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Alex J Novikoff

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I am a historian of medieval Europe and the Mediterranean. My scholarship ranges over multiple fields, including scholastic culture, interfaith relations, the history of dialogue and disputation, and the histories of Iberia, France, and Italy. I was the Nina Maria Gorrissen fellow of history at the American Academy in Berlin in fall 2016 and a visiting scholar at the Israel Institute of Advanced Studies in Jerusalem in 2018-2019. I am also a fellow of the Royal Historical Society. Since 2017 I have taught at Kenyon College in Ohio and since 2007 I have taught summer classes at Franklin University Switzerland in Lugano.
Supervisors: Edward M. Peters, Henry Charles Lea Professor of Medieval History Emeritus, University of Pennsylvania, Anna Sapir Abulafia, Professor of Abrahamic Religions, Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford University, Matthew Kempshall, Wadham College, Oxford University , and Jill N. Claster, New York University

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Justine Firnhaber-Baker

University of St Andrews

Johannes Zachhuber

University of Oxford

Alejandra B Osorio

Wellesley College

Central European University

Cristiana Facchini

Università di Bologna

Armando Marques-Guedes

UNL - New University of Lisbon

Jacques Chiffoleau

EHESS-Ecole des hautes études en sciences sociales

Emrah Safa Gürkan (ESG)

Istanbul 29 Mayis University

University of Florida

Laurajane Smith

The Australian National University

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Books by Alex J Novikoff

The Twelfth-Century Renaissance: A Reader

The Medieval Culture of Disputation: Pedagogy, Practice, and Performance

Jean-Claude Schmitt, The Conversion of Herman the Jew: Autobiography, History, and Fiction in the Twelfth Century (trans. Alex J. Novikoff)

Papers by Alex J Novikoff

Debating Truth: The Barcelona Disputation of 1263: A Graphic History. By Nina Caputo and Liz Clarke. (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2017. Pp. 256. $19.95.)

The Historian, 2018

In sharp contrast to the spate of recent publications on modern Kurdish politics and history that... more In sharp contrast to the spate of recent publications on modern Kurdish politics and history that largely covers only events in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, this work is an accessible presentation of earlier Kurdish history. "The purpose of this book," writes the author, "is to examine Kurdish distinctiveness and identity from the rise of Islam to the first development of the modern Kurdish national movement after World War I" (3). As such, Michael Eppel presents readers with a background that will enable them to know the earlier historical basics and understand how present realities came to be. As the author notes, because the Kurds had no state of their own that could promote the writing of a national history, and because the prevailing conditions in Kurdistan and Kurdish society hindered the development of a modern educated class, the history of the Kurds has not in fact really been written-a deficiency that this book hopes in some small measure to redress. (13) The relatively short text is based on a large variety of sources dating from such ancient Greek authors such as Xenophon; Arabic ones such as al-Baladhuri and al-Tabari, the famous Sharafnama or History of the Kurdish Nation, published by the Kurdish scholar Sharaf Khan al-Bitlisi in 1595; the Seyahatname, or Book of Travels, published by the Ottoman traveler Evliya Chelebi; to more modern ones, all capably listed in the thorough notes and bibliography. Wadie Jwaideh and David McDowall are two recent authors who cover similar ground. In his wide-ranging introduction, the author tells readers that "in the histories written by the surrounding states and cultures, the Kurds have been perceived as peripheral, tribal, anarchical, and possessed of a savage culture" and problematically that "the word kurd, or kord, originally meant 'shepherd,' so that it had a social significance as well as a vague socioethnic connotation" (1, 7). However, "eventually the signifier kurd acquired the connotation of 'robber'" (20). Heuristically, he adds that "the absence of a Kurdish alphabet appropriate to the sounds of the Kurdish language limited the possibilities for a cohesive literary Kurdish language" (17). Despite the Kurdish national epic Mem u Zin written in Kurdish in 1695 by Ahmad-i Khani, "the absence of a written high Kurdish V C 2018 Phi Alpha Theta language. .. as well as the dominance of the Arabic-speaking state, relegated local Kurdish dialects to a position of inferiority" (44). Michael Eppel then quickly surveys Kurdish distinctiveness under Arab, Persian, and Turkish dominance in the early Muslim centuries; the era of Ottoman and Iranian rule; the demise in the nineteenth century of the Kurdish emirates or principalities, which possessed many of the characteristics of a state; the seeds of Kurdish nationalism in the declining Ottoman Empire; the beginnings of modern Kurdish politics; the Kurds and Kurdistan during World War I; and the Kurds and the new Middle East after the Ottomans. Russia and Great Britain began to play a large role in the nineteenth century, although the rise of Kurdish nationalism was largely a reaction to Turkish and Iranian nationalism. He observes, "It was the emphasis placed by the Young Turks on the Turkish identity of the Ottoman state in 1912-1913 that accelerated the consciousness of Kurdish distinctiveness, in contrast to Turkish nationalism" (92). There is, of course, a lot more that space does not permit mention. Eppel's short volume concludes with two medieval maps, another map of the main Kurdish emirates from the seventeenth to the nineteenth centuries, and a fourth map of Kurdistan according to the Treaty of Sevres in 1920. The notes, bibliography, and index are thorough, accurate, and thus very useful. This is a good, readable analysis that will be valuable for scholars, practitioners, and the intelligent lay public.

