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Journal of Early Christian Studies, 2011
Augustine in Context, ed. Tarmo Toom, 2018
This essay provides an overview of the forms, functions, and development of the bios in Late Antiquity. It is included in the volume "Augustine In Context" (ed. Tarmo Toom) which is part of the CUP series "Literature in Context." Written for a non-specialist audience, the essay outlines a brief history of biography in the Greek and Latin literary traditions, and gives an overview of pagan and Christian Lives composed in Late Antiquity. The purpose is to build a context in which to understand the impact of biographical literature on the age of Augustine. The essay emphasizes that Late Antique authors, both Christian and pagan, read and imitated classical-era biographies, and suggests that the proliferation of biography in Late Antiquity can be best understood by considering the development of biographical literature within the context of philosophical competition in the Hellenistic period. Finally, the essay outlines several functions that biographical literature played in shaping individual and corporate identities.
Journal of Biblical Literature, 1966
The hagiographical Experiment: Developing Discourses of Sainthood, ed. by Christa Gray and James Corke-Webster, 2020
This article aims at presenting a specific aim of late antique biographical discourse: presenting to the reader an ideal, but nonetheless practical, way of life to put into practice. Gregory of Nyssa and Marinus’s biographical texts, The Life of Moses and The Life of Gregory Thaumaturgus on the one hand, and Proclus or concerning happiness on the other, provide a good example of this more or less explicit aim. Furthermore, these two texts are particularly interesting to determine the reason why late antique authors from the 4th and the 5th century CE used biographical discourse to present an ideal way of life and how this specific aim was achieved. By giving a concrete or practical example of the good life, biographical discourse can indeed be seen as a particularly adequate type of discourse to present and exhort the reader to imitate a particular way of life. By providing a practical exemple of the good life, biographical discourse facilitates the imitation of such a life, more than a theoretical discourse would do.
Augustinian Studies, 2013
Revista Catalana De Teologia, 2013
The Classical Review, 2014
Studia Patristica, vol. 66, 2013
The textual Vorbild most commonly posited for Eusebius’ Historia Ecclesiastica [Hist. eccl.] is Flavius Josephus’ Antiquitates Judaicae [AJ]. This paper probes the limits of Eusebius’ use of Josephus through a case study, a comparison of how each historian represented Philo of Alexandria. Josephus mentions Philo just once in the AJ, when the philosopher defended the Judeans of Alexandria before Caligula (18.259f.). Such sparse coverage of Philo is striking because description of the great Judean’s philosophical activity would have enhanced the Judean glories exhibited in the AJ. Far richer is Eusebius’ portrayal of Philo: not only does Philo’s political service come up in the Hist. eccl. (2.6), but Eusebius also praises Philo’s erudition (2.4), notes purported encounters with Peter and Mark (2.16), reproduces the philosopher’s description of a purportedly Christian ascetic community (2.17), and catalogues his writings (2.18): in short, Eusebius foregrounds Philo’s philosophical achievements alongside the political, deploying many un-Josephan literary topoi along the way. That Eusebius stressed Philo’s literary and philosophical activities, as well as the political service narrated by Josephus, illustrates how the models for the pioneer of church history included philosophical biography along with national historiography along Josephan lines. The paper concludes by showing that the topoi whereby Eusebius represented Philo are paralleled in Diogenes Laertius’ Lives and Opinions of the Famous Philosophers, the best surviving example of philosophical historiography. Eusebius’ display of Philo’s intellectual accomplishments through biographical topoi both reinforced the Jewish philosopher’s credibility as an admirer of Christianity and encouraged comparison between Philo and the Christian intellectuals portrayed throughout the Hist. eccl.
Common Dreams, 2020
Paul Ndomba, 2024
Marcello Musto (ed), Marx and Le Capital , 2022
Child Study Journal, 1970
Zeitschrift für Katalanistik, 37, 2024
FERITI-VA DE VICLEANA PECETLUIRE culegere de scrieri întocmită de către ieroschim. Dorotei Melinte
Humanities and Social Sciences, 2018
Arquivo Brasileiro De Medicina Veterinaria E Zootecnia, 2014
F1000Research, 2018
Developmental and Clinical Psychology, 2012
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2007
Revista Linguagens & Letramentos