Producing Descent/Dissent: Clement of Alexandria's Use of Filial Metaphors as Intra-Christian Polemic

1997 ◽  
Vol 90 (1) ◽  
pp. 89-104
Author(s):  
Denise Kimber Buell
Keyword(s):  
Biblical Interpretation ◽  
Second Century ◽  
Christian Identity ◽  
Culturally Specific ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
Clement Of Alexandria ◽  
Authoritative Discourse

In the second century, Christians vied with each other to produce an authoritative discourse on Christian identity. Some early Christians deployed historically- and culturally-specific notions of procreation and kinship in their struggles with each other over claims to represent the truth of Christian biblical interpretation, practices, and doctrine. The extant writings of the late second-century Christian author Clement of Alexandria offer a generous range of contexts for exploring the nuances of this practice. This study comprises one facet of a larger investigation into early Christian use of procreative and kinship imagery in discourses about Christian identity in the second century CE.

Polykoiranie II (Philo Judaeus, Early Christian Apologists, Pseudo-Dionysius)

2021 ◽  
pp. 70-99
Author(s):  
Geoffrey Bennington
Keyword(s):  
Second Century ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
Clement Of Alexandria ◽  
Islamic Thought ◽  
The One ◽  
Eusebius Of Caesarea ◽  
Pseudo Dionysius

The chapter pursues invocations and quotations of the same line from Homer in Philo Judaeus’s On the Confusion of Tongues, and subsequently among the second-century CE Christian apologists Clement of Alexandria, Tatian, pseudo-Justin, Eusebius of Caesarea, and the pseudo-Dionysius, and their various attempts to Christianize pagan and Judaic sources. The complexity of the “One” in the concept of “one God” is analysed in Christianity, Judaism, and Islamic thought, and shown to have a significant stylistic presence in Derrida.

The Power of God in Some Early Christian Texts

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Edwards
Keyword(s):  
First Principles ◽  
Second Century ◽  
Late Antique ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
Clement Of Alexandria ◽  
Philosophical School ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
The Common ◽  
Christian Thought ◽  
Power Of God

This chapter delineates a typology of the power of God in early Christian sources, including the New Testament, Justin Martyr, and other apologists of the second century, such as Clement of Alexandria, Origen, and Athanasius. It argues that any investigation of the concept of dunamis in early Christian writings must begin with an acknowledgement of the Scriptures, maintaining that late antique Christianity should be considered as a distinct philosophical school, which had its own first principles, interpreted its own texts, and gave its own sense to terms that it used in common with other schools. Thus, a specifically Christian notion of divine power could have been born of reflection on the common ‘reservoir’ of Christian thought, any other influence being strictly secondary.

VALENTINIAN VARIATIONS ON LK 12,8-9/MT 10,32

2003 ◽  
Vol 57 (4) ◽  
pp. 437-455
Author(s):  
Winrich Löhr
Keyword(s):  
Gospel Of John ◽  
Gospel Of Luke ◽  
Second Century ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
Clement Of Alexandria

AbstractClement of Alexandria has preserved a fragment of Herakleon, disciple of Valentinus, which comments on Lk 12,8-9 (11) par. The article interprets Herakleon's fragment as a piece of subtle second century Gospel exegesis, considers it in the context of the early Christian exegesis of Lk 12,8-9 par. and compares it with another Valentinian exegesis of the same verse which is related by Tertullian. Some conjectures as to the form of Herakleon's commentary are attempted: Apparently he first quoted the lemma and then commented on it, carefully discussing verse after verse. Method and form of the fragment are close to Herakleon's 'hypomnemata' on the Gospel of John. Our piece, however, probably formed no part of these 'hypomnemata'—Herakleon being the first known Christian exegete who commented both on the Gospel of Luke (taking into account the Synoptic parallels) and the Gospel of John.

