Licentiate in Sacred Theology (S.T.L.), University of Dayton, 2000, International Marian Research Institute

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Committee: Bertrand Buby S.M. (Advisor) Subjects: Theology

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2024, Greek and Latin

This dissertation interprets the journey of the youth (kouros) in Parmenides' proem as an idealized mythological representation of a meditative practice by analyzing its deployment of Homeric psychological terminology. The first chapter puts forth an interpretation of Homeric psychology in light of what we now call the autonomic nervous system and suggests that thumos corresponds roughly to the “fight or flight” response of the sympathetic arm and psuche to the “rest and digest” response of the parasympathetic arm. At death, I argue, characters pass from the “hot” end of that spectrum to the “cold” end as the psuche exits the body. The second chapter uses this Homeric psychological scheme to argue that the journey of the kouros in Parmenides' proem depicts in mythological terms a process of heating and immortalizing the mind by increasing the thumos. This in turn allows him to meet and understand the unnamed goddess that greets him beyond the gates of Night and Day. I argue that this journey involves an ascent (anabasis) of the thumos towards the light of the sun rather than exclusively a descent to the underworld (katabasis), a common interpretation in recent years. The third chapter builds on the psychological and mythological interpretations developed in the first two chapters and examines one aspect of a meditative practice behind the proem. I argue that the kouros would heat and immortalize his mind by “inhaling” (αμπνυτο) more “wind” (πνοιη) to increase his thumos as an initial purification to prepare for the ascent. This proposal finds support in later Greek representations of meditative breathing practices that involve inhaling hot pneuma in the Chaldean Oracles and the “Mithras Liturgy” as well as comparison with similar ideas about “heat-generating ascetic practices” (tapas) in some Indian sources. I conclude that archaic Greek sages may have used inhalation-emphasized breathing practices to stimulate the sympathetic arm of the autonomic nervou (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Thomas Hawkins (Advisor); Sarah Iles Johnston (Committee Co-Chair); Benjamin Folit-Weinberg (Committee Member); Hugh Urban (Committee Member) Subjects: Ancient Civilizations; Ancient History; Ancient Languages; Classical Studies; Comparative Literature; History; Language; Philosophy

Master of Arts (M.A.), University of Dayton, 2021, Theological Studies

This thesis argues that the Western sacramental and christological ecclesiology of Otto Semmelroth, SJ, is complementary with the Eastern pneumatological-trinitarian theology of liturgy of Jean Corbon, OP. Their little studied theologies are taken as key for interpreting and receiving the Second Vatican Council. Where Semmelroth had a distinct and influential impact on Vatican II's sacramental ecclesiology, particularly in Lumen Gentium, Corbon had a similar impact on the theology of liturgy of the Catechism of the Catholic Church. A particular point of significance of Vatican II is its personalist paradigm shift of recentering the faith of the church on God's revelation of self as Trinity of persons. Semmelroth and Corbon not only started with and maintained the primacy of divine initiative but they also made their faith-filled awareness of the mystery of God, revealed through Christ in the Spirit, the lynchpin of their theological endeavors. Their strikingly similar fundamental, methodological move of perceiving reality as determined by the mystery of the person of God enabled both Semmelroth and Corbon to achieve advances in sacramental theology and theology of liturgy, respectively. Building on these insights, this thesis synthesizes Semmelroth's and Corbon's theologies in proposing sacrament and liturgy as co-principles of the church as the form of trinitarian communion. This thesis proceeds by first characterizing the basic points of philosophical and theological twentieth century personalist thought, which takes persons as central and determinative in understanding reality. Ormond Rush's theological hermeneutical principles of Vatican II are then described. The geographical orientations of the theologies of Semmelroth, Corbon, and Vatican II are explored next and a conciliar hermeneutical principle of complementarity with distinction between Eastern and Western theologies is proposed. From there, Dei Verbum's theology of divine revelation is analyzed. Foll (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Dennis Doyle Ph.D. (Advisor); Elizabeth Groppe Ph.D. (Committee Member); William Johnston Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Religion; Theology

