David Satran
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- January 2019
- ISBN:
- 9780520291232
- eISBN:
- 9780520965089
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520291232.003.0002
- Subject:
- Religion, Early Christian Studies
This chapter focuses on the author’s narrative of the path that brought him from childhood in Asia Minor, via the progression of rhetorical and legal studies (in Berytus), to the study circle of ...
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This chapter focuses on the author’s narrative of the path that brought him from childhood in Asia Minor, via the progression of rhetorical and legal studies (in Berytus), to the study circle of Origen in Caesarea Maritima. One of the key themes explored is that of divine providence or management (oikonomia) by which the author is unwittingly led to the meeting with his master, accompanied along the way by a guiding angelic presence. Once in the company of Origen, a series of new themes come to the fore and are examined: the role of forceful constraint in the teacher’s control over his student; the use of imagery of binding and magic to describe the teacher’s effect and influence; and, finally, a description that draws on the language of a Platonic pedagogy of eros, while employing the scriptural example of Jonathan and David as a model of spiritual friendship. These themes jointly raise the central question of free will in the master-disciple relationship.Less
This chapter focuses on the author’s narrative of the path that brought him from childhood in Asia Minor, via the progression of rhetorical and legal studies (in Berytus), to the study circle of Origen in Caesarea Maritima. One of the key themes explored is that of divine providence or management (oikonomia) by which the author is unwittingly led to the meeting with his master, accompanied along the way by a guiding angelic presence. Once in the company of Origen, a series of new themes come to the fore and are examined: the role of forceful constraint in the teacher’s control over his student; the use of imagery of binding and magic to describe the teacher’s effect and influence; and, finally, a description that draws on the language of a Platonic pedagogy of eros, while employing the scriptural example of Jonathan and David as a model of spiritual friendship. These themes jointly raise the central question of free will in the master-disciple relationship.
Saul M. Olyan
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- May 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780300182682
- eISBN:
- 9780300184228
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Yale University Press
- DOI:
- 10.12987/yale/9780300182682.001.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Judaism
Friendship, though a topic of considerable humanistic and cross disciplinary interest in the contemporary academy, has mainly been ignored by scholars of the Hebrew Bible, possibly on account of its ...
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Friendship, though a topic of considerable humanistic and cross disciplinary interest in the contemporary academy, has mainly been ignored by scholars of the Hebrew Bible, possibly on account of its complexity and elusiveness. Yet friendship in the Hebrew Bible warrants the kind of thorough, detailed exploration that friendship has received from specialists in neighboring fields such as Classics and New Testament and in any number of other fields. The author of this book provides an in-depth, theoretically engaged, philologically grounded, and contextually sensitive study of friendship in the Hebrew Bible. It is the first book-length study of its kind, filling in a significant gap in our knowledge and understanding of the constellation of social relationships represented in biblical texts and contributing to contemporary, incipient cross-disciplinary theorizing of friendship. Topics covered include how the expectations of friends and family members overlap and differ, including what makes the friend a distinct social actor; failed friendship; friendships in narrative such as those of Ruth and Naomi, Jonathan and David, and Job and his three comforters; and friendship in the second century BCE Hebrew wisdom text Ben Sira, including how Ben Sira’s notions of friendship relate to ideas expressed in earlier biblical texts and in Greek sources.Less
Friendship, though a topic of considerable humanistic and cross disciplinary interest in the contemporary academy, has mainly been ignored by scholars of the Hebrew Bible, possibly on account of its complexity and elusiveness. Yet friendship in the Hebrew Bible warrants the kind of thorough, detailed exploration that friendship has received from specialists in neighboring fields such as Classics and New Testament and in any number of other fields. The author of this book provides an in-depth, theoretically engaged, philologically grounded, and contextually sensitive study of friendship in the Hebrew Bible. It is the first book-length study of its kind, filling in a significant gap in our knowledge and understanding of the constellation of social relationships represented in biblical texts and contributing to contemporary, incipient cross-disciplinary theorizing of friendship. Topics covered include how the expectations of friends and family members overlap and differ, including what makes the friend a distinct social actor; failed friendship; friendships in narrative such as those of Ruth and Naomi, Jonathan and David, and Job and his three comforters; and friendship in the second century BCE Hebrew wisdom text Ben Sira, including how Ben Sira’s notions of friendship relate to ideas expressed in earlier biblical texts and in Greek sources.