Ralph of Coggeshall's Description of Constantinople

Sources for Byzantine Art History, Vol. 3: The Visual Culture of Later Byzantium (c. 1081-c.1350) (part 1), 2022

A brief introduction to, translation of, and commentary on Ralph of Coggeshall's description of t... more

Jean de Meun's Intellectual Millieu

Approaches to Teaching The Romance of the Rose, 2023

This chapter places Jean de Meun within his scholastic context: the university setting, the confl... more

The Place of Petrus Alfonsi in the Medieval Culture of Disputation

Jewish-Christian Disputations in Antiquity and the Middle Ages, ed. Sébastien Morlet (Leuven: Peeters, 2020), 181-197. , 2020

'Plateas Publice Discurrentes': Performance and the Audio-Visual Jew in the Age of Pope Innocent III

Jews and Muslims Under the Fourth Lateran Council, ed. Marie-Thérèse Champagne and Irven M. Resni... more

Interfaith Dialogue and Disputation in the Medieval Mediterranean

Medieval Encounters, 2018

Editors introduction to the special issue of Medieval Encounters 24 (2018)

Anselm of Havelberg's controversies with the Greeks: A moment in the scholastic culture of disputation (in Averil Cameron and Niels Gaul, eds. 2017)

Chapter in Dialogues and Debate from Antiquity to Late Byzantium, ed. Avery Cameron and Niels Gau... more

Peter Abelard and Disputation: A Reexamination (Rhetorica, 2014)

Rhetorica, Dec 2014

This paper examines Abelard's engagement with disputation (disputatio) from the vantage point of ... more This paper examines Abelard's engagement with disputation (disputatio) from the vantage point of twelfth-century scholasticism. Eschewing the well-worn details of Abelard's personal life and philosophical positions, analysis is instead focused on two parallel dimensions of his career: the manner in which he attempted to face-off with his adversaries through public debate and his underlying theory of disputation. It is argued that Abelard's theory is to be found not in his theological or logical works, but in his polemical letters and his ethical dialogue, the Collationes, which together offer a coherent hermeneutical strategy for discerning truth. Abelard's contribution to the art of disputation needs to be assessed in light of his broader involvement in the scholastic method and contemporary Jewish-Christian relations.

Toward a Cultural History of Scholastic Disputation (American Historical Review, 2012)

American Historical Review, Apr 2012

THE SCHOLASTIC DEBATES OF MEDIEVAL AUTHORS have not fared well among historians. As a subject, th... more THE SCHOLASTIC DEBATES OF MEDIEVAL AUTHORS have not fared well among historians. As a subject, they are treated seriously by philosophers and theologians interested in particular points of logic or doctrine, selectively by specialists of medieval learning who focus on particular authors or key ideas, and hardly at all by historians concerned with the wider cultural fabric of medieval society. Popular images of scholastic argumentation have only isolated the field further. From Renaissance humanists and luminaries in the age of reason to general assumptions today, these debates have routinely been condemned as medieval vestiges of an anti-intellectual world: pedantic at best, pointless at worst. 1 Faced on the one hand with the pejorative connotations of "scholastic" and "quodlibet," we are on the other hand endlessly entreated these days to enter into "dialogue" with others, a discourse that both reflects and presupposes a post-Enlightenment (perhaps even postmodern) engagement with the world. 2 Marginalized and misunderstood, the history of medieval dialogue and debate is in need of a fresh assessment.

