For the Salvation of This Girl's Soul: Nuns as Converters of Jews in Early Modern Italy
This article argues that converting Jewish girls and women constituted an important expression of Italian nuns' religiosity throughout the age of Catholic Reform. Unlike their male counterparts, however, converting nuns rarely left behind accounts of their conversionary efforts. Moreover, since...
Published in: | Religions |
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Main Author: | |
Format: | Electronic Article |
Language: | English |
Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
Journals Online & Print: | |
Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
Published: |
MDPI
[2017]
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In: |
Religions
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Further subjects: | B
Council of Trent
B Tridentine reforms B Houses of Catechumens B Early Modern Italy B forced baptism B Nuns B monastic enclosure B convent education B Conversion B Jewish-Christian relations |
Online Access: |
Presumably Free Access Volltext (Verlag) Volltext (doi) |
Summary: | This article argues that converting Jewish girls and women constituted an important expression of Italian nuns' religiosity throughout the age of Catholic Reform. Unlike their male counterparts, however, converting nuns rarely left behind accounts of their conversionary efforts. Moreover, since these endeavors were directed exclusively at female Jews they are often obscured in the historical record and in modern historiography. The article tackles the difficulties of recovering the voices of converting nuns and presents examples that suggest how they could be circumvented. Exploring the potential of drawing on previously understudied texts, such as nuns' supplications, the article calls for the integration of this specific manifestation of female devotion into the scholarship and teaching on women's religious life in the early modern era. |
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ISSN: | 2077-1444 |
Contains: | Enthalten in: Religions
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Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.3390/rel8110252 |