“He, who was like no other man, could not have been given to the world without the special design of Providence.” So wrote Arrian, a Greek historian, in the middle of the second century of our era of the amazing youth, Alexander of Macedon, who five centuries before had so effectually removed the barrier between East and West and written a chapter never to be overlooked by the historian anxious to trace the complicated story of the gradual development of “One World.” Of all Alexander's contributions, and they were many, it would not be difficult to present a strong case for the contention that none surpassed his act at the delta of the Nile in 332. He had come there to complete his preliminary campaign against the Achaemenidae — the sweeping of their fleet from the sea by the methodical and simple method of depriving them of all harbors and contact with the army to the east. This he did, but he did more. He founded a city, named for himself, which was destined to spread and make current coin the magic of Greek learning and with it her civilization to a degree unsurpassed, if indeed even paralleled, by any other centre.

Ammon was made known to old Greece by the Greeks of Cyrene, Kimon visited the oracle at Siwa, Pindar wrote a hymn to Ammon, and the Athenians made his cult public at some undetermined date earlier than 371/0 B.C. Like Sarapis, Ammon seems never to have been extremely popular; Isis out-did them both. Nevertheless Ammon arrived long before, the others: the preserved records happen to show that he was receiving sacrifices from the Athenian generals themselves in a year (333/2) when the cult of Isis, which we learn about then for the first time, was still a cult of immigrants. Why Ammon, alone of all Egyptian gods, should have succeeded thus early is no mystery: he had an oracle, and he had Greek intermediaries.

This is a study of the emotional context of certain medieval anti-Jewish legends. It examines how the stories redefined the composition of society, the relation of this to popular devotion, and the paradox between a religious intention and its effect. After a brief survey of the phenomenon, I suggest that recent views of the psychological sources of the legends do not adequately account for the religious experience that they promote, nor do these explanations sufficiently account for the way the legends encouraged and reinforced social habits—“ruts in the pathways of the mind” that encouraged the maintenance of conformity among members of society. Part one will examine how the libels could help people imagine more specifically the general hostility against Jews widely propagated after the First Crusade and how this superimposed a social uniformity on the town. Part two describes the emotional context of that violence in devotion to the passion of Christ. Part three considers the moral dilemma posed by the function of these legends in popular devotion. My goal is to account for the religious content of anti-Jewish legend and an ethical problem within medieval piety, for which reason it will be necessary to draw on the diverse literature that shaped medieval Christian culture, both learned and popular, from the twelfth century, when the legends first appeared in Europe, to the eve of the Reformation.

It seems agreed that κερδαίνω in the sense of ‘to win over an unbeliever to one's faith’ (I Cor. 9.19–22, I Pet. 3.1) or ‘to win back a sinner to the way of life required by his and your faith’ (Matt. 18.15) is an echter terminus technicus der Missions-sprache; by which is meant, apparently, that there is no precedent for this sense of the word in either Hellenistic or Rabbinic language. I wish to suggest that this view is not correct; and that the use of κερδαίνω in the passages in question, while conceivably reflecting a specifically Christian trend, is in the main determined by the Rabbinic vocabulary.

The “eclectic method” in NT textual criticism is one of several disguises for the broad and basic problem of the “canons of criticism” or of the “criteria for originality” as applied to the various readings in the NT textual tradition, and in a real sense eclectic methodology—in its several forms as currently practised—is as much a symptom of basic problems in the discipline as it is a proposed and widely applied solution to those problems. By the same token, perhaps every methodological approach and even every discussion of methodology in NT textual criticism could be described as symptomatic of the problems; yet the eclectic method seems in a particularly pointed way to veil the problems of the discipline, for by its very nature it tries in one way or another to utilize all available approaches to textual problems, and in a single given case of seeking the original text it often wishes to apply to the problem several established text-critical criteria, even if these criteria have the appearance of being mutually exclusive or contradictory.

Exegetes are probably no less prone than anybody else to long for something mathematical, something clearly right or wrong, in their discipline. It is thus hardly surprising that in recent years at least two attempts have been made to examine, on a purely objective statistical basis, the disputed question of synoptic relationships.1 It is our intention in this paper to comment briefly on these two studies and to add new figures to the discussion.