In Defense of Scholasticism (The Wilson Quarterly, 2012)

Editorial "In Essence" abstract of my article "Toward a Cultural History of Scholastic Disputatio... more

Anselm, Dialogue, and the Rise of Scholastic Disputation (Speculum 2011)

Speculum, Apr 2011

From Dialogue to Disputation in the Age of Archbishop Rodrigo Jiménez de Rada

Journal of Medieval Iberian Studies, 2012

"The Middle Ages," in Antisemitism: A History (ed. Lindemann and Levy)

Oxford University Press, 2010

Licit and Illicit in the Rhetoric of the Investiture Conflict, in Law and the Illicit in Medieval Europe (ed. Karras, Kaye, and Matter)

University of Pennsylvania Press, 2008

"Reason and Natural Law in the Disputational Writings of Peter Alfonsi, Peter Abelard, and Yehuda Halevi," in Christian Attutudes Toward the Jews in the Middle Ages (ed. Frassetto)

The Renaissance of the Twelfth Century Before Haskins

Haskins Society Journal, 2005

Between Tolerance and Intolerance in Medieval Spain: An Historiographic Enigma

Medieval Encounters, 2005

The nature of what has been termed "tolerance" and "intolerance" in the historiography of medieva... more The nature of what has been termed "tolerance" and "intolerance" in the historiography of medieval Iberia has, while rarely defined, continued to provide muchemployed organizing categories for the field. This paper reviews one focus of that historiography from the nineteenth into the twenty-first century: the relations among Muslims, Jews, and Christians, with respect to tolerance/intolerance and related categories (notably, convivencia). It analyzes, among other factors, the impact on this historiography of the intellectual, cultural, and political movements which have affected historians of medieval Iberia. It makes a case for the importance for specialists in the field to be keenly aware of these aspects of historiography at a time when medieval Spain is seen as offering a unique opportunity for testing theories of interfaith relations and social interaction

The Twelfth-Century Renaissance: A Reader

The Medieval Culture of Disputation: Pedagogy, Practice, and Performance

Jean-Claude Schmitt, The Conversion of Herman the Jew: Autobiography, History, and Fiction in the Twelfth Century (trans. Alex J. Novikoff)

Debating Truth: The Barcelona Disputation of 1263: A Graphic History. By Nina Caputo and Liz Clarke. (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2017. Pp. 256. $19.95.)

The Historian, 2018

In sharp contrast to the spate of recent publications on modern Kurdish politics and history that... more In sharp contrast to the spate of recent publications on modern Kurdish politics and history that largely covers only events in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, this work is an accessible presentation of earlier Kurdish history. "The purpose of this book," writes the author, "is to examine Kurdish distinctiveness and identity from the rise of Islam to the first development of the modern Kurdish national movement after World War I" (3). As such, Michael Eppel presents readers with a background that will enable them to know the earlier historical basics and understand how present realities came to be. As the author notes, because the Kurds had no state of their own that could promote the writing of a national history, and because the prevailing conditions in Kurdistan and Kurdish society hindered the development of a modern educated class, the history of the Kurds has not in fact really been written-a deficiency that this book hopes in some small measure to redress. (13) The relatively short text is based on a large variety of sources dating from such ancient Greek authors such as Xenophon; Arabic ones such as al-Baladhuri and al-Tabari, the famous Sharafnama or History of the Kurdish Nation, published by the Kurdish scholar Sharaf Khan al-Bitlisi in 1595; the Seyahatname, or Book of Travels, published by the Ottoman traveler Evliya Chelebi; to more modern ones, all capably listed in the thorough notes and bibliography. Wadie Jwaideh and David McDowall are two recent authors who cover similar ground. In his wide-ranging introduction, the author tells readers that "in the histories written by the surrounding states and cultures, the Kurds have been perceived as peripheral, tribal, anarchical, and possessed of a savage culture" and problematically that "the word kurd, or kord, originally meant 'shepherd,' so that it had a social significance as well as a vague socioethnic connotation" (1, 7). However, "eventually the signifier kurd acquired the connotation of 'robber'" (20). Heuristically, he adds that "the absence of a Kurdish alphabet appropriate to the sounds of the Kurdish language limited the possibilities for a cohesive literary Kurdish language" (17). Despite the Kurdish national epic Mem u Zin written in Kurdish in 1695 by Ahmad-i Khani, "the absence of a written high Kurdish V C 2018 Phi Alpha Theta language. .. as well as the dominance of the Arabic-speaking state, relegated local Kurdish dialects to a position of inferiority" (44). Michael Eppel then quickly surveys Kurdish distinctiveness under Arab, Persian, and Turkish dominance in the early Muslim centuries; the era of Ottoman and Iranian rule; the demise in the nineteenth century of the Kurdish emirates or principalities, which possessed many of the characteristics of a state; the seeds of Kurdish nationalism in the declining Ottoman Empire; the beginnings of modern Kurdish politics; the Kurds and Kurdistan during World War I; and the Kurds and the new Middle East after the Ottomans. Russia and Great Britain began to play a large role in the nineteenth century, although the rise of Kurdish nationalism was largely a reaction to Turkish and Iranian nationalism. He observes, "It was the emphasis placed by the Young Turks on the Turkish identity of the Ottoman state in 1912-1913 that accelerated the consciousness of Kurdish distinctiveness, in contrast to Turkish nationalism" (92). There is, of course, a lot more that space does not permit mention. Eppel's short volume concludes with two medieval maps, another map of the main Kurdish emirates from the seventeenth to the nineteenth centuries, and a fourth map of Kurdistan according to the Treaty of Sevres in 1920. The notes, bibliography, and index are thorough, accurate, and thus very useful. This is a good, readable analysis that will be valuable for scholars, practitioners, and the intelligent lay public.

