Magic and Paganism in Early Christianity

Magic and Paganism in Early Christianity
Author :
Publisher : A&C Black
Total Pages : 150
Release :
ISBN-10 : 0567089622
ISBN-13 : 9780567089625
Rating : 4/5 (22 Downloads)

Synopsis Magic and Paganism in Early Christianity by : Hans-Josef Klauck

Many forms of magic and paganism were practiced at the time of Jesus. What were these practices, and how did the first Christians react to them?Hans-Josef Klauck, an expert in the cultic practices of the region, describes this world into which Christianity was born and relates to it the many experiences of the first Christians recorded in Acts. Peter, for example, encounters the Samaritan magician Simon; Paul meets the Jewish magician Bar-Jesus; the people in Lystra want to offer a sacrifice to Paul and Barnabas; a soothsaying slave girl is the occasion of conflict in Philippi; in Athens, Paul finds the city full of idols but also discovers an altar 'to an unknown god'; in Ephesus, some burn their books of magic formulae, while other provoke a riot in the name of Artemis.Professor Klauck provides a fascinating account of these phenomena and their significance for Christianity historically and today.Available November 2000.

Pagan Rome and the Early Christians

Pagan Rome and the Early Christians
Author :
Publisher : Indiana University Press
Total Pages : 198
Release :
ISBN-10 : 0253203856
ISBN-13 : 9780253203854
Rating : 4/5 (56 Downloads)

Synopsis Pagan Rome and the Early Christians by : Stephen Benko

"In the early Roman empire, Christians were seen by pagans as overthrowers of ancient gods and destroyers of the prevailing social order. Allegations that Christians recognized each other by secret marks, met at night and made love to one another indiscriminately, worshipped the head of an ass and the genitals of their high priests, and ate children were widely believed. In examining these charges and the Christian response to them, Benko has provided a persuasively argued and refreshing, if controversial, perspective on the confrontation of the pagan and early Christian worlds."[book cover].

Magic in the Roman World

Magic in the Roman World
Author :
Publisher : Routledge
Total Pages : 168
Release :
ISBN-10 : 9781134633678
ISBN-13 : 113463367X
Rating : 4/5 (78 Downloads)

Synopsis Magic in the Roman World by : Naomi Janowitz

Using in-depth examples of 'magical' practice such as exorcisms, love rites, alchemy and the transformation of humans into divine beings, this lively volume demonstrates that the word 'magic' was used widely in late antique texts as part of polemics against enemies and sometimes merely as a term for other people's rituals. Naomi Janowitz shows that 'magical' activities were integral to late antique religious practice, and that they must be understood from the perspective of those who employed them.

The Pagan Background of Early Christianity

The Pagan Background of Early Christianity
Author :
Publisher : Health Research Books
Total Pages : 356
Release :
ISBN-10 : 0787304166
ISBN-13 : 9780787304164
Rating : 4/5 (66 Downloads)

Synopsis The Pagan Background of Early Christianity by : William Reginald Halliday

1925 Contents: Preface; Introductory; Administration, Municipalities, Guilds; Communications; society and Social Ethics; Eastern and Western Elements in Graeco-Roman Civilisation; the Decline of Rationalism; Union with God and the Immortality of.

The Cambridge History of Magic and Witchcraft in the West

The Cambridge History of Magic and Witchcraft in the West
Author :
Publisher : Cambridge University Press
Total Pages : 897
Release :
ISBN-10 : 9781316239490
ISBN-13 : 1316239497
Rating : 4/5 (90 Downloads)

Synopsis The Cambridge History of Magic and Witchcraft in the West by : David J. Collins, S. J.

This book presents twenty chapters by experts in their fields, providing a thorough and interdisciplinary overview of the theory and practice of magic in the West. Its chronological scope extends from the Ancient Near East to twenty-first-century North America; its objects of analysis range from Persian curse tablets to US neo-paganism. For comparative purposes, the volume includes chapters on developments in the Jewish and Muslim worlds, evaluated not simply for what they contributed at various points to European notions of magic, but also as models of alternative development in ancient Mediterranean legacy. Similarly, the volume highlights the transformative and challenging encounters of Europeans with non-Europeans, regarding the practice of magic in both early modern colonization and more recent decolonization.

Magic in Christianity

Magic in Christianity
Author :
Publisher :
Total Pages : 484
Release :
ISBN-10 : 1906958610
ISBN-13 : 9781906958619
Rating : 4/5 (10 Downloads)

Synopsis Magic in Christianity by : Robert P. Conner

The world of Jesus and the early Christians swarmed with prophets and exorcists, holy men and healers, who invoked angels and demons, gods and ghosts. Magic in Christianity: From Jesus to the Gnostics explores that world through the surviving texts of the first Christians and their pagan and Jewish contemporaries. Ecstatic spirit possession, handing opponents over to Satan, sending demons into swine, striking others dead on the spot by pronouncing curses, using articles of clothing and parts of corpses to perform magical healing and exorcism, invoking ghosts and angels for protection-these are all ancient Christian practices described in the New Testament, explained in detail by early Christian writers, and preserved by Christian amulets. Pagans and Jews accused Jesus and his followers of practicing magic and Christians accused one another of sorcery. Both pagan and early orthodox writers describe the rituals of the Gnostic sects in detail, including the magical passwords required to cross through the gates of the lower heavens. Magic in Christianity: From Jesus to the Gnostics examines evidence from the New Testament, the first Christian apologists, early apocryphal works, curse tablets and amulets to reconstruct the apocalyptic magical world of Jesus and the first Christians.

