Downing, Francis Gerald creator text New Delhi Bloomsbury 2025 monographic eng

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268pages ; 24 cm. The first Christian century must be approached with careful attention to its cultural and linguistic heterogeneity. It should not simply be assumed that this past 'is a different place, they do things differently there'. Downing treats the ways in which early Christians tried to 'make things make sense' within their cultures, noting both the similarities and differences between their ways and contemporary ones and stressing the variety of contexts and influences on first-century communication. Downing brings his renowned expertise to bear in illuminating the cultural features of early Christian society with a range of fascinating and telling examples 1. "Honour" among exegetes 2. Persons in relation 3. Forgiveness? Of Forgiveness? Or the remission of offences? 4. The ambiguity of "The Pharisee and the toll collector" (Luke 18.9-14) in the Graeco-Roman world of late antiquity 5. The woman from Syrophoenicia, and her doggedness: Mark 7.24-31 (Matthew 15.21-28) 6. Deeper reflections on the Jewish cynic Jesus 7. Cynics and Christians, Oedipus and Thyestes 8. Exile in formative Judaism 9. Common strands in pagan, Jewish and Christian eschatologies in the first Christian centuries 10. Ontological asymmetry in Philo, and christological realism in Paul, Hebrews and John 11. Magic and scepticism in and around the first Christian century 12. Interpretation and the "culture gap" 13. Reflecting in the first Christian century: 1 Corinthians 13.12 F. Gerald Downing Bible Gospels Criticism, interpretation, etc Bible New Testament Christianity Church history Primitive and early church ca. 30-600 Christianity and other religions Greek Eschatology 270.1 DOW 1 9789369529445 251124 20251124134657.0