Download or read book Prophets and Prophecy in the Late Antique Near East written by Jae Hee Han and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2023-11-30 with total page 301 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Offers an interdisciplinary account of prophecy as a topic of discourse among various late antique Near Eastern communities. Against assumptions that prophecy ceased in the past, this book argues that it remained a topic of discourse among various Near Eastern communities.
Download or read book Prophets and Prophecy in the Late Antique Near East written by Jae Han and published by . This book was released on 2024 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this volume, Jae Han investigates how various Late Antique Near Eastern communities - Jews, Christians, Manichaeans, and philosophers -- discussed prophets and revelation, among themselves and against each other. Bringing an interdisciplinary, historical approach to the topic, he interrogates how these communities used discourses of prophethood and revelation to negotiate their place in the world. Han tracks the shifting contours of prophecy and contextualizes the emergence of orality as the privileged medium among rabbis, Manichaeans, and 'Jewish Christian' communities. He also explores the contemporary interest in divinatory knowledge among Neoplatonists. Offering a critical re-reading of key Manichaean texts, Han shows how Manichaeans used concepts of prophethood and revelation within specific rhetorical agendas to address urgent issues facing their communities. His book highlights the contingent production of discourse and shows how contemporary theories of rhetoric and textuality can be applied to the study of ancient texts.
Download or read book Prophets and Prophecy in the Ancient Near East written by Martti Nissinen and published by SBL Press. This book was released on 2019-07-09 with total page 373 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A new, expanded edition of a classic reference tool This volume of more than 170 documents of prophecy from the ancient Near East brings together a representative sample of written documents from Mesopotamia, the Levant, and Egypt dating to the second and first millennia BCE. Nissinen's collection provides nonspecialist readers clear translations, transliterations, and discussions of oracles reports and collections, quotations of prophetic messages in letters and literature, and texts that reference persons with prophetic titles. This second edition includes thirty-four new texts. Features: Modern, idiomatic, and readable English translations Thirty-four new translations Contributions of West Semitic, Egyptian, and Luwian sources from C. L. Seow, Robert K. Ritner, and H. Craig Melchert
Download or read book Jews and Christians in the First and Second Centuries Mapping the Second Century written by and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2024-09-19 with total page 358 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The second century is a crucial period for the formation of both Judaism and Christianity, but remains in important ways terra incognita. This volume brings together specialists in Jewish studies and Christian studies, two closely related disciplines that nonetheless continue to operate in relative isolation. Taking into consideration the full panoply of Jewish and Christian identities, the volume proposes fresh ways to map the interrelated histories of Jews and Christians. Contributions by leading scholars offer new insights into this period informed by a rich variety of perspectives, including theoretical, literary, thematic and material approaches.
Download or read book History and Identity in the Late Antique Near East written by Philip Wood and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2013-04-04 with total page 262 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book examines the importance of the past, both real and imagined, in constructing contemporary culture in the period AD 500-1000. It goes beyond 'history-writing' in a narrow sense to examine philosophy, theology, liturgy and jurisprudence as vehicles for tradition and the imagination of a past 'golden age'. The papers straddle the Roman-Persian frontier and go well into the Islamic period: together, they push the boundaries of late antiquity' into the varied language traditions: not just Greek, but also Syriac, Armenian, Coptic and Arabic.
Download or read book The Making of the Abrahamic Religions in Late Antiquity written by Guy G. Stroumsa and published by . This book was released on 2015 with total page 238 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book presents how ancient Christianity must be understood from the viewpoint of the history of religions in late antiquity. The continuation of biblical prophecy runs like a thread from Jesus through Mani to Muhammad. And yet this thread, arguably the single most important characteristic of the Abrahamic movement, often remains outside the mainstream, hidden, as it were, since it generates heresy. The figures of the Gnostic, the holy man, and the mystic are all sequels of the Israelite prophet. They reflect a mode of religiosity that is characterized by high intensity. It is centripetal and activist by nature and emphasizes sectarianism and polemics, esoteric knowledge, or gnosis and charisma. The other mode of religiosity, obviously much more common than the first one, is centrifugal and irenic. It favors an ecumenical attitude, contents itself with a widely shared faith, or pistis, and reflects, in Weberian parlance, the routinization of the new religious movement. This is the mode of priests and bishops, rather than that of martyrs and holy men. These two main modes of religion, high versus low intensity, exist simultaneously, and cross the boundaries of religious communities. They offer a tool permitting us to follow the transformations of religion in late antiquity in general, and in ancient Christianity in particular, without becoming prisoners of the traditional categories of patristic literature. Through the dialectical relationship between these two modes of religiosity, one can follow the complex transformations of ancient Christianity in its broad religious context.
