Tertullian On Idolatry And Mishnah Avodah Zarah

This work studies and compares systematically the text of Tertullian, an African Church Father of the third century CE, on idolatry with the rabbinic Mishnah Avodah Zarah, on the same subject, dating roughly from the same period. Similarities and differences between the Jewish and Christian approaches to idolatry are examined and accounted for. The research is inscribed in the wider framework of discussions on the “parting of the ways” between Jews and Christians. It also addresses related questions such as the role of the rabbis in second and third century Judaism in the Land of Israel and in the Diaspora; relations between Jews living in those places; interactions between Jews and pagans, Christians and pagans, Jews and Christians...

The accusation that Jews executed Jesus is perhaps the most overlooked of all Christianity's troubling traditions. In this study, J. Christopher Edwards shines a light on this forgotten tradition in which Christians rewrite their history to blame Jews for the crucifixion of Jesus.

This book is dealing with the relations between the Rabbinical Judaism and the Early Christianity. It studies the continuities and the mutations and clarifies the factors of influences and the polemics between these two traditions. Ce livre s'int resse aux relations entre le juda sme rabbinique et le christianisme primitif. Il tudie les continuit s et les ruptures et clarifie les facteurs d'influences et les pol miques entre les deux traditions.

"From Idols to Icons tells the fascinating history of the dramatic shift in Christian attitudes toward sacred images from the third through the early seventh century. From attacks on the cult images of polytheism to the emergence of Christian narrative iconography to the appearance of portrait type representations of holy figures, this book examines the primary theological critiques as well as defenses of holy images in light of the surviving material evidence for early Christian visual art. Against the assumption that fourth- and fifth-century Christians simply forgot or ignored their predecessors' censure and reverted to more alluring pagan practices, Robin M. Jensen contends that each stage of this profound change was uniquely Christian. Through a careful consideration of the cult of saints' remains, devotional portraits, and pilgrimage to sacred sites, Jensen shows how the Christian devotion to holy images came to be rooted in their evolving conviction that the divinity was accessible in and through visible objects. Even the briefest glance at a museum's holdings or an introductory textbook demonstrates how profoundly influential this belief would be on the course of Western art for the next fifteen hundred years"--

This book explores the story of the Israelites' worship of the Golden Calf in its Jewish, Christian, and Muslim contexts, from ancient Israel to the emergence of Islam. It focuses in particular on the Qur'an's presentation of the narrative and its background in Jewish and Christian retellings of the episode from Late Antiquity. Across the centuries, the interpretation of the Calf episode underwent major changes reflecting the varying cultural, religious, and ideological contexts in which various communities used the story to legitimate their own tradition, challenge the claims of others, and delineate the boundaries between self and other. The book contributes to the ongoing reevaluation of the relationship between Bible and Qur'an, arguing for the necessity of understanding the Qur'an and Islamic interpretations of the history and narratives of ancient Israel as part of the broader biblical tradition. The Calf narrative in the Qur'an, central to the qur'anic conception of the legacy of Israel and the status of the Jews of its own time, reflects a profound engagement with the biblical account in Exodus, as well as being informed by exegetical and parascriptural traditions in circulation in the Qur'an's milieu in Late Antiquity. The book also addresses the issue of Western approaches to the Qur'an, arguing that the historical reliance of scholars and translators on classical Muslim exegesis of scripture has led to misleading conclusions about the meaning of qur'anic episodes.

Ranging with authority from the Talmud to Maimonides, from Marx to Nietzsche and on to G.E. Moore, this account of a subject central to our culture also has much to say about metaphor, myth, and the application of philosophical analysis to religious concepts and sensibilities.

Twelve scholars contextualize and critically examine the key debates about the controversy over icons and their veneration that would fundamentally shape Byzantium and Orthodox Christianity.