Download or read book The Homeric Epics and the Gospel of Mark written by Dennis Ronald MacDonald and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 2000-01-01 with total page 284 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this groundbreaking book, Dennis R. MacDonald offers an entirely new view of the New Testament gospel of Mark. The author of the earliest gospel was not writing history, nor was he merely recording tradition, MacDonald argues. Close reading and careful analysis show that Mark borrowed extensively from the Odyssey and the Iliad and that he wanted his readers to recognise the Homeric antecedents in Mark's story of Jesus. Mark was composing a prose anti-epic, MacDonald says, presenting Jesus as a suffering hero modeled after but far superior to traditional Greek heroes. Much like Odysseus, Mark's Jesus sails the seas with uncomprehending companions, encounters preternatural opponents, and suffers many things before confronting rivals who have made his house a den of thieves. In his death and burial, Jesus emulates Hector, although unlike Hector Jesus leaves his tomb empty. Mark's minor characters, too, recall Homeric predecessors: Bartimaeus emulates Tiresias; Joseph of Arimathea, Priam; and the women at the tomb, Helen, Hecuba, and Andromache. And, entire episodes in Mark mirror Homeric episodes, including stilling the sea, walking on water, feeding the multitudes, the Triumphal E
Download or read book Does the New Testament Imitate Homer written by Dennis R. MacDonald and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 2008-10-01 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: div In this provocative challenge to prevailing views of New Testament sources, Dennis R. MacDonald argues that the origins of passages in the book of Acts are to be found not in early Christian legends but in the epics of Homer. MacDonald focuses on four passages in the book of Acts, examines their potential parallels in the Iliad, and concludes that the author of Acts composed them using famous scenes in Homer’s work as a model. Tracing the influence of passages from the Iliad on subsequent ancient literature, MacDonald shows how the story generated a vibrant, mimetic literary tradition long before Luke composed the Acts. Luke could have expected educated readers to recognize his transformation of these tales and to see that the Christian God and heroes were superior to Homeric gods and heroes. Building upon and extending the analytic methods of his earlier book, The Homeric Epics and the Gospel of Mark, MacDonald opens an original and promising appreciation not only of Acts but also of the composition of early Christian narrative in general. /DIV
Download or read book Luke and Vergil written by Dennis R. MacDonald and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2014-11-05 with total page 273 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: These two volumes of The New Testament and Greek Literature are the magnum opus of biblical scholar Dennis R. MacDonald, outlining the profound connections between the New Testament and classical Greek poetry. MacDonald argues that the Gospel writers borrowed from established literary sources to create stories about Jesus that readers of the day would find convincing. In Luke and Vergil MacDonald proposes that the author of Luke-Acts followed Mark’s lead in imitating Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey, but greatly expanded his project, especially in the Acts, but adding imitations not only of the epics but also of Euripides’ Bacchae and Plato’s Socratic dialogues. The potential imitations include spectacular miracles, official resistance, epiphanies, prison breaks, and more. The book applies mimesis criticism and uses side-by-side comparisons to show how early Christian authors portrayed the origins of Christianity as more compelling than the Augustan Golden Age.
Download or read book The Bible Homer and the Search for Meaning in Ancient Myths written by John Heath and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2019-04-29 with total page 434 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Bible, Homer, and the Search for Meaning in Ancient Myths explores and compares the most influential sets of divine myths in Western culture: the Homeric pantheon and Yahweh, the God of the Old Testament. Heath argues that not only does the God of the Old Testament bear a striking resemblance to the Olympians, but also that the Homeric system rejected by the Judeo-Christian tradition offers a better model for the human condition. The universe depicted by Homer and populated by his gods is one that creates a unique and powerful responsibility – almost directly counter to that evoked by the Bible—for humans to discover ethical norms, accept death as a necessary human limit, develop compassion to mitigate a tragic existence, appreciate frankly both the glory and dangers of sex, and embrace and respond courageously to an indifferent universe that was clearly not designed for human dominion. Heath builds on recent work in biblical and classical studies to examine the contemporary value of mythical deities. Judeo-Christian theologians over the millennia have tried to explain away Yahweh’s Olympian nature while dismissing the Homeric deities for the same reason Greek philosophers abandoned them: they don’t live up to preconceptions of what a deity should be. In particular, the Homeric gods are disappointingly plural, anthropomorphic, and amoral (at best). But Heath argues that Homer’s polytheistic apparatus challenges us to live meaningfully without any help from the divine. In other words, to live well in Homer’s tragic world – an insight gleaned by Achilles, the hero of the Iliad – one must live as if there were no gods at all. The Bible, Homer, and the Search for Meaning in Ancient Myths should change the conversation academics in classics, biblical studies, theology and philosophy have – especially between disciplines – about the gods of early Greek epic, while reframing on a more popular level the discussion of the role of ancient myth in shaping a thoughtful life.
