Throughout the entire Christian history, the idea of Jerusalem, earthly and celestial, has been formative to the Christian Church and produced a fundamental structure of literary and visual religious language. In Western Christianity, this topos has been so influential that it may be described as a code to Christian culture. The research project "Tracing the Jerusalem Code", hosted by MF Norwegian School of Theology, aims to explore the structuring significance of Jerusalem in Scandinavian history. Through a creative, interdisciplinary and cross-period investigation of literal and visual sources and with the changing idea of Jerusalem as a lens, we want to develop new theoretical perspectives on the history of Christianity and on identity constructions and legitimation strategies in diverse religious and political traditions.
In three subprojects we will deal with formative periods of religious change in Scandinavia:
1) Jerusalem in Medieval Scandinavia (ca 1000-1500)
2) Jerusalem in the Lutheran kingdoms of Denmark-Norway and Sweden (ca. 1500-1800)
3) Jerusalem in the eyes of Scandinavian revivalists and travellers (ca 1800-1920)
We investigate theological and literary texts, religious practices, material artefacts, architecture and visual culture to grasp the changing interpretation of Jerusalem in these three periods.
