Jesus the Epic Hero

The Theology of Empress Eudocia’s Homeric Gospel

Inbunden, Engelska, 2022

AvKarl Olav Sandnes,Karl Olav Sandnes,Karl Olav Sandnes

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The ancient cento-genre was prone to be used on all kinds of subjects. New texts were created out of the classical epics. Empress Eudocia followed this practice and composed the story of Jesus in lines lifted almost verbatim from Homer’s epics. Jesus and his relevance to her audience is thus presented within the confines of style and vocabulary offered by the Iliad and Odyssey. The lines picked to convey her theology are often clustered around key Homeric motifs or type scenes, such as warfare, homecoming, feast, reconciliation, hospitality. Jesus waging war against all evil and Hades in particular runs throughout this Homeric and simultaneously biblical epic. The story starts in the Old Testament which is conceived as a divine counsel on Mt. Olympus where a plan to save sinful humanity is presented. The narrative then follows the biographic lines of the canonical gospels, with John’s Gospel holding pride of place in the way she renders and interprets the Jesus-story. The story told suspends both the geography and time of Jesus. Eudocia preaches the story she tells. She emerges in this poem as one of the most, if not the most prolific female theologian and preacher in the first Christian centuries.

Produktinformation

Utgivningsdatum2022-08-29
Mått157 x 237 x 22 mm
Vikt490 g
FormatInbunden
SpråkEngelska
Antal sidor206
FörlagBloomsbury Publishing Plc
ISBN9781666908626

Tillhör följande kategorier

Romarna inom Historia och arkeologi
Religion: allmänt inom Filosofi och religion
Konstböcker inom Kultur
Biblar inom Filosofi och religion
Kristendom inom Filosofi och religion

PrefaceAbbreviationsIntroductionChapter 1: A Homeric GospelChapter 2: A Divine Plan is ConceivedChapter 3: A Readers Guide: Chaps. 19–22Chapter 4: A Ministry that Is a Sign: Introducing the Sign-Miracle CycleChapter 5: Homeric Banquets and Feasting in the Sign-Miracle CycleChapter 6: Homeward Bound in the Sign-Miracle CycleChapter 7: Recognizing the Divine and Finding a Groom in the Sign-Miracle CycleChapter 8: Taking on Death/Hades in the Sign-Miracle CycleChapter 9: Feast and Eucharist in the Passion StoryChapter 10: The Battle: Overthrowing Hades in the Passion StoryChapter 11: “The Man Who Wrought Much Evil, Beyond the Others Together”: JudasConclusionBibliographyIndexAbout the Author

Over 1,000 years before Milton put classical epic to work to ‘assert eternal Providence and justify the ways of God to Man’ in Paradise Lost, there was Eudocia, who in retelling the Christian story of salvation with lines from Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey composed a theological poem of unusual communicative power. This is a woman—an empress, no less—who, as Karl Olav Sandnes puts it, insists on being heard, at a time of charged theological debate dominated by men. Sandnes presents Eudocia’s poem as an original, even idiosyncratic, interpretation of the Gospels that weaves together Christian and pre-Christian strands of tradition into one rich tapestry.