The Prospects for Holy War
This essay offers a reading of “A Most Useful Discussion Concerning Proposals for War against the Turks.” What we have in the “Useful Discussion” is a mock consultation, a literary creation in which Erasmus appears to offer judicious advice on how Christendom might wage a successful war against the...
| Published in: | Erasmus studies |
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| Main Author: | |
| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
| Published: |
Brill
2016
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| In: |
Erasmus studies
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| IxTheo Classification: | CG Christianity and Politics KAG Church history 1500-1648; Reformation; humanism; Renaissance |
| Further subjects: | B
Erasmus
crusade
Turks
consultation
irony
|
| Online Access: |
Volltext (Verlag) |
| Summary: | This essay offers a reading of “A Most Useful Discussion Concerning Proposals for War against the Turks.” What we have in the “Useful Discussion” is a mock consultation, a literary creation in which Erasmus appears to offer judicious advice on how Christendom might wage a successful war against the Turks, only to undercut the very prospects for such a war by means of various strategies of indirection, hesitation, and ironic reversal. Erasmus works critically and ironically on several levels at once—unsettling the dogmatism of war-mongers, surprising Luther and his critics, frustrating the interests of the powerful, and nudging everyone to think seriously about fundamental questions of human life. Though the “Useful Discussion” may appear to address a specific question about a specific war, it in fact speaks—in its pendular and ironic manner—to more basic questions, inviting readers to reflect with amazement and remorse upon the numbness and deafness of human beings before God; and, on that basis, to work to enhance the moral quality of life. |
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| Contains: | In: Erasmus studies
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1163/18749275-03602009 |