Description
Book SynopsisCaspers and Margry present a cultural biography of the Amsterdam Eucharistic Miracle that led to the rise of Amsterdam as a city and religious contention during the Reformation.
Trade Review"The subtitle 'Biography of a Contested Devotion' aptly describes The Miracle of Amsterdam. This is the account of a devotional cult in Amsterdam from its origins in 1345 to the present day, thus a period of almost six hundred years. Despite the fact that the book has two authors, its authorial voice is remarkably uniform and consistent. The book is impeccably researched, elegantly written, and judicious in its handling of sometimes very tricky evidence. I found it to be a deeply insightful, balanced, humane treatment of an important topic." —Daniel Hobbins, University of Notre Dame
"The book is the first to provide a synthesis of the historical work on the Amsterdam cult and the curious religious practices that developed around it. It is one of the great achievements of this book that the authors can convince their readers of how the ritual has its own chapters. The scholarly work is impressive. The authors combine well-known historical facts and figures with smaller stories and testimonies by lay Catholics that might seem trivial at first but prove to be particularly meaningful and telling." —Tine Van Osselaer, Ruusbroec Institute of the University of Antwerp
"In their marvelously detailed account, Charles Caspers and Peter Jan Margry show how deeply embedded sacred matters are in the history of a place. Excavating layer upon layer of political, civil, and religious history, the authors bring to light the deeply structured cultural memory of a miracle, demonstrating in the process just how richly creative tradition can be. The miracle of a fourteenth-century Eucharistic host is as persistent as Dutch Catholicism and as vivacious as the city of Amsterdam. Extensively researched and clearly written, this book is a model of how to do the cultural history of religion." —David Morgan, Duke University
"This 'cultural biography' recounts the fascinating life of a religious devotion that has persisted from the Middle Ages to today. Repeatedly changing form and meaning, veneration of the Miracle of Amsterdam has been an important part of Dutch Catholic identity for almost seven centuries. Through the lens of the Miracle, Caspers and Margry offer a compelling view of a much wider story of religious and social change." —Ben Kaplan, University College London
Table of ContentsIntroduction
Part 1. Creation and expansion of a cult (1345-1500) 1.1. The rise of Amsterdam 1.2. Religious context 1.3. The Miracle 1. 1.4. Corpus Christi and Sacraments of Miracle 1.5. The bishop and the count 1.6. Miracles of the Miracle 1.7. Processions through the city
Part 2. In the Habsburgs’ Favor (1500-1600) 2.1. Royal interest in the Holy Stead 2.2. The Habsburgs and national consciousness 2.3. Eucharistic symbolism 2.4. The Reformation comes to Holland 2.5. A women’s resistance movement and the city’s identity 2.6. The failed coup of the Anabaptists in 1535 2.7. Disciplining faith and cult 2.8. 1566, the “miraculous year”
2.9. The end of Amsterdam as an international place of pilgrimage
Part 3. The Miracle on the margins (1600-1795) 3.1. Hidden devotion 3.2. Catholic hope and Reformed fear 3.3. The Miracle expressed 3.4. The Miracle celebrated 3.5. The Miracle weighed up
Part 4. The battle for public space (1795-1881) 4.1. A velvet revolution: change and continuity 4.2. 1845: the “Feast of Folly” 4.3. Antipapism and the ban on public space 4.4. The “Ultramontane miracle disease”
Part 5. The Silent Walk as a national symbol of identity (1881-1960) 5.1. The construction of the Silent Walk 5.2. Cult versus cultural heritage 5.3. A national cult 5.4. The practice of the Walk 5.5. The international Eucharistic movement 5.6. Politics and ideology: the interwar years and the Second World War 5.7. The post-war cult: climax and catharsis
Part 6. Revolution and the reinvention of tradition (1960-2015) 6.1. Reconstruction and affluence 6.2. Revolution in the long 1960s 6.3. Religion, market, and tradition 6.4. Ecumenical harmony? 6.5. Continuing, broken, restored, and new traditions
Part 7. Conflict or consensus?
Route of the Silent Walk Timeline Sources and literature Index
