Transforming Memory into Literary Narratives about the Past

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eve-Marie Becker
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
History Writing ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
The Past ◽  
Surrounding World ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
Ritual Practices

This chapter reflects on the early Christian shape of literary religious memory. The earliest Christian memorial culture does not stand alone. In order to develop, especially by literary means, it reiterates basic patterns that already circulate in its surrounding world. While maintaining continuity with both the Hebrew and Septuagint versions, the influence of Roman memorial culture is decisive in terms of how Christian groups organize their memoria. Moreover, early Christian authors tend to maintain the concepts of memory which are constitutive for Israel's history with God. In the New Testament writings, the concept of memory—which predates history-writing—is affiliated with a variety of contexts: ritual practices, the memorization of Jesus's teaching, and certain events and experiences.

The Birth of Christian History

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eve-Marie Becker ◽  
John J. Collins
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
Gospel Of Mark ◽  
Literary Tradition ◽  
Second Century ◽  
First Century ◽  
History Writing ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
Historical Awareness ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
Literary Memory

When the Gospel writings were first produced, Christian thinking was already cognizant of its relationship to ancient memorial cultures and history-writing traditions. Yet, little has been written about exactly what shaped the development of early Christian literary memory. This book explores the diverse ways in which history was written according to the Hellenistic literary tradition, focusing specifically on the time during which the New Testament writings came into being: from the mid-first century until the early second century CE. While acknowledging cases of historical awareness in other New Testament writings, the book traces the origins of this historiographical approach to the Gospel of Mark and Luke—Acts. The book shows how the earliest Christian writings shaped Christian thinking and writing about history.

The Oxford Handbook of New Testament, Gender, and Sexuality

2019 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
Sexual Difference ◽  
Early Christianity ◽  
Gender And Sexuality ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
The Past ◽  
Historical Continuity ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
History Of

The Oxford Handbook of New Testament, Gender, and Sexuality provides a roadmap to the relevant problems, debates, and issues that animate the study of sex, gender, sexuality, and sexual difference in early Christianity. Over several decades, scholarship in the New Testament and early Christianity has drawn attention to the ways in which ancient Mediterranean conceptions of embodiment, sexual difference, and desire were fundamentally different from modern ones. But scholars have also sometimes pointed to important lines of historical continuity or genealogical connection between the past and the present. Indeed, these textual materials have played a foundational role in the history of reflection on issues of gender and sexuality in Western thought and continue to impact cultural and religious debates today. Research into these topics has produced a rich and nuanced body of scholarly literature that has contributed substantially to our understanding of early Christian history and also proved relevant to ongoing contemporary theological discussion. Leading scholars in the field offer original contributions by way of synthesis, critical interrogation, and proposals for future research trajectories.

James the Just in History and Tradition: Perspectives of Past and Present Scholarship (Part I)

2006 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 73-122 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matti Myllykoski
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
New Testament ◽  
Early Christianity ◽  
Christian Theology ◽  
Social Formation ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
The Past ◽  
Jewish Christianity ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
The Church

James the Just, the brother of Jesus, is known from the New Testament as the chief apostle of the Torah-obedient Christians. Up to the last quarter of the twentieth century, Jewish Christianity was regarded as an unimportant branch of the early Christian movement. Correspondingly, there was remarkably little interest in James. However, in the past two decades, while early Christianity has been studied as a form of Judaism, the literature on James has grown considerably. Now some scholars tend to assume that James was a loyal follower of his brother right from the beginning, and that his leadership in the church was stronger than traditionally has been assumed. Fresh studies on Acts 15 and Galatians 2 have opened new questions about the Christian Judaism of James and social formation of the community which he led. Part II of this article, to be published in a later issue of Currents, will treat the rest of the James tradition—James's ritual purity, martyrdom and succession, and his role in the Gnostic writings and later Christian evidence. It will conclude with reflections concerning James and earliest Jewish-Christian theology.

