Download or read book Moses und der Mythos written by René Bloch and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2010-11-19 with total page 308 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Jewish-Hellenistic authors rejected Greek myth, but they were also aware of its importance as a symbol of power and identity. This book offers a comprehensive reading of how Jews dealt with Greek mythology in the Hellenistic period. Jüdisch-hellenistische Autoren verwarfen die griechische Mythologie, aber sie waren sich auch der Wichtigkeit der Mythen als eines Symbols von Befugnis und Identität bewusst. Dieses Buch ist die erste weitgespannte Untersuchung über den Umgang jüdisch-hellenistischer Autoren mit der griechischen Mythologie.
Download or read book Moses among the Greek Lawgivers written by Ursula Westwood and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2023-09-04 with total page 280 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Josephus’ Antiquities introduces Moses as the Jewish lawgiver, adapting the biblical account for a new audience. But who was that audience, and what did they understand by the term lawgiver (νομοθέτης)? This book uses Plutarch’s Lives as a proxy for an imagined audience, providing a historically grounded but flexible model of a lawgiver, against which some of the otherwise invisible forces shaping Josephus’ choices are thrown into sharp relief. This method reveals patterns of appeal and challenge in Josephus’ intriguing and lively account of Moses’ legislative activities.
Download or read book Nonnus of Panopolis in Context II Poetry Religion and Society written by Herbert Bannert and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2017-10-23 with total page 456 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Nonnus of Panopolis has an outstanding position in ancient literature being at the same time a pagan and a Christian author. The book covers literary and cultural aspects of Nonnus’ poetry, the Dionysiaca and the Paraphrasis of the Gospel of St. John.
Download or read book The Christological Witness Function of the Old Testament Characters in the Gospel of John written by Sanghee M Ahn and published by Authentic Media Inc. This book was released on 2014-06-01 with total page 465 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book investigates the narrative function of the Old Testament characters in the Gospel of John. The fascinating thesis is that the Hebrew characters in John's narrative uniformly function as a witness for the messianic identity of Jesus. The Jewish scriptural traditions (Hebrew and intertestamental ones) are compared to shed light on John's indebtedness for its formation of his Christology. A compelling argument ensues, which informs our understanding, not only of the Gospel itself, but also of Jesus Christ revealed in the Gospel. COMMENDATION "Dr Ahn's thorough and careful study represents a solid contribution, from which many will benefit. All serious interpreters of the Johannine witness will want to refer to this work." - Mark A. Seifrid, Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, USA
Download or read book Philo of Alexandria and Greek Myth written by and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2019-10-07 with total page 307 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Philo of Alexandria and Greek Myth: Narratives, Allegories, and Arguments, a fresh and more complete image of Philo of Alexandria as a careful reader, interpreter, and critic of Greek literature is offered. Greek mythology plays a significant role in Philo of Alexandria’s exegetical oeuvre. Philo explicitly adopts or subtly evokes narratives, episodes and figures from Greek mythology as symbols whose didactic function we need to unravel, exactly as the hidden teaching of Moses’ narration has to be revealed by interpreters of Bible. By analyzing specific mythologems and narrative cycles, the contributions to this volume pave the way to a better understanding of Philo’s different attitudes towards literary and philosophical mythology.
Download or read book Ancient Jewish Diaspora written by René Bloch and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2022-09-19 with total page 373 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The fifteen papers collected in this volume all tackle the complex cultures of Jewish Hellenism. The book covers a wide range of topics, divided into four clusters: Moses and Exodus, Places and Ruins, Theatre and Myth, Antisemitism and Reception.
