St. Teresa wrote The Way of Perfection at the request of her nuns who were eager to learn about prayer and contemplation. Throughout this work she teaches her nuns about prayer and also teaches us.Toward the end of her life, after she had experienced both the spiritual betrothal...

Best-selling author Umberto Eco's latest work unlocks the riddles of history in an exploration of the "linguistics of the lunatic," stories told by scholars, scientists, poets, fanatics, and ordinary people in order to make sense of the world. Exploring the "Force of the False," Eco uncovers layers of mistakes that have shaped human history, such as Columbus's assumption that the world was much smaller than it is, leading him to seek out a quick route to the East via the West and thus fort...

Published just after the Second World War, European Literature and the Latin Middle Ages is a sweeping exploration of the remarkable continuity of European literature across time and place, from the classical era up to the early nineteenth century, and from the Italian peninsula to the British Isles. In what T. S. Eliot called a "magnificent" book, Ernst Robert Curtius establishes medieval Latin literature as the vital transition between the literature of antiquity and the vernacu...

'What can you say to a man who tells you he prefers obeying God rather than men, and that as a result he's certain he'll go to heaven if he cuts your throat?' Voltaire's Pocket Philosophical Dictionary, first published in 1764, is a major work of the European Enlightenment. It is also a highly entertaining book: this is no 'dictionary' in the ordinary sense, nor does it treat 'philosophy' in the modern meaning of the term. It consists of a sequence of short essays...

In antiquity and the Middle Ages, memory was a craft, and certain actions and tools were thought to be necessary for its creation and recollection. Until now, however, many of the most important visual and textual sources on the topic have remained untranslated or otherwise difficult to consult. Mary Carruthers and Jan M. Ziolkowski bring together the texts and visual images from the twelfth through the fifteenth centuries that are central to an understanding of memory and memory technique...

The life and times of the most important theological work of medieval ChristendomThis concise book tells the story of the most important theological work of the Middle Ages, the vast Summa theologiae of Thomas Aquinas, which holds a unique place in Western religion and philosophy. Written between 1266 and 1273, the Summa was conceived by Aquinas as an instructional guide for teachers and novices and a compendium of all the approved teachings of th...

Philosophers of the Middle Ages endeavored to reconcile two seemingly incompatible concepts: religion and reason. By drawing extensively from the work of their predecessors, like Plato and Aristotle, medieval philosophers were able to find logical bases for their theological beliefs, thus using rationality to better comprehend their faith. This fascinating volume looks at the individuals who pioneered these new schools of thought and their lasting effects on our understanding of the nature...

St. Augustine was undoubtedly one of the great thinkers of the early church. Yet it has long been assumed--and not without reason--that the main lines of Augustine's thought have been more or less fixed since his death. That insofar as we should be aware of him in the twenty-first century, he is a figure described-if not circumscribed--by his times. A major revisionist treatment of Augustine's life and thought, Saint Augustine of Hippo overturns this assumption. In a stimulating and provoc...

This in-depth study of religious tensions in early modern Spain offers a new and enlightening perspective on the era of the Inquisition.Traditionally, the Spanish Renaissance of the 15th and 16th centuries has been framed as an epic battle of opposites. The followers of Erasmus were in constant discord with conservative Catholics while the humanists were diametrically opposed to the scholastics. Historian Lu Ann Homza rejects this simplistic view. In Religious ...

This volume explores the extraordinary life and work of Hildegard of Bingen, the 12th century abbess and prophet whose interests ranged from music to theology to zoology to medicine. These essays-written specifically for this volume-approach Hildegard from a variety of perspectives including gender theory, musicology, art history, the history of science, and comparative studies.