hom. berlegungen zur Grenzziehung zwischen Platonismus und Christentum, TRu36 [1971] 285302). 2.8; Hom. 3.81 [SC 136, 182.34]). 1.3233; 5.2933). Gen. 1 (=Eusebius, Marc. For further discussion, see Williams, Michael A., Rethinking Gnosticism: An Argument for Dismantling a Dubious Category (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1996)Google Scholar; King, Karen L., What is Gnosticism? That's certainly an example of the way in which Greek literary forms and Greek language impacted Jewish civilization and literary traditions. 4(14); Somn. It was visible in several other cities around Galilee. Jo. 2.9.6 (GK 412, 169.2128/Butterworth, 134). For more on this theme, see Scott, D., Recollection and Experience: Plato's Theory of Learning and Its Successors (Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University Press, 1995)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Historising Religion between Spiritual Continuity and Friendly Takeover. The first (or inner circle) was composed of devout, full-time adherents of the cult for whom the deity retained a separate and decisive identity (e.g., those of Yahweh, Zeus Serapis, and Isis). 17 Henry Chadwick proposes that there was a standard list of questions in philosophical schools about the soul and notes in particular Seneca's list in Ep. For pre-existence in other Jewish texts from this same era, see Bostock, The Sources, 260361; Givens, When Souls Had Wings, 4651. 1 The concept of the Hellenization of Christianity is a subset of the larger issue of the impact of the Greek language and culture on non-Greek lands after the conquests of Alexander the Greatthis earlier phenomenon is often designated Hellenism. For orientation to these concepts (with bibliographies), see Andresen, Carl, Antike und Christentum, TRE 3:5073Google Scholar; Betz, Hans Dieter, Hellenism, ABD 3:12735Google Scholar; Koester, Helmut, History, Culture, and Religion of the Hellenistic Age (Introduction to the New Testament; 2nd ed. John Burnet; vol. And therefore to say that Jesus was in some way God incarnate presents a philosophical conundrum, because it's impossible to conceive of the transcendent as immanent, as embodied in human flesh, the way that Christians were coming to proclaim. Edwards, however, suggests that we read the phrase as from the beginning of his creation, i.e., Christ's soul was only created with his body and that from this beginning it clung to the Word. The great bishop-theologian Cyprian of Carthage was martyred during the next great wave of persecutions (257259), which were aimed at eradicating the leaders of the church. 3:1011 (=Pamphilus, Apol. 2.6.4 [GK 364, 143.2427]). See esp. Later at Princ. Edwards remarks that Origen's representation of their philosophy [i.e., Platonists] is schematic, seldom conscious of its varieties and often anachronistic (Origen's Platonism, 35). While many Hellenistic Christians accepted Christ, it was difficult for some to accept the idea of Jesus as intermediary between God and the people. Io. G. W. Butterworth; Gloucester, Mass. 33) where Origen explains at length what is meant by a heretic, and does so exclusively in terms of the violation of the church's rule of faith. 126 0 obj <> endobj 160. 2.6.37). It's Me, Margaret.". We do not know just what is meant by "the link between the Palestinian and hellenistic development of Judaism." In 64 ce a fire destroyed much of Rome, and, in order to escape blame, the emperor Nero killed a vast multitude of Christians as scapegoats. 3.1.35. Erskine, Andrew; Blackwell Companions to the Ancient World; Oxford: Blackwell, 2003) 26479Google Scholar; Drobner, Hubertus R., Christian Philosophy, in The Oxford Handbook of Early Christian Studies (ed. Ti. 8 Jean Danilou, Gospel Message and Hellenistic Culture (trans. Note also Cels. 4 For more on the Hellenization of Christianity thesis, see esp. Marmodoro, Anna Its membership was drawn from the ethnic group for whom the deity was indigenous, and the group tended to continue to speak the native language. It is usually by concentrating on the diaspora that the Hellenistic character of a cult has been described. de Boor; 2 vols. Other verses that suggest this doctrine include: Eccl 1:910 (Princ. 160). ; History of Theology; Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 1996] 1:170). While every effort has been made to follow citation style rules, there may be some discrepancies. Echolls holds a B.A. And then, subsequent to that, the Roman imperial expansion, which would take that over politically. 163, 165) where Origen appears to exclude the possibility of being labeled a heretic for one's view on the origin of the soul, since the church's rule has not handed down a pronouncement on the matter:But there are also certain other dogmas that are not included in the apostolic traditions. Our editors will review what youve submitted and determine whether to revise the article. On this series of fifteen anathemas, and their relationship to the council, see Price, Acts of Constantinople, 2:270286. 