Download or read book Israel s Exodus in Transdisciplinary Perspective written by Thomas E. Levy and published by Springer. This book was released on 2015-03-28 with total page 580 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Bible's grand narrative about Israel's Exodus from Egypt is central to Biblical religion, Jewish, Christian, and Muslim identity and the formation of the academic disciplines studying the ancient Near East. It has also been a pervasive theme in artistic and popular imagination. Israel's Exodus in Transdisciplinary Perspective is a pioneering work surveying this tradition in unprecedented breadth, combining archaeological discovery, quantitative methodology and close literary reading. Archaeologists, Egyptologists, Biblical Scholars, Computer Scientists, Geoscientists and other experts contribute their diverse approaches in a novel, transdisciplinary consideration of ancient topography, Egyptian and Near Eastern parallels to the Exodus story, the historicity of the Exodus, the interface of the Exodus question with archaeological fieldwork on emergent Israel, the formation of biblical literature, and the cultural memory of the Exodus in ancient Israel and beyond. This edited volume contains research presented at the groundbreaking symposium "Out of Egypt: Israel’s Exodus Between Text and Memory, History and Imagination" held in 2013 at the Qualcomm Institute of the University of California, San Diego. The combination of 44 contributions by an international group of scholars from diverse disciplines makes this the first such transdisciplinary study of ancient text and history. In the original conference and with this new volume, revolutionary media, such as a 3D immersive virtual reality environment, impart innovative, Exodus-based research to a wider audience. Out of archaeology, ancient texts, science and technology emerge an up-to-date picture of the Exodus for the 21st Century and a new standard for collaborative research.
Download or read book The Writings of Luke and the Jewish Roots of the Christian Way written by J. Andrew Cowan and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2019-02-21 with total page 232 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: J. Andrew Cowan challenges the popular theory that Luke sought to boost the cultural status of the early Christian movement by emphasising its Jewish roots – associating the new church with an ancient and therefore respected heritage. Cowan instead argues that Luke draws upon the traditions of the Old Testament and its supporting texts as a reassurance to Christians, promising that Jesus' life, his works and the church that follow legitimately provide fulfilment of God's salvific plan. Cowan's argument compares Luke's writings to two near-contemporaries, Dionysius of Halicarnassus and T. Flavius Josephus, both of whom emphasized the ancient heritage of a people with cultural or political aims in view, exploring how the writings of Luke do not reflect the same cultural values or pursue the same ends. Challenging assumptions on Luke's supposed attempts to assuage political concerns, capitalize on antiquity, and present Christianity as an inner-Jewish sect, Cowan counters with arguments for Luke being critical of over-valuing tradition and defining the Jewish people as resistant to God and His messages. Cowan concludes with the argument that the apostle does not strive for legitimisation of the new church by previous cultural standards, but instead provides theological reassurance to Christians that God's plan has been fulfilled, with implications for broader debate.
Download or read book Moses the Egyptian in the Illustrated Old English Hexateuch London British Library Cotton MS Claudius B iv written by Herbert R. Broderick and published by University of Notre Dame Pess. This book was released on 2017-11-15 with total page 387 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Moses the Egyptian, Herbert Broderick analyzes the iconography of Moses in the famous illuminated eleventh-century manuscript known as the Illustrated Old English Hexateuch. A translation into Old English of the first six books of the Bible, the manuscript contains over 390 images, of which 127 depict Moses with a variety of distinctive visual attributes. Broderick presents a compelling thesis that these motifs, in particular the image of the horned Moses, have a Hellenistic Egyptian origin. He argues that the visual construct of Moses in the Old English Hexateuch may have been based on a Late Antique, no longer extant, prototype influenced by works of Hellenistic Egyptian Jewish exegetes, who ascribed to Moses the characteristics of an Egyptian-Hellenistic king, military commander, priest, prophet, and scribe. These Jewish writings were utilized in turn by early Christian apologists such as Clement of Alexandria and Eusebius of Caesarea. Broderick’s analysis of this Moses imagery ranges widely across religious divides, art-historical religious themes, and classical and early Jewish and Christian sources. Herbert Broderick is one of the foremost historians in the field of Anglo-Saxon art, with a primary focus on Old Testament iconography. Readers with interests in the history of medieval manuscript illustration, art history, and early Jewish and Christian apologetics will find much of interest in this profusely illustrated study.