Master of Arts, The Ohio State University, 2021, History of Art

The Ebstorf Cloth was an embroidery of the Mystic Hunt made by a nun in Ebstorf Covent in Germany in 1475. The embroidery was used as an altar cloth, in particular to hold the Missal during Mass. The visual and theological density of the Mystic Hunt allegory—in which the Annunciation is staged as a unicorn hunt—is a fitting analogy for the experience of enclosed life. Contemporary monastic reform and construction at Ebstorf reinforced enclosure, bringing new nuances to the nun's understanding of the Virgin in the gated garden motif. The pair of Virgin Mary and Gabriel also emphasize the mutability priest and nun during the aural exchange of the Mass, in which nun's works of art and music served an integral role in the Eucharistic Liturgy.

Committee: Karl Whittington PhD (Advisor); Christian Kleinbub PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Art History

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2020, Greek and Latin

My dissertation investigates how Syriac-speakers conceptualized their communal subjectivities within a Roman imperial context. I argue that Syriac literature from the Roman empire, and especially Syriac historiography and Syriac liturgical texts, provided Syriac-speakers with the discursive tools with which they could interpret recent history and formulate conceptions of the self within a Roman context. I argue that Syriac identity prior to the formation of the Syriac Orthodox Church was articulated through a dialectic with contemporary Roman imaginaries of ethnicity and citizenship. In doing so, I problematize scholarship that supposes `Syriacness' and `Romanness' were antithetical in the late Roman period. Instead, I contend that Syriac-speaking communities adopted, manipulated, and redefined discourses of Romanness in order to create their own Syriac-speaking Roman subjectivities.

Committee: Anthony Kaldellis (Advisor); David Brakke (Committee Member); Fritz Graf (Committee Member) Subjects: Classical Studies; History; Language; Linguistics; Literature; Middle Eastern History; Middle Eastern Literature; Middle Eastern Studies

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2020, English

This dissertation challenges the standard narrative of nineteenth-century literary secularization by attending to British texts that engage liturgy and ritual. According to once standard accounts of secularization, the development of modernity—the rise of the natural sciences, the spread of market economies, and so forth—necessarily entails the decline and eventual demise of religion. Until recently, many readings of Romantic and Victorian literature have assumed this trajectory of progressive secularization. However, for the last twenty years, scholarship from a variety of disciplines—history, sociology, anthropology, philosophy, and theology—has complicated and often rejected the notion that modernization brings about the death of faith. Such scholarship frequently observes how the concept of religion itself—especially when construed as private belief in supernatural ideas—is a construction of early modern Europe and is born simultaneously with the notion of the secular as the sphere of public reason. Drawing on these recent revisions of secularization theory, I ask why—in a so-called age of doubt—many nineteenth-century writers of various confessional stances nevertheless become fascinated by liturgy and ritual. Rather than simply accept the picture of religion as primarily an interior, otherworldly phenomenon, these writers, I argue, turn to liturgy to enflesh faith—that is, to resist modernity's characteristic bifurcations of natural/supernatural, body/soul, reason/faith, and so on. At once spiritual and material, liturgy incarnates unseen realities in concrete forms—bread, wine, water, the architectural arrangement of churches and temples, and the temporal patterns of ritual calendars. Romantic and Victorian writers deploy this incarnational power for a host of reasons: to reinvest the natural world and material objects with spiritual meaning, to reimagine the human person as porous and malleable rather than as closed and mechanical, to question the homoge (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Clare Simmons (Advisor); David Riede (Committee Member); Amanpal Garcha (Committee Member); Norman Jones (Committee Member) Subjects: British and Irish Literature; Literature; Religion; Theology

Master of Arts (MA), Ohio University, 2020, Art History (Fine Arts)

