HIERONYMUS UND EPIPHANIUS VON SALAMIS ÜBER DAS JUDENTUM IHRER ZEIT

2002 ◽  
Vol 33 (4) ◽  
pp. 411-436 ◽  
Author(s):  
Josef Lössl
Keyword(s):  
Christian Theology ◽  
Religious Practices ◽  
Rabbinic Judaism ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Jewish Heritage ◽  
Frequent Use ◽  
History Of ◽  
Anti Jewish ◽  
Do So

AbstractCompared to other Christian authors of the late 4th, early 5th century A.D. Jerome and Epiphanius of Salamis frequently write about Jews and Judaism. And they do so in a historical and biographical context which they largely share. Their frequent use of anti-Jewish polemics, however, has earned them a certain notoriety. But, as is argued in this paper, while their attitude in this respect is, of course, deplorable, it may be less a sign of their ignorance of, and distance from, than their proximity to, the Judaism of their time. Both, Jerome and Epiphanius, draw from very early Christian sources, sources still close to their Jewish roots. They define orthodoxy and heresy in terms of religious practices, very similar to Rabbinic Judaism, they are obsessed with scriptural detail, they reject the veneration of images, and they are interested in the languages and cultures of the Bible, far more than any other of their Christian contemporaries, or, indeed, Christians of any age. Considering their influential role in the history of Christian theology it may be worth looking at some of these aspects in detail, and see how they could have contributed not so much to the exclusion as to the preservation of the Jewish heritage in Christianity.

A Hard Yoke Upon Their Neck

2020 ◽  
pp. 161-206
Author(s):  
Michael E. Pregill
Keyword(s):  
Literary Texts ◽  
Relationship With God ◽  
Christian Church ◽  
Golden Calf ◽  
Rabbinic Judaism ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Patristic Literature ◽  
Historical Relationship ◽  
Anti Jewish

This chapter compares the presentations of the Golden Calf narrative in the literary texts of early Christianity and early rabbinic Judaism. The promotion of anti-Jewish readings of the Golden Calf narrative by the early Christian movement, especially after Christianity’s establishment as an imperial religion, would compel Jewish exegetes to adopt new apologetic interpretations that were more imaginative, as well as more evasive, concerning the issue of the culpability of both Aaron and the Israelites for their deed at Sinai. Virtually from the outset, the early Christian movement made use of the Calf narrative as proof of the disconfirmation of the formerly chosen Israel in favor of the Christian Church, positioned as the true Israel and new chosen people. Early Christian exegetes strove to emphasize the illegitimacy of the Jews’ continuing claim to covenantal priority, but this effort was tempered by the necessity of validating Israel’s historical relationship with God and the authenticity of the Bible as true revelation. Notably, these exegetes’ understanding of the significance of Israel’s idolatry with the Calf often appears to reflect an awareness of older Jewish approaches to the story. In turn, the major revisions of the episode seen in later rabbinic tradition can be read as a response to the promotion of specific anti-Jewish themes in patristic literature. Thus, despite the mutual opposition and hostility expressed by spokesmen of both communities, a basic symmetry, even symbiosis, between Jewish and Christian traditions is characteristic of this phase of development of accounts of Israel’s making of the Calf.

scholarly journals “Varii errores qui ab origine mundi emerserunt”. The semantic scope of the term “heresy” in Philastrius’ of Brescia Diversarum hereseon liber

Vox Patrum ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 68 ◽  
pp. 315-325
Author(s):  
Mariusz Szram
Keyword(s):  
Old Testament ◽  
Way Of Life ◽  
Moral Issues ◽  
Rule Of Faith ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Or Practice ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Church ◽  
Semantic Scope

The bishop of Brescia, Philastrius, author of the first Latin catalogue of he­resies, written between 380 and 388, presented in his treaty an extremely large number of heterodox movements: 28 within Judaism and 128 in early Christianity. This comes as a result of a wide understanding of the term heresis. For Philastrius this term was synonymous with the term error, recognized as any deviation from the universal truth in the history of the world, inspired by Satan as “the father of lies”, ocurring primarily in Judaism and Christianity. Among the early Christian views defined by the bishop of Brescia as heresy five groups can be distinguished. The first group includes mainly the erroneous views on fundamental theological questions contained in the rule of faith, such as the concept of a creator God and saviour Jesus Christ. The second set of he­resies, closely related with the previous one, contains the erroneous doctrines of anthropology, such as questioning the resurrection of the human body or the view of the materiality of the human soul. The third group includes the views related to the misinterpretation of Scripture, especially exaggerated literal interpretations of the texts of the Old Testament, as well as the cosmological views which do not agree with descriptions contained within the Bible. The fourth group contains the moral issues related to the based on laxism or rigorism way of life, as well as to the attitude of lack of deference to the laws of the Church, but non-threatening the primary truths of the Christian faith. The fifth group of heresies includes the movements defined by the authors of the late patristic period as a schizm, while the term schisma is not at all used by the bishop of Brescia in his work. The semantic scope of the term heresis in Philastrius’ treaty went beyond the noncompliance with the regula fidei. According to the bishop of Brescia each offense – whether in doctrinal teaching or practice of life, as well as with regard to the understanding of the text of Scripture – is a heresy because it offends God and the Church. Therefore, in Philastrius opinion one should not differentiate between superior and minor error, but equally condemn them as attitudes directed against God as the Father of Truth.