72e77a to argue for the soul's pre-existent state where it contemplated the forms. With few exceptions, each of these religions, originally tied to a specific geographic area and people, had traditions extending back centuries before the Hellenistic period. Christianity and Hellenistic philosophies experienced complex interactions during the first to the fourth centuries. There follows (4) a brief argument against the pre-existence of the soul of Christ (ibid., 9394), an error attributed to the English translation of the phrase ab initio creaturae (Princ. 50 Princ. . This fusion produced Christianity and its sister heresies collectively known as Gnosticism. 73 Edwards's view appears to be that for Origen the soul was created by God and had an existence tethered to some sort of body for only the briefest moment of time before it was united to its earthly body. 47 Indeed, for several centuries after Origen's death, there was vigorous debateand open confusionin Christian circles about how to think about the soul's embodiment. Platonism and Christianity: A Mere Antagonism or a Profound Common Ground. 2.8.48; Jerome, Comm. In particular, Martyr used the Greek concept of internal and external thought to illustrate Jesus Christ's relationship with God, and thus Christ's messiah status. 1.3.81.4.1 which he claims is often said to adumbrate a fall from the incorporeal to the bodily condition (ibid., 92). But what did the early Christians believe about their Lord and Master? I once heard a living politician, speaking on a platform, claim for Christianity, amongst other things, credit for the invention of lyddite shells. 6; Nemesius, Nat. Martyr guided this Hellenistic philosophical trend toward the monotheism of Christianity. Please select which sections you would like to print: Robert O. Anderson Distinguished Service Professor of the Humanities, University of Chicago. eccl. Neil Buchanan; 7 vols. It is difficult (2) to explain how such a wide spectrum of figures fluent in Greek, both foe and friend to Origen, erroneously attributed pre-existence to him (e.g., Pamphilus, Epiphanius, Rufinus, Jerome, Theophilus, John of Jerusalem, Theodore of Mopsuestia, among others). Taylor Echolls - Updated September 29, 2017, Copyright 2023 Leaf Group Ltd. / Leaf Group Education, Explore state by state cost analysis of US colleges in an interactive article, PBS Frontline: From Jesus to Christ - Hellenistic Culture, BBC Religions: The Basics of Christian History. Henry Chadwick; Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University Press, 1953] 21617)allusion to Phaedr. The prophet or saviour replaced the priest and king as the chief religious figure. Die Hellenisierung des Christentums in der Geschichte der Theologie von Luther bis auf die Gegenwart, HellenisierungJudaisierung des Christentums als Deuteprinzipien der Geschichte des kirchlichen Dogmas: Mit ihm und in ihm. Note as well that Ramelli has recently revived the thesis that it is possible that Origen the Christian and Origen the Platonist were one and the same personsee, Origen the Christian Middle/Neoplatonist: New Arguments for a Possible Identification, IECH 1 (2011) 98130. Paul's success at Ephesus provoked a riot to defend the cult of the goddess Artemis. Luc. 166; 17172; Jerome, Ep. It was a time of spiritual revolution in the Greek and Roman empires, when old cults died or were fundamentally transformed and when new religious movements came into being. Since these are personal objects of contemplation, there is nothing strained when Origen envisions souls not only contemplating, but also loving God and the Son (Princ. pref.2). @TJ. Ic}Z-i"L\/E%u3%K.\a3wny2 Gen. 11.2, Ep. For more on the distinction between the church's teaching and the scholar's research, see esp., Kettler, Franz Heinrich, Der ursprngliche Sinn der Dogmatik des Origenes (Beihefte zur Zeitschrift fr die neutestamentliche Wissenschaft und die Kunde der lteren Kirche 31; Berlin: Alfred Tpelmann, 1966)Google Scholar. Greg. Violence against them could be precipitated by a bad harvest, a barbarian attack, or a public festival of the emperor cult. Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree. Hier. 41c43a. That became the lingua franca of all of these subject peoples. The Christian Apologists of the 2nd century were a group of writers who sought to defend the faith against Jewish and Greco-Roman critics. The study of Hellenistic religions is a study of the dynamics of religious persistence and change in this vast and culturally varied area. its literature. Princ. See, for instance, Pamphilus, Apol. In the early stages of the development of their faith, Christians did something rare if not unique in the history of religion: they adopted the entire scriptural canon of what they now saw to be another faith, Judaism, and embraced the Hebrew Scriptures, which they called the Old Testament. The Spirit in Second Temple Jewish Monotheism and the Origins of Early Christology, co-author with Seth Polinger. See esp. I incline to the former view: see esp. 85 Note esp. Thus, while not formally included in the acts of the council, the bishops certainly had Justinian's letter and these anathemas fresh in mind when they formally condemned Origen at the council. 