The Grammar of Messianism: An Ancient Jewish Political Idiom and Its UsersMessianism is one of the great themes in intellectual history. But for precisely this reason, because it has done so much important ideological work for the people who have written about it, the historical roots of the discourse itself have been obscured from view. What did it mean to talk about "messiahs" in the ancient world, before the idea of messianism became a philosophical juggernaut, dictating the terms for all subsequent discussion of the topic? In this book, Matthew V. Novenson gives a revisionist account of messianism in antiquity. He shows that, for the ancient Jews and Christians who used the term, a messiah was not an article of faith but a manner of speaking. It was a scriptural figure of speech, one among numerous others, useful for thinking kinds of political order: present or future, real or ideal, monarchic or theocratic, dynastic or charismatic, and other variations beside. The early Christians famously seized upon the title "messiah" (in Greek, "Christ") for their founding hero and thus molded the sense of the term in certain ways, but, Novenson shows, this is nothing other than what all ancient messiah texts do, each in its own way. If we hope to understand the ancient texts about messiahs (from Deutero-Isaiah to the Parables of Enoch, from the Qumran Community Rule to the Gospel of John, from the Pseudo-Clementines to Sefer Zerubbabel), then we must learn to think in terms not of a world-historical idea but of a language game, of so many creative reuses of an archaic Israelite idiom. In The Grammar of Messianism, Novenson demonstrates the possibility and the benefit of thinking of messianism in this way. |
Contents
1 After the Messianic Idea | 1 |
2 Oil and Power in Ancient Israel | 34 |
3 Messiahs Born and Made | 65 |
4 Messiahs Present and Absent | 114 |
5 The Quest for the First Messiah | 161 |
6 The Jewish MessiahChristian Messiah Distinction | 187 |
7 The Fate of Messiah Christology in Early Christianity | 217 |
8 The Grammar of Messianism | 263 |
Bibliography | 277 |
| 327 | |
Index of Ancient Sources | 337 |
| 351 | |
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The Grammar of Messianism: An Ancient Jewish Political Idiom and Its Users Matthew V. Novenson No preview available - 2019 |
Common terms and phrases
Akiba ancient Jewish ancient messiah texts anointed Apocalypse Bar Kokhba Bar Kosiba biblical Brill Cambridge century Charlesworth Christ Christian messiah Christology claim Collins Davidic ancestry Davidide Dead Sea Scrolls divine early Christian Edited eschatological exilarch fasces Gospel of Philip Grammar of messIanIsm Greek Hasmonean Herod high priest History holy Horbury house of David idem interpretation Isaiah Israel Israelite Jacob James Jerusalem Jesus Jewish and Christian Jewish messiah Jews and Christians John Josephus Judah Judaism kingship Klausner Knohl Late Antiquity Leiden literature London Maccabees Menahem messiah ben Joseph Messianic Expectation Messianic Idea Messianology Mishnah Mohr Siebeck Mowinckel Neusner Old Testament oracle Oxford passage Patriarch Peter Schäfer Philo prophet Psalms Psalms of Solomon Qumran rabbinic rightly Roman royal Scepter scholars scriptural siah Studies Talmud Temple Testimonium Flavianum Theology tradition trans translation Trypho Tübingen University Press vols word writes YHWH Zerubbabel καὶ τὸν τοῦ χριστός משיח