Dying for God by Daniel Boyarin - ISBN: 9780804736176
Hardcover
Explores the relationship between Christianity and Judaism in late antiquity, especially around the issue of martyrdom. Through readings of contemporary Christian and Talmudic texts, the author shows how the discourse of martyrology involved the exchange of cultural and religious innovations.

Dying for God

Martyrdom and the Making of Christianity and Judaism

  • Hardcover

    268 pages

  • Release Date

    1 November 1999

Summary

Not long ago, everyone knew that Judaism came before Christianity. More recently, scholars have begun to recognize that the historical picture is quite a bit more complicated than that. In the Jewish world of the first century, many sects competed for the name of the true Israel and the true interpreter of the Torah the Talmud itself speaks of seventy and the form of Judaism that was to be the seedbed of what eventually became the Christian Church was but one of these many sects. Scholars …

Book Details

ISBN-13:9780804736176
ISBN-10:0804736170
Author:Daniel Boyarin
Publisher:Stanford University Press
Imprint:Stanford University Press
Format:Hardcover
Number of Pages:268
Release Date:1 November 1999
Weight:544g
Dimensions:229mm x 152mm
Series:Figurae: Reading Medieval Culture
What They're Saying

Critics Review

“Daniel Boyarin has done it again. With this book … he has again provoked, challenged, and enlightened us. With his usual clear, crisp, and sometimes sharp-edged writing, with his consistently critical engagement of ancient primary and modern and postmodern secondary interpretive texts and theories, Boyarin has forced us to think again and in some respects in radically different ways and on radically different terms about…the ‘making’ of Christianity and Judiasm.” - Journal of the American Academy of Religion “This is a rich, stimulating and compelling work. Boyarin’s writing is complex and full fo irony and humor… It is fascinating and, like a good drama, draws the reader in as if to solve a mystery… Even those how are not in the field of ancient Judiasm … will find much of interest in this book.” - Hebrew Studies “This volume highlights new developments in understanding Christian and Jewish origins. It is intended to be the beginning of a new investigation of the religious histories of rabbinic Jews and Christians in late antiquity. It is, according to Boyarin, to be read more as a series of hypotheses than as a series of conclusions. Nevertheless it is a very exciting publication… I find the central thesis compelling, even astonishing, but quite exhilirating. We are much indebted to someone who has the vision to see the past in ways most of us never fully envisaged.” - Journal of Beliefs & Values “ … [This] book is especially worthwhile for anyone interested in the evolution of Christian and Jewish self-understanding in Late Antiquity.” - Religious Studies Review “Boyarin tells this story with grace and impressive erudition. Previously unnoticed connections are established that shed rich light on the developments under study. Boyarin has placed the separation of Judaism and Christianity into the historical context of real people attempting to understand themselves and one another, and the once-familiar story will never again look the same. He is to be congratulated for a valuable contribution.” - The Jewish Quarterly Review

About The Author

Daniel Boyarin

Daniel Boyarin is Taubman Professor of Talmudic Culture at the University of California, Berkeley. He is the author of several books, most recently Unheroic Conduct: The Rise of Heterosexuality and the Invention of the Jewish Man.

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