Andrea Pozzo was a lay brother for the Order of the Society of Jesus in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries who utilized his work in painting, architecture, and writing to attempt to create an ideal expression of sacred art for the Counter-Reformation Catholic Church. The focus of this study is on Pozzo's illusionary paintings in Chiesa di Sant'Ignazio di Loyola in Rome as they coincide with his codification of quadratura and di sotto in su, as described through perspectival etchings and commentary in Perspectiva Pictorum et Architectorum. This thesis seeks to understand the work of Pozzo in context with his Jesuit background, examining his work under the lens of Saint Ignatius of Loyola's Spiritual Exercises, as well as the cultural, political, and religious climates of Rome during the Counter-Reformation era. Additionally, it seeks to understand how Pozzo and the Order of the Society of Jesus contributed to Baroque Art, as they are so often discussed together. Pozzo's intentions are additionally examined through a study of his predecessors and contemporaries, such as Andrea Mantegna, Baciccio, Francesco Borromini, and Pietro da Cortona. The works of these artists were either studied by Pozzo, or he encountered them directly. Seeking theatricality and striving to visualize the spiritual realm, Pozzo is finally discussed in the context of the decrees of the Council of Trent from 1543, the theology of the Catholic liturgy, and the theology of Catholic Temple.

Committee: Samuel Dodd Dr. (Advisor); Jennie Klein Dr. (Committee Member); Jody Lamb Dr. (Committee Member) Subjects: Architecture; Art History; Fine Arts; Religious History; Theology

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2019, Music

The foundation of the Order of Preachers in 1216 by Dominic of Osma (ca. 1173-1221, and the founder's own meritorious life—exemplifying the virtues of a vir evangelicus for his spiritual descendants—represent a key moment in the religious history of the Middle Ages. Receiving its definitive form in the mid-1250s, the Dominican Rite provided for the liturgical celebration and memorial of its founder with two feasts: the principal feast, 5 August, held on the vigil of his death, and the translation, 24 May, celebrating the transfer of his relics on that date in 1233, during which a miraculous fragrance (odor mirificus) and many healings occurred, speeding along Dominic's canonization, which occurred on 3 July 1234. The two offices for these feasts developed in stages similar to those of the liturgy of the Rite to which they belonged. In addition to a study of these developments, the present dissertation examines the proper chants of the offices and presents the results in commentaries on each item. This analysis reveals that the texts were carefully constructed, with attention to narrative continuity based on Dominic's early vitae, allusion to biblical and patristic sources, and the creation of striking poetic effects. Together with their melodies, which like the texts were newly composed, these pieces create an official liturgical memory of Dominic, providing a common formation, education, and understanding of the faith for the members of the Order. Each office emphasizes different aspects of Dominic's person and his life. The principal feast reminds the assembled brethren of the life, miracles, death, and heavenly glorification of their founder, describing his virtues and works, and presenting him as a model worthy of imitation. The feast of the Translation focuses on the historical translation itself—the disinterment of Dominic's remains and the miracles accompanying it—highlighting Christ as the source of these wonders and Dominic as heavenly intercessor. Th (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Charles Atkinson (Advisor) Subjects: Middle Ages; Music; Theology

Master of Arts in Theology, Mount St. Mary's Seminary & School of Theology, 2019, School of Theology

The Second Vatican Council ushered in an era of liturgical renewal in many ways unlike any renewal in the centuries that preceded it. Perhaps the most obvious and challenging expression of this renewal presented itself in the widespread introduction of the vernacular into the Liturgy. Throughout its history the Church has been honing its theology and worship through precise language within liturgical prayer, and with the promulgation of Sacrosanctum Concilium the work of liturgical theologians became yoked in a radical way to linguistics as they attempted to communicate this same theology in the vernacular. This thesis examines the ongoing process and development of the principles of translation theory that have governed the work of translators over the course of the past six decades. In doing so, it seeks to show that the Church's preference for the principles of formal equivalence (adopted into the instruction Liturgiam Authenticam) over those of dynamic equivalence (adopted into the document Comme le Prevoit) is not rooted in opposition to the principle of participatio actuosa. Rather, this preference is deeply rooted in a philosophical and theological worldview that centers on the presence of the Logos. Undergirded by the philosophy of George Steiner, who argues for a fundamental Presence that makes all language intelligible, and the liturgical theology of Pope Benedict XVI, which is shaped by the Word, this thesis argues for the primacy of the Logos over anthropos as the only manner in which to faithfully and adequately translate liturgical texts into vernacular tongues.

