Disciples of the Desert

Based on very exciting material, and she presents it very accessibly to the wider audience it deserves. The whole work is well-structured.

An important contribution... The first book-length exploration of the entire epistolary collection in its social context.

Profitable reading for anyone interested in Eastern monasticism or in the nature of ascetic authority. Hevelone-Harper presents an academically intriguing and spiritually uplifting glimpse into the nature of the desert ethos.

Hevelone-Harper's fine study offers vivid and persuasive evidence from the early centuries of monasticism of just how central to Christian life the monastic impulse was. For this reason, the book should be part of the field of vision not just for specialists in monastic history but for all who wish to understand Christianity in its historic context.

A topic of great importance in the study of Holy Men, and in the study of this community, is the relationship between the community and the wider world. The strongest chapter of this book examines these relations closely.

Hevelone-Harper demonstrates with real subtlety how spiritual authority developed and came to be transmitted among the monastic communities in Gaza. A first-rate work of scholarship.

Indispensable for students of asceticism in the later Roman world and well worth the attention of a broader audience.

A responsible and sensitive introduction to the authority and practice of these remarkable monastic spiritual directors—how they established and maintained their authority despite challenges to it, how they guided disciples from their first interest in the ascetic life to their monastic maturity, and how they interacted with lay Christians and other authoritative figures in Palestinian Christianity and the wider society.

... ambitious and satisfying book...