The “Blurred Boundaries of Religious Dissent Research Initiative” is an international network of scholars who share an interest in alternative religious thoughts and practices, as well as in the construction of religious norms in the Middle Ages. The circulation of both normative and dissident religious knowledge was the focus of their workshop “Networks of Dissent and Persecution in the Middle Ages”. The overall workshop concept included the active involvement of students of Göttingen university, who, after several weeks of preparation, took part in an intensive weekend course before engaging in the workshop discussions (and in writing this report). The workshop was based on pre-circulated papers to be commented on by the participants. It was generously funded by the programme “Pro*Niedersachsen”, the Lindemann-Stiftung of Georg August University Göttingen, the Universitätsbund Göttingen, and the Faculty of Humanities of Georg August University Göttingen.

The first day of the weekend seminar saw SAKU PIHKO (Tampere) introducing new epistemological approaches to inquisitorial records based on work done in his dissertation and putting it in contrast to traditional approaches to source criticism. He introduced several new ways forward, applicable not only to records of inquisition but similar types of sources as well. On the following day, DELFI I. NIETO-ISABEL (London) provided an insight into a blend of Digital Humanities and inquisition research through a deeper dive into networks, centring often-overlooked figures, such as women. As Saku Pihko did, she highlighted the possibilities of applying her approach to other fields of research. Both would later demonstrate the applicability of their concepts in their workshop papers.

The workshop started with a session on the circulation and distortion of normative religious discourses, chaired by Gitta Windt (Göttingen). RACHEL ERNST’s (Atlanta) paper discussed the medieval interpretations of the Ante-Nicene theologian Origen with particular focus on the concept of reincarnation. She highlighted that the attribution of such ideas to Origen, for example by Caesarius of Heisterbach, was the result of the complicated nature of the existing sources surrounding Origen. Ernst’s case study showed that there were two images of Origen, the heretic and the orthodox theologian, that coexisted in the High Middle Ages and each created different textual attributions.

ANDRA ALEXIU (Münster) introduced her paper by reemphasizing the main focus of her research, which consists in the analysis of “proximity anxiety” (Loraine Simmons) within monastic environments. In Alexiu’s approach, this anxiety is understood as the concern about religious collaboration and cohabitation between the sexes. She discussed the origins and evolution of these themes, employing a diachronic approach, and examined syneisaktism and its prevalence during the long twelfth century. Alexiu focused particularly on the perspectives of religious women and explained why this anxiety was more pronounced in certain contexts compared to others.

STAMATIA NOUTSOU’s (Copenhagen) paper re-opened the question of the relation between Bernard of Clairvaux’s overall monastic thought and his anti-heretical writings. Drawing on Deleuze’s and Guattari’s theory of “assemblage” and on Saldaña’s method of “coding”, she presented a holistic reading of Bernard’s texts that made it possible to identify the textual core elements of the Cistercian’s polemical and non-polemical texts. Noutsou came to the conclusion that Bernard was not only driven by Cistercian concepts of charity and their feeling of responsibility for the “Lord’s vineyard”, but also by the opportunity to impose monastic values on lay persons.

ANNE GREULE’s (Göttingen) paper focused on one of the first confessors’ manuals, which came up around 1200: Alan of Lille’s “Liber Poenitentialis”. Drawing on Jessalynn Bird’s research on pastoralia, she discussed its manuscript tradition and highlighted its different techniques of repressing heresy, thereby associating Alan with the pastoral movement traditionally ascribed to Peter the Chanter.

Saku Pihko’s draft opened the second session on the dynamics of information extraction and exchange in repressive contexts, moderated by Adrian Kammerer (Göttingen). Pihko’s paper extended his 2023 dissertation by focusing on religious life and communication among women in medieval inquisition records. He demonstrated that inquisitorial sources could provide valuable insights into the lives and religious participation of medieval women, making visible their engagement in the discussion and dissemination of both dissident and Catholic beliefs.

CLAIRE TAYLOR (Nottingham) presented her current work on a book project about the so-called massacre in Avignonet of the Dominican inquisitor William Arnold and his entourage in 1242. The book’s purpose is to be accessible for students and to make the work process of a historian transparent to them, while at the same time providing an introduction to recent approaches in the study of dissident belief that focus on the rich interplay between mainstream and non-mainstream beliefs and practices. To this aim, she considers different kinds of sources on the 1242 event and the various historiographical interpretations thereof.

JUSTINE TROMBLEY’s (Durham) paper revisited the seemingly enigmatic relation between Marguerite Porete, author of the “The Mirror of Simple Souls”, and Guiard of Cressonessart, who came to help the incriminated in the trial held by the inquisitor William of Paris. In contrast to research negating intellectual touch points between the two, Trombley argued that there were indeed overlapping interests and probably direct contacts between them, showing their wide-ranging networks. Moreover, she cautioned against putting medieval individuals into ideological camps that define their entire intellectual universe – particularly since those categories and definitions were in the first place created by their persecutors.

