Topic outline

  • General

    Welcome to Fluidity of Gender in the Early and Medieval Church
    • Eileen M. Harney
      Email: eharney@marlboro.edu
      Office: Dalrymple 32
    • Unsurprisingly, gender and the "appropriate" roles of the sexes were a constant concern within the Early and Medieval Church. This class will examine the "standard" and expected gender paradigms promoted in Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages and how religious and holy people conformed to and/or rebelled against them. The relationships that men and women had with the divine and with each other as well as how these men and women interpreted these relationships will be considered. The dominant and recurring imagery and language used to depict these relationships will also be studied closely. This course will explore the different circumstances and social situations that allowed women and men to engage in behavior either atypical or forbidden for their sex/gender. A focus will be placed on individuals who by challenging the standard structure experienced elements of gender fluidity and who, as a result, became acknowledged as "exemplary" and "holy" for contemporary and/or later Christians.
    • COURSE MATERIALS
    • ADDITIONAL MATERIALS OF INTEREST

  • Topic 1

    1/25 GOD AS FEMALE AND MALE
    • Required Primary Reading: Genesis 1-3; Numbers 11:10-11:15; Deuteronomy 32:1-32:43; Job 38; Psalms 123 and 131; Isaiah 42:10-42:17, 46:3-46:4, 49, and 66:5-66:16; and Galatians 3:23-3:29 (See link under Course Materials)
    • Miller, "Female Images and Metaphors" Women in Early Christianity
    • Required Secondary Reading: Bynum, "Why All the Fuss about the Body? A Medievalist's Perspective" (especially 12-33)
    • Meyers, "Woman (and Man) in the First Creation Story," "Female Images of God in the Apocryphal/Deuterocanonical Books," "Female Images of God in the Hebrew Bible," and "No 'Male and Female' in Christ Jesus" Women in Scripture
    • Suggested Reading: Brown, Body and Society, Chapter 1

  • Topic 2

    1/27 MALE-FEMALE RELATIONSHIP CONSTRUCTS AND EXPECTATIONS
    • READING JOURNAL 1 DUE
    • Required Primary Reading: Song of Songs (Song of Solomon); I Corinthians 7:1-7:30, 11:2-11:16, 14:33b-14:36; Colossians 3:18-3:25; I Timothy 2:1-3:13, 5:1-5:22; and I Peter 2:1-3:9 (See link under Course Materials)
    • Clark, "Paradise Lost: Creation, Fall, and Marriage" Women in the Early Church (excerpts)
    • Miller, "Women and Domestic Life" Women in Early Christianity (excerpt)
    • Required Secondary Reading: Burrus, Introduction (read 1-2 and 11-18) (skim 2-11)
    • Clark, "Women, Gender, and the Study of Christian History" Church History 70.3 (2001)

  • Topic 3

    2/1 MARTYRS IN THE EARLY CHURCH
    • Required Primary Reading: Jesus' Passion and Resurrection in Luke and John
    • 4 Maccabees Chapters 12-18 (skim Chapters 1-11)
    • The Martyrdom of Stephen Protomartyr (Acts of the Apostles 6-7)
    • Eusebius, The Ecclesiastical History (5.1)
    • Eusebius, The Ecclesiastical History (The Martyrs in Alexandria 6.41) and Martyrs of Palestine (8)
    • The Martyrdom of Saints Perpetua and Felicitas
    • Suggested Reading: Jesus' Passion and Resurrection in Mark and Matthew (Posted this afternoon)

  • Topic 4

    2/3 MARTYRS IN THE EARLY CHURCH
    • READING JOURNAL 2 DUE
    • Required Reading: Prudentius, Crowns of Martyrdom (Lawrence, Eulalia, Romanus, Hippolytus, and Agnes)
    • Selections from Acts of the Christian Martyrs

  • Topic 5

    2/8 MARTYRS IN THE EARLY CHURCH

  • Topic 6

    2/10 MARTYRDOM

  • Topic 7

    2/15 THE THIRD SEX
    • Required Reading: The Gospel of Thomas v. 114 (the final verse of the gospel)
    • The Gospel of Mary ch. 10
    • Ambrose, De uirginibus 1.3-4
    • Clark and Miller excerpts
    • Castelli, "Virginity and its Meaning for Women's Sexuality in Early Christianity"
    • McNamara, "Sexual Equality and the Cult of Virginity in Early Christian Thought"

  • Topic 8

    2/17 DESERT FATHERS AND MOTHERS

  • Topic 9

    2/22 DESERT FATHERS AND MOTHERS

  • Topic 10

    2/24 HOLY HARLOTS, TRANSVESTITE SAINTS
    • READING JOURNAL 4 DUE
    • Required Reading: Burrus, Chapter 4
    • Saint Pelagia (by James the Deacon) and Sayings of the Desert Mothers
    • Life of Mary of Egypt (Facing page translation of the Old English prose)