Download or read book Homer s Odyssey and the Near East written by Bruce Louden and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2011-01-06 with total page 365 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Odyssey's larger plot is composed of a number of distinct genres of myth, all of which are extant in various Near Eastern cultures (Mesopotamian, West Semitic, and Egyptian). Unexpectedly, the Near Eastern culture with which the Odyssey has the most parallels is the Old Testament. Consideration of how much of the Odyssey focuses on non-heroic episodes - hosts receiving guests, a king disguised as a beggar, recognition scenes between long-separated family members - reaffirms the Odyssey's parallels with the Bible. In particular the book argues that the Odyssey is in a dialogic relationship with Genesis, which features the same three types of myth that comprise the majority of the Odyssey: theoxeny, romance (Joseph in Egypt), and Argonautic myth (Jacob winning Rachel from Laban). The Odyssey also offers intriguing parallels to the Book of Jonah, and Odysseus' treatment by the suitors offers close parallels to the Gospels' depiction of Christ in Jerusalem.
Download or read book Jesus and Yahweh written by Harold Bloom and published by . This book was released on 2007 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This brilliant and provocative study of Jesus and Yahweh is a paradigm-changing literary criticism that will challenge and illuminate Jews and Christians alike, and may make readers rethink everything they take for granted about what they believed was a shared heritage.
Download or read book The Gospel According to Homer and Virgil written by Karl Olav Sandnes and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2011-02-14 with total page 292 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the fourth century C.E. some Christians paraphrased the stories about Jesus' life in the style of classical epics. Imitating the genre of centos, they stitched together lines taken either from Homer (Greek) or Virgil (Latin). They thus created new texts out of the classical epics, while they still remained fully within the confines of their style and vocabulary. It is the aim of this study to put these attempts into a historical and rhetorical context. Why did some Christians rewrite the Gospel stories in this way, and what came out of this? On the basis of these Christian centos, it is natural to address the view held by some scholars, namely that New Testaments narratives are imitations of the epics.
Download or read book The Historical Jesus in Context written by Amy-Jill Levine and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2009-01-10 with total page 455 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Historical Jesus in Context is a landmark collection that places the gospel narratives in their full literary, social, and archaeological context. More than twenty-five internationally recognized experts offer new translations and descriptions of a broad range of texts that shed new light on the Jesus of history, including pagan prayers and private inscriptions, miracle tales and martyrdoms, parables and fables, divorce decrees and imperial propaganda. The translated materials--from Christian, Coptic, and Jewish as well as Greek, Roman, and Egyptian texts--extend beyond single phrases to encompass the full context, thus allowing readers to locate Jesus in a broader cultural setting than is usually made available. This book demonstrates that only by knowing the world in which Jesus lived and taught can we fully understand him, his message, and the spread of the Gospel. Gathering in one place material that was previously available only in disparate sources, this formidable book provides innovative insight into matters no less grand than first-century Jewish and Gentile life, the composition of the Gospels, and Jesus himself.
Download or read book What Did Jesus Look Like written by Joan E. Taylor and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2018-02-08 with total page 289 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Jesus Christ is arguably the most famous man who ever lived. His image adorns countless churches, icons, and paintings. He is the subject of millions of statues, sculptures, devotional objects and works of art. Everyone can conjure an image of Jesus: usually as a handsome, white man with flowing locks and pristine linen robes. But what did Jesus really look like? Is our popular image of Jesus overly westernized and untrue to historical reality? This question continues to fascinate. Leading Christian Origins scholar Joan E. Taylor surveys the historical evidence, and the prevalent image of Jesus in art and culture, to suggest an entirely different vision of this most famous of men. He may even have had short hair.
