Nationality American Religion Christian Name Jeffrey Russell | Years active 1965-Present Denomination Catholic Role Historian | |
Born 1934 California Known for Professor of Medieval History Notable work Dissent and Reform in the Early Middle Ages, History of Medieval Christianity, Witchcraft in the Middle Ages, Prince of Darkness: Radical Evil and the Power of Good in History, A History of Heaven Employer University of California, Santa Barbara Education Emory University (1960), University of California, Berkeley Awards Guggenheim Fellowship for Humanities, US & Canada Books Lucifer - the Devil in the Middle A, Inventing the Flat Earth, The Prince of Darkness, Witchcraft in the Middle A, The Devil: Perceptions of Evil fro | ||
Jeffrey burton russell on the geography of heaven and hell
Jeffrey Burton Russell (born 1934) is a well-published American historian and religious studies scholar.
Contents
Review of jeffrey burton russell s mephistopheles the devil in the modern world
Biography
Russell received his undergraduate degree from the University of California, Berkeley in 1955 and his PhD from Emory University in 1960.
He is currently Professor Emeritus of History at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He has also taught History and Religious Studies at Berkeley, Riverside, Harvard, New Mexico, and Notre Dame.
Works
Russell has published widely, mostly in medieval European history and the history of theology. His first book was Dissent and Reform in the Early Middle Ages (1965). He is most noted for his five-volume history of the concept of the Devil: The Devil (1977), Satan (1981), Lucifer (1984), Mephistopheles (1986) and The Prince of Darkness (1988).
In Inventing the Flat Earth (1991) he argues that 19th century anti-Christians invented and spread the falsehood that educated people in the Middle Ages believed that the earth was flat. As one writer summarizes, "Russell also examined a large selection of textbooks and found those written before 1870 usually included the correct account, but most textbooks written after 1880 uncritically repeated the erroneous claims in Washington Irving, John William Draper and Andrew Dickson White. Russell concludes that Irving, Draper and White were the main writers responsible for introducing the erroneous flat-earth myth that is still with us today."
Russell has also written two books on the history of the notion of Heaven: A History of Heaven: The Singing Silence (1997), which deals with the period from around 200 B.C. up to Dante, and Paradise Mislaid (2006), which takes the story up to the present day.
The Library of Congress lists 18 books written by Russell:
Articles by Russell include:
Book reviews by Russell include: