The Apostolic Tradition: A Commentary

 

Paul F. Bradshaw, Maxwell E. Johnson, L. Edward Phillips, Harold W. Attridge

Fortress Press, 2002 - 249 pages

 

"The anonymous early church order that became known as the Apostolic Tradition and conventionally attributed to Hippolytus of Rome has generated enormous scholarly discussion since its discovery in the nineteenth century. Surprisingly, however, there has never before been a comprehensive commentary on it such as there is for other patristic works. We have here attempted to remedy this defect, and at the same time we have offered the first full synoptic presentation in English of the various witnesses to its text. We have also taken the opportunity to develop our argument that it is neither the work of Hippolytus nor of any other individual. Instead, we believe that it is a composite document made up of a number of layers and strands of diverse provenance and compiled over a period of time, and therefore not representing the practice of any one Christian community."? from the Preface This Hermeneia volume provides an important contribution to New Testament research as well as the study of the patristic era.

 

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Christians at Rome in the First Two Centuries: From Paul to Valentinus

Peter Lampe

Continuum International Publishing Group, 2006-06-30 - 528 pages

 Investigating the rise and shape of the earliest churches in Rome, Lampe integrates history, archaeology, theology, and social analysis. He also takes a close look at inscriptional evidence to complement the reading of the great literary texts: from Paul's letter to the Romans to the writings of Clement of Rome, Justin Martyr, Montanus, and Valentinus. Lampe deals with the shape of leadership and the followers of Christ in relation to the Judeans living in Rome.

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Church and Cosmos in Early Ottonian Germany: The View from Cologne

Henry Mayr-Harting

Oxford University Press, 2007 - 308 pages

 

Integrating the brilliant biography of Bruno, Archbishop of Cologne (953-65) and brother of Emperor Otto I, by the otherwise obscure monk Ruotger, with the intellectual culture of Cologne Cathedral, this is a study of actual politics in conjunction with Ottonian ruler ethic. Our knowledge of Cologne intellectual activity in the period, apart from Ruotger, must be pieced together mainly from marginal annotations and glosses in surviving Cologne manuscripts, showing how and with what concerns some of the most important books of the Latin West were read in Bruno's and Ruotger's Cologne. These include Pope Gregory the Great's Letters, Prudentius's Psychomachia, Boethius's Arithmetic, and Martianus Capella's Marriage of Philology and Mercury. The writing in the margins of the manuscripts, besides enlarging our picture of thinking in Cologne in itself, can be drawn into comparison with the outlook of Ruotger.

Exploring how distinctive Cologne was, compared with other centres, Henry Mayr-Harting brings out an unexpectedly strong thread of Platonism in the tenth-century intellect. The book includes a critical edition of probably the earliest surviving, and hitherto unpublished, set of glosses to Boethius's Arithmetic, with an extensive study of their content.

 

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Martin Luther, Roman Catholic Prophet

 

Gregory Sobolewski

Marquette University Press, 2001 - 187 pages

 

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Contested Christianity: The Political and Social Contexts of Victorian Theology

Timothy Larsen

Baylor University Press, 2004-03-01 - 234 pages

This volume explores the cultural, political, and intellectual forces that helped define nineteenth-century British Christianity. Larsen challenges many of the standard assumptions about Victorian-era Christians in their attempts to embody and their theological commitments. He highlights the way in which Dissenters and other free church Evangelicals employed the full range of theological resources available to them to take stands that the wider culture was still resisting--e.g., evangelical nonconformists enfranchising women, siding with the black population of Jamaica in opposition to their own colonial governor, championing the rights of Jews, Roman Catholics, and atheists. These stances belie the stereotypes of Victorian Evangelicals currently in existence and properly shift the focus to Dissent, to plebeian culture, to social contexts, and to the cultural and political consequences of theological commitments. This study brings freshness and verve to the study of religion and the Victorians, bearing fruit in a range of significant findings and connections.

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Martin Luther: Confessor of the Faith

 

Robert Kolb

Oxford University Press, 2009-03-15 - 215 pages

Martin Luther's thought continues to challenge people throughout the world in the twenty-first century. His paradigmatic shift in defining God and what it means to be human left behind a foundation for viewing human creatures that was anchored in Aristotle's anthropology. Luther defined the Revealed God in terms of his mercy and love for human beings, based not on their merit and performance but rather on his unconditioned grace. He placed 'fearing, loving, and trusting God above all else' at the heart of his definition of being human.

