But at the heart of this remarkable analysis is the duplicitous continuum of evil, the rehearsal, as it were, for Judgment itself, that the Rule formally and associatively expounds. In chapter 4 ("The Rule of Antichrist. Form, Content, Affinities"), in a succinct and plausible reading, Riess shows how the humanoid Antichrist and his effective opponents, the Orders, manifest the dichotomy of false prophecy and true vision, and how Signorelli portrays the interwoven themes of the threat of Islam and Judaism. Riess's illuminating discussion of St. Antonius, Annio da Viterbo and, most crucially, of the sermons of St. Vincent Ferrer, is central in his explication of Dominican tenets and the program's overall meaning. Remarkably, a connection between Annio's thought and the frescoes has never been made, despite the fact that his popular De futuris christianorum triumphis in Saracenos (1480) is the most comprehensive fifteenthcentury work on Antichrist. Riess shows, ultimately, how a work of art can itself promulgate ideologies, and how the visual image, by its nature instantaneous, incontrovertible, and explicit, can embrace its viewers even as it surreptitiously converts them.
264 CHURCH HISTORY remains a useful reference work. His thesis that the concept of the church (GemeindebegrijJ) was central to Menno's theology has never been seriously challenged. The doctrine of the church is central to most Anabaptist studies today. How Menno's ecclesiology, in turn, shaped his understanding of ethics, Spirit, and eschatology, including his harsh use of the ban, is carefully demonstrated. The author's analysis of Menno's heavenly flesh christology has been significantly helpful for the later studies by Keeney, Deppermann, and Voolstra. In 1936 this book was one of the early ingroup writings to move away from apologetics to relative objectivity. A rather critical review of it by John Horsch, published posthumously in the Mennonite Quarterly Review 21 (1947): 229-232, illustrates the resistance this methodology evoked.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.