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Hagiography

  • Living reference work entry
  • First Online:
Hinduism and Tribal Religions

Part of the book series: Encyclopedia of Indian Religions ((EIR))

  • 459 Accesses

Synonyms

Autobiography; Biography; Carita; Saints

Definition

A literary genre that describes the lives of saints.

Introduction

“Hagiography” is composed of Greek words that mean “to write the holy” and in Western tradition the term has historically been understood to denote a literary genre that describes the lives of revered persons, especially saints. As such, the category is considered to be a subgenre of biography, one that is expressly concerned to demonstrate that the subject is a moral exemplar, often but not exclusively according to religious standards. In Eastern and Western Christendom, hagiography was a predominant genre in medieval times, and it exhibited distinctive patterns, such as the presence of miracles and martyrdom [15, 22, 43]. Scholarly discussion of life-writing in other religious and cultural traditions is a modern phenomenon, and the term hagiography is actively, though not unproblematically, deployed. India has a long and continuous tradition of...

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Comparative Religion Department, Drew University, Madison, NJ, USA

    Karen Pechilis

Authors
  1. Karen Pechilis
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Correspondence to Karen Pechilis .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Dept of Anthropology, The University of North Texas Dept of Anthropology, Denton, Texas, USA

    Pankaj Jain

  2. The Graduate Theological Union , Berkeley, California, USA

    Rita Sherma

  3. Jamia Millia Islamia, Centre for the Study of Comparative Reli Jamia Millia Islamia, New Delhi, India

    Madhu Khanna

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Pechilis, K. (2018). Hagiography. In: Jain, P., Sherma, R., Khanna, M. (eds) Hinduism and Tribal Religions. Encyclopedia of Indian Religions. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-024-1036-5_148-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-024-1036-5_148-1

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht

  • Print ISBN: 978-94-024-1036-5

  • Online ISBN: 978-94-024-1036-5

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