Bockmuehl, M

Bockmuehl, Markus

Oxford University Research Archive

Ancient Jewish and Christian Education Karina Martin Hogan, Matthew Goff, and Emma Wasserman (eds), Pedagogy in Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity (Society of Biblical Literature, 2017), $54.95, PP: xxii-401, ISBN: 978162837165-9.   Could ancient Jews and Christians read and write? If so, what texts were they taught and how? The topic of formal education in Judaism and early Christianity has long been the subject of considerable scholarly debates, too often still at least implicitly siloed into “Palestinian” and “Hellenistic” modes of enquiry. This substantial volume brings together 14 studies gathered from annual sessions of the Society of Biblical Literature’s Wisdom and Apocalypticism section between 2012 and 2014. The project owes its origins to a suggestion by Ellen Aitken (1964-2014), to whom it is posthumously dedicated (and one of whose essays, on Hebrews, is here reprinted). Following Hogan’s introduction, highlights include the very substantial, stellar opening essay by James L. Kugel showing how the pedagogy of ancient Israelite sages survived in Second-Temple biblical interpretation. John J. Collins offers a survey on the relationship of Wisdom and Torah, complemented by more focused instantiations of Kugel’s take on Hebrew pedagogy by Matthew Goff on the “garden” of teachers in Ben Sira and at Qumran and by Elisa Uusimäki on Proverbs 1-9 in 4QBeatitudes. The majority of contributions examine various Jewish and Christian appropriations of Paideia, for example on the part of Philo of Alexandria (Karina Martin Hogan), the influence of philosophical mysticism on apocalyptic (Andrew R. Guffey) and of paideia’s inculturation on the construction of Jerusalem’s ultimately controversial gymnasium (Robert Doran); the Septuagint translators (Patrick Pouchelle); Paul and Plato (C. Andrew Ballard); Paul and Philo as well as the Book of Wisdom (Jason M. Zurawski); and Irenaeus (D. Jeffrey Bingham). Rafella Cribiore’s concluding essay asks why, despite some (in her view later) evidence of cultural polarisation, Christians were able at times to appropriate the textbooks and myths of traditional Greek Paideia on newly “neutral ground” even while rejecting the presupposition of their value as moral and spiritual guides.  As ever in such volumes, the quality and freshness of argumentation varies; but the editors deserve our thanks for bringing together this group of accomplished scholars representing an impressive spectrum of specialist expertise. The abiding impression is of an intellectual project whose genuine contribution derives significantly from the interdisciplinary conception of its research question, and from a range and quality of debate that will strike no reader as narrow or introspective.  M. Bockmuehl, University of Oxford  

English

Book review: Ancient Jewish and Christian Education: Karina Martin Hogan, Matthew Goff &amp; Emma Wasserman (eds), Pedagogy in Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity

Book review: Ancient Jewish and Christian Education: Karina Martin Hogan, Matthew Goff & Emma Wasserman (eds), Pedagogy in Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity

Abstract

Similar works

Full text

Available Versions

Oxford University Research Archive

Book review: Ancient Jewish and Christian Education: Karina Martin Hogan, Matthew Goff &amp; Emma Wasserman (eds), Pedagogy in Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity

Abstract

Similar works

Full text

Available Versions

Oxford University Research Archive

Book review: Ancient Jewish and Christian Education: Karina Martin Hogan, Matthew Goff & Emma Wasserman (eds), Pedagogy in Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity