Rethinking the Turn to Religion in Early Modern English Literature

Whereas Paul has traditionally been seen as articulating an introspective, divided self looking inward to his entrenched sinfulness, the vein of scholarship known as the New Perspective has shown us a more outward-oriented Paul, one primarily concerned with welding diverse groups (Jews and Greeks, w...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Renaissance quarterly 2009, Vol.62 (2), p.643-644
Main Author: Chapman, Alison A.
Format: Review
Language:English
Subjects:
Devotional literature
Early Modern English
Early Modern literature
English literature
Literary criticism
Religion
Religious literature
Reviews
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Summary:Whereas Paul has traditionally been seen as articulating an introspective, divided self looking inward to his entrenched sinfulness, the vein of scholarship known as the New Perspective has shown us a more outward-oriented Paul, one primarily concerned with welding diverse groups (Jews and Greeks, women and men, slaves and free, etc.) into a single church. The New Perspective shows us a communal-minded Paul, a writer focused as much on questions of social and political unions as on the individual's interiorized spiritual landscape. Kneidel's argument here is excellent, and it accords with a growing numbers of scholars who have shown the deeply collectivist nature of English Protestantism and thereby undermined the longstanding coupling of Protestantism with interiority and individualism and Catholicisim with exteriority and community.
ISSN:0034-4338
1935-0236
DOI:10.1086/599971