2nd Edition

The Early Christian World

Edited By Philip Esler Copyright 2017
    1280 Pages
    by Routledge

    1280 Pages
    by Routledge

    Since its publication in 2000, The Early Christian World has come to be regarded by scholars, students and the general reader as one of the most informative and accessible works in English on the origins, development, character and major figures of early Christianity. In this new edition, the strengths of the first edition are retained. These include the book’s attractive architecture that initially takes a reader through the context and historical development of early Christianity; the essays in critical areas such as community formation, everyday experience, the intellectual and artistic heritage, and external and internal challenges; and the profiles on the most influential early Christian figures. The book also preserves its strong stress on the social reality of early Christianity and continues its distinctive use of hundreds of illustrations and maps to bring that world to life. Yet the years that have passed since the first edition was published have seen great advances made in our understanding of early Christianity in its world. This new edition fully reflects these developments and provides the reader with authoritative, lively and up-to-date access to the early Christian world. A quarter of the text is entirely new and the remaining essays have all been carefully revised and updated by their authors. Some of the new material relates to Christian culture (including book culture, canonical and non-canonical scriptures, saints and hagiography, and translation across cultures). But there are also new essays on: Jewish and Christian interaction in the early centuries; ritual; the New Testament in Roman Britain; Manichaeism; Pachomius the Great and Gregory of Nyssa. This new edition will serve its readers for many years to come.

