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John Eastburn Boswell (March 20, 1947 - December 24, 1994), was a prominent historian and a professor at Yale University. Many of Boswell's studies focused on the issue of homosexuality and religion, specifically Roman Catholicism. March 20 is the 79th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar (80th in Leap years). ...
1947 (MCMXLVII) was a common year starting on Wednesday (the link is to a full 1947 calendar). ...
December 24 is the 358th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar (359th in leap years). ...
1994 (MCMXCIV) was a common year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar, and was designated as the International Year of the Family and the International Year of the Sport and the Olympic Ideal by United Nations. ...
Yale redirects here. ...
Homosexuality refers to sexual and romantic attraction between two individuals of the same sex. ...
The Roman Catholic Church, most often spoken of simply as the Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with over one billion members. ...
Biography Born in Boston in 1947 into a military family, Boswell earned his undergraduate degree from the College of William and Mary, where he converted to Roman Catholicism. His nickname, from his initials, was "Jeb". A gifted medieval philologist, he received his doctorate from Harvard University in 1975, whereupon he joined the Yale University history faculty; he was made full professor in 1982. In 1987, Boswell helped organize and found the Lesbian and Gay Studies Center at Yale, which is now the Research Fund for Lesbian and Gay Studies. He was named the A. Whitney Griswold Professor of History in 1990, when he was also appointed to a two-year term as chair of the Yale history department, also attaining status as tenured full professor of history. The College of William and Mary (also known as William and Mary or W&M) is a small public university located in Williamsburg, Virginia, United States. ...
The Roman Catholic Church, most often spoken of simply as the Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with over one billion members. ...
Philology is the study of ancient texts and languages. ...
Harvard University (incorporated as The President and Fellows of Harvard College) is a private university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. ...
Books Boswell was the author of the ground-breaking and controversial book Christianity, Social Tolerance and Homosexuality (1980), which, according to Chauncey et al (1989), "offered a revolutionary interpretation of the Western tradition, arguing that the Roman Catholic Church had not condemned gay people throughout its history, but rather, at least until the twelfth century, had alternately envinced no special concern about homosexuality or actually celebrated love between men." The book was also crowned with the American Book Award for History and the Stonewall Book Award in 1981. The American Book Award was established in 1978 by the Before Columbus Foundation. ...
Sponsored by the American Library Associations Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgendered Round Table, The Stonewall Book Awards are the first and most enduring awards for GLBT books. ...
He is known primarily, however, as author of Same-Sex Unions in Pre-Modern Europe (New York: Villard, 1994) in which he argues that the adelphopoiia liturgy was evidence that attitude of the Christian church towards homosexuality has changed over time, and that early Christians did on occasion accept same-sex relationships. [1] 1994 (MCMXCIV) was a common year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar, and was designated as the International Year of the Family and the International Year of the Sport and the Olympic Ideal by United Nations. ...
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Rites of 'same-sex union' occur in ancient prayer-books of both the western and eastern churches. They are rites of adelphopoiesis, literally Greek for the making of brothers. Boswell argued that these were sexual unions similar to marriage. This is a controversial point of the text, as other scholars have dissenting views of this interpretation, and believe that they were instead rites of becoming adopted brothers, or "blood brothers". [2], [3] Adelphopoiesis, or adelphopoiia from the Greek αδελφοποίησις < αδελφός (adelfos) brother and ποιώ (poio) make, literally brother-making is ceremony practiced at one time by various Christian churches to unite together two people of the same sex (normally men). ...
Boswell pointed out such evidence as an icon of two saints, Saints Sergius and Bacchus (at St. Catherine's on Mount Sinai), and drawings, such as one he interprets as depicting the wedding feast of Emperor Basil to his "partner", John. Boswell sees Jesus as fulfilling the role of the 'pronubus' or in modern parallel, best man. Christ the Redeemer (1410s, by Andrei Rublev) An icon (from Greek , eikon, image) is an image, picture, or representation; it is a sign or likeness that stands for an object by signifying or representing it, or by analogy, as in semiotics; in computers an icon is a symbol on the...
In traditional Christian iconography, Saints are usually depicted as having halos. ...
The Saint Sergius in this article is the Fourth Century martyr. ...
To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ...
Jesus (8–2 BC/BCE to 29–36 AD/CE),[1] also known as Jesus of Nazareth, is the central figure of Christianity. ...
Boswell made many detailed translations of these rites in his book The Marriage of Likeness, and claimed that one mass gay wedding occurred only a couple of centuries ago in the Basilica of St John Lateran, the cathedral seat of the pope as Bishop of Rome. Same-sex marriage is the union of two people who are of the same biological sex or gender. ...