Committee: Ryan T. Ruiz S.L.D. (Advisor) Subjects: Linguistics; Religion; Theology

Master of Arts, The Ohio State University, 2018, Near Eastern Languages and Cultures

The Rare Books Collection at the Ohio State University's Thompson Library contains two Syriac manuscripts, neither of which has been extensively investigated or properly identified until now. There is no record of where they came from or how they came to be at Ohio State. Both manuscripts are written in the East Syriac script. The larger, Ms. B, is a collection of East Syriac Christian liturgy, including the Psalms, a variety of hymns, and excerpts from the Hudra, the yearly cycle of feast and fast days. Two smaller texts have been inserted into the codex of Ms. B. One, inside the front cover, is a fragmentary collection of metrical homilies, at least one of which is by the famous fifth-century poet Narsai. The other, inside the back cover, is a description of the Creation, written in the Neo-Aramaic dialect of Alqosh (in modern Iraq). The smaller manuscript, Ms. C, also contains excerpts from the Hudra. There are more entries than in Ms. B, although each is shorter, and while the two manuscripts naturally feature many of the same feast days, the liturgies themselves are entirely different. This paper includes descriptions and discussion of the manuscripts, updated catalog entries, and text and translation of the metrical homilies inserted inside the front cover of Ms. A.

Committee: Sam Meier (Advisor); Hadi Jorati (Committee Member) Subjects: Near Eastern Studies

Master of Arts (M.A.), University of Dayton, 2016, Theology

This study seeks to examine the development of the Roman missal in order to contribute to the discussion of the methods and potential changes for the Holy Mass. The task for us in this work involves analyzing several key areas in order to understand the foundations for liturgical growth and demonstrate how these foundation can be applied in order to facilitate the growth of the Roman missal. Our first goal is to examine the historical account of how the Roman missal has developed, which is seen through what is called “organic development.” This often involves growth from the ground up; a gradual process that usually begins on the local level. Through the passage of time, some liturgical features mature and graft themselves onto the liturgy in a more permanent fashion, which may then be adopted Church-wide beyond the more local boundaries where it grew. Often, these developments have as their motivation some type of pastoral response involving the current situation in the Church. Therefore, this study will also examine the Liturgical Movement of the 20th century leading into the reforms of the Second Vatican Council. This pastoral maneuver establishes the precedent to move the Roman missal out of its nearly 400 year stagnation since the Tridentine reforms and respond to the need to generate the “active participation” of the laity. The movement quickly developed into a Church-wide entity calling for not only education and intelligent involvement with the Roman missal, but also a call to enact reforms and revisions to the Holy Mass in order to better facilitate this “active participation.” The concept of “active participation” and the laity was the banner of the 20th century liturgical changes and is still one of the major focuses today. Our study will also analyze and attempt to derive from the concept of “active participation” several subcategories. This is in an effort to identify other forms of active participation, which reveals the interior, individual, and u (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: William Johnston Dr. (Advisor); Sandra Yocum Dr. (Committee Member); Michael Carter Dr. (Committee Member) Subjects: Clergy; History; Religion; Religious Education; Religious History; Theology

Master of Arts (M.A.), University of Dayton, 2016, Theological Studies

Academic study of the Sarum Use, or the Use of Salisbury, the dominant liturgical tradition of medieval England, has long been overshadowed by a perception of triviality and eccentric antiquarianism inherited from the nineteenth century. Further, the Sarum Use has been in relative disuse in the Roman Catholic Church since the early seventeenth century. Using primarily the research of Eamon Duffy and Richard Pfaff, this thesis seeks to readdress both of these aspects of the Sarum Use and argues that because of the unique history and experience of the English Church in the period following the English Reformation, the Sarum liturgy holds an important place in English religious history. The thesis argues for the revival of serious academic interest in Sarum itself as well as for the active renewal of the Sarum tradition for contemporary Catholic liturgical use within the context of the Church.

