Theology

This volume contributes to the reconstruction of the history of ancient Christians on the basis of an exemplary selection of Greek inscriptions. Fifteen essays discussing inscriptions from Asia Minor and Greece offer striking insights into the lives, beliefs, and diversity of Christian communities that literary sources largely pass over.

Mark S. Smith maps four decades of Psalms research, foregrounding cultural contexts, pilgrimage motifs, and embodied emotion. He explores genre-bending poetics and argues for the Psalter as a carefully composed whole, shaped by its Levitical compilers and structured like an opera in five movements.

Philippa Townsend argues that early Christian sacrificial ideas were shaped by a widespread discursive association between ethnicity and sacrifice in ancient Mediterranean texts. Christians used sacrificial rhetoric to establish and perpetuate their identity as a people in ways that have shaped modern ideas about race and religion.

Matthew Percuoco offers an analysis of the final four chapters of the book of Samuel. Drawing upon the research on the use of various literary devices in biblical scholarship, he proposes that the six sections that comprise 2 Samuel 21-24 serve as a miniature replica of the book of Samuel, which reflects the content and major themes of the book.