The Church of the Reigning Lord

1948 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 66-73
Author(s):  
R. Stuart Louden
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
Old Testament ◽  
Christian Theology ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Biblical Scholarship ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
Pauline Epistles ◽  
History Of ◽  
Four Square ◽  
The Church

We can trace a revival of theology in the Reformed Churches in the last quarter of a century. The new theological interest merits being called a revival of theology, for there has been a fresh and more thorough attention given to certain realities, either ignored or treated with scant notice for a considerable time previously.First among such realities now receiving more of the attention which their relevance and authority deserve, is the Bible, the record of the Word of God. There is an invigorating and convincing quality about theology which is Biblical throughout, being based on the witness of the Scriptures as a whole. The valuable results of careful Biblical scholarship had had an adverse effect on theology in so far as theologians had completely separated the Old Testament from the New in their treatment of Biblical doctrine, or in expanding Christian doctrine, had spoken of the theological teaching of the Synoptic Gospels, the Pauline Epistles, the Johannine writings, and so on, as if there were no such thing as one common New Testament witness. It is being seen anew that the Holy Scriptures contain a complete history of God's saving action. The presence of the complete Bible open at the heart of the Church, recalls each succeeding Christian generation to that one history of God's saving action, to which the Church is the living witness. The New Testament is one, for its Lord is one, and Christian theology must stand four-square on the foundation of its whole teaching.

MARTIN HEIDEGGER E A MÍSTICA MEDIEVAL. EM BUSCA DE UMA COMPREENSÃO FENOMENOLÓGICA

2016 ◽  
Vol 43 (136) ◽  
pp. 279
Author(s):  
Bento Silva Santos
Keyword(s):  
Mystical Experience ◽  
Phenomenological Approach ◽  
History Of Philosophy ◽  
The Other ◽  
Christian Theology ◽  
Religion And Theology ◽  
Philosophical Foundations ◽  
History Of ◽  
The One ◽  
Do So

Resumo: O artigo comenta globalmente algumas anotações da Vorlesung não proferida – “Os Fundamentos Filosóficos da Mística Medieval” (1918-1919) – na tentativa ainda fragmentária de esboçar uma compreensão fenomenológica da experiência mística. Assim, destaco, primeiramente, as duas observações iniciais de Heidegger sobre o sentido ambíguo da formulação “fundamentos filosóficos da mística medieval” ora com base na história da filosofia (1), ora com base na abordagem fenomenológica. Em segundo lugar, optando pela mística medieval como expressão (Ausdruck) da religiosidade cristã, Heidegger estabelece uma dupla distinção: de um lado, a religiosidade se distingue tanto da filosofia da religião como da teologia; de outro lado, a separação entre o problema da teologia e problema da religiosidade cristã (2). Por fim, em função desta oposição problemática entre teologia escolástica e mística medieval, trato brevemente da permanência ambígua do esquema de pensamento da teologia cristã no Denkweg de Heidegger, que pressupõe inegavelmente suas origens católicas (3).Abstract: This article broadly discusses Heidegger’s notes for his undelivered Vorlesung - “The Philosophical Foundations of Medieval Mysticism” (1918-1919) - in a still fragmentary attempt to outline a phenomenological understanding of the mystical experience. In order to do so, I first highlight the two initial observations of Heidegger concerning the meaning of the ambiguous wording “philosophical foundations of medieval mysticism”, sometimes referring to the basis of mysticism in the history of philosophy (1), sometimes to its phenomenological approach. Second, I discuss Heidegger’s option to consider medieval mystic as expression (Ausdruck) of Christian religiousness. Thus, the author establishes a double distinction: on the one hand, religiousness distinguishes itself from both the philosophy of religion and theology, and on the other hand, the problem of theology is separated from that of Christian religiousness (2). Finally, in light of this problematic opposition between scholastic theology and medieval mysticism, I briefly deal with the ambiguous persistence of the model of thinking of the Christian theology in Heidegger’s Denkweg, that unmistakably presupposes his Catholic origins (3).