Ralph of Coggeshall's Description of Constantinople

Sources for Byzantine Art History, Vol. 3: The Visual Culture of Later Byzantium (c. 1081-c.1350) (part 1), 2022

A brief introduction to, translation of, and commentary on Ralph of Coggeshall's description of t... more

Jean de Meun's Intellectual Millieu

Approaches to Teaching The Romance of the Rose, 2023

This chapter places Jean de Meun within his scholastic context: the university setting, the confl... more

The Place of Petrus Alfonsi in the Medieval Culture of Disputation

Jewish-Christian Disputations in Antiquity and the Middle Ages, ed. Sébastien Morlet (Leuven: Peeters, 2020), 181-197. , 2020

'Plateas Publice Discurrentes': Performance and the Audio-Visual Jew in the Age of Pope Innocent III

Jews and Muslims Under the Fourth Lateran Council, ed. Marie-Thérèse Champagne and Irven M. Resni... more

Interfaith Dialogue and Disputation in the Medieval Mediterranean

Medieval Encounters, 2018

Editors introduction to the special issue of Medieval Encounters 24 (2018)

Anselm of Havelberg's controversies with the Greeks: A moment in the scholastic culture of disputation (in Averil Cameron and Niels Gaul, eds. 2017)

Chapter in Dialogues and Debate from Antiquity to Late Byzantium, ed. Avery Cameron and Niels Gau... more

Peter Abelard and Disputation: A Reexamination (Rhetorica, 2014)

Rhetorica, Dec 2014

This paper examines Abelard's engagement with disputation (disputatio) from the vantage point of ... more This paper examines Abelard's engagement with disputation (disputatio) from the vantage point of twelfth-century scholasticism. Eschewing the well-worn details of Abelard's personal life and philosophical positions, analysis is instead focused on two parallel dimensions of his career: the manner in which he attempted to face-off with his adversaries through public debate and his underlying theory of disputation. It is argued that Abelard's theory is to be found not in his theological or logical works, but in his polemical letters and his ethical dialogue, the Collationes, which together offer a coherent hermeneutical strategy for discerning truth. Abelard's contribution to the art of disputation needs to be assessed in light of his broader involvement in the scholastic method and contemporary Jewish-Christian relations.

Toward a Cultural History of Scholastic Disputation (American Historical Review, 2012)

American Historical Review, Apr 2012

THE SCHOLASTIC DEBATES OF MEDIEVAL AUTHORS have not fared well among historians. As a subject, th... more THE SCHOLASTIC DEBATES OF MEDIEVAL AUTHORS have not fared well among historians. As a subject, they are treated seriously by philosophers and theologians interested in particular points of logic or doctrine, selectively by specialists of medieval learning who focus on particular authors or key ideas, and hardly at all by historians concerned with the wider cultural fabric of medieval society. Popular images of scholastic argumentation have only isolated the field further. From Renaissance humanists and luminaries in the age of reason to general assumptions today, these debates have routinely been condemned as medieval vestiges of an anti-intellectual world: pedantic at best, pointless at worst. 1 Faced on the one hand with the pejorative connotations of "scholastic" and "quodlibet," we are on the other hand endlessly entreated these days to enter into "dialogue" with others, a discourse that both reflects and presupposes a post-Enlightenment (perhaps even postmodern) engagement with the world. 2 Marginalized and misunderstood, the history of medieval dialogue and debate is in need of a fresh assessment.

