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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 24 October 2008
The religionsgeschichtliche Schule, born in Germany towards the end of the XIXth century, rapidly met with considerable success throughout the world of scholarship. It reached its zenith during the first decennia of the present century, when it played a leading part in the study of Christian origins, and began to fall out of favour shortly after World War I. Alfred Loisy's Les Mystères païens et le mystère chrétien, first published in 1919 and re-edited in 1930, represents one of its most significant and also one of its last productions. Very few scholars, if any, would be willing nowadays to enlist under its banner. And yet there can be little doubt that this school, despite its obvious shortcomings and unwarranted systematisations, has, in its time, done the cause of learning signal service.
page 136 note 1 ‘L'Hermétisme’, , Revue Biblique, 1926, p. 264.Google Scholar
page 136 note 2 The so-called mythological school, which denies the historicity of the figure of Jesus, and whose publications always cause a sensation among the ill-informed public, may be considered, at least in its more recent forms, an outgrowth of the religionsgeschichtliche Schule. It makes abundant use of the comparison between early Christianity and the mystery religions and considers Jesus as just one among many mythical saviours: cf. Couchoud, P. L., Le Dieu Jésus, Paris, 1951.Google Scholar
page 137 note 1 ‘Avec un langage tout différent de celui de Jésus, Paul retrouve les affirmations essentielles de son Maître’: Trocmé, E., Histoire des Religions (Encyclopédie de la Pléiade), II, Paris, 1972, p. 214.Google Scholar
page 137 note 2 Cf. Jüngel, E., Paulus und Jesus, 3rd ed., Tubingen, 1967Google Scholar: Blank, J., Paulas und Jesus, München, 1968.Google Scholar
page 137 note 3 Cf. amongst others, J., Murphy O'Connor (ed.), Paul and Qumran, London, 1968.Google Scholar It must not, however, be forgotten that the Essene movement itself was, perhaps deeply, influenced by non-Jewish thought.
page 137 note 4 Bousset, W., Kyrios Christos, Göttingen, 1913.Google Scholar
page 138 note 1 Gesammelte Aufsätze zur Kirchengeschichte, II, I, Tübingen, 1927, p. 20.Google Scholar
page 138 note 2 Geschichte der paulinischen Forschung, Tübingen, 1911, p. 152.Google Scholar
page 138 note 3 Op. cit. p. 151.
page 139 note 1 ‘Das christliche Mysterium und die heidnischen Mysterien’, Eranos Jahrbwfh, 1944, p. 356.Google Scholar
page 139 note 2 Justin Martyr, addressing Antoninus and his imperial associates and speaking of the Mithraic meal, alludes to the words pronounced on that occasion which, he says, ‘you know or may learn’, obviously without being initiated: I Apol., 66, 4.
page 139 note 3 Cf. Dunand, F., Le Culte d'Isis dans letassin oriental de la Méditerranée, III, Leiden, 1973, p. 251, n. 2.Google Scholar
page 139 note 4 I have discussed this point in my contribution to the forthcoming W. D. Davies Festschrift.
page 140 note 1 Paul, pp. 119 ff. Cf. Schweitzer, A., Die Mystik des Apostels Paulus, pp. 13 ff.Google Scholar
page 140 note 2 Cf. Martyr, Justin, I Apol., 66,Google Scholar 4; Dialogue, 70, 1; 78, 6; Tertullian, , De praescr. haeret., 40.Google Scholar
page 140 note 3 Mystères, p. 348.
page 141 note 1 De errore profan, relig., 22, 3.
page 141 note 2 Cf. for instance Prümm, K., Religionsgeschichtliches Handbuch für den Raum der altchristlichen Umwelt, Freiburg-Breisg., 1943, pp. 330 ff.Google Scholar and, as regards possible Jewish influences, Kittel, R., Die hellenistischen Mysterienreligionen und das alte Testament, Stuttgart, 1924.Google Scholar An influence of the mysteries on Hellenistic Judaism is much more likely: cf. Cerfaux, L., ‘Influence des mystères sur le judaïsme alexandrin avant Philon’, Recueil Lucien Cerfaux, I, Gembloux, 1954, pp. 65–112,Google Scholar and the debatable views developed by Goodenough, E. R. in By Light, Light. The Mystic Gospel of Hellenistic Judaism, New Haven, 935.Google Scholar
page 141 note 3 Cf. for instance K. Holl, op. cit. p. 7.
page 142 note 1 Geschichte, p. 151.
page 143 note 1 Metam. xi, 23.
page 143 note 2 The meal mentioned in Metam. xi, 24 as taking place on two successive days is just a joyful banquet which follows the initiation; it is no integral part of it and seems to be a semi-religious and semi-profane function: Apuleius describes it in turn as suaves epulae, faceta convivia, jentaeulum religiosum.
