Approaching the Bible in Medieval England

Traces how the Bible came to be known by lay people through different mediums. It brings together intellectual and religious history with art history, music, literature and social history to trace how the Bible was sung and preached, revered and studied in thirteenth- and fourteenth-century England.

How did people learn their Bibles in the Middle Ages? Did church murals, biblical manuscripts, sermons or liturgical processions transmit the Bible in the same way?

This book unveils the dynamics of biblical knowledge and dissemination in thirteenth- and fourteenth-century England. An extensive and interdisciplinary survey of biblical manuscripts and visual images, sermons and chants, reveals how the unique qualities of each medium became part of the way the Bible was known and recalled; how oral, textual, performative and visual means of transmission joined to present a surprisingly complex biblical worldview. This study of liturgy and preaching, manuscript culture and talismanic use introduces the concept of biblical mediation, a new way to explore Scriptures and society. It challenges the lay-clerical divide by demonstrating that biblical exegesis was presented to the laity in non-textual means, while the ‘naked text’ of the Bible remained elusive even for the educated clergy.

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