Committee: Michael Carter Ph.D. (Advisor); William Johnston Ph.D. (Committee Member); Jennifer Speed Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: British and Irish Literature; Clergy; European Studies; Medieval History; Medieval Literature; Middle Ages; Religion

Master of Arts (M.A.), University of Dayton, 2015, Theological Studies

This thesis begins with a meditation on the role of Christ's Resurrection in the life of the early and modern Church. In light of the evangelistic fervor that marked the apostolic era on account of the first Christians' experience of the Resurrection, this thesis argues that the Resurrection retains a central role in any attempt to reinvigorate the Church's missionary efforts, in particular the recent Magisterial project of the New Evangelization. Rejecting apologetics as a way to reorient evangelization around the Resurrection, I turn to the biblical Emmaus story to argue for the privileged role of the liturgy as a place of evangelistic encounter with the Risen Christ. Turning, then, to the 20th century German Benedictine liturgist Dom Odo Casel, I spend the remainder of the thesis, with the help of the Catholic Magisterium and the theological debate his work occasioned, exploring his unique and controversial assertion that the Paschal Mystery, the historical event that so radically reordered the lives of the first Christians, is substantially present in the sacraments. Though the majority of Catholic theologians reject his assertion, as I am also inclined, I will argue that post-conciliar sacramental theology has nevertheless “thrown the baby out with the bath water” by underemphasizing essential evangelistic elements of liturgical worship. Indeed, I lastly argue that by retrieving and clarifying Casel's unique assertion, we can help to recover his important central insight and so articulate a kerygmatic liturgical theology for the New Evangelization.

Committee: William Johnston (Advisor); Dennis Doyle (Committee Member); William Portier (Committee Member) Subjects: Religion; Theology

Master of Arts (M.A.), University of Dayton, 2015, Theological Studies

This project explores the practice of Christian pilgrimage as an embodied, sacramental reality. Taking into consideration theological concerns coming from outside of the Catholic tradition which reveal some controversy as to the appropriateness of the practice of pilgrimage within Christianity, it will address objections to the concept of sacred space by pointing to the anticipatory/not-yet dimension of the Christian faith. Drawing on the methodological approach taken by Roberto S. Goizueta in Caminemos con Jesus: Toward a Hispanic/Latino Theology of Accompaniment in which the author uses a specific experience as a source for theological reflection, this project will begin with a particular experience of pilgrimage and, in dialogue with Scripture and tradition, use the experience to examine the practice of pilgrimage as an embodiment of the Christian journey. Drawing especially from Luke's account of two disciples journeying to Emmaus, it will explore how the Church's tradition of understanding the Christian life as a journey simultaneously nourished by and culminating in Eucharist may be enriched by an experience of pilgrimage. It will examine ways in which the practices of pilgrimage and liturgy mutually illuminate one another. Finally, taking this discussion as evidence of the effectiveness of embodiment, it will explore the essential role of embodiment in Christian practice. Drawing on the necessity of mediation to answer objections initially raised against the practice of pilgrimage, it will conclude by positing that the recognition of pilgrimage as a sacramental reality may be an effective starting point on which to build a theology of Christian pilgrimage.

Committee: Sandra Yocum Ph.D. (Advisor); William Johnston Ph.D. (Other); Dennis Doyle Ph.D. (Other) Subjects: Religion; Spirituality; Theology

