Dr ROB LUTTON ROB.LUTTON@NOTTINGHAM.AC.UK
ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR
Devotion to the Holy Name of Jesus in the Medieval West
LUTTON, ROB
Authors
Abstract
From the eleventh century onward, there was an increasing preoccupation in Western Christianity with Christ’s humanity and suffering body. This “Christocentric turn” was not just towards the bloodied human body of Christ but also towards his human name, “Jesus.” The roots of this were deep, as from the early Church onwards Christian writers had promoted personal attachment to the name “Jesus” through prayer, worship, and meditation as well as its benefits of healing, protection, and salvation. Distinctive cults of the Holy Name developed in different territories that gained significant popular followings and, in time, official sanction, although not without controversy. This chapter sketches the development of these different traditions and assesses their significance. It explores the relationship of the cult of the Holy Name to other
forms of Christocentric devotion, principally practices focused on the Passion of Christ. It asks how distinctive was devotion to the Name of Jesus, and why it gained popular appeal. An important aspect of this was the development of Holy Name contemplative practices and the dissemination of mystical ideals
and ecstatic experiences. The chapter also explores other aspects, including the wide dissemination of the sacred monogram. Lastly, it examines the controversies that surrounded the increasing popularity of devotion to the Name of Jesus, including accusations of idolatry and conservative reactions to Holy Name enthusiasm.
Citation
LUTTON, R. (2019). Devotion to the Holy Name of Jesus in the Medieval West. In Illuminating Jesus in the Middle Ages (129-153). Brill Academic Publishers. https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004409422_009
Online Publication Date | Oct 10, 2019 |
---|---|
Publication Date | Sep 12, 2019 |
Deposit Date | Jun 2, 2020 |
Publisher | Brill Academic Publishers |
Pages | 129-153 |
Series Title | Commentaria: Sacred Texts and Their Commentaries: Jewish, Christian and Islamic |
Series Number | Vol. 12 |
Series ISSN | 1874-8236 |
Book Title | Illuminating Jesus in the Middle Ages |
Chapter Number | 7 |
ISBN | 9789004409415 |
DOI | https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004409422_009 |
Keywords | Anselm of Bec; Bernard of Clairvaux; Bernardino of Siena; charisma and its routinization; contemplation; devotion; ecstatic experience; John of Howden; heresy; heterodoxy; liturgy; mendicants; mysticism; Name of Jesus; prayer; preaching; reading; Richard Rolle; ritual; sacred monogram; Henry Suso |
Public URL | https://nottingham-repository.worktribe.com/output/2626536 |
Publisher URL | https://brill.com/view/book/edcoll/9789004409422/BP000008.xml |
Contract Date | Dec 7, 2018 |
You might also like
From Micro- to Macro-processes of Religious Change
(2019)
Journal Article
‘...but have you read this?’: dialogicity in Robert Thornton’sHoly name devotions
(2018)
Journal Article
Downloadable Citations
About Repository@Nottingham
Administrator e-mail: discovery-access-systems@nottingham.ac.uk
This application uses the following open-source libraries:
SheetJS Community Edition
Apache License Version 2.0 (http://www.apache.org/licenses/)
PDF.js
Apache License Version 2.0 (http://www.apache.org/licenses/)
Font Awesome
SIL OFL 1.1 (http://scripts.sil.org/OFL)
MIT License (http://opensource.org/licenses/mit-license.html)
CC BY 3.0 ( http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/)
Powered by Worktribe © 2025
Advanced Search