In Defense of Scholasticism (The Wilson Quarterly, 2012)

Editorial "In Essence" abstract of my article "Toward a Cultural History of Scholastic Disputatio... more

Anselm, Dialogue, and the Rise of Scholastic Disputation (Speculum 2011)

Speculum, Apr 2011

From Dialogue to Disputation in the Age of Archbishop Rodrigo Jiménez de Rada

Journal of Medieval Iberian Studies, 2012

"The Middle Ages," in Antisemitism: A History (ed. Lindemann and Levy)

Oxford University Press, 2010

Licit and Illicit in the Rhetoric of the Investiture Conflict, in Law and the Illicit in Medieval Europe (ed. Karras, Kaye, and Matter)

University of Pennsylvania Press, 2008

"Reason and Natural Law in the Disputational Writings of Peter Alfonsi, Peter Abelard, and Yehuda Halevi," in Christian Attutudes Toward the Jews in the Middle Ages (ed. Frassetto)

The Renaissance of the Twelfth Century Before Haskins

Haskins Society Journal, 2005

Between Tolerance and Intolerance in Medieval Spain: An Historiographic Enigma

Medieval Encounters, 2005

The nature of what has been termed "tolerance" and "intolerance" in the historiography of medieva... more The nature of what has been termed "tolerance" and "intolerance" in the historiography of medieval Iberia has, while rarely defined, continued to provide muchemployed organizing categories for the field. This paper reviews one focus of that historiography from the nineteenth into the twenty-first century: the relations among Muslims, Jews, and Christians, with respect to tolerance/intolerance and related categories (notably, convivencia). It analyzes, among other factors, the impact on this historiography of the intellectual, cultural, and political movements which have affected historians of medieval Iberia. It makes a case for the importance for specialists in the field to be keenly aware of these aspects of historiography at a time when medieval Spain is seen as offering a unique opportunity for testing theories of interfaith relations and social interaction

Henry VII and the Universal Empire of Engelbert of Admont and Dante Alighieri

Pensiero Politico Medievale, 2005

Review of Ian Wei, Thinking About Animals in Thirteenth-Century Paris, in AHR (June 2023)

American Historical Review, 2023

Review of Leah Shopkow, The Count and the Saint: A Case Study for Reading Like a Historian

Canadian Journal of History, 2022

Review of Nina Caputo & Liz Clarke, Debating Truth: The Barcelona Disputation of 1263. A Graphic History in CHURCH HISTORY (2018)

Church History, 2018

Review of John of Salisbury's Metalogicon, ed. and trans. J. B. Hall, in THE JOURNAL OF MEDIEVAL LATIN, vol. 28 (2018): 350-353

Review of Suzanne LaVere, Out of the Cloister: Scholastic Exegesis of the Song of Songs, 1100-1250 (Brill, 2016), in the American Historical Review 123/2 (April 2018): 626-629

Review of Barbara Newman, Making Love in the Twelfth Century: 'Letters of Two Lovers' in Context (2016), in H-France Review, 18/77 (April 2018): 1-5.

H-France Review, 2018

Review of Olga Weijers, A Scholar's Paradise: Teaching and Debating in Medieval Paris (Brepols, 2015), in Speculum, 93/1 (Jan. 2018)

Speculum, 2018

Review of Seth Kimmel, Parables of Coercion: Conversion and Knowledge at the End of Islamic Spain (Chicago, 2015), in Comparative Literature, 69, 4 (2017)

Comparative Literature, 2017

Review of R. Szpiech (ed.), Medieval Exegesis and Religious Difference, in TMR

The Medieval Review, 2017

Scholars are saying much these days about religious difference and interfaith encounters within t... more Scholars are saying much these days about religious difference and interfaith encounters within the multicultural world of the medieval Mediterranean-the term "premodern" apparently now a synonym for the Middle Ages. As this subfield of scholarship becomes more crowded, and the topics of investigation more fissiparous, it is therefore refreshing to pick up a volume that is at once admirably focused and provocatively original. The thirteen essays that comprise this handsomely edited collection focus on interfaith scriptural exegesis, or on how Jewish, Christian, and Muslim scholars engaged with the sacred texts of their neighboring communities. As the essays amply demonstrate, such a program of study could be both doctrinally conservative and intellectually creative at the same time. Above all, these case studies challenge us to rethink some basic categories and boundaries involved in the study of medieval religious identities. Revisionist historiography (in its most productive sense) is in fact a recurring theme and constitutes one of the more exciting aspects of the collection as a whole.

