Joseph Sievers – författare

This book makes available in English important essays that mark the fortieth anniversary of the Second Vatican Council's Declaration on the Relationship of the Church to Non-Christian Religions (Nostra Aetate). Surveying Vatican dialogues and documents, the essays explore challenging theological questions posed by the Shoah and the Catholic recognition of the Jewish people's covenantal life with God.Featuring essays by Vatican officials, leading rabbis, diplomats, and Catholic and Jewish scholars, the book discusses the nature of Christian-Jewish relations and the need to remember their conflicted and often tragichistory, aspects of a Christian theology of Judaism, the Catholic-Jewish dialogue since the Shoah, and the establishment of formal diplomatic relations between the Holy See and Israel. The book includes an essayby Cardinal Walter Kasper, president of the Pontifical Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews, and documents on the rapprochement between the Church and the Jewish people.

The essays in this volume focus on the relationship between Josephus’ Judean and Jewish identity on the one hand, and his life and writings in the context of Flavian Rome on the other. From very different points of view the various contributions to this volume, which is the fruit of an international colloquium entitled ‘Josephus between Jerusalem and Rome’ held in the city of Rome in 2003, shed light on the complex cultural interplay in Josephus’ writings. After examining more general historiographical and literary questions, the volume proceeds to address specific issues of Josephus’ presentation of Judaism and of historical “data”, inter alia about the war of 66-70 CE. A final section deals with the translation and transmission of his works.