Philip Benedict
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Philip Benedict is an American historian of the
Protestant Reformation The Reformation (alternatively named the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation) was a major movement within Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the Catholic Church and in ...
in Europe, currently holding the title of Professor Emeritus (profeseur honoraire) at the
University of Geneva The University of Geneva (French: ''Université de Genève'') is a public research university located in Geneva, Switzerland. It was founded in 1559 by John Calvin as a theological seminary. It remained focused on theology until the 17th centu ...
’s Institute for Reformation History (l'Institut d'histoire de la Réformation).


Early life

Benedict was born in Washington, D.C. on 20 August 1949 to the astrophysicist William S. Benedict and the medical doctor and print collector Ruth B. Benedict. He has stated that he is agnostic and that his parents raised him in a secular Jewish household, wholly disconnected from the Calvinism in which he would come to specialize. Benedict graduated from Woodrow Wilson High School in Washington DC in 1966.


Training

Benedict received his B.A. from
Cornell University Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to teach an ...
in 1970, where he studied early modern European history with H.G. Koenigsberger.Benedict, Philip (1981). Rouen During the Wars of Religion. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pg. xvi. He completed his M.A. in 1972 and his Ph.D. in 1975 at
Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial Colleges, fourth-oldest ins ...
, under the direction of
Theodore K. Rabb Theodore K. Rabb (March 5, 1937 – January 7, 2019) was an American historian specializing in the early modern period of European history. He was a Professor Emeritus in the Department of History at Princeton University. He was one of the lea ...
and
Lawrence Stone Lawrence Stone (4 December 1919 – 16 June 1999) was an English historian of early modern Britain, after a start to his career as an art historian of English medieval art. He is noted for his work on the English Civil War and the history of marr ...
. While conducting his dissertation research in France, Benedict also followed the seminar of Denis Richet at what was then the VIe Section of the
École Pratique des Hautes Études École may refer to: * an elementary school in the French educational stages normally followed by secondary education establishments (collège and lycée) * École (river), a tributary of the Seine flowing in région Île-de-France * École, Savoi ...
.


Research

Benedict’s publications have ranged from economic history to the history of printmaking and information, but have chiefly focused on the social and political history of the Reformation, with primary reference to the
French Wars of Religion The French Wars of Religion is the term which is used in reference to a period of civil war between French Catholic Church, Catholics and Protestantism, Protestants, commonly called Huguenots, which lasted from 1562 to 1598. According to estim ...
and the Protestant minority in sixteenth and seventeenth-century France. Benedict's first book, ''Rouen during the Wars of Religion'', has been described as a "model study of the interaction of social, religious, and political factors in French religious wars" by the American Historical Association Guide to Historical Literature. His ''Christ's Churches Purely Reformed: A Social History of Calvinism'' was awarded the 2003 Philip Schaff Prize from the
American Society of Church History The American Society of Church History (ASCH) was founded in 1888 with the disciplines of Christian denominational and ecclesiastical history as its focus. Today the society's interests include the broad range of the critical scholarly perspectiv ...
, and the 2004 Phyllis Goodhart Gordan Prize from
The Renaissance Society of America The Renaissance Society of America (RSA) is an academic association founded in 1954 supporting the study of the Renaissance period, 1300–1650. The RSA brings together scholars from many backgrounds in a wide variety of disciplines from North A ...
. In contrast to
Denis Crouzet Denis Bertrand Yves Crouzet (born 10 March 1953) is a French historian specialising in the history of the early modern period and particularly in the French Wars of Religion during the Protestant Reformation, reformation. He is a professor at Paris ...
and Natalie Davis, who have explored the motivations and psychology behind Roman Catholic religious violence in early modern France, Benedict has asserted various motivations and reasons that
Huguenot The Huguenots ( , also , ) were a religious group of French Protestants who held to the Reformed, or Calvinist, tradition of Protestantism. The term, which may be derived from the name of a Swiss political leader, the Genevan burgomaster Be ...
s engaged in religious violence against Catholics. Benedict has stated that three important factors inspired French Protestants to wage war against their Catholic adversaries: (1)
John Calvin John Calvin (; frm, Jehan Cauvin; french: link=no, Jean Calvin ; 10 July 150927 May 1564) was a French theologian, pastor and reformer in Geneva during the Protestant Reformation. He was a principal figure in the development of the system ...
’s condemnation of “
Nicodemism A Nicodemite () is a person suspected of publicly misrepresenting their religious faith to conceal their true beliefs. The term is sometimes defined as referring to a Protestant Christian who lived in a Roman Catholic country and escaped persecuti ...
,” (2) Reformed polemical treatises and sermons against Catholic images, and (3) the Huguenot belief that the 1562
Edict of January The Edict of Saint-Germain, also known as the Edict of January, was a landmark decree of tolerance promulgated by the regent of France, Catherine de' Medici, in January 1562. The act represented the culmination of several years of slowly libera ...
was under direct assault by overzealous Catholics, and thus needed to be defended by force of arms.


