Zeitschrift für Antikes Christentum / Journal of Ancient Christianity

Published by De Gruyter

Volume 20 Issue 1

Issue of Zeitschrift für Antikes Christentum / Journal of Ancient Christianity

Contents
Journal Overview

Publicly Available January 16, 2016

Titelei

Page range: I-IV

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January 16, 2016

Artikel

January 16, 2016

The Genre Apocalypse Reconsidered

John J. Collins

Page range: 21-40

Abstract

The analysis of the genre apocalypse published in Semeia 14 (1979) relied on a classificatory approach, which identified core features of the genre, listed features that were typical but not necessary, and distinguished different types of apocalypses. The main difficulty encountered by such an approach is that genres have fuzzy edges. Some works that fit the definition are atypical of the genre, while some that do not have much in common with it. The emergence of prototype theory as a method of analysis is helpful in this regard, and allows for a less rigid kind of classification, without lapsing into the indeterminacy of family resemblances. Genres are recognized on the basis of a few clear exemplars. Other works may resemble them to a greater or lesser extent.

January 16, 2016

3 Baruch Revisited: Jewish or Christian Composition, and Why It Matters

Martha Himmelfarb

Page range: 41-62

Abstract

In his important 1976 paper, “The Pseudepigrapha in Christianity,” Robert A. Kraft insists that scholars of ancient Judaism and Christianity need to take full account of the Christian contexts in which so-called Old Testament pseudpigrapha have come down to us before attempting to make the case that a text preserved only in late manuscripts in languages used primarily or exclusively by Christians reflects a Jewish original of the Second Temple period. The end result, Kraft admitted, is likely to be a smaller library of Jewish works from the turn of the era. This paper discusses 3 Baruch, an apocalypse that most scholars have treated as originally Jewish despite, in addition to its preservation by Christians, certain features quite unusual in Jewish works, as a test case. It argues that recent scholarship has failed to give adequate weight to Kraft’s crucial insights and suggests that scholarly accounts of diaspora Judaism in the Second Temple period would look rather different if those insights were taken more seriously. Finally it offers some tentative suggestions about a Christian setting in which 3 Baruch might have been composed.

January 16, 2016

Why did Early Believers in Jesus Write Apocalypses?

Enrico Norelli

Page range: 63-83

Abstract

There were different messianic expectations in Judaism at the time of Jesus and his disciples, but in all of them, to the best of our knowledge, the presence of the Messiah marked the end of the action of evil powers in the world. Such a statement represents what Umberto Eco called a semiotic judgement in a semiotic system. However, the fact that the first believers in Jesus were still exposed to a distress they understood as being caused by evil powers obliged them to formulate a factual judgement, predicating of a given content “semantic markers that have never been attributed to it by a previous code.”1 As the code provided the ground for stating that Jesus was the Messiah, it could not simply be dismissed, but had to be restructured through the integration of the factual judgement as a new semiotic judgement. Taking up and transforming the genre “apocalypse” allowed early believers in Jesus to effect that transformation, because it required a competent authority to establish a rule corresponding to the factual statement. In a Christian apocalypse, God or a heavenly Being authorized by God accomplishes such a performance, explaining that the distress of believers between Christ’s Resurrection and his Parousia fits a system built on the idea of God’s plan of salvation for humans. John’s Revelation discloses Christ’s heavenly identity and his power over history, showing that his suffering and death was a necessary step for his glorification and that the same path has to be trodden by his followers. The last part of the contribution illustrates two examples of the transformation of traditional apocalyptic motifs so that they may function in the system restructured through the central role attributed to Jesus.

January 16, 2016

The Concealment and Disclosure of Knowledge in the Old Irish In Tenga Bithnua

John Carey

Page range: 84-91

Abstract

This brief contribution considers some of the ways in which the theme of knowledge is treated in the Old Irish apocalyptic text In Tenga Bithnua. These include: the cyclical nature of the mysteries which baffle mankind and of the realities that are disclosed; the idea that the revelation is made in an angelic language (specimens of which are cited) and the treatment of this celestial speech in the manuscript; the claim that what the text reveals goes beyond what God communicated to Moses; and the evocation of further mysteries that are entirely beyond human (in one case, even angelic) capacities of cognition.

