Biography

Professor Markus Vinzent holds the Chair for the History of Theology in the Department of Theology and Religious Studies at King’s College (2010-), is Fellow of the European Academy of Science, Vienna, Austria (2001-), Fellow of the Max-Weber-Institut for Advanced Studies, Erfurt University, Germany (2012-) and has been Adjunct Professor of Korea University, Seoul, South Korea (2010-2015).

 

In his previous posts he has been H.G. Wood Professor of Theology at the University of Birmingham (1999-2010, Head of Department 1999-2002), and C-4 Professor and Chair for the History of Theology at Cologne University, Germany (1997-1999). He is an award holder of the British Academy, of the Arts and Humanities Research Board, the Austrian Research Foundation, the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft and the French Agence de Recherche.

Project Abstract

Retrospection – or the turn of time

 

After a number of other turns (material turn, cultural turn ...), it is time to reflect upon the turn of time. While notions of reception, cultural transformation and alike still follow the chronological understanding of time as movement from the past to the present and future and intrinsically follow the Aristotelean concept of cause and effect with its inbuilt teleology, historians by nature work against such understanding of time. They conceptualise the past from the very present, guided by what they assume as the future. Yet, presentialism (and all its critiques) does not fully capture the work of historians, as in the past presentialism still either retrojected the present into the past or placed the past into the present.

Developing a concept of retrospection, as undertaken in a recent publication (Writing the History of Early Christianity. From Reception to Retrospection, Cambridge University Press 2019), the project seeks to attempt an anachronological conceptualising of history and time, by which history is taken as retro-moving stories or ‘Geschichte’ as ‘Schichten’.

Curriculum vitae

Academic Employment

 

2010 - Present: Professor of History of Theology, King’s College London

1999 - 2010: HG Wood Professor of Theology, University of Birmingham (1999-2001 Head
of Department)

1997 - 1999: C4-Professor for History of Theology, University of Cologne, Germany

1996 - 1997: C4-Professor (non-tenure) for History of Theology in the times of the
Reformation and Modernity, University of Mainz, Germany

 

Education

 

1991 - 1995: Habilitation, History of Theology, Ruprecht-Karls Universität Heidelberg, Germany

1987 - 1991: Ph.D, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität Munich, Germany

 

Academic Leadership and outside activity

 

2014: Fellow of TOPOI, Berlin, Humboldt-University, Germany

2013 - 2018: Fellow of the Max-Weber-Centre, Erfurt (Max Weber Kolleg)

2010 - Present: Adjunct Professor, Korea University, Seoul, Korea

2001 - Present: Member of the European Academy of Science, Vienna

1991 - 1993: Senior Research Fellow King’s College, Cambridge

 

Research Grants

 

2018 - 2021: DFG/ANR major research grant on ‘Meister Eckhart and the auctoritates patrum’ (EUR 620,000)

2013 - 2016: AHRC major research grant on ‘Meister Eckhart and the Parisian University in
the early 14th century’ (£680,000)

2010 - 2012: British Academy major grant ‘Early Christian Iconography and Epigraphy: A
new approach to Dölger's classical project’ (£ 119,000)’

2000 - 2002: ALTANA/BMW-Foundation (Quandt-Stiftung), major Industry-research grant
on the trialogue of cultures (EUR 120,000) (the project is still ongoing with funding of over EUR 3m being invested into the project outcomes: School competition in the Trialogue of Cultures)

Selected Publications

Writing the History of Early Christianity:  From Reception to Retrospection (Cambridge University Press: Cambridge, 2019).

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Eusebius of Caesarea, Against Marcellus and Ecclesiastical Theology. Translated with introduction and notes by Kelley McCarthy Spoerl and Markus Vinzent, The Fathers of the Church 135 (Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 2017).

 

Tertullian’s Preface on Marcion’s Gospel, Studia Patristica Supplements, 5 (Leuven: Peeters, 2016).

 

Marcion and the Dating of the Synoptic Gospels, Studia Patristica Supplements 2 (Leuven: Peeters, 2014), 399p.

 

Meister Eckhart’s On the Lord’s Prayer: Eckhart: Texts and Studies 2 (Leuven: Peeters, 2012), 320p.