We are pleased to announce our study day on Simple Believers: The Layering of Knowledge in Religious Communities from Late Antiquity to Modern Times, which will take place on July 16, 2025, in the Fürstenzimmer at Hohentübingen Castle.

Late antique and medieval Christian authors regularly referred to certain members of their communities as “simple.” These were Christians considered insufficiently theologically educated and therefore possibly particularly susceptible to false or incorrect beliefs. Even members of the clergy—including bishops—could be regarded as “simple” believers. The idea that within a religious community there were members with a deeper or better understanding of the shared faith points to an interesting sociological phenomenon: in every community united by belief in certain convictions, there will be different levels of understanding, knowledge, and commitment to these convictions. The existence of such a layering of knowledge raises a number of fascinating historical questions about what this stratification meant for each individual faith community—both regarding the relationship of its members to the assumed beliefs of their own group, and their relationship to members of other, sometimes rival, religious communities.

The format of the event will consist of 20-minute impulse lectures from various theological fields (Patristics, Practical Theology) and historical disciplines or regions (Byzantium, the Latin West, Sasanian Iran, the Islamic world, as well as the Christian-Arab and Syriac Christian spheres), followed by an open discussion aimed at a broad audience of students, academic colleagues, and interested members of the public.

The event is organized by the Emmy Noether Research Group Religious Conflict and Mobility between Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages: Byzantium and the Greater Mediterranean, 700–900 in cooperation with the Department of Ancient History at the Faculty of Humanities as well as the Chair of Early Church History and Patristics at the Catholic Theological Faculty of the University of Tübingen. It is funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research and the Ministry of Science, Research and the Arts of Baden-Württemberg as part of the Excellence Strategy, through the Tübingen Center for Religion, Culture and Society.

For information and registration, please contact: maren.bienerspam prevention@student.uni-tuebingen.de. To the full schedule.