Harvard professor Eric Nelson to challenge ideals of Western governance in talk May 2

MIDDLEBURY, Vt. ― Professor of Government Eric Nelson of Harvard University will give a lecture, ”The Lord Alone Shall be King of America: Hebraism and the Republican Turn of 1776,” on Thursday, May 2, at 4:30 p.m. in Dana Auditorium at Middlebury College. Nelson’s talk will be the 2013 John Hamilton Fulton Lecture in the Liberal Arts. The lecture is free and open to the public.

Nelson’s research and teaching address issues related to European intellectual history, the foundations of political theory, the emergence of the concept of religious freedom, and a reexamination of the fundamental values of contemporary liberal democracy. He is a young scholar whose groundbreaking and prize-winning work has attracted the attention of his peers. Nelson is the author of “The Hebrew Republic: Jewish Sources and the Transformation of European Political Thought” (Harvard/Belknap, 2010), which received the Laura Shannon Prize in Contemporary European Studies and was named a Choice Outstanding Academic Title of 2010, and “The Greek Tradition in Republican Thought” (Cambridge University Press, 2004). Nelson was also the editor of “Thomas Hobbes’s Translations of Homer: The Iliad and the Odyssey” (The Clarendon Press, Oxford, 2008).

“Eric Nelson forces us to re-examine long-held views about political values and what they mean, reformulating our assumptions,” said Middlebury College President Ron Liebowitz. “We look forward to what I know will be an interesting and stimulating discussion.”

The John Hamilton Fulton Lecture in the Liberal Arts was established at Middlebury College in 1966. The late Alexander Hamilton Fulton, an emeritus member of the Middlebury College board of trustees, donated the gift that established the lectureship, which is named in honor of his father. Previous Fulton lecturers have included Lani Guinier, Michael Ignatieff, Chief Justice John Roberts, Beverly Sills, James A. Baker III, William H. Rehnquist, Wynton Marsalis and Elie Wiesel.

For more information, contact Sarah Ray, director of public affairs, at ray@middlebury.edu or 802-443-5794.