The Interpretation of the New Testament in Greco-Roman Paganism PDF Download

Author: John Granger Cook
Publisher: Baker Academic
ISBN: 9780801045943
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
In the early centuries of what came to be called the Christian era, that new religion competed not only with Judaism but also with various traditional Greco-Roman religious beliefs and practices. "Pagan" intellectuals read the emerging Christian scriptures and responded with critiques that provoked lengthy and repeated rejoinders from contemporary Christian leaders. In some cases, these criticisms anticipated perspectives that re-emerged many centuries later in modern scholarship. John Granger Cook offers the first detailed description of the exegesis of five of the most important ancient pagan critics of the New Testament: Celsus, Porphyry, the anonymous pagan reported by Macarius Magnes, Hierocles, and the emperor Julian.

Author: John Granger Cook
Publisher:
ISBN: 9783161586538
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :

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Book Description
Recent New Testament scholarship has raised the question of the effect of the New Testament on readers including an 'implied' reader. How did the New Testament affect ancient readers who rejected it?John Granger Cook contributes to the ongoing investigation of the relationship between Christianity and Greco-Roman antiquity. He addresses the response to the New Testament in the following authors: Celsus, Porphyry, the anonymous philosopher of Macarius Magnes, Hierocles, and Julian the Apostate. These authors are readers who found the New Testament to be a rejection of values they took to be fundamental in Greco-Roman culture. The works of these pagans exist in fragments preserved by Christian apologists who attempted to respond to their critique of Christian texts and practices. The doctrine of the resurrection, for example, contradicts the belief in reincarnation and an immortal bodiless soul. Apocalyptic texts rejected the eternity of the universe. Jesus was considered to be inferior to the heroes of Hellenistic culture such as Apollonius of Tyana who conducted themselves as philosophers should. Pagans were disturbed by the ability of Christian language to persuade people to join the movement. Both pagans and Christians made use of apologetic techniques designed to attract people to their respective positions. Rhetoric and literary criticism were tools that both used in their ongoing arguments.John Granger Cook makes use of these tools to analyze the texts of the pagan readers of the New Testament.

Author: John Granger Cook
Publisher:
ISBN: 9783161586675
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :

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Book Description
According to the available evidence not many pagans knew the Greek Bible (Septuagint) before the advent of Christianity. Those pagans who later became aware of Christian texts were among the first, according to the surviving data, to seriously explore the Septuagint. They found the Bible to be difficult reading. The pagans who reacted to biblical texts include Celsus (II C.E.), Porphyry (III C.E.), and Julian the Apostate (IV C.E.). These authors thought that if they could refute one of the primary foundations of Christianity, namely its use or interpretation of the Septuagint, then the new religion would perhaps crumble. John Granger Cook analyzes these pagans' voice and elaborates on its importance, since it shows how Septuagint texts appeared in the eyes of Greco-Roman intellectuals. Theirs was not an abstract interest, however, because they knew that Christianity posed a grave danger to some of their dearest beliefs, self-understanding, and way of life.

Author: John Granger Cook
Publisher: Mohr Siebeck
ISBN: 9783161484742
Category : Bible
Languages : en
Pages : 424

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Book Description
According to the available evidence not many pagans knew the Greek Bible (Septuagint) before the advent of Christianity. Those pagans who later became aware of Christian texts were among the first, according to the surviving data, to seriously explore the Septuagint. They found the Bible to be difficult reading. The pagans who reacted to biblical texts include Celsus (II C.E.), Porphyry (III C.E.), and Julian the Apostate (IV C.E.). These authors thought that if they could refute one of the primary foundations of Christianity, namely its use or interpretation of the Septuagint, then the new religion would perhaps crumble. John Granger Cook analyzes these pagans' voice and elaborates on its importance, since it shows how Septuagint texts appeared in the eyes of Greco-Roman intellectuals. Theirs was not an abstract interest, however, because they knew that Christianity posed a grave danger to some of their dearest beliefs, self-understanding, and way of life.

Author: Charles Edgar Pratt
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781258143947
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 256

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Book Description

Author: David Edward Aune
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 9004226311
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 233

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Book Description
Focusing on a strength of the faculty of the Pontifical Biblical Institute, this volume is a collection of nine essays by an international group of scholars who have used texts from the Greco-Roman world to illuminate various aspects of the New Testament.

Author: Hans-Josef Klauck
Publisher: Fortress Press
ISBN: 9781451409390
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 156

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Book Description
Readers: College, university, and seminary students; New Testament scholars

Author: Lynn Allan Kauppi
Publisher: A&C Black
ISBN: 0567080978
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 193

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Book Description
Where and why does Luke include references in Acts to Graeco-Roman gods and religious practices? How do these explicit and implicit mentions relate to other literature, inscriptions and artifacts from the same period? Through a close and informative reading of seven key texts in Acts, Kauppi analyses the appearances of Graeco-Roman.

Author: Luke Timothy Johnson
Publisher: Yale University Press
ISBN: 0300156499
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 480

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Book Description
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.

Author: Luke Timothy Johnson
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780300168105
Category : Christianity and culture
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
An acclaimed scholar presents a bold new interpretation of the relationship between Greco-Roman religion and Christianity. The question of Christianity's relation to the other religions of the world is more pertinent and difficult today than ever before. While Christianity's historical failure to appreciate or actively engage Judaism is notorious, Christianity's even more shoddy record with respect to "pagan" religions is less understood. Christians have inherited a virtually unanimous theological tradition that thinks of paganism in terms of demonic possession, and of Christian missions as a rescue operation that saves pagans from inherently evil practices. In undertaking this 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 the tradition of William James's Variety of Religious Experience, he identifies four distinct ways of being religious: religion as participation in benefits, as moral transformation, as transcending the world, and as stabilizing the world. Using these criteria as the basis for his exploration of Christianity and paganism, Johnson finds multiple points of similarity in religious sensibility. Christianity's failure to adequately come to grips with its first pagan neighbors, Johnson asserts, inhibits any effort to engage positively with adherents of various world religions. This thoughtful and passionate study should help break down the walls between Christianity and other religious traditions.