Building Connections with Excellence
Story becomes History
"Looking out to the even darker blue sea and the slightly lighter sky in the early evening, the sailing ships remind me that the very nature of scholarship is to work against the trodden paths of individual boats. These leave short traces of waves, but soon, these are gone, merged with the larger and smaller waves to become the constant movement of the more incredible sea. Writing means pushing against streams, including those produced by oneself, against conventions and established paradigms, and giving back one’s input that becomes one with those of countless others. And yet, this does not result in simply sailing with the winds." — Early Christianity and the Challenge of Writing History, xxiii
Strands
"Sometimes, I wished to lie beside her, exposed to the same short distance between life and death. Then, she asked me to look after myself, care for our children, and stay close to her, but not too close. At the same time, she endorsed Cicero’s main thesis that virtue is sufficient for living a happy life, and if not always happy and sometimes sad, for living a thankful life. She spoke about those people and things dear to her, put on a smile, relaxed, and got up the next morning with energy that surpassed my drive. Long before I had gone up, she sat on the balcony of our holiday home, wrote her new book on art and performance, and had completed page after page when I offered her a first coffee. She gave me a hug and encouraged me to sit down with her and start my own writing and suggested we should have our breakfast a bit later as she felt kissed by the Muses. The sun was rising, and the black sea turned its color to blue and red." — Early Christianity and the Challenge of Writing History, 2
From these waves emerged three scholarly strands:
"Writing" or "How to write History"
"Resetting" or "How to write the Beginnings of Christianity" and
"Detaching" or "How and why Meister Eckhart is important"