Description
It is well known that early Christian groups predominantly preferred codices for copying their texts. By utilising several features as evidenced in the remaining manuscripts, these Jesus movement followers created a specific reading culture as well as a kind of textual community. This paper will address the early Christian appropriation and use of the codex by looking at the Pauline letters as an example. First, some recently published text-critical studies focusing on material dimensions and paratexts of Christian manuscripts will be used to substantiate and fine-tune this hypothesis. Second, the “book culture” established by early Christian circles, which contained many urban features, will be situated in ancient urban settings. Insights from the research into ancient urban religion, particularly studies of the intellectual trend in the first few centuries of the Common Era, will be brought up. Third, attention will also be paid to relevant passages in the New Testament (e.g., Col 4:16; the textual variants at Eph 1:1; 2 Pet 3:15–16) and those from the early patristic authors. By so doing, the current paper aims to shed some new light upon early Christian practices of reading and circulation of the Pauline letters in ancient cities.| Period | 18 Jul 2023 |
|---|---|
| Event title | Colloquium Biblicum Lovaniense: Early Christianity in Civic Space |
| Event type | Conference |
| Location | Leuven, BelgiumShow on map |
| Degree of Recognition | International |