Review of E. M. Rose, The Murder of William of Norwich: The Origins of the Blood Libel in Medieval Europe (AJS Review, 41: 1, 2017: 24-27).

Association for Jewish Studies Review, 2017

Review of J. Malegam, The Sleep of Behemoth: Disputing Peace and Violence in Medieval Europe, 1000-1200 (Speculum 01/2017)

Review of S. Young, Scholarly Community at the Early University of Paris (AHR)

Review of David Nirenberg, Neighboring Faiths: Christianity, Islam, and Judaism in the Middle Ages and Today (Marginalia)

Review of G. Anderson, The Islamic Villa in Early Medieval Iberia: Architecture and Court Culture in Umayyad Córdoba

International Journal of Islamic Architecture, vol 4. no. 2, 2015

a sort of lingua franca that is spoken in whispers and still circulates almost silently from one ... more

Review of O. Weijers, In Search of the Truth: A History of Disputation Techniques from Antiquity to Early Modern Times (Ren. Quarterly)

Review of J. Safran, Defining Boundaries in Al-Andalus (TMR)

The Medieval Review, Dec 2014

Review of W. Courtenay and E. Goddard, eds. Rotuli Parisienses: Supplications to the Pope from the University of Paris, Volume III: 1378-1394 (Medieval Prosopography)

Medieval Prosopography

Review of Christopher Beckwith, Warriors of the Cloisters: The Central Asian Origins of Science in the Medieval World (The Medieval Review)

The Medieval Review

The title of this book is peculiar and misleading. The volume deals not with monasticism or any s... more The title of this book is peculiar and misleading. The volume deals not with monasticism or any socio-religious aspect of the cenobitic life in the East or West, nor does it concern warriors of a physical or metaphorical kind that medievalists are likely to recognize (such as, for example, the milites Christi), and nor does it present any substantively new information in the history of science traditionally defined. The cloistered warriors in question are the pacifist Buddhist monks of Central Asia (whose social environment is never explained) and who sinologist Christopher Beckwith claims were the first to develop what he calls recursion, the systematic method of listing arguments, sub-arguments, and counter-arguments in pursuit of the truth. According to Beckwith, this intellectual approach not only lies at the heart of the scientific method (a point I am inclined to agree with), but it was transmitted to the West from Central Asia via the Islamic colleges (madrasas) of classical Arabic civilization, which developed no scientific culture of its own. Modern science as we know it thus stems directly from the Buddhist monks of ancient Central Asia. If such a theory were even remotely provable, it would present a major reorientation to the consensus view of the Greco-Arabic foundations of the Western scientific tradition. If overhyped, as revisionist arguments of this sort often are, then one would do well to recall the historical fallacy Marc Bloch labeled the "idol of origins," by which Bloch meant not simply the tendency to explain the present in terms of the remote past, but more specifically the danger inherent in attempting to identify a finite beginning that can serve as a complete and unifying explanation of the whole.

Review of Paola Tartakoff, Between Christian and Jew: Conversion and Inquisition in the Crown of Aragon, 1250-1391 (The Medieval Review)

The Medieval Review, Jan 2014

Review of Ryan Szpiech, Conversion and Narrative: Reading and Religious Authority in Medieval Polemic (AARHMS website)

