Ignatius of Antioch and the Second Sophistic
A Study of an Early Christian Transformation of Pagan Culture
by Allen Brent
The letters of Ignatius of Antioch, whether considered genuine or pseudonymous, have been generally understood as addressing concerns and issues within the Church. Consequently, his language has been read as an expression of second century Judaeo Christianity or as a reply to Valentinianism, with little direct contact or concern with the surrounding pagan culture. Allen Brent submits Ignatius’ language to a comprehensive analysis and seeks to show that both conceptually, and in terms of the form of his arguments, his language game is clearly that of the pagan, Greek city-states of Asia Minor in the Second Sophistic. The author shows from a variety of evidence, both literary, epigraphic and iconographic, that Ignatius’ cultural background is in the world of the discourse of Hellenic autonomy against Roman imperial power, in the image-bearing mystery cults of the cities to whom he writes, in their embassies and Homonia treaties, and in their ideal of unity in a common culture expressed by their constitutions and cultural practices. Ignatius emerges as a brilliant missionary strategist, able to reshape ecclesial order in terms of secular social order and its conventions, whose work was scarcely comprehended by his more conservative Christian contemporaries and only later canonized by means of a gross distortion that obscured his original meaning.
- By (author) Allen Brent
Other Titles in this Series
Medizin und Christentum in Spatantike und fruhem Mittelalter
Christliche Arzte und ihr Wirken
Volume 27
Der Libellus Carminum des Eugenius von Toledo
Poesie als Lebensbewaltigung und spirituelle Praxis
Volume 133
Kommunikation in der Kirche des 3. Jahrhunderts
Bischofe und Gemeinden zwischen Konflikt und Konsens im Imperium Romanum
Volume 92
Das Konzept des geistlichen Gehorsams bei Johannes Sinaites
Zur Entwicklungsgeschichte eines Elements orthodoxer Konfessionskultur
Volume 37
Die “Erzählung des Aphroditian”
Thema und Variationen einer Legende im Spannungsfeld von Christentum und Heidentum
Volume 53
Jakob von Sarug im Kontext der Entwicklung des syrischen Mönchtums
Mit einer Edition, Übersetzung und Kommentar seines Werks ‚Über die Einsiedler‘
Krankheit und ihre Behandlung
Studien zu Sophronios von Jerusalems Wundern der Heiligen Kyros und Johannes
Volume 118
Der Mensch zwischen Weltflucht und Weltverantwortung
Lebensmodelle der paganen und der judisch-christlichen Antike
Volume 87
Die Theologie des Kreuzes beim fruhen Cyrill von Alexandria
Dargestellt an seiner Schrift 'De adoratione et cultu in spiritu et veritate'
Volume 29
Das offentliche Auftreten des Christentums im spatantiken Antiochia
Eine Studie unter besonderer Berucksichtigung der Agonmetaphorik in ausgewahlten Martyrerpredigten des Johannes Chrysostomos
Volume 109
Die Wurzel allen Ubels
Vorstellungen uber die Herkunft des Bosen und Schlechten in der Philosophie und Religion des 1.-4. Jahrhunderts. Ratio Religionis Studien III
Volume 91
Mia Energeia
Untersuchungen zur Einigungspolitik des Kaisers Heraclius und des Patriarchen Sergius von Constantinopel
Volume 66
Christliche Kosmologie und kaiserzeitliche Philosophie
Die Auslegung des Schopfungsberichtes bei Origenes, Basilius und Gregor von Nyssa vor dem Hintergrund kaiserzeitlicher Timaeus-Interpretationen
Volume 56
Jao-Jahwe und seine Engel
Jahwe-Appellationen und zugehorige Engelnamen in griechischen und koptischen Zaubertexten
Volume 74
The Benedictine Prologue
A Contribution to the Early History of the Latin Prologues to the Pauline Epistles
Volume 136
Augustine’s Conversion from Traditional Free Choice to ‘Non-free Free Will’
A Comprehensive Methodology
Volume 111
Augustin und die Dialektik
Eine Untersuchung der Argumentationsstruktur in den Cassiciacum-Dialogen
Volume 67
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