Download or read book Splendide Mendax written by Edmund P. Cueva and published by Barkhuis. This book was released on 2016-02-25 with total page 380 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Many new and fruitful avenues of investigation open up when scholars consider forgery as a creative act rather than a crime. We invited authors to contribute work without imposing any restrictions beyond a willingness to consider new approaches to the subject of ancient fakes and forgeries.
Download or read book Expressions of Sceptical Topoi in Late Antique Judaism written by Reuven Kiperwasser and published by Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG. This book was released on 2021-07-19 with total page 216 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The series Studies and Texts in Scepticism contains monographs, translations, and collected essays exploring scepticism in its dual manifestation as a purely philosophical tradition and as a set of sceptical strategies, concepts, and attitudes in the cultural field - especially in religions, perhaps most notably in Judaism. In such cultural contexts scepticism manifests as a critical attitude towards different dimensions and systems of secular or revealed knowledge and towards religious and political authorities. It is not merely an intellectual or theoretical worldview, but a critical form of life that expresses itself in such diverse phenomena as religion, literature, and society. Further book series of the Maimonides Centre for Advanced Studies are Jewish Thought, Philosophy, and Religion and the Yearbook of the Maimonides Centre for Advances Studies.
Download or read book Christian Divination in Late Antiquity written by Robert Wisniewski and published by Amsterdam University Press. This book was released on 2020-10-21 with total page 290 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Late Antiquity, people commonly sought to acquire knowledge about the past, the present, and the future, using a variety of methods. While early Christians did not doubt that these methods worked effectively, in theory they were not allowed to make use of them. In practice, people responded to this situation in diverse ways. Some simply renounced any hope of learning about the future, while others resorted to old practices regardless of the consequences. A third option, however, which emerged in the fourth century, was to construct divinatory methods that were effective yet religiously tolerable. This book is devoted to the study of such practices and their practitioners, and provides answers to essential questions concerning this phenomenon. How did it develop? How closely were Christian methods related to older, traditional customs? Who used them and in which situations? Who offered oracular services? And how were they treated by the clergy, intellectuals, and common people?
Download or read book Muhammad A Very Short Introduction written by Jonathan A.C. Brown and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2011-03-24 with total page 161 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Drawing on traditional Muslim sources, Michael Cook describes Muhammad's life and teaching. He also attempts to stand back from this traditional picture to show how far it is historically justified.
Download or read book History and Religion written by Bernd-Christian Otto and published by Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG. This book was released on 2015-08-31 with total page 475 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: History is one of the most important cultural tools to make sense of one’s situation, to establish identity, define otherness, and explain change. This is the first systematic scholarly study that analyses the complex relationship between history and religion, taking into account religious groups both as producers of historical narratives as well as distinct topics of historiography. Coming from different disciplines, the authors of this volume ask under which conditions and with what consequences religions are historicised. How do religious groups employ historical narratives in the construction of their identities? What are the biases and elisions of current analytical and descriptive frames in the History of Religion? The volume aims at initiating a comparative historiography of religion and combines disciplinary competences of Religious Studies and the History of Religion, Confessional Theologies, History, History of Science, and Literary Studies. By applying literary comparison and historical contextualization to those texts that have been used as central documents for histories of individual religions, their historiographic themes, tools and strategies are analysed. The comparative approach addresses circum-Mediterranean and European as well as Asian religious traditions from the first millennium BCE to the present and deals with topics such as the origins of religious historiography, the practices of writing and the transformation of narratives.
Download or read book The Qur an and the Aramaic Gospel Traditions written by Emran El-Badawi and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2013-12-17 with total page 302 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is a study of related passages found in the Arabic Qur’ān and the Aramaic Gospels, i.e. the Gospels preserved in the Syriac and Christian Palestinian Aramaic dialects. It builds upon the work of traditional Muslim scholars, including al-Biqā‘ī (d. ca. 808/1460) and al-Suyūṭī (d. 911/1505), who wrote books examining connections between the Qur’ān on the one hand, and Biblical passages and Aramaic terminology on the other, as well as modern western scholars, including Sidney Griffith who argue that pre-Islamic Arabs accessed the Bible in Aramaic. The Qur’ān and the Aramaic Gospel Traditions examines the history of religious movements in the Middle East from 180-632 CE, explaining Islam as a response to the disunity of the Aramaic speaking churches. It then compares the Arabic text of the Qur’ān and the Aramaic text of the Gospels under four main themes: the prophets; the clergy; the divine; and the apocalypse. Among the findings of this book are that the articulator as well as audience of the Qur’ān were monotheistic in origin, probably bilingual, culturally sophisticated and accustomed to the theological debates that raged between the Aramaic speaking churches. Arguing that the Qur’ān’s teachings and ethics echo Jewish-Christian conservatism, this book will be of interest to students and scholars of Religion, History, and Literature.
