Conversion and Initiation in Antiquity: Shifting Identities – Creating Change

✍ Scribed by Birgitte Secher Bøgh (editor)

• Publisher: Peter Lang
• Year: 2014
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 313
• Series: Early Christianity in the Context of Antiquity 16
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

For decades, Arthur D. Nock’s famous definition of conversion and his distinction between conversion and adhesion have greatly influenced our understanding of individual religious transformation in the ancient world. The articles in this volume – originally presented as papers at the conference Conversion and Initiation in Antiquity (Ebeltoft, Denmark, December 2012) – aim to nuance this understanding. They do so by exploring different facets of these two phenomena in a wide range of religions in their own context and from new theoretical and empirical perspectives. The result is a compilation of many new insights into ancient initiation and conversion as well as their definitions and characteristics.

✦ Table of Contents

Cover
Contents
Abbreviations
Introduction
In Life and Death: Choice and Conversion in The Cult of Dionysos (Birgitte Bøgh)
1. The choice: reasons, motivations, and results
2. Agency and agents: The context of decision
3. The change: the nature of reorientation
4. Education: instructing and guiding the converts
Becoming Christian in Carthage in the Age of Tertullian (Éric Rebillard)
1. Identity markers
External markers
Tokens of membership recognition
Identification by association
Identification by abstention
Conclusion
2. Christianness
Situational selection
Multiple identities
Intermittency
Conclusion
Conversion in the oldest Apocryphal Acts (Jan N. Bremmer)
1. The "Acts of John"
2. The "Acts of Peter"
3. The "Acts of Paul"
Conclusions and general observations
Human and Divine Agency in Conversion in Apologetic Writings of The Second Century: To “Dance With Angels” (Jakob Engberg)
Approach, terminology, and previous scholarshipon accounts of conversion
The convert as an active agent in his/her conversion
The apologists (seeing themselves) as agentsin the conversion of readers
Christians (described as) setting examples for converts incharity, morality and by courage
Human and divine agency in conversion (conceived as)prompted by prayer and miracles
Divine agency in conversion
Conclusion: Agency and from ideology to experience
Ontological Conversion: a Description and Analysis of Two Case Studies from Tertullian’s "De Baptismo" and Iamblichus’ "De Mysteriis" (Nicholas Marshall)
1. The Study of religious and philosophical conversionfrom psychology to sociology
2. Ontological conversion: Definition and minor examples
3a. Tertullian’s "De baptismo"
3b. Iamblichus’ "De mysteriis"
4. Conclusion
Agents of Apostasy, Delegates of Disaffiliation (Zeba Crook)
Introduction
Collectivism and allocentricity
Collectivism and agency
The rhetoric of apostasy
Contextualising Apostasy as Disaffiliation
Conclusion
Change and Continuity: Reading A new Augustine’s Conversion (Carmen Cvetković)
Conclusions
‘The Devil is in The Details’. Hellenistic Mystery Initiation Rites: Bridge-Burning or Bridge-Building? (Luther H. Martin)
Introduction
1. Occultation of the mysteries
2. Essentialisation of the mysteries
The Eleusinian family cult
The Pan-Hellenic cult of Eleusis
The Roman era cult of Eleusis
Roman mystery cults
Historical puzzles
3. Evidential ambiguity
4. Initiatory consequences
Social transformations
Transformation of self
A. The mind of the initiate
B. Cognitive transformations
Conclusion
Conversion, Conflict, and The Drama of Social Reproduction: Narratives of Filial Resistance in Early Christianity and Modern Britain (Kate Cooper and James Corke-Webster)
Adolescent withdrawal in the "Apocryphal Acts of the Apostles"
The novel before the novel: Identity crisis andthe literature of dislocation
Sympathy with the devil: Narrative focalisation and thecognitive wound of dissonant empathy
Conclusion
There and Back Again: Temporary Immortality in The Mithras Liturgy (Radcliffe G. Edmonds III)
The Mithras Liturgy à la van Gennep
The mystery of the Mithras Liturgy
The Mithras Liturgy as a rite of extreme purification
Patterns of purification rituals from simple to extreme
Identity Formation Through Catechetical Teaching In Early Christianity (Anders-Christian Jacobsen)
Baptismal catechesis and early Christian identity formation
Identity – what is that?
The organisation of catechetical instruction
Identity formation through catechetical instruction
Moral and doctrinal identity formation
Doctrinal identity formation
Moral identity formation
Conclusions
The Role of Religious Education in six of The Pagan Religions of The Hellenistic-Roman Period (Per Bilde)
1. Purpose, background, focus, issue, and sources
2. Definitions and procedure
3. The position of my opponents
4. General considerations
5.1 Orphism
5.2 Eleusis
5.3. The cult of Bacchus
5.4 The cult of Isis
5.5 Cybele and Atargatis
5.6 The Roman cult of Mithras
5.7 Conclusion
6. Results
Educating a Mithraist (Roger Beck)
Observations on Late Antique Rabbinic Sources on Instruction of Would-Be Converts (Elisabetta Abate)
Introduction
The sources
Instruction for converts in the making
Conclusion
The Role of Philosophy and Education in Apologists’ Conversion to Christianity: The Case of Justin and Tatian (Tobias Georges)
1. Historical context and method
2. The role of philosophy and education in connection withconversion according to Justin’s and Tatian’s accounts
3. Final questions
General Index
Index Locorum
Biblical books and apocryphal literature
Modern literature
Papyri
Inscriptions