Shortly before his death Professor Nock asked me to arrange publication of the following lecture on Gnosticism (which had been read at the Harvard Divinity School and elsewhere). Of several unfinished lectures and papers he wished it alone to be printed. Anyone who knows his work or who could have seen the mass of material which he had already collected to supplement and annotate this paper will understand the hesitations which such a perfectionist must have overcome in order to authorize its appearance in so incomplete a form. He was clearly preparing to transform it into a major article with full augmentation and reference to other work. Though it remains only a sketch, however, it presents his final evaluation of a subject to which he had devoted frequent attention in articles and reviews for almost forty years. A few months before his death he wrote an important summary of recent work and of his own views on early gentile Christianity as an introduction to the recent paperback reprint of Early Gentile Christianity and Its Hellenistic Background (Harper Torchbooks, 1964). There he said that Gnosticism “may fairly be called the crucial issue today in the study of early Christianity.” In his brief discussion the present lecture was evidently very much in his mind.

Philo, professionally, was not a teacher of philosophy. He was a preacher, a preacher on biblical topics, who dispensed his philosophic thoughts in the form of sermons. And because he was not professionally a teacher of philosophy, some modern students of his works say that he was not a philosopher. For nowadays, as we all know, to be called philosopher one must be ordained and one must be hired to teach philosophy and one must also learn to discuss certain hoary problems as if they were plucked yesterday out of the air. Some say that Philo was an eclectic. But there is one eminent authority who would begrudge him even the title of eclectic without further qualification, for, after all, eclecticism is the name of a reputable system in ancient Greek philosophy. The eclecticism of Philo, our eminent authority says, “is that of the jackdaw rather than the philosopher.” But, while we may deny Philo the honorific title of philosopher, with the privilege of wearing ostentatiously a special garb like that affected by ancient Greek philosophers, we cannot deny him the humbler and more modest title of religious philosopher. As such, Philo was the first who tried to reduce the narratives and laws and exhortations of Scripture to a coherent and closely knit system of thought and thereby produced what may be called scriptural philosophy in contradistinction to pagan Greek philosophy.

The question of how different gnostic Christians interpreted and practiced sacraments — so long limited to the sparse references in the anti-gnostic writers — is being reexamined in the light of recently available gnostic documents. Yet one source long available — the fragments of Heracleon that Origen cites in his own Commentary on John — yields evidence that Heracleon not only interprets the sacraments in terms of Valentinian theology, but also criticized, from this theological standpoint, the sacramental theology and practice of the “great church.” Heracleon's sacramental theology, however, has escaped the notice of those researchers that have limited their investigation to the quoted fragments themselves. Analysis of Origen's commentary as a whole reveals that other statements of Heracleon's doctrine frequently appear apart from the direct quotations. Such statements, recognizable by their concurrence of terminology and doctrine with the quoted fragments, Origen introduces as the opinion of “the heterodox,” 3 or “those who introduce the doctrine of natures,” or in the voice of the imaginary interlocutor. As Heracleon is his principal protagonist, these often set forth his views. Extending our methodology to include investigation of Origen's arguments — which are characteristically structured, in the John commentary, to refute Heracleon's allegations — we discover in the extant debate evidence for a Valentinian theology of baptism and the eucharist.

Mark 4:1–8:26 is a compositional unit whose external boundaries are determined by its internal structure. Because neither this structure nor the unit it defines has been observed previously I shall concentrate on them, dealing with other views of Mark's composition only when they are relevant to my argument. My purpose is to identify the compositional structure of Mark 4:1–8:26, and to point to some of the hermeneutical implications of the structure. The method to be followed is composition-critical to the extent that it is concerned both with the segmentation of the narrative into its constituent units and with their arrangement as a key to their significance in their Markan literary context. I acknowledge that most of these units originated in pre-Markan traditions, some of which may have been accessible to Mark in the form of collections, and that Mark's dependence upon such material determines the hermeneutical problem of his narrative. This problem can be expressed either as the question of the author's investment in his material or as the question of the literary significance of the once preliterary material. Because the answer to the former question is necessarily an inference from the answer to the latter, my orientation is to the latter, namely, to the question of the relevance of the compositional structure of Mark 4:1–8:26 for understanding the compositional significance of its parts.

