Includes bibliographical references (pages [237]-244) and index.
Contents:
Monasticism before monasticism: Up to 320: From asceticism to monasticism -- The formation of the tradition: The period of the ecumenical councils: Solitude, community and the church: Beginnings in Egypt -- Asceticism and society: The holy men of Syria -- An experiment in community living: The cities of Asia Minor -- The holy city of Jerusalem and its desert -- The city of Constantinople: Where all roads meet -- The forms of monastic tradition: After iconoclasm: Going west: Two Benedicts -- East to Asia and south to Africa: The Syriac tradition -- City and mountains: The Byzantine tradition -- Missionaries and kings: The Balkans -- Monasteries in the north: Russia -- The meaning and purpose of monastic life: Heyschasm from Origen to Gregory Palamas -- Resistances and renewals: After 1453: Varieties of tribulation: Under Islamic government -- Revival and renewal in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries -- Varieties of tribulation: Genocide and atheism -- Revival and renewal in the twentieth century -- Conclusion.
Summary:
Despite its rich history in the Latin tradition, Christian monasticism began in the east; the wellsprings of monastic culture and spirituality can be directly sourced from the third-century Egyptian wilderness. In this volume John Binns creates a vivid, authoritative account that traces the four main branches of eastern Christianity, up to and beyond the Great Schism of 1054 and the break between the Catholic and Orthodox churches--back cover.
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