The final sessions of the workshop centred on fluidity and connections in religious identity construction, and were chaired by Stefanie Lenk and Matthias Berlandi (both Göttingen). Delfi I. Nieto-Isabel’s paper started with the council of Tarragona in February 1318, often misdated to February 1317, and its three first canons on the handling of beguinos et beguinas south of the Pyrenees. She demonstrated their so far overlooked importance for the history of the persecution of lay religious expressions within the orbit of Spiritual Franciscanism. Nieto-Isabel equally highlighted that, at this point, beguinos et beguinas served as an umbrella term to encompass new forms of transgression. These transgressions south of the Pyrenees, she stressed, were already persecuted before their formal papal condemnation and shared many of the features of the groups condemned in “Sancta romana”, issued by John XXII in December 1317, including the role of literacy.

SEAN L. FIELD’s (Vermont) paper, discussed in absentia and moderated by Delfi Nieto-Isabel, dealt with the life of Clare of Rimini (c. 1260–1326), an un-cloistered ascetic visionary woman, as it is described in her hagiography. The focus was on Clare’s connections, how her networks were instrumental in the dissemination of her ideas, and her everchanging position in the eyes of church officials and the public.

THOMAS HENDRIK KAAL (London) opened up a series of three papers that focused on conversos, as the Iberian Jews who had been forcibly converted to Christianity since the end of the 14th century and their descendants were called. He placed particular emphasis on the Franciscan friar Alonso de Espina (c. 1410–c. 1466), who called for a general inquisition in Castile in his treatise “Fortalitium fidei”, and on his targeting of converso unbelief. For Espina, the greatest heretical threat to religious orthodoxy in Castile clearly emanated from the New Christian population in the country, in whose faith he had no trust. Suspecting the conversos of “Judaizing”, he saw such alleged practices as a form of unbelief. The denial of the existence of God came henceforth to be regarded as a form of “Judaizing”.

BERT CARLSTROM’s (London) paper dealt with the construction and co-production of religious identities in late 15th century Spanish sources, showing that Christian self-identity depended on an understanding (however inaccurate) of Judaism. Following John Van Engen, he moved beyond established binaries, such as “reformers” and “dissenters”, and conceived of this process as one and the same conversation about religious identity. He focused on the ways in which lines were blurred between Christianity and Judaism both in works of religious instruction, such as Hernando de Talavera’s, and in an anonymous pamphlet (the “Libelo”, condemned as heretical), emphasizing the many diverse expressions of religiosity in the 15th century.

ROSA VIDAL DOVAL’s (Oxford) paper focused on the origin and the enormously fast spreading of the concept of “limpieza de sangre” (“purity of blood”) in Renaissance Spain, where individuals of Jewish and Muslim heritage were viewed as inferior to “orthodox” Christians. As a result, descendants of Jewish converts were not seen or acknowledged as full members of the Christian society, despite their being baptised. The “success” of this proto-racist concept was partly connected to socio-economic factors, but, as Vidal Doval argued, deeply rooted antisemitism and anti-Judaism were much more vital. To this must be added medieval ideas about nobility, scientific theories of the inheritance of negative characteristics, and slavery, that all contributed to the logic underpinning the concept of “purity of blood” in Renaissance Spain.

In the final discussion, the participants did not only reassess their leading workshop concepts, such as “circulation” and “fluidity”, but also decided to put special emphasis on the students’ contributions to the workshop. Their engagement helped carve out the pedagogical aim of operationalizing the research initiative’s concept of “blurred boundaries” in the planned collection.

Conference Overview:

Rachel Ernst (Atlanta): Misinterpreting Origen: The Convoluted Legacy of the Alexandrian Theologian in the High Middle Ages

Andra Alexiu (Münster): Going Against the Flow? Religious Women and Responses to Proximity Anxiety in Twelfth-Century Germany

Stamatia Noutsou (Copenhagen): Permeable Network of Discourses: How Images, Ideals and Ideas Were Transmitted through the Various Works of Bernard of Clairvaux

Anne Greule (Göttingen): The Repression of Heresy in Medieval Confessor’s Guides – The Case of Alan of Lille’s “Liber Poenitentialis”

Saku Pihko (Tampere): Female Religious Talk in Medieval Inquisition Records

Claire Taylor (Nottingham): Faith in Crisis or a Crisis of Faith. Avignonet 1242: A Pedagogical Approach

Justine Trombley (Durham): Heretics Without Borders: Reconsidering Connections Between Marguerite Porete and Guiard of Cressonessart

Delfi I. Nieto-Isabel (London): Coming to Terms: Beguins, Beguines, Tertiaries, Beghards and the Network Boundary Problem in the 14th Century

Sean L. Field (Vermont): The Life of Clare of Rimini as a Case Study in the Flow of Controversial Religious Claims

Thomas Hendrik Kaal (London): Targeting of Converso Unbelief in 15th-Century Castile. The View of Friar Alonso de Espina

Bert Carlstrom (London): Entanglement through Separation: The Religious Instruction of Conversos in 15th-Century Castile

Rosa Vidal Doval (Oxford): “Limpieza de sangre”: Jews, Conversos, and the Boundaries of Genealogy in Renaissance Spain