Teachers and Texts in the Ancient World: Philosophers, Jews and Christians

by Snyder,H. Greg

• ISBN13: 9780415217668
• ISBN10: 0415217660
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Nonspecific Binding
• Copyright: 2000-09-15
• Publisher: Routledge

Summary

Teachers and Texts in the Ancient Worldpresents a comprehensive and accessible survey of religious and philosophical teaching and classroom practices in the ancient world. Snyder synthesizes a wide range of ancient evidence and modern scholarship to address such questions as how the literary practices of Jews and Christians compared to the literary practices of the philosophical schools and whether Christians were particularly noteworthy for their attachment to scripture.

Author Biography

H. Gregory Snyder is Assistant Professor of Religion at Davidson College, North Carolina

Table of Contents

List of plates	x
Preface	xi
List of abbreviations	xiv
General introduction	1	(13)
``Not subjects of a despot'': Stoics	14	(31)
``Things handed down to us'': re-presented texts	15	(3)
``See how well I read'': texts in use	18	(22)
Conclusions	40	(5)
``Salvation through each other'': Epicureans	45	(21)
A few books between friends: the collection and distribution of written texts	46	(4)
Snakes in the garden: pseudepigraphy and textual criticism	50	(3)
Veritas, brevitas: epitomes	53	(3)
``Mali verborum interpretes'': translation and commentary	56	(1)
``Most 'scruciating idle'': the use (and non-use) of books	57	(4)
The rhetoric of stone: the inscription of Diogenes of Oenoanda	61	(2)
Conclusions	63	(3)
A library lost and found: Peripatetics	66	(27)
Aristotle redux: Andronicus	67	(2)
Jots and tittles: pseudepigraphy, textual criticism, and corpus organization	69	(6)
Commentaries simple and complex	75	(7)
Pseudo-Aristotelians at work: epitomes and paraphrases	82	(4)
``It was discussed'': texts in use	86	(5)
Conclusions	91	(2)
Books beneath a plane tree: Platonists	93	(29)
Arranging according to wisdom: strategies for reading	94	(6)
``Readers by themselves'': commentary	100	(7)
Cliff notes meets the Timaeus: epitomes and handbooks	107	(4)
``For three days ...'': texts in use	111	(7)
Conclusions	118	(4)
Jewish and Christian groups	122	(96)
General introduction	122	(1)
Laws transcendent and dazzling: Philo of Alexandria	123	(15)
``A continuous flood of instruction'': Philo the teacher	127	(9)
Conclusions	136	(2)
Books among the sons of light: Qumran	138	(27)
The community	139	(1)
``The interpretation concerns ...'': pesher commentary	140	(7)
Targum: translating scripture	147	(1)
Texts ``at home and away'': abbreviations and anthologies	148	(3)
``How lovely are her eyes'': re-presented Bible	151	(5)
``All night long'': study contexts at Qumran	156	(3)
Why so much writing at Qumran?	159	(6)
Texts and text-brokers: Judaism in Palestine	165	(24)
Of young girls and virgins: translating the Bible (Greek)	166	(4)
``His eyes were not red'': translating the Bible (Aramaic)	170	(3)
``Dew from the ice of Paradise'': re-presented Bible	173	(5)
``Find, open, read, observe'': texts in use	178	(3)
Textual experts: scribes	181	(8)
``Unless someone guides me'': Christian groups	189	(29)
The demands of performance and the form of texts	190	(4)
``As when present, so when absent'': Paul as teacher and text-broker	194	(12)
``Not as a teacher'': the Epistle of Barnabas as anthology and commentary	206	(6)
Christians and the codex	212	(2)
Conclusions	214	(4)
General conclusions	218	(10)
Teachers and texts: a model	223	(5)
Appendix: What did Thaumasius want?	228	(2)
Notes	230	(60)
Bibliography	290	(31)
Index	321