Doctor of Philosophy, Case Western Reserve University, 2014, Musicology

The Roman Catholic Good Friday liturgy includes a series of chants known today as the Improperia (“Reproaches”) beginning with the following text: Popule meus, quid feci tibi? aut in quo contristavi te? responde mihi. Quia eduxi te de terra Egypti, parasti crucem Salvatori tuo (“My people, what have I done to you, or in what have I grieved you? Answer me. Because I led you out of the land of Egypt, you prepared a cross for your Savior”). The earliest witness to the chants is a Carolingian liturgical book from around 880, but it is agreed among scholars that their history extends back farther than this. Employing comparative analysis of Biblical exegesis, chant texts, and chant melodies, this study suggests that the initial chant verse, Micah 6:3–4a plus a Christianizing addendum (“My people... you prepared...”), originated in northwestern Italy between the end of the 4th century and the end of the 7th century and carried associations of the Last Judgment, the Passion, and Christian works, penitence, and forgiveness. Although previous scholarship has sometimes pointed to the Reproaches as a key text of Christian anti-Jewish history, it is clear that the initial three verses, the Popule meus verses, originally held allegorical rather than literal meanings. The fact that there are several preserved Popule meus chants across various liturgical repertoires and, moreover, several sets of Popule meus verses in a smaller subset of these repertoires—in northern Italy, southern France, and the Spanish March—bespeaks the pre-Carolingian origins of the Popule meus verses and raises the question of why the verses appear in the Carolingian liturgy when they do. This study proposes that the Popule meus verses were incorporated into the Carolingian liturgy at the Abbey of Saint-Denis under the abbacy of Charles the Bald (867–77). In the Adoration of the Cross ceremony adopted from Rome, paired with the Greek Trisagion, and carrying Gallican melody and meaning, the Carolingian (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: David Rothenberg (Advisor) Subjects: Ancient History; Art History; Bible; Biblical Studies; European History; History; Judaic Studies; Medieval History; Medieval Literature; Middle Ages; Middle Eastern History; Music; Near Eastern Studies; Religion; Religious History; Theology

DMA, University of Cincinnati, 2012, College-Conservatory of Music: Conducting, Choral Emphasis

Johann Sebastian Bach's cantatas occupy a significant portion of his output. This document focuses on his four cantatas written for the Quinquagesima Sunday in Leipzig. The first two cantatas (BWV 22 and BWV 23), which were audition pieces for the cantor position in Leipzig (1723), were performed again in the following year as part of his first cantata cycle. The other two surviving cantatas for this Sunday (BWV 127 and BWV 159) are found in his second (1724–25) and fourth (1728–29) cantata cycles. Not only for his audition, but also for the special context of the Quinquagesima Sunday, (the last major religious musical event in Leipzig before the Passion at the Good Friday Vespers), Bach carefully constructed these cantatas to display his considerable musical ability, his attention to text expression, and his knowledge of liturgical and theological issues for the preparation of the Lenten season. This document will provide a conductor's guide to preparing and conducting these cantatas and examine how Bach achieves his goals of musical and liturgical function within the Lutheran tradition.

Committee: Earl Rivers DMA (Committee Chair); Matthew Peattie PhD (Committee Member); L. Scott DMA (Committee Member) Subjects: Music

PhD, University of Cincinnati, 2002, Arts and Sciences : History

Since the seventeenth century, English antiquarians, scholars and popular authors have sought to explain why Saint George became the patron saint of England. Unfortunately, the majority of these works have concerned themselves so thoroughly with documenting the development of the saint as the symbol of the nation that they have forgotten or ignored the fact that medieval people venerated Saint George as a martyr. In short, these works have ignored Saint George's place within the context of medieval piety – the very context out of which the political and patriotic symbol of the nation emerged. This study examines the history of the cult of Saint George in England with special emphasis on the manner in which English men and women venerated and prayed to Saint George. The result of this new analysis is a picture of medieval piety that clearly identifies Saint George as a personal intercessor. While medieval men and women recognized Saint George's special connection to England – via his patronage of the Order of the Garter and his intercession in times of war – they prayed to the saint for their own needs and not for the well-being of the kingdom. Such acts of personal piety, widespread throughout England, underpin broader royal, martial and political events, all of which explain why a fourth-century martyr became and remains the patron saint of England.

