1st Edition
Eschatology in Antiquity Forms and Functions
This collection of essays explores the rhetoric and practices surrounding views on life after death and the end of the world, including the fate of the individual, apocalyptic speculation and hope for cosmological renewal, in a wide range of societies from Ancient Mesopotamia to the Byzantine era.
The 42 essays by leading scholars in each field explore the rich spectrum of ways in which eschatological understanding can be expressed, and for which purposes it can be used. Readers will gain new insight into the historical contexts, details, functions and impact of eschatological ideas and imagery in ancient texts and material culture from the twenty-fifth century BCE to the ninth century CE. Traditionally, the study of “eschatology” (and related concepts) has been pursued mainly by scholars of Jewish and Christian scripture. By broadening the disciplinary scope but remaining within the clearly defined geographical milieu of the Mediterranean, this volume enables its readers to note comparisons and contrasts, as well as exchanges of thought and transmission of eschatological ideas across Antiquity. Cross-referencing, high quality illustrations and extensive indexing contribute to a rich resource on a topic of contemporary interest and relevance.
Eschatology in Antiquity is aimed at readers from a wide range of academic disciplines, as well as non-specialists including seminary students and religious leaders. The primary audience will comprise researchers in relevant fields including Biblical Studies, Classics and Ancient History, Ancient Philosophy, Ancient Near Eastern Studies, Art History, Late Antiquity, Byzantine Studies and Cultural Studies. Care has been taken to ensure that the essays are accessible to undergraduates and those without specialist knowledge of particular subject areas.
List of figures
List of tables
List of contributors
Acknowledgements
List of abbreviations
Introduction
Helen Van Noorden, Hilary Marlow and Karla Pollmann
Section 1: Ancient Near East and Hebrew Bible
1 Beyond the Future: Mesopotamian Perceptions of the Very End
Dina Katz
2 Individual and Universal Eschatology in Zoroastrianism
Leon Goldman
3 Egyptian Oracles and the Afterlife
Alexandre Loktionov
4 Eschatology in the Book of Isaiah: Multiple Perspectives on the Promised Times
Uta Schmidt
5 "As I Looked": Visionary Experiences and Conceptions of Place in the Book of Ezekiel
Hilary Marlow
6 Daniel and Daniel Apocalyptica
Lester L. Grabbe
Section 2: Greek World
7 Beyond the Stream of the Ocean: Hades, the Aethiopians and the Homeric eschata
George A. Gazis
8 ‘Orphic’ Eschatologies? Varying Visions
of the Afterlife in Greek Thought
Radcliffe Edmonds
9 Eschatological Visions in Pindar and Empedocles
Chiara R. Ciampa
10 Plato’s Myths, the Soul and its Intra-cosmic Future
Alex Long
11 Contemplating the End of Roman Power: Polybius' Histories in Context
Nicolas Wiater
Section 3: Jewish Texts of the Hellenistic and Roman Periods
12 Protology and Eschatology in the Enochic Traditions
Gabriele Boccaccini
13 Dreams and Visions of Eschatological Trees in The Book of the Watchers (1 Enoch 1-36)
Frances Flannery
14 Apocalyptic Eschatology in the Dead Sea Scrolls: The End as Counter-Cultural Discourse on Society and Creation
Albert Hogeterp
15 Returning from the Diaspora of the Soul: Eschatology in Philo of Alexandria
Sami Yli-Karjanmaa
16 End Times and Ending Times in 4 Ezra
Carla Sulzbach
17 Eschatology in the Early Jewish Pseudepigrapha and the Early Christian Apocrypha
Lorenzo DiTommaso
Section 4: Etruscan and Roman Worlds
18 Etruscan eschata
L. Bouke van der Meer
19 Hope and Empire in Ciceronian Eschatology
Jed W. Atkins
20 Lucretius ‘On the Nature of Things’: Eschatology in an Age of Anxiety
Alessandro Schiesaro
21 Eschatological Temporalities in Vergil’s Elysium
Giovanna Laterza
22 The End is the Beginning is the End: Apocalyptic Beginnings in Augustan Poetry
Elena Giusti
23 Eschatology in Seneca: The Senses of an Ending
Gareth Williams
24 Enduring Death and Remembering the Apocalypse: Identity, Timespace, and Lucanian Paradoxes
Katharine M. Earnshaw