January 16, 2016

Death and Judgment in the Apocalypse of Paul: Old Imagery and Monastic Reinvention

Emiliano Fiori

Page range: 92-108

Abstract

This paper focuses on the post-mortem judgment scene of the Apocalypse of Paul and explores how, while preserving the traditional judicial imagery of earlier apocalyptic texts, it profoundly reinvented its meaning. Nightmare visions of God’s tribunal were quite common in 4th-century Christianity, and were often placed at the starting or turning point of important ascetic careers, such as those of Jerome and Evagrius of Pontus. The embedding of God’s dreadful judgment in ascetic discipline, however, is most apparent in the Pachomian corpus. Here its features are similar to those in the Apocalypse of Paul, a work which stems, like the Pachomian literature, from late 4th-century Egypt. This helps interpret the tribunal setting of this apocalypse as a new monastic staging of old images, and provides further evidence to support the hypothesis of the origin of the Apocalypse of Paul within the Pachomian koinonia.

January 16, 2016

Talking Skulls: On Some Personal Accounts of Hell and Their Place in Apocalyptic Literature

Emmanouela Grypeou

Page range: 109-126

Abstract

Established definitions of apocalypticism and apocalyptic literature in Late Antiquity often disregard a variety of apocalyptic visions and ideas that are included in a variety of genres of the Christian literature of Late Antiquity. The present paper discusses personal afterlife accounts and more specifically, personal hell visions, as found in various Christian texts and sources, such as monastic and hagiographical or martyrological literature. These visions and their special features are analysed in the context of related apocalyptic literature and traditions, as well as in their relationship with pagan local traditions and necromantic rituals. As will be argued, personal accounts of afterlife present a specific literary phenomenon in the history of ancient Christian apocalyptic literature and tradition, but they also demonstrate a significant diachronic popularity in other religious communities and their literatures.

January 16, 2016

Edfu and the Oriens: On Re-discovering Ancient Egyptian Lore in Two Coptic Apocalypses

Daniele Tripaldi

Page range: 127-146

Abstract

The article attempts to examine anew two classical cases of alleged continuity of ancient Egyptian traditions into Coptic Late Antique and its literature. Formal correspondences are sought, possible channels of transmission are surveyed and discussed, the explanatory potential of the identified survivals is ascertained. A few concluding remarks on detecting and reconstructing transfers of knowledge in and through literary texts are finally added.

January 16, 2016

Audi, Thomas, . . . Audi a me signa quae futura sunt in fine huius saeculi – Zum Textbestand und zur Überlieferung der apokryphen Thomas-Apokalypse

Matthias Geigenfeind

Page range: 147-181

Abstract

The Revelation of Thomas (ApkTh) is certainly rather an unknown apocryphal apocalypse. Its existence has long been known only by its reference in the Decretum Gelasianum. Today the revelation’s text is testified not only by medieval English homilies but also interestingly by three various text forms all having been written in Latin and most of them discovered by scholars in different monastery libraries at the beginning of the 20th century. The so-called „short form“ of the apocalypse, which is - because of the dating of the oldest of the relevant manuscripts - considered to be the earliest witness created in the fifth century, consists of an address by Christ to Thomas, where he announces that famine, wars, and pestilences will appear when the End of Times approaches. After that, a list of the single events taking place on the last and final days follows. This distribution of the de-creation of the world on seven days before Christ’s arrival on the eighth - events which are moreover all testified in the second transmitted „abbreviated form“ of the ApkTh variant containing only the list predicting the End - hereby is what makes the Revelation of Thomas so fascinating and simultaneously unique among all the other apocalypses known so far. In the third variant of testification, which for its part can be named the „long recension,“ the relevant medieval manuscripts of the ApkTh additionally deal with the calamities striking the humans on earth and preceding Christ’s parusia. This prophetic introduction of the Revelation of Thomas contains insinuations to historical events having taken place in the fifth century C. E. Among those observable references the allusion to Arcadius and Honorius, the two sons of the Roman Emperor Theodosius I, is quite unambiguous, while other scourges described in the text cannot be assigned to actual occurrences without doubt. In any case the setting seems to be the Western part of the Roman Empire, although the Eastern part can’t be totally excluded.