The current Pope is Benedict XVI (born Joseph Alois Ratzinger), who was elected at the age of 78 on 19 April 2005. ...
Christ Giving the Keys to Peter, fresco by Pietro Perugino, 1481–82, commissioned by Pope Sixtus IV, Sistine Chapel, Rome: the act upon which papal authority depends The Bishop of Rome is the bishop of the Holy See and is more commonly referred to as the Pope. ...
Boswell's writings touched off detailed debate in The Irish Times some years ago and the article which triggered off the debate, a major feature in the "Rite and Reason" religion column in the paper by a respected Irish historian and religious commentator, has been reproduced on many websites.[4] The Irish Times is Irelands newspaper of record, launched in the late 1850s. ...
Rite and Reason is the weekly religious column in The Irish Times newspaper. ...
Faith and sexuality Boswell himself was throughout his life a devout Roman Catholic. Although he was orthodox in most of his beliefs, he strongly disagreed with his church's stated opposition to homosexual behavior and relationships. To a certain degree much of the work and research Boswell did regarding the Christian church's historical relationship with homosexuality can be seen as an attempt (which some regard as successful) to find grounds for reconciliation between his religious beliefs and his sexual orientation. The Roman Catholic Church, most often spoken of simply as the Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with over one billion members. ...
Sexual orientation describes the direction of an individuals sexuality, often in relation to their own sex or gender. ...
In Revolutions, Universals, and Sexual Categories (1982, revised), Boswell compares the constructionist-essentialist positions to the realist-nominalist dichotomy. He also lists a three types of sexual taxonomies: Social constructionism is a school of thought introduced into sociology by Peter L. Berger and Thomas Luckmann with their 1966 book on The Social Construction of Reality. ...
Essentialism is the belief and practice centered on a philosophical claim that for any specific kind of entity it is at least theoretically possible to specify a finite list of characteristics, all of which any entity must have to belong to the group defined. ...
Realism is commonly defined as a concern for fact or reality and rejection of the impractical and visionary. ...
Nominalism is the position in metaphysics that there exist no universals outside of the mind. ...
- All or most humans are polymorphously sexual ... external accidents, such as socio-cultural pressure, legal sanctions, religious beliefs, historical or personal circumstances determine the actual expression of each person's sexual feelings.
- Two or more sexual categories, usually, but not always based on sexual object choice.
- One type of sexual response [is] normal ... all other variants abnormal.
Aside from sexuality issues, his "Royal Treasure" is a detailed historical study of the Mudejar Muslims in Aragon in the 14th century. Mudejar Medieval Spanish corruption of the Arabic word Mudajjan مدجن, meaning domesticated. The term means those who accepted submission to non Muslim authorities in lands taken over by Christians in the Mediterranean. ...
A Muslim is a believer in or follower of Islam. ...
Capital Zaragoza Official language(s) Spanish; Aragonese and Catalan also used Area – Total – % of Spain Ranked 4th 47,719 km² 9. ...
This 14th-century statue from south India depicts the gods Shiva (on the left) and Uma (on the right). ...
Death Boswell died of complications from AIDS-related illness on December 24, 1994, at age 47. December 24 is the 358th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar (359th in leap years). ...
1994 (MCMXCIV) was a common year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar, and was designated as the International Year of the Family and the International Year of the Sport and the Olympic Ideal by United Nations. ...
Works - Royal Treasure: Muslim Communities Under the Crown of Aragon in the Fourteenth Century (1977) – Online
- Christianity, Social Tolerance, and Homosexuality (1980)
- Rediscovering Gay History: Archetypes of Gay Love in Christian History (1982)
- The Kindness of Strangers: The Abandonment of Children in Western Europe from Late Antiquity to the Renaissance (1989)
- Homosexuality in the Priesthood and the Religious Life (1991) (co-author)
- Forms of Desire: Sexual Orientation and the Social Constructionist Controversy (1992)
- The Marriage of Likeness: Same-Sex Union in Premodern Europe (1994)
Source - Boswell, John (1989, 1982). "Revolutions, Universals, and Sexual Categories", Hidden from History: Reclaiming the Gay & Lesbian Past, Chauncey et al, eds. New York: Meridian, New American Library, Penguin Books. ISBN 0-452-01067-5.
- Chauncey et al, eds (1989). "Introduction", Hidden from History: Reclaiming the Gay & Lesbian Past (1990), New York: Meridian, New American Library, Penguin Books. ISBN 0-452-01067-5.
See also Queer studies is the study of issues relating to sexual orientation and gender identity. ...
This is a partial list of confirmed famous people who were or are gay, lesbian or bisexual. ...
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