American Academy of Research Historians of Medieval Spain, Jan 2014

Reviewed by Alex J. Novikoff (Fordham University) Voluntary conversion from one faith to another,... more Reviewed by Alex J. Novikoff (Fordham University) Voluntary conversion from one faith to another, perhaps even more than the parallel conversion from secular to religious life, is the embodiment of a process that is generally understood to reflect a range of complex and at times converse motivations. These can often be formulated in terms of binary oppositions: inner self versus outer persona; estrangement versus belonging; individual experience versus communal identity; historical past versus salvational future, and so on. A striking feature of the medieval apologetic tradition is the variety of conversionary accounts that were preserved and memorialized in narrative or disputational form, in turn provoking further reflection by future readers upon the very meaning of conversion as a paradigm of history and exegesis. It is this crucial if somewhat blurry intersection between what Karl Morrison has termed the "thing felt" (conversion itself) and the "thing made" (the act of recording that conversion) that Ryan Szpiech endeavors to examine, for his book is framed not as a study of conversion patterns in general but rather as an exploration of the function of conversionary accounts in the polemical literature of the High and Late Middle Ages. It is an admirably broad--ranging study of this body of writing and includes alongside numerous converts to Christianity a few notable converts to Judaism and Islam. On an interpretative plane, Szpiech claims to depart from earlier readings of these works in three specific ways. First, he aims to underscore the essentially social and ideological function of conversion narratives as expressions of apologetic intentions rather than of devotional or psychological meaning; in other words, to access "communal portrayal rather than the vestiges of individual experiences" (25). This approach is perhaps not quite as original as the author suggests, as this ground has been traversed before (notably by Karl Morrison, Jean--Claude Schmitt, and Harvey Hames), but the framework is a salutary reminder that conversion in the Middle Ages constitutes a dialectic engagement with the past and with the future more ruminative than the often abrupt moments of personal illumination that typically animate such accounts. Second, he considers the role played by narrative in expressing this connection between conversion and authority. This narratological emphasis on conversion's duality as both an embracing of the new and a rejecting of the old allows him "to weave together its formal doctrinal and narrative elements" (26), meaning that the polemical and fictive aspects of purported first--hand accounts must not be ignored. Third, and most intriguingly, Szpiech compares Christian conversion paradigms with the depiction of conversion within the apologetic works of Jewish and Muslim writers in order to gain perspective on competing visions of history and salvation. It is in this final area of analysis that

Randall J. Pedersen Review of The Medieval Culture of Disputation in CHURCH HISTORY AND RELIGIOUS CULTURE (2018)

Church History and Religious Culture, 2018

In this fresh and ambitious study of the medieval practice of disputation, Alex J. Novikoff seeks... more In this fresh and ambitious study of the medieval practice of disputation, Alex J. Novikoff seeks to shed light on an ancient custom that became entrenched in medieval thought and culture. While there have been books on medieval disputatio before, the present work offers a welcome and more appreciative tone than many earlier and more negative perspectives.

James J. Murphy Review The Medieval Culture of Disputation in Rhetoric Society Quarterly (2014)

Rhetoric Society Quarterly, 2014

Richard Utz review of The Medieval Culture of Disputation in the American Historical Review (2015)

proceeds essentially in order through The Golden Legend, starting with the prologue. Even though ... more proceeds essentially in order through The Golden Legend, starting with the prologue. Even though Jacobus did not give dates for the feast days of the saints he celebrated, he did arrange them by liturgical season, starting with Advent. Le Goff discusses many of these saints, usually only for a page or two, with the stated intention of focusing on what the saint illustrated about the nature of time.

Alain Boureau Review of The Medieval Culture of Disputation in Speculum (July 2014)

Anthony Minnema Review of the Medieval Culture of Disputation in Comitatus: A Journal of Medieval and Renaissance Studies, 45 (2014)

Antonia Fitzpatrick Review of The Medieval Culture of Disputation in MEDIUM AEVUM (2015)

Medium Aevum, 2015

William C. Jordan Review of The Conversion of Herman the Jew in SHOFAR: A JOURNAL OF JEWISH STUDIES (2011)

Shofar, 2011

Anna Sapir Abulafia Review of The Conversion of Herman the Jew in AHR (2011)

American Historical Review, 2011

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, a... more JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.

Jonathan Elukin Review of The Conversion of Herman the Jew in BIOGRAPHY (2011)

Biography, 2012

Lucy Pick review of The Conversion of Herman the Jew in JOURNAL OF RELIGION (2012)

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, a... more JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.

Ryan Szpiech Review of The Conversion of Herman the Jew in The Medieval Review

Franklin Harkins Review of The Conversion of Herman in THEOLOGICAL STUDIES (2011)

Theological Studies, 2011

Review of The Conversion of Herman the Jew in COMITATUS (2011)

French & English Audio Recording of Guy de Maupassant's "La Parure"

Chatterbox Audio Theater, Sep 2013

The Disputation of Mallorca (1286): A Case Study in the Medieval Culture of Disputation

MedievalJewishStudiesNow!, 2022

Research Spotlight for MedievalJewishStudiesNow!: A Blog for Research and Current Events in Medie... more

CNN Jerusalem Documentary

CNN, 2021

Publicity Flyer for Jerusalem: City of Faith and Fury (2021). Featured in Episode 3 (Holy War).

