This study addresses the need to learn what medieval thinkers had to say about the concept of work by examining the thought of Peter Damian and numerous other religious leaders and groups of the High Middle Ages for evidence of their contributions, deepening our understanding of this concept.

Autorentext
PATRICIA RANFT, Professor of History, Emerita, at Central Michigan University, USA, is the author of numerous studies on religious, intellectual and women's history. Her books include Women and the Religious Life in Premodern Europe (1996), a History Book Club selection, Women and Spiritual Equality in Christian Tradition (1998), A Woman's Way: The Forgotten History of Women Spiritual Directors (2000) and Women in Western Intellectual Culture, 600-1500 (2002), all published by Palgrave Macmillan. With this current study she returns to her earlier interest in the medieval religious renewal movement, about which she published some dozen articles.

Inhalt
Introduction PART ONE: THE FOUNDATION: EARLY CHRISTIAN THEOLOGIES OF WORK Early Christian Attitudes toward Work PART TWO: THE FRAMEWORK: PETER DAMIAN'S CONTRIBUTIONS The Eleventh-Century World of Peter Damian Damian's Social Theology Damian's Apostolate: Theology of Work in Action PART THREE: THE COMPLETED EDIFICE: MEDIEVAL MONASTIC MOVEMENT Regular Canons The Cistercians Women and Other Reformers The Mendicants The Epilogue