Bible and Poetry in Late Antique Mesopotamia

Ephrem the Syrian was one of the founding voices in Syriac literature. While he wrote in a variety of genres, the bulk of his work took the form of madrashe, a Syriac genre of musical poetry or hymns. In Bible and Poetry in Late Antique Mesopotamia, Jeffrey Wickes offers a thoroughly contextualized study of Ephrem’s magnum opus, the Hymns on Faith, delivered in response to the theological controversies that followed the First Council of Nicaea. The ensuing doctrinal divisions had tremendous impact on the course of Christianity and led in part to the development of a uniquely Syriac Church, in which Ephrem would become a central figure. Drawing on literary, ritual, and performance theories, Bible and Poetry shows how Ephrem used the Syriac Bible to construct and conceive of himself and his audience. In so doing, Wickes resituates Ephrem in a broader early Christian context and contributes to discussions of literature and religion in late antiquity.

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Gregory of Nazianzus s Letter Collection

Saint Gregory of Nazianzus, also known as Gregory the Theologian, lived an illustrious life as an orator, poet, priest, and bishop. Until his death, he wrote scores of letters to friends and colleagues, clergy members and philosophers, teachers of rhetoric and literature, and high-ranking officials at the provincial and imperial levels, many of which are preserved in his self-designed letter collection. Here, for the first time in English, Bradley K. Storin has translated the complete collection, offering readers a fresh view on Gregory’s life, social and cultural engagement, leadership in the church, and literary talents. Accompanying the translation are an introduction, a prosopography, and annotations that situate Gregory’s letters in their biographical, literary, and historical contexts. This translation is an essential resource for scholars and students of late antiquity and early Christianity.

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Jephthah s Daughter Sarah s Son

Late antiquity was a perilous time for children, who were often the first victims of economic crisis, war, and disease. They had a one in three chance of dying before their first birthday, with as many as half dying before age ten. Christian writers accordingly sought to speak to the experience of bereavement and to provide cultural scripts for parents who had lost a child. These late ancient writers turned to characters like Eve and Sarah, Job and Jephthah as models for grieving and for confronting or submitting to the divine. Jephthah's Daughter, Sarah’s Son traces the stories these writers crafted and the ways in which they shaped the lived experience of familial bereavement in ancient Christianity. A compelling social history that conveys the emotional lives of people in the late ancient world, Jephthah's Daughter, Sarah's Son is a powerful portrait of mourning that extends beyond antiquity to the present day.

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Self Portrait in Three Colors

A seminal figure in late antique Christianity and Christian orthodoxy, Saint Gregory of Nazianzus published a collection of more than 240 letters. Whereas these letters have often been cast aside as readers turn to his theological orations or autobiographical poetry for insight into his life, thought, and times, Self-Portrait in Three Colors focuses squarely on them, building a provocative case that the finalized collection constitutes not an epistolary archive but an autobiography in epistolary form—a single text composed to secure his status among provincial contemporaries and later generations. Shedding light on late-ancient letter writing, fourth-century Christian intelligentsia, Christianity and classical culture, and the Christianization of Roman society, these letters offer a fascinating and unique view of Gregory’s life, engagement with literary culture, and leadership in the church. As a single unit, this autobiographical epistolary collection proved a powerful tool in Gregory’s attempts to govern the contours of his authorial image as well as his provincial and ecclesiastical legacy.

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From Ephrem to Romanos

It is often forgotten that many people in Late Antique Syria were bilingual in Syriac and Greek. The 16 articles in this volume explore different aspects of the interaction between these two literary cultures, exemplified in the works of two of the greatest Christian poets and hymnographers of the period: Ephrem the Syrian and Romanos the Melode. Among the topics covered are the legend of King Abgar and the origins of Christianity in Edessa, Syriac texts on the finding of the Cross, translations from Syriac into Greek and Greek into Syriac (with specific studies on the Aristotle commentary tradition and Hunayn's translation of Hippocrates' Aphorisms). The volume concludes with the case of a distinctive topos employed by Greek and Latin scribes, but whose earliest and latest attestations are to be found in colophons of Syriac manuscripts.

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Poems of Heaven and Hell from Ancient Mesopotamia

Presents a collection of ancient poems about such topics as the creation of Earth, descent into the underworld, and prayers to gods.

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Shifting Frontiers in Late Antiquity

This volume results from a conference held at the University of Kansas in 1995. The papers it encapsulates cover frontier studies from the third to the seventh century. It takes in the Roman world from Spain to Syria and from Britain to Dacia, clarifying the boundary role of Late Antiquity.

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Near Eastern Religious Texts Relating to the Old Testament

W. Beyerlin, the editor, selected all texts and commentaries. He added references to points of comparison to the O.T. The book was translated and published in English. There are 15 illustrations throughout the book, and five plates; also a list of abbreviations. The introduction covers items like the discovery of the texts, and their collection, followed by a history and description of their analysis. Author provided: information on the text, where it was found and kept and the version of translation; outline of historical and literary context; details of points of comparison with the O.T.; citations of relevant literature. Beyerlin broke up the main body of the book into five sections: Egyptian, Mesopotamian, Hittite, Ugaritic, and North Semitic. Editor gave an introduction to each section. He also included sub-sections with headings, including items like myths, creation stories, prayers, epics, different kinds of Inscriptions, votives, rituals, instructions, and prophecies, plus some others, depending on what sorts of texts are available from each main section under discussion -- From Amazon description.