La catastrophe de Notre Dame vue des États Unis : un écho considérable, une résonance politique

TV5 Monde, 2019

Entretien avec TV5 Monde

Interview on Deutsche Welle TV (Nov 15. 2016)

Interview on Deutsche Welle Television on the topic of interfaith dialogue in the aftermath of th... more

Interview on Deutsche Welle TV (Oct 21, 2016)

Interview on Deutsche Welle Television (Berlin studio) concerning the US Presidential Debates.

Entretien avec TV5 sur Joan of Arc (Janv. 2012)

TV5 Monde, Jan 2012

Interview on WKNO (Memphis channel of NPR): What Were the Crusades?

Series Flyer: Knowledge Communities

by Shannon Cunningham, Mette Birkedal Bruun, Clare Monagle, Alex J Novikoff, Willemien Otten, and Severin Kitanov

This series focuses on innovative scholarship in the areas of intellectual history and the histor... more This series focuses on innovative scholarship in the areas of intellectual history and the history of ideas, particularly as they relate to the communication of knowledge within and among diverse scholarly, literary, religious and social communities across Western Europe. Interdisciplinary in nature, the series especially encourages new methodological outlooks that draw on the disciplines of philosophy, theology, musicology, anthropology, paleography and codicology.

Les Techniques Digitales au Moyen Âge

Ateliers et conférences du Laboratoire de médiévistique occidentale de Paris (LAMOP) et du Intern... more

Interfaith Dialogue and Disputation in the Medieval Mediterranean, ed. Brian Catlos & Alex Novikoff. [Special Issue of Medieval Encounters: Jewish, Christian, and Muslim Culture in Confluence and Dialogue (2018)]

by Alex J Novikoff and Brian A . Catlos

Medieval Encounters, vol. 24, no. 5-6, 2018

The Visual Culture of Later Byzantium (c.1081–c.1350), parts 1 & 2.

ISBN: 9781108483056 Series: Sources for Byzantine Art History 3 In this book the beauty and m... more ISBN: 9781108483056
Series: Sources for Byzantine Art History 3

In this book the beauty and meaning of Byzantine art and its aesthetics are for the first time made accessible through the original sources. More than 150 medieval texts are translated from nine medieval languages into English, with commentaries from over seventy leading scholars. These include theories of art, discussions of patronage and understandings of iconography, practical recipes for artistic supplies, expressions of devotion, and descriptions of cities. The volume reveals the cultural plurality and the interconnectivity of medieval Europe and the Mediterranean from the late eleventh to the early fourteenth centuries. The first part uncovers salient aspects of Byzantine artistic production and its aesthetic reception, while the second puts a spotlight on particular ways of expressing admiration and of interpreting of the visual.

"Interfaith Dialogue and Disputation in the Medieval Mediterranean" Special Edition,

by Brian A . Catlos and Alex J Novikoff

Medieval Encounters 24(5-6) , 2018

The Mediterranean world in the Middle Ages was a zone of multiple and overlapping identities. In ... more The Mediterranean world in the Middle Ages was a zone of multiple and overlapping identities. In this zone of competing principalities and elites, various groups identified with a particular doctrinal ideology (what we will call "ecu-menian"). However, this was also a zone that was characterized by the interpen-etration of religious and ethnic communities. Muslims, Jews, and Christians of various denominations and orientations lived amongst each other, rubbing and jostling shoulders socially, competing and collaborating economically, serving in each others' administrations and armies, pleading in each others' courts, passing through each others' homes and beds, and occasionally killing or otherwise inflicting oppression or violence on each other. Running beneath the formal differences that circumscribed these various real or imagined communities were powerful commonalities. The peoples of the medieval Mediterranean all acknowledged themselves as Abrahamic monotheists who venerated the prophets and patriarchs of the Hebrew tradition. All were heirs to or appropriators of Perso-Hellenistic culture and of Roman and Byzantine institutions, and they shared many of the same legends, myths, folk traditions and magical beliefs. They were joined by common social values and similar ideas regarding gender, social order, beauty, sophistication, and the family. They spoke common languages and shared the sacred languages of their confessional neighbors; they read each others' scripture and appropriated each others' literary traditions. Together this made the Mediterranean a zone of "mutual intelligibility" wherein shared languages, values and conceptual repertoires lubricated cultural communication and made it possible for multi-ethnic, multi-confessional societies to find common ground and ME_024_05-06_01_CatlosNovikoff.indd 503