Biography

Tamar Herzig is Tenured Senior Lecturer in Early Modern History at Tel Aviv University, Israel. She has authored articles on topics such as the prosecution of heresy and witchcraft, Renaissance demonology, premodern reform movements, and female spirituality. Her first book, Savonarola's Women: Visions and Reform in Renaissance Italy, was published by the University of Chicago Press in 2008. Another monograph,"Christ Transformed into a Virgin Woman": Lucia Brocadelli, Heinrich Institoris, and the Defense of the Faith, was recently published by Edizioni di Storia e Letteratura (2013). In 2012, Herzig was elected member of the Young Academy of Israel, founded by the Israeli Academy of Sciences and Humanities.

Project Summary 

This project seeks to explore the impact that the controversy, dialogue, and competition with Jews in Renaissance Ferrara had on Christian belief and on the development of Catholic spirituality. It is based on an analysis of texts that presented female stigmatization as the foremost confirmation of Christ’s Incarnation and Crucifixion—key Christian tenets that were refuted by the Jews.