Ritual, Emotion, and Materiality in the Early Christian World

Description

This volume advances our understanding of early Christianity as a lived religion by approaching it through its rites, the emotions and affects surrounding those rites, and the material setting for the practice of them. The connections between emotions and ritual, between rites and their materiality, and between emotions and their physical manifestation in ancient Mediterranean culture have been inadequately explored as yet, especially with regard to early Christianity and its water and dining rites. Readers will find all three areas—ritual, emotion, and materiality—engaged in this exemplary interdisciplinary study, which provides fresh insights into early Christianity and its world. Ritual, Emotion, and Materiality in the Early Christian World will be of special interest to interdisciplinary-minded researchers, seminarians, and students who are attentive to theory and method, and those with an interest in the New Testament and earliest Christianity. It will also appeal to those working on ancient Jewish and Greco-Roman religion, emotion, and ritual from a comparative standpoint. Cover Endorsement Page Half Title Series Page Title Page Copyright Page Dedication Table of Contents List of figures List of tables List of contributors Acknowledgements List of abbreviations Introduction Chapter 1 Theorizing ritual, emotion, and material Chapter 2 Emotional display in the necropoli at Roman Thessalonike Chapter 3 Water Rites in the world of the New Testament: Archaeological Highlights Chapter 4 Water rites in Greek and Roman associations Chapter 5 Water rites, emotions, and epiphanic encounters in the literary and material record of the Roman east Chapter 6 Ritual experience and emotions: The right place for water rites in Luke-Acts Chapter 7 Early Christian ritual from the perspective of affect and emotion studies Chapter 8 Precious, powerful, and pernicious: The polyvalence of water and water symbolism in early Christianity Chapter 9 Scared disciples: Emotions of fear in Mark 4:35–41 and 6:45–52 Chapter 10 “Let the children be fed first” (Mark 7:27): Rituals, emotions, and identity in the Synoptic tradition Chapter 11 Water rites as structuring elements in ancient meals: An examination of foot washing in John 12 and 13 Chapter 12 Physical affect and ritual as starting points of Pauline paraenesis Conclusion Modern authors Subject index Ancient sources