Dennis R. MacDonald
Auteur van The Legend and the Apostle: The Battle for Paul in Story and Canon
Over de Auteur
Dennis R. MacDonald is John Wesley Professor of New Testament and Christian Origins, Claremont School of Theology. He is the author or editor of a number of works, including The Intertextuality of the Epistles: Explorations of Theory and Practice (Sheffield Phoenix), Acts of Andrew (Polebridge), toon meer and Does the New Testament Imitate Homer? Four Cases from the Acts of the Apostles (Yale University Press). toon minder
Werken van Dennis R. MacDonald
Does the New Testament Imitate Homer?: Four Cases from the Acts of the Apostles (2003) 32 exemplaren
Mimesis and Intertextuality in Antiquity and Christianity (Studies in Antiquity & Christianity) (2001) — Redacteur — 21 exemplaren
There Is No Male and Female: The Fate of a Dominical Saying in Paul and Gnosticism (Harvard Dissertations in Religion) (1987) 15 exemplaren
Two Shipwrecked Gospels: The Logoi of Jesus and Papias's Exposition of Logia about the Lord (Early Christianity… (2012) 14 exemplaren
The Acts of Andrew and the Acts of Andrew and Matthias in the city of the cannibals (1990) 9 exemplaren
The Gospels and Homer: Imitations of Greek Epic in Mark and Luke-Acts (The New Testament and Greek Literature) (2014) 8 exemplaren
Luke and Vergil: Imitations of Classical Greek Literature (The New Testament and Greek Literature) (2014) 7 exemplaren
Synopses of Epic, Tragedy, and the Gospels 2 exemplaren
Imitations of Greek Epic in the Gospels 2 exemplaren
Rediscovering Paul 1 exemplaar
Gerelateerde werken
Images of the Feminine in Gnosticism (Studies in Antiquity & Christianity) (1988) — Medewerker — 31 exemplaren
A Feminist Companion To Mark (Feminist Companion to the New Testament and Early Christian) (2001) — Medewerker — 28 exemplaren
A Feminist Companion To The Acts Of The Apostles (Feminist Companion to the New Testament and Early Chritian Writings) (2004) — Medewerker — 23 exemplaren
Ancient Fiction: The Matrix of Early Christian And Jewish Narrative (Symposium Series) (2005) — Medewerker — 17 exemplaren
The Elijah-Elisha Narrative in the Composition of Luke (The Library of New Testament Studies) (2013) — Medewerker — 7 exemplaren
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MacDonald is on very firm ground in proposing mimesis as a key ingredient of ancient composition, since many classical texts do instruct writers in this process as well as demonstrate it. In this book, he focuses on four examples where he maintains that "Luke" (the author of Acts) drew on the Illiad for literary substance in tales about the apostles Peter, Paul, and Matthias. (The Illiad was easily the most popular model for literary emulation in antiquity.) Since these particular biblical stories have no corroboration in ancient historical documents, scholars have generally assigned "traditional" or "legendary" provenance to their accounts. MacDonald is able to demonstrate methodically, however, that they have identifiable literary sources in Homer and that mimesis accounts for details that are difficult to reconcile with the usual explanations of these texts.
MacDonald sets out six criteria to support mimetic authorship, and evaluates them in full for each of his cases. The third and fourth of these are the density and sequence of textual similarities, and these are illustrated throughout the book with parallel columns from the Illiad and the Acts of the Apostles. For those able to work with the original language, there is a 12-page appendix giving all of this matter in the original Greek. There are also some Latin texts, used to illustrate mimesis of Homer by other classical authors.
In his introduction, the author raises an important question: "If Homeric influence on the Gospels and Acts is so extensive and significant, why ... in two centuries of critical scrutiny have modern scholars not recognized it?" (13) He gives a number of reasonable answers, invoking Thomas Kuhn's notion of disciplinary paradigms and pointing to specializations of method in the field of New Testament studies. These could be usefully supplemented, though, with the arguments of Jonathan Z. Smith's Drudgery Divine, which describe the processes by which a crypto-theological agenda has captured religious scholarship, particularly excluding the consideration of "pagan" sources for Christian beliefs and practices.
On the jacket copy of Does the New Testament Imitate Homer? Mary Tolbert is quoted as saying that MacDonald's earlier work "poses a profound challenge to current scholarship on the history of early Christianity and the historical Jesus." In his conclusion to this volume, MacDonald declares that Luke "was by no means a credulous editor of tradition but a sophisticated author; it is we, his readers, who have been naïve" (146-7). For all we know, there was a historical Pinocchio, who in some way informed or inspired the work of Carlo Collodi--and thus all his later adapters and imitators. But it is not any underlying "facts" (however unverifiable) that make Pinocchio's story compelling and relevant. MacDonald is absolutely right to turn the reader's attention to the literary craft of the writers of scripture.… (meer)