By the Same Word: Creation and Salvation in Hellenistic Judaism and Early Christianity

Ronald Cox

Published by De Gruyter 2007

By the Same Word

Creation and Salvation in Hellenistic Judaism and Early Christianity

Ronald Cox

Volume 145 in the series Beihefte zur Zeitschrift für die neutestamentliche Wissenschaft

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110212143

Overview
Contents

About this book

Middle Platonism explained how a transcendent principle could relate to the material world by positing an intermediary, modeled after the Stoic active cause, that mediated the supreme principle’s influence to the world while preserving its transcendence. Having similar concerns as Middle Platonism, Hellenistic Jewish sapientialism, early Christianity, and Gnosticism appropriated this intermediary doctrine as a means for understanding their relationship to God and to the cosmos. However, these traditions vary in their adaptation of this teaching due to their distinctive understanding of creation and humanity’s place therein. The Jewish writings of Philo of Alexandria and Wisdom of Solomon espouse a holistic ontology, combining a Platonic appreciation for noetic reality with an ultimately positive view of creation and its place in human fulfillment. The early Christians texts of 1 Cor 8:6, Col 1:15-20, Heb 1:2-3, and the prologue of John provide an eschatological twist to this ontology when the intermediary figure finds final expression in Jesus Christ. Contrarily, Poimandres (CH 1) and the Apocryphon of John, both associated with the traditional rubric “Gnosticism”, draw from Platonism to describe how creation is antithetical to human nature and its transcendent source.

Author / Editor information

Ronald Cox, Pepperdine University, Malibu, California, USA.

Reviews

"[...] an impressive and provokative study."
William Adler in: The Catholic Biblical Quarterly 72/2010

"This is a through study of an important issue across three bodies of literature, showing their common yet different appropriation of Middle Platonic philosophy."
Lutz Doering in: Journal for the Study of the NT 31.5/2009

Topics

Frontmatter Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	I
Contents Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	IX
Chapter One. Introduction Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
Chapter Two. Middle Platonic Intermediary Doctrine Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	28
Chapter Three. Salvation as the Fulfillment of Creation: The Roles of the Divine Intermediary in Hellenistic Judaism Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	56
Chapter Four. Salvation as the Reparation of Creation: The Roles of the Divine Intermediary in New Testament Christology Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	141
Chapter Five. Salvation as the Undoing of Creation: The Roles of the Divine Intermediary in “Gnosticism” Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	276
Chapter Six. Conclusion Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	352
Backmatter Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	358

(Deutsch)

Language: English
Publisher: De Gruyter
Audience: Academics, Institutes, Libraries
Pages
- Front matter: 14
- Main content: 392
Keywords: New Testament; Judaism; Philosophy (Middle Platonism); Gnosticism

eBook

Published: February 26, 2009
ISBN: 9783110212143

Hardcover

Published: July 16, 2007
ISBN: 9783110193428