Download or read book Jews and Christians in the First and Second Centuries How to Write Their History written by Peter J. Tomson and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2014-08-21 with total page 562 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The papers in this volume are organized around the ambition to reboot the writing of history about Jews and Christians in the first two centuries CE. Many are convinced of the need for a new perspective on this crucial period that saw both the birth of rabbinic Judaism and apostolic Christianity and their parting of ways. Yet the traditional paradigm of Judaism and Christianity as being two totally different systems of life and thought still predominates in thought, handbooks, and programs of research and teaching. As a result, the sources are still being read as reflecting two separate histories, one Jewish and the other Christian. The contributors to the present work were invited to attempt to approach the ancient Jewish and Christian sources as belonging to one single history, precisely in order to get a better view of the process that separated both communities. In doing so, it is necessary to pay constant attention to the common factor affecting both communities: the Roman Empire. Roman history and Roman archaeology should provide the basis on which to study and write the shared history of Jews and Christians and the process of their separation. A basic intuition is that the series of wars between Jews and Romans between 66 and 135 CE – a phenomenon unrivalled in antiquity – must have played a major role in this process. Thus the papers are arranged around three focal points: (1) the varieties of Jewish and Christian expression in late Second Temple times, (2) the socio-economic, military, and ideological processes during the period of the revolts, and (3) the post-revolt Jewish and Christian identities that emerged. As such, the volume is part of a larger project that is to result in a source book and a history of Jews and Christians in the first and second centuries.
Download or read book How the Gospels Became History written by M. David Litwa and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 2019-08-06 with total page 311 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A compelling comparison of the gospels and Greco-Roman mythology which shows that the gospels were not perceived as myths, but as historical records Did the early Christians believe their myths? Like most ancient--and modern--people, early Christians made efforts to present their myths in the most believable ways. In this eye-opening work, M. David Litwa explores how and why what later became the four canonical gospels take on a historical cast that remains vitally important for many Christians today. Offering an in-depth comparison with other Greco-Roman stories that have been shaped to seem like history, Litwa shows how the evangelists responded to the pressures of Greco-Roman literary culture by using well-known historiographical tropes such as the mention of famous rulers and kings, geographical notices, the introduction of eyewitnesses, vivid presentation, alternative reports, and so on. In this way, the evangelists deliberately shaped myths about Jesus into historical discourse to maximize their believability for ancient audiences.
Download or read book Alienated Wisdom written by Giuseppe Veltri and published by Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG. This book was released on 2018-08-21 with total page 394 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The present study addresses problems of an epistemological nature which hinge on the question of how to define Jewish thought. It will take its start in an ancient question, that of the relationship between Jewish culture, Greek philosophy, and then Greco-Roman (and Christian) thought in connection with the query into the history and genealogy of wisdom and knowledge. Our journey into the history of the denomination ‘Jewish philosophy’ will include a leg that will lead us to certain declarations of political, moral, and scientific principles, and then on to the birth of what is called philosophia perennis or, in Christian circles, prisca theologia. Our subject of inquiry will thus be the birth of the concept of Jewish philosophy, Jewish theology and Jewish philosophy of religion. A special emphasis will fall on the topic treated in the last part of this study: Jewish scepticism, a theme that involves a philosophical attitude founded on dialectical "enquiry", as the etymology of the Greek word skepsis properly means.
