Greek Religion and Culture, the Bible and the Ancient Near East

by Bremmer, Jan N.

• ISBN13: 9789004164734
• ISBN10: 9004164731
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2008-04-15
• Publisher: Brill Academic Pub

Summary

This book greatly enhances our knowledge of the interrelationship of Greek religion & culture and the Ancient Near East by offering important analyses of Greek myths, divinities and terms like 'magic' and 'paradise', but also of the Greek contribution to the Christian notion of atonement.

Author Biography

Jan N. Bremmer is professor of Religious Studies at the University of Groningen.

Table of Contents

Preface	p. ix
Acknowledgements	p. xv
Conventions and Abbreviations	p. xvii
Canonical and Alternative Creation Myths	p. 1
Pandora or the Creation of a Greek Eve	p. 19
The Birth of Paradise	p. 35
The First Crime: Brothers and Fratricide in the Ancient Mediterranean	p. 57
Greek Fallen Angels: Kronos and the Titans	p. 73
Near Eastern and Native Traditions in Apollodorus' Account of the Flood	p. 101
Don't Look Back: From the Wife of Lot to Orpheus and Eurydice	p. 117
Balaam, Mopsus and Melampous: Tales of Travelling Seers	p. 133
Hebrew Lishkah and Greek Lesche	p. 153
The Scapegoat between Northern Syria, Hittites, Israelites, Greeks and Early Christians	p. 169
Close Encounters of the Third Kind: Heliodorus in the Temple and Paul on the Road to Damascus	p. 215
Persian Magoi and the Birth of the Term 'Magic'	p. 235
Anaphe, Apollo Aigletes and the Origin of Asclepius	p. 249
Attis: A Greek God in Anatolian Pessinous and Catullan Rome	p. 267
The Myth of the Golden Fleece	p. 303
Genesis 1.1: A Jewish Response to a Persian Challenge?	p. 339
Magic and Religion?	p. 347
The Spelling and Meaning of the Name Megabyxos	p. 353
Bibliography	p. 357
Index of Names, Subjects and Passages	p. 401
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