Download or read book Constantine and the Christian Empire written by Charles Odahl and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2010-07-02 with total page 435 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Drawing on over a quarter of a century of the author's research and experience, this book focuses on the man and his life for scholars, students, and those interested in Roman imperial, early Christian, and Byzantine imperial history. It is illustrated with ninety-two photographs and eight maps.
Download or read book The Life and Legacy of Constantine written by M. Shane Bjornlie and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-07-15 with total page 292 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The transformation from the classical period to the medieval has long been associated with the rise of Christianity. This association has deeply influenced the way that modern audiences imagine the separation of the classical world from its medieval and early modern successors. The role played in this transformation by Constantine as the first Christian ruler of the Roman Empire has also profoundly shaped the manner in which we frame Late Antiquity and successive periods as distinctively Christian. The modern demarcation of the post-classical period is often inseparable from the reign of Constantine. The attention given to Constantine as a liminal figure in this historical transformation is understandable. Constantine’s support of Christianity provided the religion with unprecedented public respectability and public expressions of that support opened previously unimagined channels of social, political and economic influence to Christians and non-Christians alike. The exact nature of Constantine’s involvement or intervention has been the subject of continuous and densely argued debate. Interpretations of the motives and sincerity of his conversion to Christianity have characterized, with various results, explanations of everything from the religious culture of the late Roman state to the dynamics of ecclesiastical politics. What receives less-frequent attention is the fact that our modern appreciation of Constantine as a pivotal historical figure is itself a direct result of the manner in which Constantine’s memory was constructed by the human imagination over the course of centuries. This volume offers a series of snapshots of moments in that process from the fourth to the sixteenth century.
Download or read book Remembering Constantine at the Milvian Bridge written by Raymond Van Dam and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2011-04-29 with total page 311 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Constantine's victory in 312 at the battle of the Milvian Bridge established his rule as the first Christian emperor. This book examines the creation and dissemination of the legends about that battle and its significance. Christian histories, panegyrics and an honorific arch at Rome soon commemorated his victory, and the emperor himself contributed to the myth by describing his vision of a cross in the sky before the battle. Through meticulous research into the late Roman narratives and the medieval and Byzantine legends, this book moves beyond a strictly religious perspective by emphasizing the conflicts about the periphery of the Roman empire, the nature of emperorship and the role of Rome as a capital city. Throughout late antiquity and the medieval period, memories of Constantine's victory served as a powerful paradigm for understanding rulership in a Christian society.
Download or read book The Emergence of Christianity written by Cynthia White and published by Fortress Press. This book was released on 2010-10-01 with total page 238 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This brief survey text tells the story of early Christianity. Cynthia White explores the emergence of Christianity in Rome during the first four centuries of the Greco-Roman empire, from the first followers of Jesus Christ, to conflicts between Christians and Jewish kings under Roman occupation, to the torture of Christian followers, Diocletian's reforms, and Constantine's eventual conversion to monotheism, which cemented Christianity's status as the official religion of Rome. The text's chapters will integrate key pedagogy, including introductions, study questions, textboxes, photos, maps, suggested readings, and a glossary and timeline.
Download or read book The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Constantine written by Noel Emmanuel Lenski and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2012 with total page 546 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume presents a comprehensive survey of Emperor Constantine and his times. It examines political history, religion, social and economic history, art, and foreign relations as well as the intimate interplay between emperor and empire.
Download or read book The Sibylline Oracles written by J. L. Lightfoot and published by OUP Oxford. This book was released on 2007-12-13 with total page 640 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this book, J. L. Lightfoot throws a bridge between two mutually ignorant areas: pagan oracles and Judaeo-Christian studies. The Sibyl was a legendary figure in Greco-Roman antiquity who was credited with verse prophecies, often of an apocalyptic character. Lightfoot describes how she was taken over by Jews in the Hellenistic period, and later by Christians, as a vehicle for their own understandings of prophecy. She explores what those understandings were, and describes how the message was then clothed in the very distinctive and mannered pagan idiom that was the hallmark of Sibylline prophecy. The volume contains an edition, translation, and commentary on the undeservedly neglected first and second books of extant oracles. The commentary illustrates some of the ways in which biblical scriptures were represented and recast in an oracular idiom, and pays particular attention to the oracle's most noteworthy feature, its extraordinarily rich description of the Day of Judgement.
