Description
Book SynopsisChristian Reading shifts the assumption that study of the Bible must be about the content of the Bible or aimed at confessional projects of religious instruction. Blossom Stefaniw focuses on the lesson transcripts from the Tura papyri, which reveal verbatim oral classroom discourse, to show how biblical texts were used as an exhibition space for the traditional canon of general knowledge about the world. Stefaniw demonstrates that the work of Didymus the Blind in the lessons reflected in the Tura papyri was similar to that of other grammarians in late antiquity: articulating the students' place in time, their position in the world, and their connection to their heritage. But whereas other grammarians used revered texts like Homer and Menander, Didymus curated the cultural patrimony using biblical texts: namely, the Psalms and Ecclesiastes. By examining this routine epistemological and pedagogical work carried out through the Bible, Christian Reading generates a new model of the relationship of Christian scholarship to the pagan past.
Trade Review"Stefaniw deserves credit for drawing attention back to the classroom setting of these texts, because they are precious evidence of how one real classroom worked in antiquity. . . . Stefaniw’s vivid and lively study returns attention to the teaching of a learned Alexandrian whose texts remain understudied." * Bryn Mawr Classical Review *
"In sum, an orienting narrative, original translations of understudies texts, and thoughtful engagement with theory make this book required reading for anyone interested in ancient Christian reading practices. Its prose will make that requirement a joy." * Church History *
Table of ContentsAcknowledgments Prologue
1. A Narrative History of the Tura Papyri
2. Reading with a Grammarian
3. The Textual Patrimony: Knowledge, Language, and Reading
4. The Intellectual Patrimony: Ethics, Logic, and the Order of Things
5. Christian Reading: Chronography, Cartography, and Genealogy
Epilogue
Bibliography
Index
