Ancient Philosophy & Religion – serie

This first volume of the new Brill series “Ancient Philosophy & Religion” is a collection of articles by scholars of Classics, Ancient Philosophy, and Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity. The articles are based on papers presented at two colloquia on the interface between Ancient Philosophy and Religion at the universities of Aarhus and Cambridge. They focus extensively on Platonic philosophy and piety and sketch an emerging religio-philosophical discourse in ancient Judaism (both in the Sibylline Oracles and 4 Maccabees). Furthermore, this volume studies Seneca’s religio-philosophical understanding of 'consolation', compares early depictions of Jesus with those of ancient philosophers, and, finally, reconsiders responses of pagan philosophers to Christianity from the second century to Late Antiquity.

The interest in interdisciplinary research on the experience of religious conversion or spiritual transformation grows progressively. In light of this burgeoning area of study, this volume explores conversion or converting experience in the ancient Mediterranean with attention to early Judaism, early Christianity, and philosophy in the Roman empire. The contributions include both historical and philological reconstructions relying on source material and utilizing interdisciplinary approaches. Similarly, the authors analyze the literary use of the motif of conversion, the topic of philosophical conversion as well as ritual, social and embodied aspects of spiritual transformation.

This volume is an interdisciplinary investigation and contextualization of the various concepts of divine union in the private and public sphere of the Greek and Near Eastern worlds.

Can the Divine itself come down to earth? The Platonist Celsus rejected it as most shameful, Origen however defended this idea as an essential part of Christian doctrine. This book comments on passages from Origen’s Against Celsus 4 in which both authors put forward their arguments. The Greek text is discussed from three perspectives: linguistics, rhetoric and philosophical theology. This approach includes a focus on the communication between author and readers, the structure of the discourse, and the persuasive strategies used by Celsus and Origen. Attention is also given to conceptions of God and his relation to the world, which form the backdrop to their arguments. Moreover, their theological conceptions are related to the wider philosophical discourse of the Greco-Roman age.

The notion of faith experienced a remarkable surge in popularity among early Christians, with Paul as its pioneer. Yet what was the wider cultural significance of the pistis word group? This comprehensive work contextualizes Paul’s faith language within Graeco-Roman cultural discourses, highlighting its semantic multifariousness and philosophical potential. Based on an innovative combination of cognitive linguistics and discourse analysis, it explores ‘faith’ within social, political, religious, ethical, and cognitive contexts. While challenging modern individualist and irrational conceptualizations, this book shows how Paul uses pistis to creatively configure philosophical narratives of his age and propose Christ as its ultimate embodiment.

How on earth can humans be perfect? The striving for perfection has always occupied a central place in ancient Greek culture. This dynamics urged the Greeks on to surpass themselves in different fields, from sculpture and architecture over athletics to philosophy. In this volume, an international group of scholars examines how the ideal of perfection was conceived and pursued in Late Antiquity, both within philosophical circles and Christianity. Their studies yield a fascinating panorama of various attempts to bridge the unbridgeable and assimilate our frail, imperfect human nature as far as possible to divine perfection.