Anti-Jewish Sentiments in Liturgical and Patristic Biblical Interpretations

Bibliographic Data

ID23573281
AuthorsBogdan G Bucur (0000-0003-4809-0351, Theology, Duquesne University, corresponding author)
Year2022
Pages484-500
Publication date2022-05-19
Open AccessNo
TypeCHAPTER
VenueOxford Handbook of the Bible in Orthodox Christianity (SOURCE_BOOK)
PublisherOxford University Press (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1093/oxfordhb/9780190948658.013.20
OpenAlexW4281260772
ISBN9780190948658
LanguageEN
References cited16

The gradual transformation of the Jesus movement from an ethnically Jewish to an overwhelmingly Gentile community was coextensive with a shift from intracommunitarian polemics within the boundaries of Second Temple Judaism to acrimonious relations between two religions competing for the inheritance of biblical Israel. Although anti-Jewish rhetoric colors early Christian references to contemporary Jews and Judaism, it also constitutes a topos of intra-Christian heresiology; these two spheres of use sometimes overlap. Among the various exegetical strategies used by the early Church, “Christophanic exegesis” is the most ancient, adaptable, and widespread; it also entailed sometime strident anti-Jewish polemics. Special attention should be given to hymnography, as the performative character and liturgical embeddedness of this veritable distillate of patristic thought have ensured its enormous influence across time and space. The centrality of Christophanic exegesis in Byzantine festal hymns and the absence, in most of these hymns, of anti-Jewish polemics, indicates that, although present and strident, anti-Judaism sentiments are not an essential feature of patristic and hymnographic exegesis.

Aesthetics · Art · Exegesis · Josephus · Judaism · Literature · Performative utterance · Theology · Biblical Studies and Interpretation · Byzantine Studies and History · Historical and Linguistic Studies · History · Philosophy · Religious studies

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