25 Popular Eschatological Visions in the Roman Empire
Jerry Toner
26 Four Eschatological Emperors: Augustus, Nero, Vespasian and Hadrian
Christopher Star
Section 5: New Testament texts
27 The End of the Temple or the End of the World? 1st Century Eschatology in the Gospels of Mark and Matthew
Sarah Underwood Dixon
28 The End—What and When? Eschatology in Luke-Acts
Steve Walton
29 Eschatology in the Gospel of John and the Johannine Epistles
Jörg Frey
30 Eschatology—Pauline and Catholic Epistles
Eve-Marie Becker
31 The Book of Revelation: The Apocalypse of Jesus Christ
Christopher Rowland
Section 6: Late Antiquity and Byzantine World
32 Eschatology in Origen from Alexandria
Anders-Christian Jacobsen
33 Eschatology in Early Christian Poetry
Nikolaus Klassen
34 The Eschatological Thought of Basil the Great and Gregory of Nyssa
Sergey Trostyanskiy
35 Knowing One’s Place: Eschatological Thought in Augustine
Karla Pollmann
36 Eschatological Motifs and Patterns of Thought in Christian Hagiography
Peter Gemeinhardt
37 Syriac Eschatology in Antiquity
Witold Witakowski
38 Eschatology and Anti-Jewish Polemic: Examples from the Armenian Tradition
Zaroui Pogossian
39 Early Muslim Apocalypses and their Origins
David Cook
40 Christian Eschatology in Late Antique/Byzantine Egypt
David Frankfurter
41 Symbols, Icons, Liturgy: Eschatology in Early Christian Art
Vladimir Cvetkovic
42 Eschatology in the Apocalyptic Revival in Judaism (6th-9th centuries CE) in its Historical Context
Philip Alexander
Index of names and subjects
Biography
Hilary Marlow is Fellow, Director of Studies and Tutor at Girton College, Cambridge, UK, and teaches Hebrew Bible in the Faculty of Divinity, University of Cambridge, UK. Her research interests include nature in the Hebrew Bible, ecology and the Bible and prophetic texts of the Hebrew Bible. She is author of Biblical Prophets and Contemporary Environmental Ethics (2009) and numerous articles and essays.
Karla Pollmann is Dean of the Faculty of Arts at the University of Bristol, UK, and Professor of Classics and Theology. She is also an honorary member of the University of Aarhus, Denmark, and the University of Stellenbosch, South Africa, and a Distinguished Visiting Fellow at Green College, UBC, Vancouver, Canada. Her research interests span Classical and Late Antique literature and culture, and their reception. In 2020, she was awarded a Humboldt Research Prize in recognition of her internationally leading work. Major publications include The Oxford Guide to the Historical Reception of Augustine, 3 vols (2013) as Editor-in-Chief, and The Baptized Muse (2017).
Helen Van Noorden is Senior Lecturer in Classics and Wrigley Fellow at Girton College, Cambridge, UK, and in 2020–2022 is Associate Professor and AIAS-COFUND Fellow at the Aarhus Institute of Advanced Studies, Denmark. She is the author of Playing Hesiod: the ‘Myth of the Races’ in Classical Antiquity (2015). Her current focus is a monograph study and translation of Books 3–5 of the Sibylline Oracles.
"[N]ot only does Eschatology in Antiquity provide an up-to-date examination of specific eschatological texts/themes/materials from across antiquity, it also creates a unique opportunity for comparison and contrast across an extensive breadth of cultural and historical milieux.... The significance of this volume’s unique scope cannot be overstated and should be considered the culmination of several recent trends in eschatological scholarship... [T]he volume is highly accessible to both non-specialists and undergraduates... In sum, Eschatology in Antiquity will be a valuable resource for anyone broadly interested in eschatology in the ancient world. Not only does this volume provide accessible, up-to-date examinations of key texts, cultures, and materials but it combines this with a previously unrealised opportunity for comparison and contrast via its unprecedented breadth of scope (geographically, temporally, and culturally)." - Bryn Mawr Classical Review
"The volume is an impressive collection of studies...even in cases where I disagree with the conclusions, the papers are stimulating food for thought." - The Classical Review