Committee: Dr. James M. Murray (Advisor) Subjects: History, Medieval

Doctor of Philosophy, University of Toledo, 2012, History

During the Middle Ages the Church worked to make official liturgical services unified and universal. Close textual and historical analysis of Latin liturgical documents offers insight into the writers' method and the sentiments expressed in prayer. The repertory for this study is a set of poems drawn from selected hours of the Divine Office: first vespers, matins, lauds, second vespers. All of the Offices date from the late Middle Ages (A.D. 1100-1500) and were written to honor saints who served as bishops. Although the texts are late medieval, there is a great range in the bishops' lifetime. A discussion of liturgy and the cycle of celebrations is followed by a consideration of the special Divine Office category: services dedicated to bishop saints. Thirty-five Latin Offices honoring thirteen bishops are considered. This study restricts itself to the lyrics, not the musical notation. The identification of rhyme scheme, metrical pattern, and overall structure is followed by delineation of peculiar features of each poem. They are examined for such elements as figures of speech, scriptural allusion, place names, and hagiographical convention. Especially notable are references to the bishop's interaction with secular authorities. Special attention is given to two saints especially popular during the period under consideration: Bishop Nicholaus of Bari (fourth century) and Bishop Guillelmus of Bourges (early thirteenth century). The former represents early saints whose cult spread throughout Europe during the late Middle Ages and who were revered, not through the official canonization process, but rather by force of popular devotion. The aim of this study is threefold. It establishes the late medieval identity of the bishop saint. It also traces, in Nicolaus of Bari and Guillelmus of Bourges, the outline of the bishop saint as a patron who also stood up to secular authority when the Church's position was challenged. Third, the examination of texts of Nicolaus as an ea (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Carol Bresnahan (Committee Chair); Robert Curtis I (Committee Member); Michael Jakobson (Committee Member); Diane Britton (Committee Member) Subjects: European History; Foreign Language; Medieval History; Medieval Literature; Religious History

Doctor of Philosophy, University of Toledo, 2012, History

During the Middle Ages the Church worked to make official liturgical services unified and universal. Close textual and historical analysis of Latin liturgical documents offers insight into the writers' method and the sentiments expressed in prayer. The repertory for this study is a set of poems drawn from selected hours of the Divine Office: first vespers, matins, lauds, second vespers. All of the Offices date from the late Middle Ages (A.D. 1100-1500) and were written to honor saints who served as bishops. Although the texts are late medieval, there is a great range in the bishops' lifetime. A discussion of liturgy and the cycle of celebrations is followed by a consideration of the special Divine Office category: services dedicated to bishop saints. Thirty-five Latin Offices honoring thirteen bishops are considered. This study restricts itself to the lyrics, not the musical notation. The identification of rhyme scheme, metrical pattern, and overall structure is followed by delineation of peculiar features of each poem. They are examined for such elements as figures of speech, scriptural allusion, place names, and hagiographical convention. Especially notable are references to the bishop's interaction with secular authorities. Special attention is given to two saints especially popular during the period under consideration: Bishop Nicholaus of Bari (fourth century) and Bishop Guillelmus of Bourges (early thirteenth century). The former represents early saints whose cult spread throughout Europe during the late Middle Ages and who were revered, not through the official canonization process, but rather by force of popular devotion. The aim of this study is threefold. It establishes the late medieval identity of the bishop saint. It also traces, in Nicolaus of Bari and Guillelmus of Bourges, the outline of the bishop saint as a patron who also stood up to secular authority when the Church's position was challenged. Third, the examination of texts of Nicolaus as an ear (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Carol Bresnahan PhD (Committee Chair); Robert Curtis PhD (Committee Member); Michael Jakobson PhD (Committee Member); Diane Britton PhD (Other) Subjects:

Master of Arts, The Ohio State University, 2012, Near Eastern Languages and Cultures

With these three chapters analyzing Saadiah's bible translations, exegesis, and liturgical translations, it will be demonstrated that Saadiah's use of Arabic terminology allowed him to create an innovative form of the expression of Jewish ideas. In the case of the Pentateuch translations, the Arabic terminology that was analyzed served to preserve not only a very literal meaning of the text in the vernacular of the Jewish masses but also the sacred nature of the text by utilizing terms which possess a sacred nature in the Qur'an and Islamic texts. In his translations of the baqqashot, Saadiah includes names for God which occur in Islamic prayer and includes terminology that describes its actual choreography. In this way, Saadiah allowed for the prayer to not only serve as a form of Jewish piety, but also to resemble the Muslim piety for the sake of his readers. The interpretation of the first Psalm also displays an innovative form of the expression of Jewish ideas by supplying a multiplicity of meanings for some words, a feat which is not common in the Jewish literature that preceded him.

Committee: Daniel Frank PhD (Advisor); Michael Swartz PhD (Committee Chair) Subjects: Judaic Studies