This volume places the development and exposition of these key presuppositions in Luther's thinking within the historical context of late medieval theology and piety as well as the unfolding dynamics of political and social change at the dawn of the modern era. Special attention is given the development of a 'Wittenberg way' of practicing theology under Luther's leadership. It left behind a dependence on allegorical methods of biblical interpretation for a 'literal-prophetic' approach to Scripture. More importantly, it placed the distinction between the 'gospel' as God's unmerited gift of identity as his children and the 'law', the expression of God's expectations for the performance of his children in good works, at the heart of all interpretation of the Bible. This presuppositional framework for practicing theology reflects Luther's personal experience and his deep commitment to pastoral care of common Christians as well as his reading of the biblical text. It is supported by his distinction of two kinds of human righteousness (passive in God's sight, active in relationship to others), his distinction of two realms or dimensions of human life, and his theology of the cross. The volume unfolds Luther's maturing thought on the basis of this method.

 

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Newman and the Alexandrian Fathers: Shaping Doctine in Nineteenth-Century England

 

Benjamin John King

Oxford University Press, 2009-07-15 - 289 pages

 

John Henry (later Cardinal) Newman is widely known to have been devoted to reading the Church Fathers. By exploring which Fathers interested Newman most and when, using both published and archive material, Benjamin J. King demonstrates the influence of the various Alexandrian theologians indifferent periods of Newman's life. In each of these periods, King draws a causal connection between the patristic theology Newman was reading and his own developing theology; revealing how key events in these periods changed the theologian's interpretation of the Fathers. King argues that ultimately Newman tailored his reading of the Church Fathers to fit his own needs. Seemingly 'trying on' the ideas of different Fathers in turn, Newman began with those who predated the Council of Nicaea in the late 1820s, moving on to the post-Nicenes during his research intoChristological controversies in the mid-1830s, and finding Athanasius the best fit in the 1840s. By the 1870s, the Athanasius he tried on was tailored to Catholic tastes and, measuring Origen up with the interpretations made by Aquinas and Suarez, Newman found him a better fit than he had in the1840s. A careful comparison of Newman's translations of Athanasius from 1842-44 and 1881, not previously undertaken, demonstrates that in 1881 it is not so much Aquinas as the neo-Thomism of the teachers of Leo XIII whom he read back into Athanasius.

 

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Seeing and Being Seen in the Later Medieval World: Optics, Theology, and Religious Life

 

Dallas George Denery

Cambridge University Press, 2005 - 202 pages

 

During the later Middle Ages people became increasingly obsessed with vision, visual analogies and the possibility of visual error. In this book Dallas Denery addresses the question of what medieval men and women thought it meant to see themselves and others in relation to the world and to God. Exploring the writings of Roger Bacon, Duns Scotus, Peter Aureol and Nicholas of Autrecourt in light of an assortment of popular religious guides for preachers, confessors and penitents, including Peter of Limoges' Treatise on the Moral Eye, he illustrates how the question preoccupied medieval men and women on both an intellectual and practical level. This book offers a unique interdisciplinary examination of the interplay between religious life, perspectivist optics and theology. Denery presents significant new insights into the medieval psyche and conception of the self, ensuring that this book will appeal to historians of medieval science and those of medieval religious life and theology.

 

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Gregory of Nyssa: The Minor Treatises on Trinitarian Theology and Apollinarism

 

Volker Henning Drecoll, Margitta Berghaus

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At the Origins of Christian Worship: The Context and Character of Earliest Christian Devotion

 

Larry W. Hurtado

W.B. Eerdmans Pub. Co., 1999 - 138 pages

 

This volume makes a valuable contribution to the debate about the origins and development of Christianity. Larry Hurtado argues that understanding the nature of Christianity in the first century requires taking full account of the first Christians' devotional practices because worship was the context in which christological titles and other expressions of faith were given their specific meaning-a fact that has largely been ignored. Hurtado focuses on two distinguishing characteristics of earliest Christian worship: its exclusivity (rejecting the worship of other deities) and its "binitarian" shape (the veneration of Christ alongside God the Father). Setting early Christianity within the religious environment of the Roman era, Hurtado describes the features of Christianity that attracted followers and led them to renounce other religions. He then turns his attention to a more detailed discussion of the place of Christ in the monotheistic worship of the earliest Christians, showing that Christ figured in their public and corporate devotional life at a surprisingly early stage. The book concludes with some reflections for Christian worship today based on the historical features of early Christian devotional practices. Clear, illuminating, and relevant to the modern church, this volume will be of interest to scholars, pastors, students, and general readers seeking insight into the origins of Christian faith and practice.

