Category:Historical Jesus Studies--Italy

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Historical Jesus Studies in Italy / Italian Scholarship on Jesus

• See Historical Jesus Scholars in Italy

The category includes:

• (a) Works by Italian Scholars; see Category:Historical Jesus Studies--Italian Scholarship
• (b) Translations of Scholarly Works into Italian; see Translated into Italian
• (c) Non-Fictional Works by Italian Authors, including Translations of Non-Fictional Works into Italian; see Historical Jesus Studies--Italian Non-Fiction
• (d) Fictional Works by Italian Works, including Translations of Fictional Works into Italian; see Historical Jesus Studies--Italian Fiction

See also Historical Jesus Studies--Italian language, for a complete list of works available in Italian language.

Overview

No Italian scholar contributed to the international rise of modern critical research on the Historical Jesus, which was prompted by the publication in 1774-78 of the work of Hermann Samuel Reimarus. The most popular "Lives of Jesus" of early 19th-century Italy were literary works of spiritual edification, composed by Catholic prelates of great erudition, such as Antonio Cesari, Giuseppe Lorini and Cardinal Alfonso Capecelatro. Their scope did not go beyond the objective of providing a harmonization of the gospels to create elegant and consistent historical-biographical narratives. Since the Renaissance Italy had a long tradition of literary retellings of the life of Jesus, culminated in the masterpieces of Aretino and Metastasio and popularized in the 18th century by the production of numerous oratorios.

In the period preceding the Italian Unification, the Roman Catholic Church maintained a strict control of the cultural and religious life, effectively blocking the publication of any non-conformist voice. The news of the emerging scholarly debate on the Historical Jesus reached Italy as the echoes of far-away heresies. The only conspicuous exception is given by historian Aurelio Bianchi-Giovini, who in 1853, challenging censorship and risking jail, made available to Italian readers the most advanced results of international research. His "Critica degli Evangeli" had to be published in Zurich, Switzerland and only in the 1860s, after the Unification, could be reissued in Milan. Bianchi-Giovini remained a brilliant, yet isolated figure of precursor in the field of Second Temple Judaism and Christian Origins.

The establishment of the Italian State in 1861 created a new climate of religious freedom. A more solid beginning was provided by the translation of the works of David Friedrich Strauss and Ernest Renan in 1863. In a field hitherto monopolized by Catholic theologians and priests, the publication of such works was in itself a great accomplishment and as expected, was followed by a flow of scandalized judgments and apologetic responses. Things were changing rapidly, however. Italy was now officially a liberal State which in 1870 successfully completed its battle against the temporal power of the Church and conquered Rome as its new capital. In 1873, following the abolition of the Faculties of Theology in Italy, the first chair of History of Christianity was established at the University of Naples. Liberal ideas penetrated also among Catholic authors. Luigi Arosio distinguished himself as the first Catholic NT scholar. In 1890, with his Life of Jesus illustrated by the Best Artists, Ruggeri Bonghi, a friend of Antonio Rosmini and Alessandro Manzoni, a professor of Latin literature and ancient history and founder in 1862 of the newspaper La Stampa, was the first author to inaugurate the Italian tradition of journalists and writers to compete successfully in this literary genre still largely reserved for authors ecclesiastical. The public was also exposed to the first romanticized "apocryphal" versions of the life of Jesus, being they characterized by a new and provocative look at ancient sources (the Judas of Petruccelli or the socialist Jesus of Giannelli) or instead animated by a reverent attitude toward the tradition (the Ben-Hur of Wallace, or The Centurion" by Routhier).

At the turn of the century, with the consolidation of the Italian State, we have the first scholarly contributions by Italian University professors Alessandro Chiappelli and Baldassare Labanca, both in line with the approach of the European Liberal School. At the beginning of the twentieth century the development of the international “Modernist” movement in Roman Catholicism prompted the rise also of an Italian school promoting a rationalistic approach to Scriptures across established religious boundaries (University professors Adolfo Omodeo, Ernesto Buonaiuti, Luigi Salvatorelli, and Pietro Martinetti, as well as Jewish scholars Felice Momigliano and Israele Zolli, Protestant scholars Piero Chiminelli e Giovanni Luzzi, and Catholic scholars Leone Tondelli and Giuseppe Ricciotti). The condemnation of Modernism by Pope Pius X in 1907, the rise of Fascism in the ‘20s and especially, the Concordat of 1929 between Fascist Italy and the Vatican, and the anti-Jewish racial law in 1938, caused a progressive yet dramatic decline in the freedom of research and the end of this creative experience. The generation of Modernism would have no heirs.

It would take 40 years to see a new beginning and blossoming of an Italian school in the 1980s and 1990s, after the Second Vatican Council laid the foundations for a renewed interest in historical research and fostered a new climate of freedom and ecumenical dialogue. The seminal work of Carlo Maria Martini, rector of the Pontifical Biblical institute in the 1970s, prepares the path for the emergence of a new generation of Italian scholars: University professors Giorgio Jossa, Mauro Pesce, and Paolo Sacchi, as well as Theological Seminary professors Giuseppe Barbaglio, Rinaldo Fabris, Bruno Maggioni, and Giuseppe Segalla. The future of Italian scholarly research on Jesus today appears brighter as more Italian scholars in the field are engaged in international ventures (Mauro Pesce, Paolo Sacchi, Giorgio Jossa, Marcello Del Verme) or teach abroad (Enrico Norelli, Gabriele Boccaccini, Pierluigi Piovanelli, Edmondo Lupieri). Yet there are three major obstacles: the precarious situation of studies in religion in Italian Universities and Seminaries; the lasting influence of religious conservatism against the historical method; and the difficulty for young researchers and scholars to find academic positions. What will follow the generation of the Second Vatican Council is yet to be seen.