Marcion and his Critics

2019 ◽  
pp. 365-382
Author(s):  
H. Clifton Ward
Keyword(s):  
Biblical Interpretation ◽  
Second Century ◽  
Contemporary Philosophy ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
Jewish Scriptures ◽  
Editorial Work ◽  
The Church ◽  
Critical Methods ◽  
Philosophical Understanding

Marcion of Sinope was active in Rome in the middle of the second century ce. Marcion’s views on Scripture and hermeneutics led to a separation from the Church in Rome and the creation of a concurrent Marcionite community. This chapter examines Marcion’s legacy within subsequent early Christian biblical interpretation, seen most clearly in his role as an early practitioner of philological reading techniques to interpret Scripture. This chapter considers Marcion’s conception of the diversity of two gods—the Creator and the unknown God—in light of contemporary philosophy, and it suggests that Marcion’s literary-critical methods were deployed to confirm this philosophical understanding of deity. After an analysis of Marcion’s philology, seen in both his hermeneutical stance towards the Jewish Scriptures and his editorial work on the New Testament, this chapter concludes by arguing that writers like Tertullian and Epiphanius rejected Marcion’s philosophical conclusions while coming to terms with the validity of the methods of philology for biblical interpretation.

scholarly journals The Creation of the Devil and the End of the White Man’s Rule: The Theological Influence of the Nation of Islam on Early Black Theology

Religions ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (6) ◽  
pp. 305
Author(s):  
Marjorie Corbman
Keyword(s):  
White Supremacy ◽  
Biblical Interpretation ◽  
Black Theology ◽  
Political Movements ◽  
Nation Of Islam ◽  
Christian Identity ◽  
Black Power Movement ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
Complete Identification ◽  
The Devil

This article examines the emergence of the Black Theology movement in the late 1960s and early 1970s in the context of the religiously diverse milieu of Black political movements during the same period. In particular, the theology of the Nation of Islam was widely understood by contemporary commentators as a major source of the confrontational rhetoric and tactics of the Black Power movement. Drawing upon the writings of the radical Black nationalist minister Albert B. Cleage, Jr., this article examines the importance of what Cleage termed the Nation of Islam’s “Black cultural mythology” in providing the possibility of a break in identification with white Christianity. In particular, it traces the influence of the Nation of Islam’s proclamation of God’s imminent apocalyptic destruction of white America on the theology of James H. Cone and Cleage. In doing so, this article argues for the importance of examining questions of racial and religious difference in American history alongside one another. It was precisely through creative appropriation of a non-Christian framework of biblical interpretation, rooted in faith in God’s complete identification with Black humanity and the consequent imminent judgment of white America, that early (Christian) Black Theologians were able to retain their Christian identity and sever its entanglement with white supremacy.

The Oxford Handbook of Early Christian Biblical Interpretation

2019 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Biblical Interpretation ◽  
Church History ◽  
Critical Study ◽  
Christian Identity ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
The Bible ◽  
God's Word ◽  
Sacred Scripture ◽  
The Church

The Bible was the lifeblood of virtually every aspect of the life of the early churches. The essays in this Handbook explore a wide array of themes related to the reception, canonization, interpretation, uses, and legacies of the Bible in early Christianity. A first group of studies examines the material text transmitted, translated, and invested with authority, and the very conceptualization of sacred Scripture as God’s word for the Church. A second group looks at the culture and disciplines or science of interpretation in representative exegetical traditions. A third group of essays addresses the remarkably diverse literary and non-literary modes of interpretation, while a fourth group canvasses the communal background and foreground of early Christian interpretation, where the Bible was paramount in shaping normative Christian identity. A fifth group assesses the determinative role of the Bible in major developments and theological controversies in the life of the churches. A sixth group returns to interpretation proper and samples how certain abiding motifs from within scriptural revelation were treated by major Christian expositors. A seventh and final group of studies follows up by examining how early Christian exegesis was retrieved and critically evaluated in later periods of church history. Along the way, readers will be oriented to the major resources for, and issues in, the critical study of early Christian biblical interpretation.