 

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Nazarene Jewish Christianity: From the End of the New Testament Period Until Its Disappearance in the Fourth century

 

Ray Pritz

Brill Archive, 1988 - 153 pages

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Judaism and Christianity in the Age of Constantine: History, Messiah, Israel, and the Initial Confrontation

Jacob Neusner

University of Chicago Press, 2008-04-15 - 262 pages

With the conversion of Constantine in AD 312, Christianity began a period of political and cultural dominance that it would enjoy until the twentieth century. Jacob Neusner contradicts the prevailing view that following Christianity's ascendancy, Judaism continued to evolve in isolation. He argues that because of the political need to defend its claims to religious authenticity, Judaism was forced to review itself in the context of a triumphant Christianity. The definition of issues long discussed in Judaism—the meaning of history, the coming of the Messiah, and the political identity of Israel—became of immediate and urgent concern to both parties. What emerged was a polemical dialogue between Christian and Jewish teachers that was unprecedented.

In a close analysis of texts by the Christian theologians Eusebius, Aphrahat, and Chrysostom, and of central Jewish works such as the Talmud of the Land of Israel, the Genesis Rabbah, and the Leviticus Rabbah, Neusner finds that both religious groups turned to the same corpus of Hebrew scripture to examine the same fundamental issues. Eusebius and Genesis Rabbah both address the issue of history, Chrysostom and the Talmud the issue of the Messiah, and Aphrahat and Leviticus Rabbah the issue of Israel. As Neusner demonstrates, the conclusions drawn shaped the dialogue between the two religions for the rest of their shared history in the West.

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Early Egyptian Christianity: From its Origins to 451 CE

 

C. Wilfred Griggs

BRILL, 2000 - 276 pages

In this study, the history of Christianity in Egypt is discussed, from its earliest recorded origins until 451 CE, when the Egyptian Coptic Church became the national religion.
During this period, we observe the development of features unique to Egyptian Christianity, such as the imposition of Catholic ecclesiasticism in Alexandria and southward, and the presence of forces that would lead to the establishment of a national religion. This study will greatly contribute to an increased understanding of early Egyptian history, as well as to the understanding of early Christianity in general.

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Christianity in the Second Century: The Case of Tatian

Emily Jane Hunt

Psychology Press, 2003-07-18 - 240 pages

Tatian is a significant figure in the early Church, his work both representing and revealing his second century context. This study offers a detailed exploration of his thought. It is also a valuable introduction to the entire period, particularly the key developments it witnessed in Christianity. Emily Hunt examines a wide range of topics in depth: Tatian's relationship with Justin Martyr and his Oration to the Greeks; the Apologetic attempt to defend and define Christianity against the Graeco-Roman world, and Christian use of hellenistic philosophy. Tatian was accused of heresy after his death, and this work sees him at the heart of the orthodox/ heterodox debate. His links with the East, and his Gospel harmony the Diatessaron, lead to an exploration of Syriac Christianity and asceticism. In the process, scholarly assumptions about heresiology and the Apologists' relationship with hellenistic philosophy are questioned, and the development of a Christian philosophical tradition is traced from Philo,through Justin Martyr, to Tatian - and then within several key Syriac writers. This is the first dedicated study of Tatian for more than 40 years.

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Early Christian Ireland

T. M. Charles-Edwards

Cambridge University Press, 2000-11-30 - 707 pages

This is the first fully-documented history of Ireland and the Irish between the fourth and ninth centuries AD, from Saint Patrick to the Vikings - the earliest period for which historical records are available. It opens with the Irish raids and settlements in Britain, and the conversion of Ireland to Christianity. It ends as Viking attacks on Ireland accelerated in the second quarter of the ninth century. The book takes account of the Irish both at home and abroad, including the Irish in northern Britain, in England, and on the continent. Two principal thematic strands are the connection between the early Irish church and its neighbours, and the rise of Uí Néill and the kingship of Tara. The author, Thomas Charles-Edwards, is Professor of Celtic in the University of Oxford. His previous books include Bechbretha (1983, with Fergus Kelly), The Welsh Laws (1989) and Early Irish and Welsh Kinship (1993).