Rezensionen

January 16, 2016

Vasilije Vranic: The Constancy and Development in the Christology of Theodoret of Cyrrhus

Richard J. Perhai

Page range: 182-186

January 16, 2016

Konrad F. Zawadzki: Der Kommentar Cyrills von Alexandrien zum 1. Korintherbrief. Einleitung, kritischer Text, Übersetzung, Einzelanalyse

Christoph Riedweg

Page range: 187-192

January 16, 2016

Nestor Kavvadas: Isaak von Ninive und seine Kephalaia Gnostika. Die Pneumatologie und ihr Kontext

Matthias Binder

Page range: 193-196

January 16, 2016

Sigrid Schottenius Cullhed: Proba the Prophet. The Christian Virgilian Cento of Faltonia Betitia Proba

Gottfried Kreuz

Page range: 197-202

January 16, 2016

Helga Köhler, Hg.: C. Sollius Apollinaris Sidonius. Die Briefe. Eingeleitet, übersetzt und erläutert von Helga Köhler

Danuta Shanzer

Page range: 203-210

About this journal

The Journal of Ancient Christianity aims to publish original, international research from various disciplines of ancient Christianity and to bring these research topics into dialogue. Essays are welcome from patristics or patrology, history of antiquity and late antiquity, classical philology, (late) ancient history of philosophy, and archaeology, as are contributions on epigraphy, papyrology, manuscript studies, edition techniques, ancient legal history, etc. The journal also considers sources from the Christian Orient (Syriac, Coptic, Ethiopian, etc.) and offers space for short critical editions.

The journal is not restricted to a particular program in terms of content or methodology, but instead is open to new research initiatives. Thus, the journal does not impose a particular concept of "antiquity" or "late antiquity," although it does concentrate on the period from the 2nd to the 8th century. The focus is on ancient and late antique Christianity in its entire breadth, i.e., with its various religious practices, theories, concepts, and group formations, inasmuch as these represent integral aspects of (late) antique culture.

The journal is open to all those interested in ancient and late antique Christianity, regardless of origin, religion, denomination, language, gender, or status. It is committed to making source texts accessible in their original languages and therefore requires precise information on the critical editions used for all citations. A separate section with in-depth reviews is devoted to critical discussion of current research findings. Once a year, a thematic issue offers guest editors the opportunity to publish the results of smaller conferences or workshops.

The length of the individual essay should not exceed 60,000 characters (including spaces). Articles may be written in English, German, French, or Italian and should include an English abstract. The journal accepts articles for publication based on a peer review process and maintains high editorial standards.

Volume 20 Issue 1

Issue of Zeitschrift für Antikes Christentum / Journal of Ancient Christianity

Titelei

Editorial/Einleitung

The Genre Apocalypse Reconsidered

Abstract

3 Baruch Revisited: Jewish or Christian Composition, and Why It Matters

Abstract

Why did Early Believers in Jesus Write Apocalypses?

Abstract

The Concealment and Disclosure of Knowledge in the Old Irish In Tenga Bithnua

Abstract

Death and Judgment in the Apocalypse of Paul: Old Imagery and Monastic Reinvention

Abstract

Talking Skulls: On Some Personal Accounts of Hell and Their Place in Apocalyptic Literature

Abstract

Edfu and the Oriens: On Re-discovering Ancient Egyptian Lore in Two Coptic Apocalypses

Abstract

Audi, Thomas, . . . Audi a me signa quae futura sunt in fine huius saeculi – Zum Textbestand und zur Überlieferung der apokryphen Thomas-Apokalypse

Abstract

Vasilije Vranic: The Constancy and Development in the Christology of Theodoret of Cyrrhus

Konrad F. Zawadzki: Der Kommentar Cyrills von Alexandrien zum 1. Korintherbrief. Einleitung, kritischer Text, Übersetzung, Einzelanalyse

Nestor Kavvadas: Isaak von Ninive und seine Kephalaia Gnostika. Die Pneumatologie und ihr Kontext

Sigrid Schottenius Cullhed: Proba the Prophet. The Christian Virgilian Cento of Faltonia Betitia Proba

Helga Köhler, Hg.: C. Sollius Apollinaris Sidonius. Die Briefe. Eingeleitet, übersetzt und erläutert von Helga Köhler