Neither Jew nor Greek?: Constructing Early Christianity

Description

A ground-breaking study in the formation of early Christian identity, by one of the world's leading scholars.In Neither Jew Nor Greek, Judith Lieu explores the formation and shaping of early Christian identity within Judaism and within the wider Graeco-Roman world in the period before 200 C.E. Lieu particularly examines the way that literary texts presented early Christianity. She combines this with interdisciplinary historical investigation and interaction with scholarship on Judaism in late Antiquity and on the Graeco-Roman world.The result is a highly significant contribution to four of the key questions in current New Testament scholarship: how did early Christian identity come to be formed? How should we best describe and understand the processes by which the Christian movement became separate from its Jewish origins? Was there anything special or different about the way women entered Judaism and early Christianity? How did martyrdom contribute to the construction of early Christian identity? The chapters in this volume have become classics in the study of the New Testament and for this Cornerstones edition Lieu provides a new introduction placing them within the academic debate as it is now.

Judith Lieu is Lady Margaret's Professor of Divinity at the University of Cambridge, UK.

[A] wonderfully learned volume, Judith Lieu's capacity to hold together biblical, Jewish and patrisitc material commands respect, and she is an authority on the borderland between early Christianity and Judaism * Stuart G. Hall, Former Professor of Ecclesiastical History at King's College, London, UK * Anyone interested in early Christian origins would be well advised to read this text. Lieu is a very careful biblical historian, marshaling a range of evidence while also able to acknowledge the limitations and ambiguity of some of this evidence. * Mary Coloe, Australian Catholic University, Australia * This is a helpful collection which focuses on a broadly coherent theme. The essays are wide-ranging and show up their author's broad and detailed knowledge of both primary and secondary material. One is given a strong sense of the complexity of the subjects under discussion, not least because of the difficulty we encounter in dealing with texts (and it is texts with which Lieu is primarily concerned) with such a heavy rhetorical aspect- in fact much of what Lieu presents us with are a gradual unveiling of problems. We should, however, be grateful to have this erudite collection so easily available to us, not least because of the many issues and problems with which it presents its reader. * James Carleton Paget, Journal of Jewish Studies *