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Ambrosiaster's Political Theology

Sophie Lunn-Rockliffe

Oxford University Press, 2007-11-24 - 211 pages

The works of Ambrosiaster, a Christian writing in Rome in the late fourth century, were influential on his near contemporaries and throughout the Middle Ages. In the first half of her study, Sophie Lunn-Rockliffe addresses the problem of the author's mysterious identity (which scholars have puzzled over for centuries) and places him in a broad historical and intellectual context. In the second half she addresses Ambrosiaster's political theology, an idea which has been explored in other late Roman Christian writers but which has never been addressed in his works. She looks at how Ambrosiaster's attitudes to social and political order were formed on the basis of theological concepts and the interpretation of scripture, and shows that he espoused a rigid hierarchical and monarchical organization in the church, society, and the Roman empire. He also traced close connections between the Devil, characterized as a rebel against God, and the earthly tyrants and usurpers who followed his example.

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Early Christian Doctrines

 

J. N. D. Kelly

Continuum International Publishing Group, 2000-11-20 - 528 pages

A history of doctrines of the Early Church, written and arranged with exceptional clarity by a leading patristic scholar. Canon Kelly describes the development of the principal Christian doctrines from the close of the first century to the middle of the fifth, and from the end of the apostolic age to the council of Chalcedon.

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Gregory of Nazianzus

 

Brian Daley, S.J.

Routledge, 2006-04-19 - 273 pages

 

Gregory of Nazianzus, a complex and colorful figure living during a crucial age in which it was permissible for the first time to be a public Christian intellectual (4th Century AD), was well placed to become one of the outstanding defenders and formulators of Trinitarian orthodoxy.
A gifted and skilled rhetorician, poet, and orator, as well as a profound theologian, Gregory was ordained a bishop and served as head of the orthodox Christian community in Constantinople, where he played an important role in formulating the classical doctrines of the Trinity and the person of Christ. Under fire from opponents in the Church, the enigmatic Gregory soon retreated into a quiet life of study and simple asceticism, concentrating on quiet meditation and strengthening his canon of literature. Gregory's body of works, comprising poetry, letters, sermons and lectures on religious themes and written with the terseness and elegance of classical Greek literature, was canonized in the Byzantine age as equal to the greatest Greek writers before him.
A collection of new translations of a selection of these achievements in literature and theology, with an extensive introduction to Gregory's life, thought, and writings, Gregory Nazianzus portrays a vivid picture of a fascinating character of vital importance; who deserves to be regarded as the first true Christian humanist.

 

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Jerome

 

Stefan Rebenich

Routledge, 2002 - 211 pages

 

Jerome (AD 347-420) brought the traditions of classical rhetoric and Christian exegesis more closely together than any other early Christian writer, many of whom saw classical culture as an enemy to be rejected. As a scholar and commentator on the Bible and an indefatigable translator from Hebrew, Jerome was a major intellectual force in the early church. His novelistic lives of the saints encapsulated Christian aspirations in an attractive literary form. As an ascetic and (often irascible) mentor to many young Christian men and women, he shaped the ideals of Christian chastity and poverty for generations to come. This book assembles a representative selection of his voluminous output, and will help readers to a balanced portrait of a complex and brilliant, but not always likeable man.

 

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Maximus the Confessor

 

Andrew Louth

Routledge, 1996 - 230 pages

St. Maximus the Confessor, the greatest of the Byzantine theologians, lived through the most catastrophic period the Byzantine Empire was to experience before the Crusades. This book introduces the reader to the times and upheavals during which Maximus lived. It discusses his cosmic vision of humanity and the role of the church. The study makes available a large number of Maximus' theological treatises, many of them translated for the first time, which are accompanied by lucid and informed introductions. Maximus the Confessor provides a much needed introduction to the theology of Maximus, as well as direct access to his profound but often difficult thought.

 

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