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Understanding the Bible

This is a nonsectarian guide for students undertaking their first systematic study of the Bible, giving information on archaeological data and historical background, and providing material on the date, authorship, and theological content of each book of the Old and New Testaments.

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Graduate and Undergraduate Programs and Courses in Middle East Studies in the United States Canada and Abroad

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Birkat Shalom

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Men and Masculinity in the Hebrew Bible and Beyond

c. 385 pp. 30 / $47.50 / 35 Scholar's Price 60 / $95 / 70 List Price Hardback Men and Masculinity in the Hebrew Bible and Beyond Edited by Ovidiu Creang The study of masculinity in the Bible is increasingly becoming established as a field of critical inquiry in biblical gender studies. This book highlights a variety of methodological approaches that reveal the complex and multifaceted construction of masculinity in biblical and post-biblical literature. It focuses uniquely and explicitly on men and the world they inhabit, documenting changes in the type of men and masculinities deemed legitimate, or illegitimate, across various social and historical contexts of the ancient Near East. At the same time, it interrogates readers' assumptions about the writers' positioning of male bodies, sexuality and relationships in a gender order created to reflect men's interests, yet in need of constant reordering In this volume specific features of biblical masculinity are explored: the masculinity of less favoured sons in Genesis (Susan Haddox); the ideology of Temple masculinity in Chronicles (Roland Boer); the masculinity of Moses (Brian DiPalma); the performative nature of masculinity in the Sinai episode (David Clines); Deuteronomy's regimentation of masculinity (Mark George); Joshua's hegemonic masculinity in the Conquest Narrative (Ovidiu Creang ); Na'aman's disability in relation to ideologies of masculinity (Cheryl Strimple and Ovidiu Creang ); Job's position as a man in charge in the Testament of Job (Maria Haralambakis); Priestly notions of sexuality in the covenant of the rainbow and circumcision in Genesis (Sandra Jacobs); Samson's masculinity in terms of male honour (Ela Lazarewicz-Wyrzykowska); the popular depiction of Jeremiah as a 'lamenting prophet' against the book of Jeremiah's male ideology (C.J. Patrick Davis); the gendered interaction of a Bible-study group with Daniel's dreams (Andrew Todd). Finally, David J.A. Clines and Stephen D. Moore offer closing critical reflections that situate the book's topics within a broader spectrum of issues in masculinity."

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The Anchor Bible Dictionary K N

Contains over six thousand alphabetically arranged entries that provide information about developments and issues associated with the study of the Bible, covering people and places, versions of the Bible, methodologies of Bible scholarship, and historical and archaeological subjects, and includes illustrations, cross-references, and bibliographies.

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Scripta classica Israelica

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Encyclopedia of Religious and Philosophical Writings in Late Antiquity

The Encyclopedia of Religious and Philosophical Writings in Late Antiquity offers easily accessible introductions to the content and historical setting of the main writings of Greco-Roman paganism, early Judaism, and formative Christianity from the period of Alexander the Great to Mohammed. Examining over seven hundred ancient texts, the Encyclopedia provides for each document details of authorship and provenance, a statement of the text's content and place within its religious tradition, a listing of editions and commentaries, and a bibliography of the pertinent scholarly literature. The Encyclopedia of Religious and Philosophical Writings in Late Antiquity is an unparalleled resource both for general readers and for scholars of ancient religion and philosophy.

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Directory of Graduate and Undergraduate Programs and Courses in Middle East Studies in the United States Canada and Abroad

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The Torah: a women's commentary collects and showcases the teachings of Jewish women in the first comprehensive commentary on the Torah written entirely by women. Distinguished women scholars, clergy, and poets illumine the meanings of the Torah by using both traditional tools and contemporary approaches, such as literary analysis, historical criticism, comparative linguistics, philology, archeology, anthropology, and sociology. The object of the Women of Reform Judaism (WRJ) in creating this book was to bring together interpreters for the 21st century, so that the voices of the entire Jewish people at last would be fully represented.

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Journal of Biblical Literature

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Rituals of Islamic Monarchy

Rituals of Islamic MonarchyAndrew MarshamRituals of Islamic Monarchyis a history of the oath of allegiance by which the caliph was recognised at his accession. Beginning in pre-Islamic Arabia, it traces the development of a formal ceremonial of Islamic monarchy in Syria and Iraq during the 7th-9th centuries CE.Author Andrew Marsham examines how the caliphs sought to proclaim their status as the representatives of God's covenant on earth through syntheses of Roman and Iranian royal ritual and customs and practices brought from pre-Islamic and early Islamic Arabia. Engaging with current debates about the reliability of the Islamic tradition for early Islamic history, he identifies key turning-points in the formation of classical Islamic political culture.An early chapter discusses the importance of the Qur'an as a historical source for the time of the Prophet Muhammad. For the caliphal period, close readings of the sources for specific rituals alternate with the examination of later copies of documents used at these accession rituals.This study of the invention and re-invention of a central institution of early Islamic political culture is the first such account of Islamic accession ceremonial and will appeal to both specialists in early Islamic history and non-specialists alike.Andrew Marsham is a Lecturer in Islamic History at the University of Edinburgh.

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Books for College Libraries Index

The third edition lists 50,000 titles that form the foundation of an undergraduate library's collection. This volume provides an index to the other five books in the set.

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