God and the goddesses
Subtitle: vision, poetry, and belief in the Middle Ages
By: Barbara Newman.
Series: The Middle Ages series
Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press
Published: 2003
Place of publication: Philadelphia
Language: eng
Number of pages: 446
Subjects: Poetry, Medieval -- History and criticism.; Goddesses in literature.; God in literature.
Description: "God and the Goddesses is a study in medieval imaginative theology, examining the numerous daughters of God who appear in allegorical poems, theological fictions, and the visions of holy women. We have tended to understand these deities as mere personifications and poetic figures, but that, Barbara Newman contends, is a mistake. These goddesses are neither pagan survivals nor versions of the Great Goddess constructed in archetypal psychology, but distinctive creations of the Christian imagination.

As emanations of the Divine, mediators between God and the cosmos, embodied universals, and ravishing objects of identification and desire, medieval goddesses transformed and deepened Christendom's concept of God, introducing religious possibilities beyond the ambit of scholastic theology and bringing them to vibrant imaginative life."--BOOK JACKET.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. [409]-436) and index.