Download or read book Homer and the Nibelungenlied written by Bernard Fenik and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 1986 with total page 238 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Greek Myth and the Bible written by Bruce Louden and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2018-11-06 with total page 370 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Since the nineteenth-century rediscovery of the Gilgamesh epic, we have known that the Bible imports narratives from outside of Israelite culture, refiguring them for its own audience. Only more recently, however, has come the realization that Greek culture is also a prominent source of biblical narratives. Greek Myth and the Bible argues that classical mythological literature and the biblical texts were composed in a dialogic relationship. Louden examines a variety of Greek myths from a range of sources, analyzing parallels between biblical episodes and Hesiod, Euripides, Argonautic myth, selections from Ovid’s Metamorphoses, and Homeric epic. This fascinating volume offers a starting point for debate and discussion of these cultural and literary exchanges and adaptations in the wider Mediterranean world and will be an invaluable resource to students of the Hebrew Bible and the influence of Greek myth.
Download or read book Mimesis and Intertextuality in Antiquity and Christianity written by Dennis MacDonald and published by Trinity Press International. This book was released on 2001-02 with total page 192 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A groundbreaking collection of essays by distinguished scholars that examines the ways in which early Christian writers consciously imitated literary models from the Greco-Roman world.
Download or read book The Cambridge Guide to Homer written by Corinne Ondine Pache and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2020-03-05 with total page 985 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From its ancient incarnation as a song to recent translations in modern languages, Homeric epic remains an abiding source of inspiration for both scholars and artists that transcends temporal and linguistic boundaries. The Cambridge Guide to Homer examines the influence and meaning of Homeric poetry from its earliest form as ancient Greek song to its current status in world literature, presenting the information in a synthetic manner that allows the reader to gain an understanding of the different strands of Homeric studies. The volume is structured around three main themes: Homeric Song and Text; the Homeric World, and Homer in the World. Each section starts with a series of 'macropedia' essays arranged thematically that are accompanied by shorter complementary 'micropedia' articles. The Cambridge Guide to Homer thus traces the many routes taken by Homeric epic in the ancient world and its continuing relevance in different periods and cultures.
Download or read book The Text of New Testament written by B.M. Metzger and published by Рипол Классик. This book was released on 1968 with total page 385 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Gospel According to Mark written by and published by Canongate Books. This book was released on 1999-01-01 with total page 73 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The earliest of the four Gospels, the book portrays Jesus as an enigmatic figure, struggling with enemies, his inner and external demons, and with his devoted but disconcerted disciples. Unlike other gospels, his parables are obscure, to be explained secretly to his followers. With an introduction by Nick Cave
Download or read book The Secret of the Kingdom of God written by Hugh Humphrey and published by Fortress Academic. This book was released on 2018-11-14 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book emphasizes the literary creativity of the Evangelist Mark by detailing his use and imitation of literary materials well-known to him and to his first-century audience. All this was in service of what constitutes the "secret of the Kingdom of God," that is, authentic Christian discipleship.
Download or read book Mark Canonizer of Paul written by Tom Dykstra and published by . This book was released on 2012-10-01 with total page 286 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For over 150 years the idea that Mark used the Pauline epistles has been recurring in New Testament research. Now in the work of Tom Dykstra, wide-ranging work and thoughtful, the truth of that idea emerges with a clarity it never had before. The result is to give a fresh sense of the origin and nature of Mark, of all the New Testament books, and of the quest for history. -Thomas Brodie, Director, Dominican Biblical Institute, author of - The Birthing of the New Testament Tom Dykstra draws connections between Paul and the Gospel of Mark that are stunning, surprising, and original, and leave readers with a sense that the evidence deserves a better interpretation than traditional Synoptic models can o ffer. Well argued, easy to read, immersed in the relevant current exegetical discussion, the book fascinates, provokes, and encourages to think outside the box. David Trobisch, author of The First Edition of the New Testament In addition to its main focus on Mark, this book is a lucid introduction to early church history, oral tradition, the gospels genre, and how to understand scripture in general. Paul Nadim Tarazi, Professor of Biblical Studies, St. Vladimir s Seminary