In light of our present knowledge it seems clear that the Essenes, despite all their intentions to be “true Israel,” in fact constituted a digression from the Judaism of their times, both in their mode of life and in certain of their basic concepts. As to their concepts, one can think of dualism, determinism, astrology, manticism, and perhaps also their highly developed hierarchical angelology; as to their modes of life, illustrations include their extreme segregation, their living in communes, common property, common meals, solar calendar, and baptism as a principal part of their ritual. Many attempts have been made to trace these traits within the Stoa, Cynicism, and Neopythagoreanism, as well as in the Persian religon. Some have been content with comparing the Essenes to other sects of the Hellenistic era. In the following pages I assume the well-established theory of the identity of the Essenes depicted in Philo and Josephus with the community of the Qumran scrolls and propose to show that the accounts of Philo and Josephus did not contain commonplace topoi of classical Utopias.

The April before he delivered his address at the Divinity School, Emerson had traveled into Cambridge to discuss “theism” with some of the Divinity School students. Although he was not usually reluctant to let his views be known, he went to this meeting “rather heavy-hearted,” fearing that what he had to say about theism would not be warmly received. “I always find,” he confessed, “that my views chill or shock people at the first opening.” But this conversation must have gone well. Emerson came away from it “cheered,” and remembered one point that seemed to impress the students favorably:

In the literature of Judaism and Christianity ‘evil eye’ is a term for niggardliness. This probably is a usage independent of the term ‘evil eye’ of magic. It belongs rather to that nomenclature of what I may call physiological psychology that is so conspicuous, especially in the Old Testament. Emotions are located in different parts of the anatomy — pity in the bowels, anger in the nostrils, and so forth. The eye is, among other things, the seat of niggardliness as in the phrase of the book of Tobit: “Let not thine eye be grudging when thou doest alms.”

Diocletian, as we all know, included religion in his schemes for the regeneration of the Roman State and put forward a new formulation of paganism, by which he placed himself under the special protection of Jupiter, while his fellow Augustus, Maximian, stood under the protection of Hercules, and the Caesars, Galerius and Constantius Chlorus, appointed in A.D. 293, owned as patrons Mars and Sol respectively. Several aspects of the new religious policy have already been sufficiently emphasized. It was definitely conservative, in that Diocletian did not, like AureKan, claim for the Eastern Sun-God the ‘dominatus imperii Romani,’ but went back to the traditional chief god of Rome — Jupiter, ‘the Best and Greatest.’ It was in accordance with the spirit of an age, which was learning more and more to conceive of the divine powers as companions and preservers (‘conservatores’ and ‘comites’) of the rulers. It took account of the new configuration of the Empire under the Tetrarchy of Diocletian and his colleagues. The divine sphere was to be rounded off, to represent the earthly. And we may add, in all probability, that account was taken of the very Roman conception of the Genius, the spirit of life in the individual, and that Diocletian and Maximian, when they took the titles of Jovius and Herculius, meant to suggest that, though they were not actually identified with Jupiter and Hercules, they bore in themselves the spirit of the two gods. It is tempting to suppose that the ‘Iovi Augg.’ of the coins was intended to suggest just this. The idea would be helped out by the fact that the spirit of the individual woman was actually called ‘Juno.’ I want, in this little paper, to suggest yet another consideration, not quite so obvious and not quite so well observed, that may have entered into the calculations of Diocletian.

“I will not return evil to anybody, with good will I pursue man, for with God rests the judgment of every living being and he is the one to repay man for his deeds. … And the trial of a man of perdition I will not handle until the Day of Vengeance. But my anger I will not turn away from the men of deceit, and I will not be content until He has established judgment.” 1 QS x, 17-20.