Download or read book Philo of Alexandria and the Construction of Jewishness in Early Christian Writings written by Jennifer Otto and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2018-05-03 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Philo of Alexandria and the Construction of Jewishness in Early Christian Writings investigates portrayals of the first-century philosopher and exegete Philo of Alexandria, in the writings of Clement of Alexandria, Origen, and Eusebius. It argues that early Christian invocations of Philo are best understood not as attempts simply to claim an illustrious Jew for the Christian fold, but as examples of ongoing efforts to define the continuities and distinctive features of Christian beliefs and practices in relation to those of the Jews. This study takes as its starting point the curious fact that none of the first three Christians to mention Philo refer to him unambiguously as a Jew. Clement, the first in the Christian tradition to openly cite Philo's works, refers to him twice as a Pythagorean. Origen, who mentions Philo by name only three times, makes far more frequent reference to him in the guise of an anonymous "one who came before us." Eusebius, who invokes Philo on many more occasions than does Clement or Origen, most often refers to Philo as a Hebrew. These epithets construct Philo as an alternative "near-other" to both Christians and Jews, through whom ideas and practices may be imported to the former from the latter, all the while establishing boundaries between the "Christian" and "Jewish" ways of life. The portraits of Philo offered by each author reveal ongoing processes of difference-making and difference-effacing that constituted not only the construction of the Jewish "other," but also the Christian "self."
Download or read book Acting Gods Playing Heroes and the Interaction between Judaism Christianity and Greek Drama in the Early Common Era written by Courtney J. P. Friesen and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2023-07-07 with total page 184 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: While many ancient Jewish and Christian leaders voiced opposition to Greek and Roman theater, this volume demonstrates that by the time the public performance of classical drama ceased at the end of antiquity the ideals of Jews and Christians had already been shaped by it in profound and lasting ways. Readers are invited to explore how gods and heroes famous from Greek drama animated the imaginations of ancient individuals and communities as they articulated and reinvented their religious visions for a new era. In this study, Friesen demonstrates that Greek theater’s influence is evident within Jewish and Christian intellectual formulations, narrative constructions, and practices of ritual and liturgy. Through a series of interrelated case studies, the book examines how particular plays, through texts and performances, scenes, images, and heroic personae, retained appeal for Jewish and Christian communities across antiquity. The volume takes an interdisciplinary approach involving classical, Jewish, and Christian studies, and brings together these separate avenues of scholarship to produce fresh insights and a reevaluation of theatrical drama in relation to ancient Judaism and Christianity. Acting Gods, Playing Heroes, and the Interaction between Judaism, Christianity, and Greek Drama in the Early Common Era allows students and scholars of the diverse and evolving religious landscapes of antiquity to gain fresh perspectives on the interplay between the gods and heroes—both human and divine—of Greeks and Romans, Jews and Christians as they were staged in drama and depicted in literature.
Download or read book Our Mythical Childhood The Classics and Literature for Children and Young Adults written by and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2016-11-01 with total page 540 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In The Classics and Children's Literature between West and East a team of contributors from different continents offers a survey of the reception of Classical Antiquity in children’s and young adults’ literature by applying regional perspectives.
Download or read book Image and Imitation written by Martin Friis and published by Mohr Siebeck. This book was released on 2018-10-29 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: N this work, Martin Friis examines the ancient Jewish author Flavius Josephus' various ways of self-presentation. He provides numerous examples of how in the first half of the Jewish Antiquities Josephus carefully constructs an image of himself as a capable and competent Greco-Roman historian.
Download or read book Posthuman Transformation in Ancient Mediterranean Thought written by M. David Litwa and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2021-01-07 with total page 207 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: There is not just a desire but a profound human need for enhancement - the irrepressible yearning to become better than ourselves. Today, enhancement is often conceived of in terms of biotechnical intervention: genetic modification, prostheses, implants, drug therapy - even mind uploading. The theme of this book is an ancient form of enhancement: a physical upgrade that involves ethical practices of self-realization. It has been called 'angelification' - a transformation by which people become angels. The parallel process is 'daimonification', or becoming daimones. Ranging in time from Hesiod and Empedocles through Plato and Origen to Plotinus and Christian gnostics, this book explores not only how these two forms of posthuman transformation are related, but also how they connect and chasten modern visions of transhumanist enhancement which generally lack a robust account of moral improvement.