The Comparative Study of “Scholasticism” in Late Antique Mesopotamia: Rabbis and East Syrians

AJS Review ◽  
2010 ◽  
Vol 34 (1) ◽  
pp. 91-113 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adam H. Becker
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Comparative Study ◽  
Middle Ages ◽  
Late Antiquity ◽  
Great Distance ◽  
Late Antique ◽  
Rabbinic Judaism ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
Transmission Of Knowledge ◽  
History Of

Now is an appropriate time to reconsider the historiographical benefit that a comparative study of the East Syrian (“Nestorian”) schools and the Babylonian rabbinic academies may offer. This is attributable both to the recent, rapid increase in scholarship on Jewish–Christian relations in the Roman Empire and late antiquity more broadly, and to the return by some scholars of rabbinic Judaism to the issues of a scholarly exchange of the late 1970s and early 1980s about the nature of rabbinic academic institutionalization. Furthermore, over the past twenty years, scholars of classics, Greek and Roman history, and late antiquity have significantly added to the bibliography on the transmission of knowledge—in lay person's terms, education—in the Greco-Roman and early Christian worlds. Schools continue to be an intense topic of conversation, and my own recent work on the School of Nisibis and the East Syrian schools in general suggests that the transformations and innovations of late antiquity also occurred in the Sasanian Empire, at a great distance from the centers of classical learning, such as Athens, Alexandria, and Antioch. The recently reexamined East Syrian sources may help push the conversation about rabbinic academic institutionalization forward. However, the significance of this issue is not simply attributable to its bearing on the social and institutional history of rabbinic institutions. Such inquiry may also reflect on how we understand the Babylonian Talmud and on the difficult redaction history of its constituent parts. Furthermore, I hope that the discussion offered herein will contribute to the ongoing analysis of the late antique creation and formalization of cultures of learning, which were transmitted, in turn, into the Eastern (i.e., Islamic and “Oriental” Christian and Jewish) and Western Middle Ages within their corresponding communities.

scholarly journals Enlivening Spirits

Théologiques ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
pp. 103-124
Author(s):  
Kimerer L. LaMothe
Keyword(s):  
Christian Theology ◽  
Divine Revelation ◽  
Unique Case ◽  
The Bible ◽  
History Of ◽  
Second Coming

In the history of dance and Christian theology, the United Society of Believers in the Second Coming of Christ, otherwise known as the Shakers, prove a unique case. Not only did the Shakers practice dancing for over 140 years as the central, constitutive ritual of a successful separatist religious socialism ; and not only did the Shakers mount a biblically informed theological defense of their dancing practice. The Shakers also elevated dancing alongside the Bible as a privileged medium of divine revelation. This paper mobilizes an ecokinetic approach in relation to the first two arcs of Shaker history to argue that the Shakers’ dancing serves as an authorizing source for their theological innovations. Dance is theopraxis.

The Bible, Its Status and African Christian Theologies: Foundational Document or Stumbling Block?

1998 ◽  
Vol 5 (3) ◽  
pp. 265-310 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jeremy Punt
Keyword(s):  
Vantage Point ◽  
Christian Theology ◽  
Human Suffering ◽  
African Theology ◽  
History Of Interpretation ◽  
The Bible ◽  
The Status ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Relationship

AbstractThe relationship between the Bible and Christianity, including Christian theology, is traditionally strong and undisputed; however, in Christian theology in Africa, as elsewhere, the status of the biblical texts is contested. A brief consideration of the Bible as 'canon' leads to a broader discussion of how the Bible has to a certain extent become a 'problem' in African theology also, both because of theological claims made about its status, and - and in conjunction with - its perceived complicity in justifying human suffering and hardship. The legacy of the Bible as legitimating agent is dealt with from the vantage point of the history of interpretation; but the latter also provides for a 'rehumanising' of Scripture. In the end, this article is also an attempt to explain some of the different views of the Bible's status in Africa, and to address and mediate the resulting conflict by attending to proposals to view the biblical canon as 'historical prototype', foundational document' - as scripture. A number of important aspects regarding the continuing role of the Bible in African theologies in particular, conclude the essay.

scholarly journals Questioning Divine δεῖ

2019 ◽  
Vol 61 (1) ◽  
pp. 40-54
Author(s):  
Peter-Ben Smit
Keyword(s):  
Gospel Of Mark ◽  
Salvation History ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
Divine Will ◽  
History Of ◽  
History Of Scholarship ◽  
Do So

AbstractFrequently, δεῖ is associated with salvation history and the exercise of divine will and identified as “theological δεῖ” or “divine δεῖ”. In the history of scholarship, there is an increasing emphasis on interpreting δεῖ along these lines, thereby marginalizing other shades of meaning that this verb may have. The question is whether this course of interpretative action is justified. This will be tested in this article. In order to do so, first a brief overview of the possible shades of meaning of δεῖ will be provided; second, the occurrences of δεῖ in the Gospel of Mark are systematically reviewed; third and finally, concluding reflections will be offered, including a word of caution when it comes to deifying δεῖ. In this manner, the current study seeks to contribute to the undoing of the theosis of this particular part of early Christian vocabulary.

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