Career

Benedict became a Professor Emeritus (''professeur honoraire'') at the University of Geneva in 2015. He held the title of ''professeur ordinaire'' at the University of Geneva's Institute for Reformation History for nine years prior to his retirement. Benedict served as the Director of the Institute from 2006–2009. Benedict taught at
Brown University Brown University is a private research university in Providence, Rhode Island. Brown is the seventh-oldest institution of higher education in the United States, founded in 1764 as the College in the English Colony of Rhode Island and Providenc ...
for 26 years, where he was the Willard Prescott and Annie McClelland Smith Professor of Religious Studies. He has held visiting positions or fellowships at Cornell University, the
Institute for Advanced Study The Institute for Advanced Study (IAS), located in Princeton, New Jersey, in the United States, is an independent center for theoretical research and intellectual inquiry. It has served as the academic home of internationally preeminent scholar ...
in Princeton, New Jersey,
All Souls College, Oxford All Souls College (official name: College of the Souls of All the Faithful Departed) is a constituent college of the University of Oxford in England. Unique to All Souls, all of its members automatically become fellows (i.e., full members of t ...
, the
School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences The School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences (french: École des hautes études en sciences sociales; EHESS) is a graduate ''grande école'' and ''grand établissement'' in Paris focused on academic research in the social sciences. The ...
(Paris), the
Lumière University Lyon 2 Lumière University Lyon 2 (french: Université Lumière Lyon 2) is one of the three universities that comprise the current University of Lyon, having splintered from an older university of the same name, and is primarily based on two campuses in ...
,
Humboldt University Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin (german: Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, abbreviated HU Berlin) is a German public research university in the central borough of Mitte in Berlin. It was established by Frederick William III on the initiative of ...
(Berlin), and the
National Gallery of Art The National Gallery of Art, and its attached Sculpture Garden, is a national art museum in Washington, D.C., United States, located on the National Mall, between 3rd and 9th Streets, at Constitution Avenue NW. Open to the public and free of char ...
's Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts (Washington, D.C.). Benedict has published five monographs, one collection of documents, edited (or co-edited) thirty-five edited volumes, and contributed chapters to five edited volumes, nineteen peer-reviewed articles in journals. He has published book reviews in Le Monde, The American Historical Review, Journal of Modern History, The Sixteenth Century Journal, Journal of Interdisciplinary History, Annales: E.S.C., Catholic Historical Review, Social History, Volkskundig Bulletin, Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte Literaturbericht, Journal of Economic History, French History, Journal of Ecclesiastical History, Journal of American History, Bibliothèque d'Humanisme et Renaissance, and The English Historical Review.


Teaching

Benedict has led the Institut d'histoire de la Réformation's intensive graduate seminars (''cours d'été''), which attract a wide range of participants to Geneva from institutions across Europe and North America. Several late medieval and early modern historians have credited him with supervising their dissertations, including Michael Breen, Larissa Taylor, and Liam Brockey. Taylor and Brockey's first books, both of which began as dissertations under Benedict's supervision, have gone on to win major book prizes.


Works


Monographs

* * * * * Revised and abridged French translation,


Edited and co-edited volumes

* * * * * *


Selected chapters in edited volumes

* * *


Selected articles

* * * * * * Awarded the Nancy Lyman Roelker Prize by the Sixteenth Century Studies Conference.


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Benedict, Philip Cornell University alumni Princeton University alumni University of Geneva faculty 1949 births Living people Academics from Washington, D.C. Brown University faculty Woodrow Wilson High School (Washington, D.C.) alumni 21st-century American historians 21st-century American male writers American male non-fiction writers