Hebrews 13.9–14 is among the most difficult passages of the entire New Testament. Here, in the context of a warning against “diversified and foreign doctrines” (διδαξαì πoικíλαι καì ξεναι), a Christological argument occurs (13.11-12). It is obviously the intention of the writer to ground his objection to the “foreign doctrines” on this Christological basis. But the character of the doctrines opposed in these verses has remained an enigma to commentators inasmuch as the function of the Christological argument in this polemical setting has not been recognized clearly. However, a closer examination of the Old Testament passage which underlies the Christological argument in Hebrews 13.11 may provide a key for a fresh solution of the complex problems of this passage.

Critical scholarship on the Hebrew Bible a hundred years ago held a much lower estimation of the role of law in the religion of ancient Israel and of the value of biblical law than do scholars today. Julius Wellhausen, for example, whose work was the most influential of the nineteeth century, maintained that in its creative period, Israel had no law, but only “usage and tradition” which “were looked on to a large extent as the institution of the Deity.” Thus, the prophets, whom Wellhausen stressed, did not preach out of any legal tradition in his view, but rather “out of the spirit which judges all things and itself is judged of no man.” In their canonical shape, however, the materials ancient Israel bequeathed us are so strongly nomistic that even Wellhausen could not deny that at a certain point law became central, displacing the spirit. That point marks the transition from Israelite religion to something new called “Judaism,” which is distinguished by the idea of a written Torah. Judaism, in Wellhausen's theory, represents the senility of Israel, for “a body of traditional practice should only be written down when it is threatening to die out, and … a book should be, as it were, the ghost of a life which is closed.” This transition from usage to codified law reflects a fundamental change in the nature of the relationship of God and Israel, a change from a purely natural relationship to one of covenant.

In his seminal 1968 study of Francis Bacon's political thought, Howard B. White argued that the New Atlantis is “a rewriting of a Platonic myth, and a rewriting clearly intended as a refutation.” Bacon's attack on Plato, however, is partially mediated through his critique of Christianity. Indeed, Bacon pays more explicit attention to the tropes and themes of revealed religion than he does to those of the story of the “old” Atlantis told in Plato's Timaeus and Critias. Scholars are divided as to the exact nature of Bacon's intentions in his treatment of religion in the New Atlantis. Richard Tuck suggests that “the desire for a reconstructed religion” is “explicit in the blend of Protestantism and Judaism” created by Bacon. Most scholars, however, unlike Tuck, argue that Bacon was more interested in undermining religion—or more specifically, its political authority—than in reconstructing it. Laurence Lampert's argument that Bacon stands at the head of “the actual holy war fought in Europe . . ., the warfare of science against religion that tamed sovereign religion” typifies much of the scholarly commentary on the New Atlantis since White's reading of it almost forty years ago. The consensus view is that Bacon promotes the politic manipulation of the tropes and themes of revealed religion so that they might be made to support the modern scientific project and the cause of peace from religious strife: “Bacon's lifelong concern for religion uniformly expressed itself in arguments for moderation in religion.” White argues that Bacon demonstrates how “religious turmoil” can be countered “not only by religious toleration, but also by religious eclecticism, amounting to religious universality.”

In the middle of the twentieth century biblical scholars claimed the unity of the human person as the core of biblical anthropology.1 The Hebrew term , “life,” “person,” was no longer to be translated as “soul,” and the best English equivalent for the Greek ψυχή was “person.” In the seventies and eighties, on both sides of the Atlantic, the pendulum swung even further, to the point of favoring the body. In Paris, in the École Pratique des Hautes Études, Pierre Geoltrain offered a lecture course on the “body” in several texts of the New Testament, while in the United States Dale Martin worked on his book published under the title The Corinthian Body.2 In Geneva, where expression corporelle had become a form of instruction in dance and eurhythmic practice at the Institut Jaques-Dalcroze, some New Testament scholars incorporated bodily experience into their understanding of biblical passages.3 It was also this time that saw—in the secular realm—the creation of “body shops” and the continuous care of one's own body. With Merleau-Ponty we can say that this recent period witnesses a rediscovery of the body.4