What is the role of scepticism in the religious landscape of the ancient Mediterranean? How is doubt expressed within a religious community? How does »insider doubt« differ from the sceptical attitude of outsiders? The essays in this volume explore these questions with respect to a range of ancient religious contexts.
What are the roles of doubt and scepticism in the religious landscape of the ancient Mediterranean? How is doubt expressed within a specific religious community, and what reactions does it provoke? How does »insider doubt« differ from the sceptical attitude of outsiders? Exploring these questions with respect to a wide range of religious contexts and topics (including early Christianity, Greco-Roman religions, Egyptian religions, astrology, and magic), the essays in this volume confirm the thesis that doubting one's own religious tradition is not simply a »Western« post-Enlightenment phenomenon. On the contrary, ancient religions offered opportunities and contexts wherein aspects of doubt are not just tolerated but accepted; moreover, doubt and scepticism concerning certain religious ideas or aspects of belief also motivated creative reinterpretation of those ideas.
Table of contents:
Clifford Ando: Disbelief and Cognate Concepts in Roman Antiquity -
Jan Assmann: Ancient Egyptian Disbelief in the Promises of Eternity -
Tim Whitmarsh: The Invention of Atheism and the Invention of Religion in Classical Athens -
Jan N. Bremmer: Youth, Atheism, and (Un)Belief in Late Fifth-Century Athens -
Matthew A. Fox: Disbelief in Rome: A Reappraisal -
Babett Edelmann-Singer: »Who Will Worship This Man as a God, Who Will Believe in Him?« - Seneca's
Apocolocyntosis and the Hermeneutical Categories of Belief and Scepticism in Emperor Cult -
Kai Trampedach: Plutarch als Apologet des Orakels von Delphi -
Janet Downie: Belief and Doubt in Aelius Aristides's
Isthmian Oration: To Poseidon - Inger N.I. Kuin: Loukianos Atheos? Humour and Religious Doubt in Lucian of Samosata -
Tobias Nicklas: Skepsis und Christusglaube: Funktionen, Räume und Impulse des Zweifels bei Paulus -
David P. Moessner: Luke as Sceptical »Insider« - Re-configuring the »Tradition« by Re-figuring the »Synoptic« Plot -
Benjamin Schliesser: The Gospel for Sceptics: Doubting Thomas (John 20:24-29) and Early Christian Identity Formation -
Anna Van den Kerchove: »Why Do You Doubt?« - Scepticism and Some Nag Hammadi Writings -
Richard L. Gordon: Evading Doubt: Astrology and Magic in the Greco-Roman Period
