Ethnicity and Argument in Eusebius' Praeparatio Evangelica

Bibliographic Data

ID20000515
AuthorsAaron P Johnson (0000-0003-0214-8511, corresponding author)
Year2006
Pages261
Publication date2006-10-01
Open AccessNo
TypeBOOK
VenueETHNICITY AND ARGUMENT IN EUSEBIUS' PRAEPARATIO EVANGELICA. (SOURCE_BOOK)
PublisherOxford University Press (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199296132.001.0001
OpenAlexW568270385
Open LibraryOL22739469M
ISBN9780199296132
LanguageEN
Citations received46

The task of the early Christian apologists was fundamentally one of constructing, maintaining, and manipulating the identities of Christianity and its rivals — Greeks, Jews, Romans, and others. Eusebius of Caesarea’s Praeparatio Evangelica, written in the early part of the 4th century, is the most comprehensive and sustained attempt in early apologetic literature to represent Christian, Greek, and Jewish ethnic identity as the basis for its defence of Christianity. This book traces the manipulations of ethnicity in Eusebius’ Praeparatio and highlights the implications of such ethnic argumentation for the understanding of Christian-Jewish and Christian-Greek relations, as well as the limits of modern notions of ‘religion’ to early Christian identity. Christianity is seen as a new nation (ethnos) — and at the same time a restoration of the oldest nation, that of the Hebrews — and is distinguished from the other nations of the Greeks, Phoenicians, Egyptians, Jews, and Romans who are all shown to possess inferior ethnic identities. Eusebius’ apologetic argument rests not on a defence of Christian doctrine or belief, but upon a vision of the ancient ethnic landscape, which manipulates national histories and boundaries so as to elevate Christians (as Hebrews) to a level of superiority in their national character and antiquity

Argument (complex analysis) · Christian Identity · Christianity · Early Christianity · Ethnic group · Greeks · Hebrews · Judaism · Late Antiquity · Sociology · Theology · Anthropology · Archaeology and Historical Studies · Biblical Studies and Interpretation · Classics · Historical and Linguistic Studies · History · Philosophy · Religious studies · Apologetics · Biblical teaching · Ethnicity · Ethnology in the bible · Eusebius, of caesarea, bishop of caesarea, approximately 260-approximately 340

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