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New from WLU Press:

 

Terence L. Donaldson, editor,

Religious Rivalries and the Struggle for Success in Caesarea Maritima

 

Paper $29.95
ISBN 0-88920-348-2
416 pages
June 2000

 

 

From the author...

Modern perception of religious life in the early centuries of the Roman empire is often hampered by the fact that we know too much. Specifically, we know how the story ended -- with the "triumph" of Christianity and the eventual Christianization of the Roman empire as a whole. But how would religious life have appeared to an observer at a time when the conversion of the emperor was only a Christian pipe-dream? And how would it have appeared from a close-up vantage point --not the generalized "Roman empire" as a whole, but this or that particular city within it?

This volume takes a detailed look at the religious dimension of life in one particular Roman city -- Caesarea Maritima, on the Mediterranean coast of Judea. Founded by a Jewish King (Herod the Great), in honour of his Roman patron (the emperor Augustus), on the site of an already-existing Hellenistic city (Strato's Tower), Caesarea was marked by a complex religious identity from the outset. The passage of time added to the diversity, as other religious groups -- including Christianity, Mithraism and Samaritanism --found a home in the city, where they jostled with each other, and with those already present, for position, influence and the means of survival. There has been increasing scholarly interest in Caesarea in recent years, spurred on by the rich archaeological evidence that continues to emerge.

This volume, written by a team of seasoned scholars and promising newcomers, not only represents the first full-scale study of the religious life of the city, it also brings a fresh angle of approach to the study of religion in antiquity generally. First, there is a deliberate attempt in each of the chapters to understand religion as an urban phenomenon and thus to examine it in its natural habitat -- the physical and social realia of the city itself. Second, religious groups are studied not in isolation but as part of a dynamic process of social interaction, spanning a spectrum from coexistence, through competition and rivalry, to open conflict. The cumulative result is a fresh and fascinating look at one of antiquity's most interesting cities.

From the Press...

Caesarea Maritima, a Graeco-Roman port city on the coast of modern Israel, numbered among the building projects of the Jewish king Herod (74-4 B.C.E.). Home of Jews, `Syrians,' and the earliest Gentile Christians, Caesarea was also headquarters of Roman governors and troops and thus abounded in pagan deities and their cultists. The same city harbored a numerous Samaritan community, famous Jewish rabbis, and, in the third century, the Christian academy and library of Origen. This was a cosmopolitan, maritime setting in which soldiers, navigators, and merchants from across the Mediterranean rubbed shoulders in streets, markets, and along the docks with Semitic- or Greek-speaking, locally rooted farmers, winesellers, stevedores, actresses, barbers, and bureaucrats. In places like Caesarea men and women of different groups contended face to face, slowly fashioning attitudes toward religious identity and strategies of group cohesion that still prevail today. Exploring these contentions in their urban setting, this book tells a fascinating and powerful story....Pagans, Samaritans, Jews, and Christians receive focused treatment, with emphasis on how each group interacted with the religious 'other.'

What others are saying...

"Professor Donaldson and his collaborators have crafted a wide-ranging but coherent study that merits careful attention from a broad readership interested in biblical studies, the history of religions, ancient urbanism, and processes of identity formation.'' -- Professor Kenneth G. Holum, University of Maryland, Co-director of the Combined Caesarea Expedition

About the author:

Terry Donaldson currently teaches at the University of Toronto, where he is the Lord and Lady Coggan Professor of New Testament Studies at Wycliffe College.

 

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