Plutarch On Literature Graeco Roman Religion Jews And Christians

The present book includes sixteen studies by Professor Frederick E. Brenk on Plutarch on Literature, Graeco-Roman Religion, Jews and Christians. Of them, thirteen were published earlier in different venues and three appear here for the first time. Written between 2009 and 2022, these studies not only provide an excellent example of Professor Brenk’s incisiveness and deep knowledge of Plutarch; they also provide an excellent overview of Plutarchan studies of the last years on a variety of themes. Indeed, one of the most salient characteristics of Brenk’s scholarship is his constant interaction and conversation with the most recent scholarly literature.

The aim of this book is to give access to sources which illustrate Graeco-Roman views on Jews and Christians from 200 BC to AD 200. Passages range from longer extracts written by historians to short incidental references by disparate authors which throw light on attitudes towards beliefs and social customs. The pagan religious background, especially the Mystery religions, is also described and illustrated by selected passages, so that the reader may have some idea of the general religious climate during this period. Every quotation is prefixed by a brief biography of the author and all passages have been translated into English, with explanatory comment when necessary. Connecting essays act as summaries and focus the attention on essential issues. These, together with a chronological chart and maps should enable a student coming fresh to the subject, without previous specialized knowledge, to see the period in historical perspective.

A collection of essays, most of which were published previously. Partial contents:

A collection of previously published papers by leading scholars, dealing with the religious history of the Roman Empire. It covers Christianity and Judaism as well as the paganism of the Empire which so deeply influenced these world religions.

In Christian Origins and Hellenistic Judaism, Stanley E. Porter and Andrew W. Pitts assemble an international team of scholars whose work has focused on reconstructing the social matrix for earliest Christianity through reference to Hellenistic Judaism and its literary forms.

Background becomes foreground in Moyer Hubbard's creative introduction to the social and historical setting for the letters of the Apostle Paul to churches in Asia Minor and Europe. Hubbard begins each major section with a brief narrative featuring a fictional character in one of the great cities of that era. Then he elaborates on various aspects of the cultural setting related to each particular vignette, discussing the implications of those venues for understanding Paul's letters and applying their message to our lives today. Addressing a wide array of cultural and traditional issues, Hubbard discusses: • religion and superstition • education, philosophy, and oratory • urban society • households and family life in the Greco-Roman world This work is based on the premise that the better one understands the historical and social context in which the New Testament (and Paul's letters) was written, the better one will understand the writings of the New Testament themselves. Passages become clearer, metaphors deciphered, and images sharpened. Teachers, students, and laypeople alike will appreciate Hubbard's unique, illuminating, and well-researched approach to the world of the early church.

Presenting a fresh inquiry into early Christianity and Greco-Roman paganism, Luke Timothy Johnson begins with a broad definition of religion as a way of life organized around convictions and experiences concerning ultimate power.

In this book, the author draws on two original sources, on a Greek biographer, historian, and rhetorician, Dionysius of Halicarnassus, as well as on Pompeian domestic art and architecture. Generally, NT scholars read texts, but Greeks and ancient Romans loved beauty. The walls and floors of their houses were decorated with thousands of colorful frescoes and mosaics, art that two millennia later is still on display in Pompeii. Christians lived and worshipped in those typical houses; relating the art to NT texts generates many intriguing new questions! What stories/myths did Greeks and Romans see every day? What were their sports, and how violent were they? Many NT scholars know as much or more Latin than they do Greek, and they therefore cite the Latin historian Livy rather than the Greek Dionysius, who wrote a century before the first Christian historian, Luke. Dionysius' rhetoric expressed values shared across cultures, by Greeks, Romans, and Jews (e.g., by the historian--and rhetorician--Josephus), some values that Luke also shares. Dionysius makes clear that cities and ethnic groups had to praise how they treated emigrant foreigners, questions handled differently by Josephus and by Luke. This enables new interpretations of Jesus' inaugural speech in Luke 4 and of Peter's second Pentecost speech in Acts 10.