"This volume describes the attitudes towards Gentiles in both ancient Judaism and the early Christian tradition. The Jewish relationship with and views about the Gentiles played an important part in Jewish self-definition, especially in the Diaspora where Jews formed the minorit…
For the early Christians, "pagan" referred to a multitude of unbelievers: Greek and Roman devotees of the Olympian gods, and "barbarians" such as Arabs and Germans with their own array of deities. But while these groups were clearly outsiders or idolaters, who and what was pagan…
For the early Christians, "pagan" referred to a multitude of unbelievers: Greek and Roman devotees of the Olympian gods, and "barbarians" such as Arabs and Germans with their own array of deities. But while these groups were clearly outsiders or idolaters, who and what was pagan…
"Ancient Christians invoked sin to account for an astonishing range of things, from the death of God's son to the politics of the Roman Empire that worshipped him. In this book, award-winning historian of religion Paula Fredriksen tells the surprising story of early Christian co…
Ancient Christians invoked sin to account for an astonishing range of things, from the death of God's son to the politics of the Roman Empire that worshipped him. In this book, the author, a historian of religion tells the surprising story of early Christian concepts of sin, exp…
St. Ephrem, who was proclaimed a Doctor of the Church by Pope Benedict XV, and Jacob of Serugh were two of the earliest and most important representatives of the theological worldview of the Syriac church. Much of their work was in the form of hymns and metrical homilies, using …
The doctrine of purgatory - the state after death in which Christians undergo punishment by God for unforgiven sins - raises many questions. What is purgatory like? Who experiences it? Does purgatory purify souls, or punish them, or both? How painful is it? Heaven's Purge explor…
This book traces purgatory's roots in the texts and debates of late antiquity. Illuminating the varied perspectives on post-mortem purgation in late antiquity, Moreira challenges the conclusions of recent scholarship through an examination of the texts, communities and cultural …
"Knowledge and the Coming Kingdom is a study of the meal prayers of Didache 9-10. The opening chapters pursue a sustained argument regarding the relationship between the Didache's meal ritual and the well-known tradition of Jesus' final meal. The central goal of this argument is…
"Destruction of temples and their transformation into churches are central symbols of late antique change in religious environment, socio-political system, and public perception. Contemporaries were aware of these events' far-reaching symbolic significance and of their immediate…
"Destruction of temples and their transformation into churches are central symbols of late antique change in religious environment, socio-political system, and public perception. Contemporaries were aware of these events' far-reaching symbolic significance and of their immediate…
