The Ecclesiastical History of the English People (Bede)

I sort of cheated on this one, in the sense that I didn't read it all.  I read more than 2/3, though, so I'm counting this.  I read the first half, then started skipping to the chapters that looked interesting.  There were too many references to random people for me to remember this stuff.

The Venerable Bede wrote his Ecclesiastical History in the 730s, making it an extremely valuable account of Anglo-Saxon England.  As the title implies, it covers history from the Church's perspective, and by that I mean it focuses on things like "who was bishop where, at what time."  It sounds like fascinating reading, doesn't it?  That's why I didn't read it all.

While I found little personal value in the bishop succession portion, I recognize that there is a good amount of historical value there, so I don't want to judge too harshly.  Also, there is more to this, and that made the reading a bit more palatable.  Some of the other themes include:
- a description of miracles attributed to various people and phenomena; often these miracles involve people being healed of illness, preservation of corpses of, or buildings touched by, saints, and more
- some letters from popes to Church officials; I was surprised how true to Scripture they are
- the synod of Whitby in 660s, during which the English settled a dispute with the Irish on when Easter was to be celebrated
- the life of Cuthbert, one of the more famous monks
- visions people had of hell and demons
- the mention of so many place names with which I'm familiar, living in northern England, to include Ripon, Whitby, and Lindisfarne

Here are some of my theological takeaways from reading this:
- Bede was really devoted to the date of Easter, and harsh of Irish (and other) Churches who disagreed
- virgins were viewed as especially pure
- many monks looked tremendously forward to death
- many isolated themselves to focus on God
- many punished themselves for their sins through painful physical acts
- there is a big emphasis on working to repent of your sins.  Important, certainly, but at times it seemed to cross the line into working for salvation.  We do good works because we're saved, not so that we can be saved.  People often forget that.

In the end, there were some interesting things, certainly, but overall, avoid this unless you're heavy into Church history, down to the nitty gritty details.

Rating: C