Download or read book Early Christian Thinkers written by Paul Foster and published by SPCK. This book was released on 2012-04-10 with total page 199 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book introduces twelve key Christians from the second and third centuries, a formative period for the Church. These figures are: Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Tatian, Theophilus of Antioch, Clement of Alexandria, Tertullian, Perpetua, Origen, Hippolytus, Cyprian, Gregory Thaumaturgos and Eusebius. Each chapter is self-contained and requires no preliminary knowledge of the figure under discussion, making this an ideal book for laity and for undergraduates studying Christian origins or Patristics.
Download or read book Escaping Shame Mary s Dilemma and the Birthplace of Jesus written by N. Clayton Croy and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2022-08-01 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The only narratives of Jesus’ birth locate the event in Bethlehem, but the adult Jesus is consistently associated with Nazareth. How do we reconcile these two indisputable facts? Some dismiss Bethlehem as a theologoumenon, a theological fabrication. Others insist on Bethlehem based on the census of Quirinius. In the present volume, N. Clayton Croy argues that both are wrong. Instead Jesus’ birthplace was determined by the scandalous nature of Mary’s pregnancy, with it being necessary for Mary and Joseph to escape the inevitable shame of an ill-timed conception and decamp to a less hostile environment. In this light, a Bethlehem-born Jesus who grew up in Nazareth should never have been considered problematic.
Download or read book The Patient Ferment of the Early Church written by Alan Kreider and published by Baker Academic. This book was released on 2016-03-29 with total page 336 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How and why did the early church grow in the first four hundred years despite disincentives, harassment, and occasional persecution? In this unique historical study, veteran scholar Alan Kreider delivers the fruit of a lifetime of study as he tells the amazing story of the spread of Christianity in the Roman Empire. Challenging traditional understandings, Kreider contends the church grew because the virtue of patience was of central importance in the life and witness of the early Christians. They wrote about patience, not evangelism, and reflected on prayer, catechesis, and worship, yet the church grew--not by specific strategies but by patient ferment.
Download or read book Paradise in Antiquity written by Markus Bockmuehl and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2010-06-03 with total page 273 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The social and intellectual vitality of Judaism and Christianity in antiquity was in large part a function of their ability to articulate a viably transcendent hope for the human condition. Narratives of Paradise - based on the concrete symbol of the Garden of Delights - came to play a central role for Jews, Christians, and eventually Muslims too. The essays in this volume highlight the multiple hermeneutical perspectives on biblical Paradise from Second Temple Judaism and Christian origins to the systematic expositions of Augustine and rabbinic literature. They show that while early Christian and Jewish sources draw on texts from the same Bible, their perceptions of Paradise often reflect the highly different structures of the two sister religions. Dealing with a wide variety of texts, these essays explore major themes such as the allegorical and literal interpretations of Paradise, the tension between heaven and earth, and Paradise's physical location in space and time.
Download or read book The Oxford Handbook of Early Christian Studies written by Susan Ashbrook Harvey and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2008-09-05 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Oxford Handbook of Early Christian Studies responds to and celebrates the explosion of research in this inter-disciplinary field over recent decades. As a one-volume reference work, it provides an introduction to the academic study of early Christianity (c. 100-600 AD) and examines the vast geographical area impacted by the early church, in western and eastern late antiquity. It is thematically arranged to encompass history, literature, thought, practices, and material culture. It contains authoritative and up-to-date surveys of current thinking and research in the various sub-specialties of early Christian studies, written by leading figures in the discipline. The essays orientate readers to a given topic, as well as to the trajectory of research developments over the past 30-50 years within the scholarship itself. Guidance for future research is also given. Each essay points the reader towards relevant forms of extant evidence (texts, documents, or examples of material culture), as well as to the appropriate research tools available for the area. This volume will be useful to advanced undergraduate and post-graduate students, as well as to specialists in any area who wish to consult a brief review of the 'state of the question' in a particular area or sub-specialty of early Christian studies, especially one different from their own.