86 Princ. 19.149150; Comm. 2.9.7; 3.3.5). posit that the soul is always in a body (as Eratosthenes, Ptolemy the Platonist, and others do) and make it pass from subtler bodies into dense bodies (John F. Finamore and John M. Dillon, Iamblichus De Anima: Text, Translation, and Commentary [Philosophia antiqua 92; Boston: Brill, 2002], 55). Corrections? would have been the Syrian kingdom, the Seleucid kingdom, and the Ptolemaic kingdom which survived in Egypt, which was finally taken over by Rome in 31 B.C. . press reaction. You may be asking whether it is necessary to consider as heretics those who hold various opinions on these matters, or who investigate them in various ways. 30 See Her. 20 See Comm. Iamblichus, De Anima 26: Another set of Platonists . In Dawson's words, this "synthesis has remained the foundation of Western culture and has never been destroyed.". At any time in the 2nd or 3rd centuries, Christians could find themselves the object of unpleasant attention. 2.1; 2.3 (736a316); 2.4.25 (738b). Here I look at the way that Paul confronts, adapts, and "Christianizes" Greco-Roman theo-philosophical God-language in order to better communicate the unique reality of the gospel and the Christian God in his theologizing and evangelism into the Hellenistic world. The misleading tendency to present Origen as a dogmatizer on pre-existence is already clearly developed by Epiphanius (see his Ep. Jes. 16 See Eusebius, Hist. Jo. The great Church Father compared Classical literature to the gold of the Egyptians, which God permitted the Hebrews to use on their journey to the Promised Land even though it had once been used in pagan religious practice. Harvey, Susan Ashbrook and Hunter, David G.; Oxford Handbooks; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008) 67290Google Scholar; Markschies, Christoph, Does it Make Sense to Speak of a Hellenization of Christianity in Antiquity? Church History and Religious Culture 92 (2012) 3334CrossRefGoogle Scholar. I examine three representative Pauline texts1 Cor 8:4-6, Rom 11:36, and Col 1:15-17to see how Paul speaks about the Christian God. 68 Princ. 10 Henri Crouzel, Origen (trans. On the Hellenic spirit, 1:49. 1.32 for the pre-existence of Jesus's soul. The influence of Greek language, philosophy and culture on Jews and early Christians. Luc. To regain divine protection, the emperors introduced the systematic persecution of Christians throughout the empire. Thanks to Gretchen Reydams-Schils, as well as the graduate students, fellows, and faculty affiliated with the Center, who provided valuable critique. : Peter Smith, 1973] 2). And his conquest, which extended from India all the way through Egypt, [was] divided into three main areas within 20 years after his death. From this basis I trace the development of Christology to the end of the second century, demonstrating how Christian thought moved from its primitive understanding of Jesus to the foundations of the doctrine of the Trinity. Content may require purchase if you do not have access. 1: a person living in Hellenistic times who was Greek in language, outlook, and way of life but was not Greek in ancestry especially: a hellenized Jew. For a concise and balanced discussion of how Origen interacted with particular philosophical positions, see Chadwick, Henry, Origen, in Cambridge History of Later Greek and Early Medieval Philosophy (ed. Hom. 5.30 (SC 147, 88.9). To accomplish this, the Apologists adopted the philosophical and literary vocabulary of the broader culture to develop a more refined expression of the faith that could appeal to the sophisticated sensibilities of their pagan contemporaries. Hellenistic religion, any of the various systems of beliefs and practices of eastern Mediterranean peoples from 300 bc to ad 300. 3.) 49(240); Gig. 3.4.2. Like the Jews, the Christians (unless they were gnostic) were opposed to syncretism. It is primarily a devotional or votive religion, based on the exchange of gifts between the divine and mortals typically through correctly performed sacrificial rituals. Henri Crouzel and Antonio Quacquarelli; Quaderni di Vetera Christianorum 15; Rome: Edizioni dell'Ateneo, 1980] 6364). Justin and other Christian apologists certainly argued that the tradition of polytheistic belief and practice that was current in the Greco-Roman world was wrong, was immoral, and was philosophically deficient.
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