Enrico Norelli: faith and intellectual honesty.

1. Entity type Lemma
2. Original titleEnrico Norelli: credinta si onestitate intelectuala.
3. Language term Romanian
4. lemma author Stavinschi, Alexandra
5. lemma category Orthodox theological tradition and practice > Patristic studies - Co-existence - Scientific theories and disciplines > Religious studies
6. Publication date 24-1-2017
7. lemma work Bădiliţă, Cristian [Author]. Enrico Norelli: faith and intellectual honesty.
8. lemma manifestations Stiinta dragoste credinta. Convorbiri cu patrologi europeni. [Science faith love. Conversations with European patrologists]
9. Keywords Classical studies - Early Church Fathers - apocrypha
10. Citations
    1. 68-79
11. Lemma body

    1. This is the third dialogue of Cristian Badilita’s book Stiinta dragoste credinta. It is based on a conversation held in 2000 in Turin with the Italian scholar Enrico Norelli. Norelli, born in 1952 in Grosseto, is at that time Associate Professor at the autonomous Faculty of Theology in Geneva. Prior to that, he did classical studies in Pisa, medieval Christian history studies and research on the second century Syrian prophethood (Bologna). Along with a group of Italian specialists, he published the Isaiah’s ascent to heaven, a crucial text for defining the prophetic role in the ancient Christian communities of Asia Minor.

       Enrico Norelli is a member of the Association for the study of Christian apocryphal literature, the Association for the development of religious sciences in Italy, the Italian Biblical Association and the Societas Novi Testamenti Studiorum. He is now preparing a comprehensive monograph on Marcion and the setting up of the Christian canon.

       Norelli was educated at a time involving a change of paradigm. He recalls that after Vatican II, people showed great interest in renewal and some intolerance towards certain structures and ideas which were perceived as old, in the sense that they were part of an understanding of Christianity which felt as no longer suitable. Vatican II was shortly followed by the 1968 movement. This entailed an end to a certain type of fundamentalist Christianity, perceived as linked to a system of power and Church interference in worldly matters. Norelli goes on to evoke episodes from his academic training at Pisa and then Bologna, where he worked with Bettiolo, Pesce, Bori and Perrone.

       He kept his faith throughout all these years, but, unlike Badilita who refuses to make a distinction between the believer and the researcher, Norelli insists that such a distinction ought to be made, using the method of historical sciences.

       Finally, Norelli talks about the readings that influenced him the most and about the focus of his current research.