FRAZEE, Charles A(aron) 1929-

PERSONAL: Born July 4, 1929, in Rushville, IN; son of Charles Aaron (in politics) and Frances (Geraghty) Frazee; married Kathleen Siegert, September 10, 1971; children: two. Education: St. Meinrad College, A.B., 1951; Catholic University of America, M.A., 1954; Indiana University, Ph.D. and Certificate of Russian and East European Institute, 1965. Politics: Democrat. Religion: Catholic.

ADDRESSES: Home—726 Paris Way, Placenta, CA 92870-4142. Office—Episcopal Theological School at Claremont, 1325 N. College Ave., Claremont, CA 91711-3199. E-mail—[email protected].

CAREER: Educator and author. Marian College, Indianapolis, IN, instructor, 1956-59, assistant professor, 1959-65, associate professor of history, 1965-70; Indiana University at Bloomington, visiting assistant professor of history, summer, 1969, spring, 1970; California State University, Fullerton, professor of history, 1970-1993; Episcopal Theological School, Claremont, CA, processor of Church History, 1994—. Researcher in Athens, Greece, 1964, 1970, 1975, 1978, 1983, 1990, 2000, 2003. Indiana Academy of Religion, secretary, 1967-68, president 1968-69, American Historical Association, Slavic and East European Conference, president, 1988; Institute for Teaching and Learning, California State University, Fullerton, CA, history faculty coordinator, 1988-90, director, Humanities Institute, 1998-92; board member, California International Studies Project, 1998-2001.

MEMBER: Catholic Historical Society, American Society of Church History, Modern Greek Studies Association.

AWARDS, HONORS: American Philosophical Society grant, summer, 1972; National Endowment for the Humanities grant, summer, 1976.

WRITINGS:

The Orthodox Church and Independent Greece, Cambridge University Press (London, England), 1969.

Catholics and Sultans: The Church and the Ottoman Empire, 1453-1923, Cambridge University Press (New York, NY), 1983.

The Island Princes of Greece: The Dukes of the Archipelago, A. M. Hakkert (Amsterdam, Holland), 1988.

World History, Barron's (Hauppauge, NY), 1997.

(Editor) World History: Original and Secondary Source Readings, Greenhaven Press (San Diego, CA), 1999.

Two Thousand Years Ago: The World at the Time of Jesus, W. B. Eerdmans (Grand Rapids, MI), 2002.

Contributor to books, including The Religious Heritage of Southern California, edited by Francis Weber, 1976; Greece in Transition, edited by J. T. A. Kovmoulides, Zeno (London, England), 1977; Hellenic Perspectives, edited by John A. Koumiulides, 1985; Following the Star from the East: Essays in Honor of Archimandrite Boniface Luykx, edited by Andriy Chirovsky, 1992; Seeking God: The Recovery of Religious Identity in Orthodox Russia, Ukraine, and Georgia, edited by Stephen K. Batalden, 1993; Balkan Currents: Studies in the History, Culture, and Society of a Divided Land, edited by Lawrence A. Trittle, 1998; The Encyclopedia of Monasticism, edited by Paul Johnston, 2 volumes, 2000; and Minorities in Greece: Aspects of a Plural Society, edited by Richard Clogg, 2002. Contributor to historical journals.

SIDELIGHTS: Charles A. Frazee is an educator, historian, and author, whose book Two Thousand Years Ago: The World at the Time of Jesus was warmly received by critics. "Two Thousand Years Ago is one of those rare studies wherein the professor of Church History at the Episcopal Theological School, Claremont, places the events of the Savior's life, as recorded in the New Testament, into the larger context of world history," concluded Msgr. Francis J. Weber, in a review of the book for Tidings Online. Msgr. Weber went on to say, "Dr. Charles Frazee offers an absorbing and unprecedented survey of people and events around the world at the time of Jesus."

Frazee imagines what Jesus' life would have been like if he had been born anywhere other than Roman Palestine. Each chapter of Two Thousand Years Ago covers a region of the world during Christ's time, such as Europe, North Africa, Egypt, southwest Asia, the Sahara, and China. Drawing from historical records and the work of archaeologists and anthropologists, Frazee studies human civilization, paying particular attention to California, which at the time of Jesus, was home to many different types of human beings who lived in small villages. Some of them hunted with spears and harvested sea mammals and fish. These villages were led by chiefs whose status was determined by their number of wives. Chiefs were advised by Shamaus, who were believed to have contact with the spiritual world. Msgr. Weber maintained that Frazee "has observed that 'all history is local'" and added that "surely this is true about the mission of Jesus so many centuries ago."

In each chapter of the book, Frazee theorizes how Jesus would have influenced the region if he had been born there. "Frazee's compelling comparisons also include the Artic, Pacific Islands, and the Americas—almost always concluding that Jesus' teachings would have never taken hold anywhere other than the Middle East," noted a Publishers Weekly reviewer.

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

books

Directory of American Scholars, Thomson Gale (Detroit, MI), 2001.

periodicals

American Historical Review, October, 1984, review of Catholics and Sultans: The Church and the Ottoman Empire, 1453-1923, p. 1127.

Catholic Historical Review, January, 1986, review of Catholics and Sultans, p. 159.

Church History, March, 1985, review of Catholics and Sultans, p. 408; March, 1992, Demetrios J. Constantelos, review of The Island Princes of Greece: The Dukes of Archipelago, p. 139.

English Historical Review, January, 1986, review of Catholics and Sultans, p. 225.

Kliatt Young Adult Paperback Book Guide, March, 1999, review of World History, Volumes 1-2, p. 38.

Publishers Weekly, October 28, 2002, review of Two Thousand Years Ago: The World at the Time of Jesus, p. 67.

Spectator, March 28, 1969.

online

Tidings Online, http://www.the-tidings.com/ (December 6, 2002), Msgr. Francis J. Weber, review of Two Thousand Years Ago: The World at the Time of Jesus.