In this Book

summary
Peter the Venerable's extensive literary legacy includes poems, a large epistolary collection, and polemical treatises. The first of his four major polemics targeted a Christian heresy, the Petrobrussians (Against the Petrobrusians); the rest took aim at Jews and Saracens. Catholic University of America Press has published his Against the Inveterate Obduracy of the Jews. This present volume will make available in their entirety Peter the Venerable's twin polemics against Islam - A Summary of the entire heresy of the Saracens and Against the sect of the Saracens - as well as related correspondence. These works resulted from a sustained engagement with Islam begun during Peter's journey to Spain in 1142-43. There the abbot commissioned a translation of sources from the Arabic, the so-called Toledan Collection, that include the Letter of a Saracen with a Christian Response (from the Apology of [Ps.] Al-Kindi ); Fables of the Saracens (a potpourri of Islamic hadith traditions); and Robert of Ketton's first Latin translation of the whole of the Qur'an. Thanks to Peter's efforts, from the second half of the twelfth century Christians could acquire a far better understanding of the teachings of Islam, and Peter may rightly be viewed as the initiator of Islamic studies in the West.

Table of Contents

Cover

Title Page, Copyright

pp. i-iv

Contents

pp. v-vi

Abbreviations and Sigla

pp. vii-viii

Select Bibliography

pp. ix-xx

Introduction

pp. 1-24

Writings Against the Saracens

Letter [To Bernard of Clairvaux] on His Translation (Epistola de translatione sua)

pp. 27-33

A Summary of the Entire Heresy of the Saracens (Summa totius haeresis Saracenorum)

pp. 34-50

Against the Sect of the Saracens (Contra sectam Saracenorum)

Prologue

pp. 51-74

Book One

pp. 75-122

Book Two

pp. 123-160

Appendices

Letter of Peter of Poitiers (Epistola Petri Pictaviensis)

pp. 163-166

Peter of Poitiers’ Chapter Headings (Capitula)

pp. 167-172

Indices

General Index

pp. 175-179

Index of Holy Scripture

pp. 180-182

Index of Quranic References

pp. 183-185
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