Jan Willem van Henten holds the chair in New Testament and Hellenistic Jewish literature at the University of Amsterdam. He is director of the Netherlands School for Advanced Studies in Theology and Religion (NOSTER). His publications include Studies in Early Jewish Epigraphy (edited with P. W. van der Horst, 1994) and The Maccabean Martyrs as Saviours of the Jewish People (1997)., Friedrich Avemarie is a research and teaching assistant at the Institut für antikes Judentum und hellenistische Religionsgeschichte, Evangelisch-theologische Fakultät, University of Tübingen. His most recent publication is Die Taufberichte der Apostelgeschichte: Theologie und Geschichte (1999, 2001).

• INTRODUCTION; Chapter 1 PAGAN TRADITIONS OF NOBLE DEATH; Chapter 2 NOBLE DEATH IN EARLY JEWISH SOURCES; Chapter 3 CHRISTIAN MARTYRS FROM THE FIRST TO THE THIRD CENTURY CE; Chapter 4 MARTYRDOM AND NOBLE DEATH IN THE RABBINIC TRADITION; BIBLIOGRAPHY; Index;