Download or read book Dalmatia and the Mediterranean written by Alina Payne and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2014-01-23 with total page 491 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Using the Braudelian concept of the Mediterranean this volume focuses on the condition of “coastal exchanges” involving the Dalmatian littoral and its Adriatic and more distant maritime network. Spalato and Ragusa intersect with Constantinople, Cairo and Spanish Naples just as Sinan, Palladio and Robert Adam cross paths in this liquid expanse. Concentrating on materiality and on the arts, architecture in particular, the authors identify portability and hybridity as characteristic of these exchanges, and tease out expected and unexpected serendipitous moments when they occurred. Focusing on translation and its instruments these essays expand the traditional concept of influence by thrusting mobility and the "hardware" of cultural transmission, its mechanisms, rather than its effects, into the foreground. Contributors include: Doris Behrens-Abouseif, SOAS, University of London; Joško Belamarić, Institute of Art History, Split; Marzia Faietti, Uffizi, Florence; Jasenka Gudelj, University of Zagreb; Cemal Kafadar, Harvard University; Ioli Kalavrezou, Harvard University; Suzanne Marchand, State University of Louisiana; Erika Naginski, Harvard University; Gülru Necipoğlu, Harvard University; Goran Nikšić, City of Split, Split; Alina Payne, Harvard University; Avinoam Shalem, Columbia University and David Young Kim, University of Pennsylvania
Download or read book On Genesis written by Saint Bede (the Venerable) and published by Liverpool University Press. This book was released on 2008-01-01 with total page 372 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Venerable Bede—theologian, historian, and scientific cosmologist—played an undeniable role in laying the foundations of the modern world. From his quantitative approach to questions of science to his introduction of the Anno Domini system of dating and his critical methods of biblical analysis, Bede both anticipated and influenced our modern ways of thinking. Bede: On Genesis is the first English-language translation of Bede's Latin commentary on the book of Genesis—the opening chapters of which he regarded as the foundational narrative of the world and through which he derived the theoretical basis for his scientific treaties and his notion of the English as the chosen people of God. Accompanied by an informative introduction that makes Bede's commentary accessible to anyone with an interest in his work, this volume is an essential contribution to ecclesiastical history.
Download or read book Technopaignia Formspiele in der griechischen Dichtung written by Christine Luz and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2010-11-19 with total page 466 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Technopaignia is the first comprehensive collection and scholarly analysis of a corpus of literary phenomena whose particularity consists in the artistic play with formal features (acrostics, anagrams, palindromes etc.). The study both discusses each phenomenon separately as a part of the history of ancient literature and touches upon more fundamental questions about the conception of language, the interaction of literary production and reception, the relation of literary and non-literary forms of writing, the nature of art etc. It thus combines a literary approach with issues from other fields of classical studies. Furthermore, most technopaignia have enjoyed a long tradition of imitation and revival, hence this book provides a basis for reception studies and the study of modern literatures. Die griechischen Technopaignia, eine Gruppe von literarischen Formspielen (Akrosticha, Anagrammen, Palindromen, Isopsepha, Figurengedichten u.ä.), werden hier erstmals systematisch zusammengestellt und besprochen. Neben der Untersuchung der einzelnen Phänomene und ihrer Bedeutung für die Literaturgeschichte wirft die Studie auch grundsätzlichere Fragen zur Konzeption von literarischem Spiel, den Grenzen und Möglichkeiten von Sprache, der Wechselwirkung von literarischer Produktion und Rezeption, dem Verhältnis von Literatur und Subliteratur oder dem Wesen von Kunst auf und verbindet damit den literarhistorischen mit einem kulturwissenschaftlichen Ansatz. Die antiken Technopaignia sind außerdem Vorläufer einer literarischen Tradition, die bis in die heutige Zeit lebendig bleibt. Ihre Untersuchung bietet dadurch einen Ausgangspunkt für das Studium ihrer Rezeption und für komparatistische Fragestellungen.
Download or read book A Brief History of Christianity written by Carter Lindberg and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2009-02-04 with total page 232 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Charting the rise and development of Christianity, Carter Lindberg has succeeded in writing a concise and compelling history of the world’s largest religion. He spans over 2,000 years of colorful incident to give an authoritative history of Christianity for both the general reader and the beginning student. Ranges from the missionary journeys of the apostles to the tele-evangelism of the twenty-first century. Demonstrates how the Christian community received and forged its identity from its development of the Bible to the present day. Covers topics fundamental to understanding the course of Western Christianity, including the growth of the papacy, heresy and schism, reformation and counter-reformation. Includes an introduction to the historiography of Christianity, a note on the problems of periodization, an appendix on theological terms, and a useful bibliography. An authoritative yet succinct history, written to appeal to a general audience as well as students of the history of Christianity. Written by internationally regarded theologian, Carter Lindberg, who is the author of numerous titles on theology and Church history.
Download or read book Cambridge History of Christianity Volume 1 Origins to Constantine written by Margaret M. Mitchell and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on with total page 796 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book A Century of Miracles written by Harold Allen Drake and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2017 with total page 329 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The fourth century of our common era began and ended with a miracle: Constantine's famous Vision of the Cross at one end and Theodosius' victory bearing prayer at the other. In this book, historian H. A. Drake shows how miracles in this century forever altered the way Christians, pagans, and Jews understood themselves and each other.