The Missing Rhetorical History Between Quintilian and Augustine

2015 ◽  
Vol 33 (4) ◽  
pp. 349-376
Author(s):  
Mike Duncan
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
Early Christianity ◽  
Classical Rhetoric ◽  
Rhetorical History ◽  
Church Fathers ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
Christian Thought ◽  
Rhetorical Force ◽  
Apostolic Church

Current histories of rhetoric neglect the early Christian period (ca. 30–430 CE) in several crucial ways–Augustine is overemphasized and made to serve as a summary of Christian thought rather than an endpoint, the texts of church fathers before 300 CE are neglected or lumped together, and the texts of the New Testament are left unexamined. An alternative outline of early Christian rhetoric is offered, explored through the angles of political self-invention, doctrinal ghostwriting, apologetics, and fractured sermonization. Early Christianity was not a monolithic religion that eventually made peace with classical rhetoric, but as a rhetorical force in its own right, and comprised of more factions early on than just the apostolic church.

The Origins of Christian Hell

Numen ◽  
2009 ◽  
Vol 56 (2-3) ◽  
pp. 282-297 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dimitris Kyrtatas
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
Original Meaning ◽  
The New Testament

The paper re-examines the evidence concerning the early Christian conceptions of punishment of sinners in the afterlife. It commences with the New Testament and the ideas attributed to Jesus and moves on to the apocryphal Apocalypse of Peter , composed about a generation later, which enjoyed great popularity among several early Christian circles and was seriously considered for inclusion in the New Testament canon. It is claimed that as it now reads, Apoc. Pet. advances ideas about hell that sharply contrast those presented in the New Testament. To solve this riddle, it is proposed that the Apoc. Pet. , as it has been preserved, was reorganized at a much later stage to meet the needs of the developing Church. Its original meaning was consequently twisted almost beyond recognition. In its earliest layers, the apocryphal document appears to have been mostly concerned, just like the New Testament, with salvation rather than everlasting chastisement.

Kann man die neutestamentlichen Briefe der Gattung „Apostelbrief“ zuordnen?

2015 ◽  
Vol 57 (3) ◽  
pp. 227-250
Author(s):  
Bärbel Bosenius
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
Christian Communities ◽  
The New Testament

During the last 40 years New Testament scholarship did not apply the term “apostolic letter” consistently. All early Christian letters and only the New Testament or Pauline respectively Deutero-Pauline letters were called “apostolic letters” by New Testament scholars. Since the term from the sources ἀπόστολος in the undisputed Pauline letters refers to Paul’s function as founder of early Christian communities but not to his function as their leader, New Testament scholars should avoid the misleading term “apostolic letter.” Within the corpus of New Testament letters one should rather differentiate between “kerygmatic letters,” “pseudepigraphic Pauline letters” and “early Christian Diaspora letters.”

scholarly journals Salvific Dissolution: The Mystery of the Betrayal between the New Testament and theGospel of Judas

2016 ◽  
Vol 63 (1) ◽  
pp. 111-124
Author(s):  
Jonathan Cahana
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
Gospel Of Judas

The recently discoveredGospel of Judashas created much controversy among scholars. While it is clear that Judas is liable for Jesus' crucifixion in this text, it is much debated whether his actions should be understood positively or negatively. This article suggests that focusing on how theGospel of Judasevaluates the salvific meaning of Jesus' crucifixion alongside the New Testament gospels and other early Christian writings may provide a key for solving this problem. In this way, theGospel of Judascan be seen as a rare attempt to unravel what Irenaeus aptly termed ‘the mystery of the betrayal’.

Commentary on Morgan-Miller's “An Exploratory Study of Different Types of Violence Presented in Early Christian and Islamic Historical Documents”

2002 ◽  
Vol 91 (2) ◽  
pp. 571-574 ◽  
Author(s):  
Walter R. Schumm
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
Exploratory Study ◽  
Historical Documents ◽  
Short Supply ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
Contemporary World ◽  
Moral Transformation ◽  
Different Types ◽  
The New Testament

Oversights are observed in Morgan-Miller's previous 2002 report on themes of violence in the New Testament and the Qur'an. While both the New Testament and the Qur'an seem to suggest some type of moral transformation in the life of Jesus, it is not clear to what extent such a transformation remains normative in the lives of ordinary believers or even continues to be expected. However, Jesus seemed to expect that his followers would forsake violence against their enemies, a lesson that seems in short supply throughout the contemporary world.

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