Jewish Christianity: The Making of the Christianity-Judaism Divide (The Anchor Yale Bible Reference Library | AYBRL)

by Matt Jackson-McCabe

Publisher:

Yale University Press

, 2020

Overview

A fresh exploration of the category Jewish Christianity, from its invention in the Enlightenment to contemporary debates

For hundreds of years, historians have been asking fundamental questions about the separation of Christianity from Judaism in antiquity. Matt Jackson-McCabe argues provocatively that the concept “Jewish Christianity,” which has been central to scholarly reconstructions, represents an enduring legacy of Christian apologetics. Freethinkers of the English Enlightenment created this category as a means of isolating a distinctly Christian religion from what otherwise appeared to be the Jewish culture of Jesus and the apostles.

Tracing the development of this patently modern concept of a Jewish Christianity from its origins to early twenty-first-century scholarship, Jackson-McCabe shows how a category that began as a way to reimagine the apologetic notion of an authoritative “original Christianity” continues to cause problems in the contemporary study of Jewish and Christian antiquity. He draws on promising new approaches to Christianity and Judaism as socially constructed terms of identity to argue that historians would do better to leave the concept of Jewish Christianity behind.

Key Features

• Shows how a category that began as a way to reimagine the apologetic notion of an authoritative “original Christianity” continues to cause problems in the contemporary study of Jewish and Christian antiquity
• Draws on promising new approaches to Christianity and Judaism as socially constructed terms

Contents

• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• 1 The Invention of Jewish Christianity: From Early Christian Heresiology to John Toland's Nazarenus
• 2 Jewish Christianity, Pauline Christianity, and the Critical Study of the New Testament: Thomas Morgan and F. C. Baur
• 3 Apostolic vs. Judaizing Jewish Christianity: The Reclamation of Apostolic Authority in Post-Baur Scholarship
• 4 The Legacy of Christian Apologetics in Post-Holocaust Scholarship: Jean Daniéiou, Marcel Simon, and the Problem of Definition
• 5 Problems and Prospects: Jewish Christianity and Identity in Contemporary Discussion
• 6 Beyond Jewish Christianity: Ancient Social Taxonomies and the Christianity-Judaism Divide
• Abbreviations
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index

Praise for Jewish Christianity

This conceptual problem [of ‘Jewish Christianity’] has been a persistent research question for Jackson-McCabe, and with this book . . . his patience, erudition, and collaboration with colleagues have come to fruition.

—Reading Religion

Through an incisive and critical analysis of the history of the concept of ‘Jewish Christianity,’ Matt Jackson-McCabe shows persuasively how abandoning the concept enables different voices and social formations to be heard and mapped in their own terms.

—Judith Lieu, University of Cambridge

The term ‘Jewish Christianity’ has always been problematic. This book is a provocative and stimulating plea for an abandoning of the term, in spite of its long history of study, and is sure to engender discussion and reassessment.

—James Carleton Paget, University of Cambridge

Product Details

• Title: Jewish Christianity: The Making of the Christianity-Judaism Divide
• Author: Matt Jackson-McCabe
• Series: The Anchor Yale Bible Reference Library
• Publisher: Yale University Press
• Print Publication Date: 2020
• Pages: 328
• Language: English
• Resources: 1
• Format: Digital › Logos Research Edition
• Resource ID: LLS:JWSHCHRSTNLBRRY
• Resource Type: Monograph
• Metadata Last Updated: 2024-07-24T21:20:53Z

About Matt Jackson-McCabe

Matt Jackson-McCabe is a professor in the Department of Philosophy and Comparative Religion at Cleveland State University. He is the author of Logos and Law in the Letter of James and editor of Jewish Christianity Reconsidered.