Download or read book The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Justinian written by Michael Maas and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2005-04-18 with total page 743 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book introduces the Age of Justinian, the last Roman century and the first flowering of Byzantine culture. Dominated by the policies and personality of emperor Justinian I (527–565), this period of grand achievements and far-reaching failures witnessed the transformation of the Mediterranean world. In this volume, twenty specialists explore the most important aspects of the age including the mechanics and theory of empire, warfare, urbanism, and economy. It also discusses the impact of the great plague, the codification of Roman law, and the many religious upheavals taking place at the time. Consideration is given to imperial relations with the papacy, northern barbarians, the Persians, and other eastern peoples, shedding new light on a dramatic and highly significant historical period.
Download or read book Revelation Literature and Community in Late Antiquity written by Philippa Townsend and published by Mohr Siebeck. This book was released on 2011 with total page 388 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Papers from a conference held 2007, Princeton University.
Download or read book The Early Christian World written by Philip Esler and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2017-07-20 with total page 2044 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Since its publication in 2000, The Early Christian World has come to be regarded by scholars, students and the general reader as one of the most informative and accessible works in English on the origins, development, character and major figures of early Christianity. In this new edition, the strengths of the first edition are retained. These include the book’s attractive architecture that initially takes a reader through the context and historical development of early Christianity; the essays in critical areas such as community formation, everyday experience, the intellectual and artistic heritage, and external and internal challenges; and the profiles on the most influential early Christian figures. The book also preserves its strong stress on the social reality of early Christianity and continues its distinctive use of hundreds of illustrations and maps to bring that world to life. Yet the years that have passed since the first edition was published have seen great advances made in our understanding of early Christianity in its world. This new edition fully reflects these developments and provides the reader with authoritative, lively and up-to-date access to the early Christian world. A quarter of the text is entirely new and the remaining essays have all been carefully revised and updated by their authors. Some of the new material relates to Christian culture (including book culture, canonical and non-canonical scriptures, saints and hagiography, and translation across cultures). But there are also new essays on: Jewish and Christian interaction in the early centuries; ritual; the New Testament in Roman Britain; Manichaeism; Pachomius the Great and Gregory of Nyssa. This new edition will serve its readers for many years to come.
Download or read book From Sasanian Mandaeans to bians of the Marshes written by Kevin T. Van Bladel and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2017-02-06 with total page 163 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This historical study argues that the Mandaean religion originated under Sasanid rule in the fifth century, not earlier as has been widely accepted. It analyzes primary sources in Syriac, Mandaic, and Arabic to clarify the early history of Mandaeism. This religion, along with several other, shorter-lived new faiths, such as Kentaeism, began in a period of state-sponsored persecution of Babylonian paganism. The Mandaeans would survive to become one of many groups known as Ṣābians by their Muslim neighbors. Rather than seeking to elucidate the history of Mandaeism in terms of other religions to which it can be related, this study approaches the religion through the history of its social contexts.
Download or read book How Prophecy Lives written by Diana Tumminia and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2011-09-20 with total page 201 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Taking its inspiration from the 50th anniversary of the publication of Festinger et al.'s 1956 seminal and controversial volume When Prophecy Fails, which introduced the notion of "cognitive dissonance" as an explanation for how a small group of flying saucer devotees handled the failure of a predicted visit from space aliens, this volume looks at both theoretical and empirical studies of religious groups for whom space beings and civilizations provided an inspiration to prepare for the nearness of events that would trigger "the end of the world." Rather than examining merely the rationales adopted to account for the disappointments associated with such "failures," the core of the present volume seeks to explore the dynamics that inspire not only such beliefs but also the vigorous participation in activities in which adherents engage to prepare for the coming of (or transport to) alien civilizations from "outer space." Contributors include: Lorne L. Dawson, Arthur L. Greil, Ralph W. Hood, Jr., Benton Johnson, Salvador J. Murguia, Jon R. Stone, Bradley Whitsel, and Stuart A. Wright.