Prayer, Magic, and the Stars in the Ancient and Late Antique World

Prayer, Magic, and the Stars in the Ancient and Late Antique World
Author :
Publisher : Penn State Press
Total Pages : 274
Release :
ISBN-10 : 0271046007
ISBN-13 : 9780271046006
Rating : 4/5 (07 Downloads)

Synopsis Prayer, Magic, and the Stars in the Ancient and Late Antique World by : Scott Noegel

In the religious systems of ancient Mesopotamia, Egypt, and the Mediterranean, gods and demigods were neither abstract nor distant, but communicated with mankind through signs and active intervention. Men and women were thus eager to interpret, appeal to, and even control the gods and their agents. In Prayer, Magic, and the Stars in the Ancient and Late Antique World, a distinguished array of scholars explores the many ways in which people in the ancient world sought to gain access to--or, in some cases, to bind or escape from--the divine powers of heaven and earth. Grounded in a variety of disciplines, including Assyriology, Classics, and early Islamic history, the fifteen essays in this volume cover a broad geographic area: Greece, Egypt, Syria-Palestine, Mesopotamia, and Persia. Topics include celestial divination in early Mesopotamia, the civic festivals of classical Athens, and Christian magical papyri from Coptic Egypt. Moving forward to Late Antiquity, we see how Judaism, Christianity, and Islam each incorporated many aspects of ancient Near Eastern and Graeco-Roman religion into their own prayers, rituals, and conceptions. Even if they no longer conceived of the sun, moon, and the stars as eternal or divine, Christians, Jews, and Muslims often continued to study the movements of the heavens as a map on which divine power could be read. The reader already familiar with studies of ancient religion will find in Prayer, Magic, and the Stars both old friends and new faces. Contributors include Gideon Bohak, Nicola Denzey, Jacco Dieleman, Radcliffe Edmonds, Marvin Meyer, Michael G. Morony, Ian Moyer, Francesca Rochberg, Jonathan Z. Smith, Mark S. Smith, Peter Struck, Michael Swartz, and Kasia Szpakowska. Published as part of Penn State's Magic in History series, Prayer, Magic, and the Stars appears at a time of renewed interest in divination and occult practices in the ancient world. It will interest a wide audience in the field of comparative religion as well as students of the ancient world and late antiquity.

A Kind of Magic

A Kind of Magic
Author :
Publisher : T&T Clark
Total Pages : 230
Release :
ISBN-10 : UVA:X030209534
ISBN-13 :
Rating : 4/5 (34 Downloads)

Synopsis A Kind of Magic by : Michael Labahn

This collection explores the importance of magic within Early Christianity

The Christians as the Romans Saw Them

The Christians as the Romans Saw Them
Author :
Publisher : Yale University Press
Total Pages : 244
Release :
ISBN-10 : 0300098391
ISBN-13 : 9780300098396
Rating : 4/5 (91 Downloads)

Synopsis The Christians as the Romans Saw Them by : Robert Louis Wilken

This book offers an engrossing portrayal of the early years of the Christian movement from the perspective of the Romans.

Guide to the Study of Ancient Magic

Guide to the Study of Ancient Magic
Author :
Publisher : BRILL
Total Pages : 817
Release :
ISBN-10 : 9789004390751
ISBN-13 : 9004390758
Rating : 4/5 (51 Downloads)

Synopsis Guide to the Study of Ancient Magic by : David Frankfurter

In the midst of academic debates about the utility of the term “magic” and the cultural meaning of ancient words like mageia or khesheph, this Guide to the Study of Ancient Magic seeks to advance the discussion by separating out three topics essential to the very idea of magic. The three major sections of this volume address (1) indigenous terminologies for ambiguous or illicit ritual in antiquity; (2) the ancient texts, manuals, and artifacts commonly designated “magical” or used to represent ancient magic; and (3) a series of contexts, from the written word to materiality itself, to which the term “magic” might usefully pertain. The individual essays in this volume cover most of Mediterranean and Near Eastern antiquity, with essays by both established and emergent scholars of ancient religions. In a burgeoning field of “magic studies” trying both to preserve and to justify critically the category itself, this volume brings new clarity and provocative insights. This will be an indispensable resource to all interested in magic in the Bible and the Ancient Near East, ancient Greece and Rome, Early Christianity and Judaism, Egypt through the Christian period, and also comparative and critical theory. Contributors are: Magali Bailliot, Gideon Bohak, Véronique Dasen, Albert de Jong, Jacco Dieleman, Esther Eidinow, David Frankfurter, Fritz Graf, Yuval Harari, Naomi Janowitz, Sarah Iles Johnston, Roy D. Kotansky, Arpad M. Nagy, Daniel Schwemer, Joseph E. Sanzo, Jacques van der Vliet, Andrew Wilburn.