    Dedication

    List of Illustrations
    Preface

    List of Abbreviations

    I THE CONTEXT

    1. The Mediterranean Context of Early Christianity

    Philip F. Esler

    2. Emperors, Armies and Bureaucrats 68-430 CE

    Jill Harries

    3. Greek and Roman Philosophy and Religion

    Luther Martin

    4.Jewish Tradition and Culture

    James Aitken

    II CHRISTIAN ORIGINS AND DEVELOPMENT

    5. Jesus in His World

    Douglas Oakman

    6.Early Jewish Christianity

    Edwin Broadhead

    7.Paul and the Development of Gentile Christianity

    Todd Klutz

    8.The Jesus Tradition: The Gospel Writers’ Strategies of Persuasion

    Richard Rohrbaugh

    9.The Second and Third Centuries

    Jeffrey S. Siker

    10.From Constantine to Theodosius and Beyond

    Bill Leadbetter

    11.Jewish and Christian Interaction from the First to the Fifth

    Centuries

    Anders Runesson

    III COMMUNITY FORMATION AND MAINTENANCE

    12.Mission and Expansion

    Thomas Finn

    13.The Development of Office in the Early Church

    Mark Edwards

    14.Christian Regional Diversity

    David Taylor

    15.Monasticism

    Columba Stewart OSB

    IV EVERYDAY CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE

    16.Reading the New Testament in Roman Britain

    Richard Cleaves

    17.Sex and Sexual Renunciation I

    Teresa Shaw

    18.Sex and Sexual Renunciation II: Developments in Research since

    2000

    Elizabeth Castelli

    19.Women, Children and House Churches

    Mona LaFosse

    20.Worship, Practice and Belief

    Max Johnson

    21.Ritual and the Rise of the Early Christian Movement

    Risto Uro

    22.Communication and Travel

    Blake Leyerle

    V CHRISTIAN CULTURE

    23.Christian Realia: Books, Papyri and Artefacts

    Giovanni Bazzana

    24.Scriptures in Early Christianity

    Outi Lehtipuu and Hanne von Weissenberg 

    25.Saints and Hagiography

    Mark Humphries

    26.Translation and Communication across Languages

    Malcolm Choat

    VI THE INTELLECTUAL HERITAGE

    27.The Apostolic Fathers

    Carolyn Osiek

    28.The Apologists

    Anders-Christian Jacobsen

    29.Early Theologians

    Gerald Bray

    30.Later Theologians of the Greek East

    Andrew Louth

    31.Later Theologians of the West

    Ivor Davidson

    32.Creeds, Councils and Doctrinal Development

    Piotr Ashwin-Siejkowski

    33. Biblical Interpretation

    Oskar Skarsaune

    VII THE ARTISTIC HERITAGE

    34.Early Christian Architecture: The First Five Centures

    L. Michael White

    35. Art

    Robin Jensen

    36.Music

    John Arthur Smith

    37.Imaginative Literature

    Richard Bauckham

    VIII EXTERNAL CHALLENGES

    38.Political Oppression and Martyrdom

    Candida R. Moss

    39. Graeco-Roman Philosophical Opposition

    Michael Simmons

    40. Popular Graeco-Roman Responses to Christianity

    Craig de Vos

    IX INTERNAL CHALLENGES

    41. Internal Renewal and Dissent in the Early Christian World

    Sheila McGinn

    42. Gnosticism

    Alistair Logan

    43. Montanism

    Christine Trevett

    44. Donatism

    Jakob Engberg

    45. Arianism

    David Rankin

    46. Manichaeism

    Jason BeDuhn

    X PROFILES

    47. Origen

    Thomas Scheck

    48. Tertullian

    Geoffrey D. Dunn

    49. Perpetua and Felicitas

    Shira L. Lander and Ross S. Kraemer

    50. Constantine

    Bill Leadbetter

    51. Antony the Great

    Columba Stewart OSB

    52. Pachomius the Great

    James E. Goehring

    53. Athanasius

    David Gwynn

    54. John Chrysostom

    Wendy Mayer and Pauline Allen

    55. Gregory of Nyssa

    Elena Ene D-Vasilescu

    56. Jerome

    Dennis Brown

    57. Ambrose

    Ivor Davidson

    58. Augustine

    Carol Harrison

    59. Ephrem the Syrian

    Kathleen McVey

    60. Julian the Apostate

    Biography

    Philip F. Esler is the Portland Chair in New Testament Studies and Director of the International Centre for Biblical Interpretation in the University of Gloucestershire, Cheltenham, UK. His previous positions include Chief Executive of the Arts and Humanities Research Council (2005-2009) and Principal of St Mary’s University College, Twickenham, London (2010-2013). His research focus lies primarily in the social-scientific of biblical and extra-biblical texts and ancient legal papyri, and he also writes on the Bible and the visual arts and on New Testament theology. His latest monograph is Babatha’s Orchard: The Yadin Papyri and An Ancient Jewish Family Tale Retold (2017) and before that he published Sex, Wives and Warriors: Reading the Old Testament With Its Ancient Audience (2011).

    "This new edition is a goldmine of up-to-date information for anyone interested in the development of early Christianity. The contributors represent an international collection of top-flight scholars, and the range of topics covered is expansive; yet the essays are written in an accessible style and could certainly be used in a classroom setting at the undergraduate and graduate levels. Of particular note is the way in which the essays situate Christianity within its broader cultural contexts, rather than treating it as if it developed in a 'holy vacuum'. You will want this book on your shelf as a standard reference work for the study of early Christianity."
    - Professor David Eastman, Ohio Wesleyan University, USA

    "The second edition of this valuable collection will be welcomed even by those who already own the first edition. This thoroughly updated edition preserves the structure and comprehensiveness of the first, as well as its important focus on social history and everyday experience. It also adds both depth and breadth through the inclusion of new topics and current approaches. This volume will be a boon to instructors looking for current and provocative readings to challenge their students, and indeed to anyone interested in early Christianity in its historical, social and cultural contexts."
    - Professor Adele Reinhartz, University of Ottawa, Canada

    "The second edition of the Early Christian World successfully manages a difficult task. It not only updates the existing contributions in the first edition of this highly useful tool for studying early Christianity, it also includes new directions in scholarship. Thus it promises to be an valuable part of the libraries of students, academics, and any reader interested in the first five centuries of Christianity alike."
    - Dr Jutta Leonhardt-Balzer, University of Aberdeen, UK

    "The Early Christian World is and remains an enormously useful reference work. It is highly accessible to specialist and non-specialist readers, with essays written in an accessible style, rich illustrations, indices of biblical, classical, Jewish references and patristic references as well as a subject index. These indices make it somewhat easier to navigate through its almost 1200 pages of text. Each article is followed by an extensive and up-to-date bibliography, encouraging and facilitating further research."
    - Dr Ine Jacobs, University of Oxford, UK, Bryn Mawr Classical Review 2018

    "The analysis demonstrates that by silencing slaves and using a rhetoric of violence, the authors of these texts contributed to the construction of myths in which slaves functioned as a useful trope to support the combined power of religion and empire."
    - A Journal of Bible and Theology

    "This new edition fully reflects these developments and provides the reader with authoritative, lively, and up-to-date access to the early Christian world. A quarter of the text is entirely new and the remaining essays have all been carefully revised and updated by their authors.
    This book gives a detailed view on Early Christianity from many different angles which are indispensable in studying and comprehending the genesis and further developments in Late Antiquity. "
    - Mark Beumer, Kleio-Historia