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What has Troy to do with Jerusalem? How can the venerable Greek traditions of epic poetry, drama, and mythology help us understand early Christians and their literary products? ... although Jesus and his closest followers are all understood to be Jews, their home ground had long been politically and culturally separate from Judea, a fact reflected in its majority-Gentile population. This has profound implications for our understanding of Jesus’s message and the earliest stages of his movement. As the twenty-first century comes into its own, the growing field of Greco-Roman backgrounds to early Christianity owes, if not its existence, certainly its increasing prominence in large part to MacDonald.

In the tug-of-war between moral instruction and entertainment, thinkers like Plato, Plutarch, and Strabo attempt to discern which texts are worthy not only of imitation, but of reading at all (and why), and in the process invent critical exegesis. Pervo turns the attention of this argument to fictive/historiographical texts such as the Acts of the Apostles and 2 Maccabees to show that pleasure can act in the service of instruction, as a lure and a hook.

Froelich, Margaret Christian Origins and the New Testament in the Greco-Roman Context: Essays in Honor of Dennis R. MacDonald (pp. 1-6) Claremont Press, 2016

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106 Connections Found

Aratus, Phaenomena

Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics

Callimachus, Hymns

Dio Chrysostom, Discourse

Dioscorides, Materia Medica

Epimenides, Cretica

Iamblichus, Life of Pythagoras

Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews Book 1

Livy, The History of Rome Book 2

Lucian, Voyage to the Lower World

Menander, Thais

Philo, Allegorical Interpretation

Philo, Who is the Heir of Divine Things

Pliny the Younger, Letters

Plutarch, Moralia

Polybius, Histories Book 4

Pseudo Philo, Biblical Antiquities

Seneca, Moral Epistles

Suetonius, The Twelve Caesars

Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews Book 2

Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews Book 4

Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews Book 15

Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews Book 18

Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews Book 19

Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews Book 20

Philo, On the Creation

Philo, On the Giants

Lucian, The Death of Peregrine

Pliny the Elder, Natural History Book 2

Pliny the Elder, Natural History Book 7

Pliny the Elder, Natural History Book 30

Philo, On Dreams Book 1

Virgil, Eclogues

Diogenes Laertius, Lives of the Eminent Philosophers Book 1

Hymn to a Universal God

Philo, The Special Laws

Philo, The Decalogue

Tacitus, Annals Book 15

Euripides, Hecuba

Seneca, On the Happy Life

Philo, On the Birth of Abel

Philo, On the Unchangeableness of God

Josephus, The Jewish War Book 5

Philo, On the Confusion of Tongues

Philo, On Abraham

Philo, Every Good Man is Free

Cicero, De Oratore

Philo, On the Life of Moses Book 1

Plato, Timaeus

Philo, On the Virtues

Plato, Apology

Seneca, On Providence

Hierocles, On the Gods

Hierocles, On Fraternal Love

Hierocles, On Relatives

Cicero, Dream of Scipio

Orphic Hymn to Zeus

Plato, Laws

Josephus, Against Apion

Greco-Roman Literature and the New Testament

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