Sexual Defilement in Early Christian Texts

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Moshe Blidstein
Keyword(s):  
Hebrew Bible ◽  
Second Temple ◽  
Second Century ◽  
Sexual Ethics ◽  
Christian Community ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
Greco Roman ◽  
The Family ◽  
Main Target ◽  
Christian Society

Chapter 7 demonstrates that sexual sin became the main target for purity discourse in early Christian texts, and attempts to explain why. Christian imagery of sexual defilement drew from a number of traditions—Greco-Roman sexual ethics, imagery of sexual sin from the Hebrew Bible and Second Temple texts, and both Jewish and pagan purity laws, all seen through the lens of Paul’s imagery of sexuality and sexual sin. Two broad currents characterized Christian sexual ethics in the second century: one upheld marriage and the family as the basis for a holy Christian society and church, while the second rejected all sexuality, including in marriage. Writers of both currents made heavy use of defilement imagery. For the first, sexual sin was a dangerous defilement, contaminating the Christian community and severing it from God. For the second, more radical current, sexuality itself was the defilement; virginity or continence alone were pure.

Purity, Community, and Ritual in Early Christian Literature

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Moshe Blidstein
Keyword(s):  
Third Century ◽  
Close Reading ◽  
Christian Identity ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
Greco Roman ◽  
Christian Culture ◽  
Christian Literature ◽  
Christian Practices ◽  
Dietary Laws ◽  
New Religion

This book examines the meanings of purification practices and purity concepts in early Christian culture, as articulated and formed by Greek Christian authors of the first three centuries, from Paul to Origen. Concepts of purity and defilement were pivotal for understanding human nature, sin, history, and ritual in early Christianity. In parallel, major Christian practices, such as baptism, abstinence from food or sexual activity, were all understood, felt, and shaped as instances of purification. Two broad motivations, at some tension with each other, formed the basis of Christian purity discourse. The first was substantive: the creation and maintenance of anthropologies and ritual theories coherent with the theological principles of the new religion. The second was polemic: construction of Christian identity by laying claim to true purity while marking purity practices and beliefs of others (Jews, pagans, or “heretics”) as false. The book traces the interplay of these factors through a close reading of second- and third-century Christian Greek authors discussing dietary laws, death defilement, sexuality, and baptism, on the background of Greco-Roman and Jewish purity discourses. There are three central arguments. First, purity and defilement were central concepts for understanding Christian cultures of the second and third centuries. Second, Christianities developed their own conceptions and practices of purity and purification, distinct from those of contemporary and earlier Jewish and pagan cultures, though decisively influenced by them. Third, concepts and practices of purity and defilement were shifting and contentious, an arena for boundary-marking between Christians and others and between different Christian groups.

Connecting Gospels

2018 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Second Century ◽  
Common Belief ◽  
Field Of Study ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
Single Field ◽  
Vantage Points ◽  
Canonical Texts ◽  
Normative Status ◽  
Two Bodies ◽  
Shed Light

By the late second century, early Christian gospels had been divided into two groups by a canonical boundary that assigned normative status to four of them while consigning their competitors to the margins. The project of this volume is to find ways to reconnect these divided texts. The primary aim is not to address the question whether the canonical/non-canonical distinction reflects substantive and objectively verifiable differences between the two bodies of texts—although that issue may arise at various points. Starting from the assumption that, in spite of their differences, all early gospels express a common belief in the absolute significance of Jesus and his earthly career, the intention is to make their interconnectedness fruitful for interpretation. The approach taken is thematic and comparative: a selected theme or topic is traced across two or more gospels on either side of the canonical boundary, and the resulting convergences and divergences shed light not least on the canonical texts themselves as they are read from new and unfamiliar vantage points. The outcome is to demonstrate that early gospel literature can be regarded as a single field of study, in contrast to the overwhelming predominance of the canonical four characteristic of traditional gospels scholarship.

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