Knowledge and Religious Authority in the Pseudo-Clementines

Situating the 'Recognitions' in Fourth Century Syria

by Nicole Kelley

Book cover: Knowledge and Religious Authority in the Pseudo-Clementines

Extent: 250 pages

Publisher: Mohr Siebeck

Subjects: Religious Studies

Series: Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 2.Reihe

Series volume number: 213

Language: English

(Paperback) (Published)

(June 2006)

ISBN: 9783161490361

Price: $93.00

Out of stock

The Pseudo-Clementines are best known for preserving early Jewish Christian traditions, but have not been appreciated as a resource for understanding the struggles over identity and orthodoxy among fourth-century Christians, Jews, and pagans. Using the work of sociologist Pierre Bourdieu, Nicole Kelley analyzes the rhetorical strategies employed by the Recognitions . These strategies discredit the knowledge of philosophers and astrologers, and establish Peter and Clement as the exclusive stewards of prophetic knowledge, which has been handed down to them by Jesus. This analysis reveals that the Pseudo-Clementine Recognitions is not a jumbled collection of earlier source materials, as previous interpreters have thought, but a coherent narrative concerned primarily with epistemological issues. The author understands the Recognitions as a reflection of complex rivalries between several types of Christian and non-Christian groups such as that found in fourth-century Antioch or Edessa.

  • By (author) Nicole Kelley