  • Topic 11

    3/1 HOLY HARLOTS, TRANSVESTITE SAINTS
    • Required Reading: Life of Mary Magdalene (from The Golden Legend)
    • Saint Eugenia (from Aelfric's Lives of Saints)
    • Saint Euphrosyne (from Aelfric's Lives of Saints)
    • The Virgin of Antioch (from Ambrose's Concerning Virgins)
    • Miller, "Is There a Harlot in This Text? Hagiography and the Grotesque"
    • Suggested Readings: Review Castelli, "Virginity and Its Meaning" (esp. 75-76)

  • Topic 12

    3/3 HOLY HARLOTS, TRANSVESTITE SAINTS

  • Topic 13

    3/8 MARY MAGDALENE DOCUMENTARY

    • Topic 14

      3/10 TRANSVESTITE SAINTS, JULIAN OF NORWICH DOCUMENTARY
      • Review Materials from 3/1 (Eugenia, Euphrosyne, and The Virgin of Antioch)

    • Topic 15

      3/29 and 3/31 CHASTE MARRIAGES
      • READING JOURNAL 6 DUE (THURSDAY)
      • Review The Acts of Paul and Thecla and The Virgin of Antioch (from Ambrose's Concerning Virgins)
      • Required Reading: Aethelthryth, Cecilia, and Chrysanthus and Daria (Aelfric's Life of Saints)
      • Review Burrus' section "The Queer Marriage of Malchus the Monk" (Ch. 1)
      • Huntington, "Edward the Celibate, Edward the Saint: Virginity in the Construction of Edward the Confessor"
      • Elliott, Spiritual Marriage (excerpt) (Coming Soon!)

    • Topic 16

      4/5 and 4/7 ROMANTIC RELATIONSHIPS WITH CHRIST
      • READING JOURNAL 7 DUE (THURSDAY)
      • Review Aelfric's Homilies on Chrysanthus and Daria and Cecilia and Valerian
      • Required Reading: Aldhelm, Carmen de uirginitate (Chrysanthus and Daria and Cecilia excerpts)
      • Book of Margery Kempe (Book 1, lines 1-435 and 2000-2254) (Book 1, Introduction through Chapter 6 and Chapters 35 through 40)
      • Mills, Suspended Animation, Chapters 5-6
      • Suggested Reading: Mills, Suspended Animation, Chapter 4

    • Topic 17

      4/12 IMAGES OF MOTHERHOOD
      • Review the Book of Margery Kempe and Chapter 6 of Mills' Suspended Animation
      • Review saints' lives that involve the flow of milk from wounds: Bokenham's Saint Agnes (esp. her speech about Christ as Lover) and Saint Christina, Saint Katherine from the Katherine Group (esp. the scenes with the Empress and Katherine's beheading), and Saint Blaise (from The Golden Legend)
      • Required Reading: Saint Margaret (from the Katherine Group)
      • Life of Saint Paul (from The Golden Legend)
      • Bynum, "Woman as Body and as Food" (from Holy Feast, Holy Fast)
      • Warner, "The Milk of Paradise" (from Alone of All Her Sex: The Myth and the Cult of the Virgin Mary)

    • Topic 18

      4/14 IMAGES OF MOTHERHOOD
      • READING JOURNAL 8 DUE
      • Review Readings and Sources from Tuesday's Class
      • Required Reading: Bell, "The Cloister" (from Holy Anorexia)
      • Required Reading (We'll likely only start these materials on Thursday): Irish Life of Colman Elo (from Bethada naem nErenn: Lives of Irish Saints)
      • Excerpt from the Hiberno-Latin Life of St. Berach (from Vitae sanctorum Hiberniae) (Coming Soon!)
      • Dorothy Ann Bray, "Suckling at the Breast of Christ: A Spiritual Lesson in an Irish Hagiographical Motif"

    • Topic 19

      4/19 IMAGES OF MOTHERHOOD
      • Review Remaining (Irish) Sources from Thursday
      • Required Reading: Bynum, Jesus as Mother (Introduction)

    • Topic 20

      4/21 JESUS AS MOTHER
      • READING JOURNAL 9 DUE
      • Required Reading: Julian of Norwich, Revelations of Divine Love, Short Text
      • Julian of Norwich, Revelations of Divine Love, Long Text 1-12
      • Bynum, Jesus as Mother (Chapter 3)

    • Topic 21

      4/26 JESUS AS MOTHER
      • PAPER PROPOSAL (FOR THE "DEVIL'S BARGAIN") DUE
      • Required Reading: Julian of Norwich, Revelations of Divine Love, Long Text
      • The Dream of the Rood (Modern English Translation)

    • Topic 22

      4/28 JESUS AS MOTHER
      • READING JOURNAL 10 DUE
      • Required Reading: Julian of Norwich, Revelations of Divine Love, Long Text 1-43
      • Bynum, Jesus as Mother (Chapter 4)

    • Topic 23

      5/3 COURSE WRAP-UP
      • READING JOURNAL 11 DUE (FINAL THOUGHTS)
      • Required Reading: Julian of Norwich, Revelations of Divine Love, Long Text 44-86
      • Bynum, Jesus as Mother (Chapter 5 and Epilogue)

    • Topic 24

      5/6 PAPER DUE (NOON D32)