Guilt by Association: Heresy Catalogues in Early Christianity - Hardcover

Smith, Geoffrey S.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0199386781 ISBN 13: 9780199386789

Publisher: Oxford University Press, 2014

Synopsis

Few literary innovations have exercised as much influence upon Christian attitudes toward internal diversity as has the practice of organizing the names and alleged misdeeds of rival teachers into heresy catalogues. For two millennia, followers of Jesus have employed the heresy catalogue as a powerful weapon in internal struggles for legitimacy, authority, and supremacy. Despite its enduring popularity and influence within the Christian tradition, the heresy catalogue remains an underappreciated polemical genre among historians of early Christianity.

Guilt by Association explores the creation, publication, and circulation of heresy catalogues by second- and early third-century Christians. Polemicists made use of these religious blacklists, which include the names of heretical teachers along with summaries of their unsavory doctrines and nefarious misdeeds, in order to discredit opponents and advocate their expulsion from the "authentic" Christianity community. The heresy catalogue proved to be especially effective because it not only recast rival teachers as menacing adversaries, but also reinforced such characterizations by organizing otherwise unaffiliated teachers into coherent intellectual, social, and scholastic communities that are established and sustained by demonic powers.

Geoffrey Smith focuses especially on the earliest Christian heresy catalogues, including those found within the works of Justin, Irenaeus, and Hegesippus, to shed new light upon the complex process through which early Christianity took shape.

About this title

About the Author:

Geoffrey Smith is Nease Fellow and Lecturer, Department of Religious Studies, The University of Texas at Austin. His research interests include the apostle Paul, Gospels, New Testament textual criticism, papyrology and manuscript studies, patristics, Valentinianism, and "orthodoxy" and "heresy" in early Christianity.

Review:

"Few bring so much erudition and lateral thinking to the subject or exhibit such a capacity for picking up the most promising thread in a labyrinth that is littered with false trails."--Catholic Historical Review

"This is a very smart and thought-provoking book that is certain to make a major contribution by redrawing the map of internal Christian conflicts in the second century and beyond."--Vigiliae Christianae

"Smith offers major challenges to scholarly consensus.... Guilt by Association would serve as a stimulating introduction for those unfamiliar with the literature; at the same time, even if specialists in the field are not persuaded at every point, they will have to take very seriously both specific suggestions and his overall portrayal. Guilt by Association is to be welcomed for its decisive invitation to others to engage with this, sometimes disturbing, tradition."--Judith Lieu, The Journal of Ecclesiastical History

"Geoffrey Smith's book is a welcome and timely study that is sure to generate further discussion and debate . An important original contribution that explores the heretofore-assumed origins of Christian heresiology and will undoubtedly complicate and enrich our understanding of the dynamics of early Christianity."--Journal of Early Christian Studies

"Geoffrey Smith has written a wonderful book - a fresh approach to oft-discussed subjects, integrating literary criticism, but also philological and sociological approaches. Smith brings new clarity to notoriously unclear matters, like the questions related to the lost 'Syntagama of all heresies' of Justin Martyr. For the first time the Nag Hammadi evidence is fully taken into consideration, allowing a new light to fall on the difficult questions how we can model Gnostic groups like the so called 'Valentinians.'"--Christoph Markschies, Theologische Fakultät, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin

"This important book should be essential reading in research on pseudo-Pauline letters, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, and Nag Hammadi writings, among others. It is a wonderfully fresh break-through on the development of heresy 'black-lists' even prior to Irenaeus, and one that challenges received wisdom about Irenaeus's own innovations. With Smith's remarkably economic analysis, some historically significant but famously inconvenient loose pieces in Irenaeus's use of the term 'gnostic' now fall into place."--Michael A. Williams, author of Rethinking "Gnosticism": An Argument for Dismantling a Dubious Category

"This excellent new study traces the origins of early Christian boundary drawing over against those considered 'heretics.' Smith breaks new ground in delineating what made Christian accounts of heresies, from pseudo-Pauline epistles to texts written in the fourth century, distinct from ancient inventories of varied opinions among the philosophers. Smith's argument that, in early Christian usage, 'school' belongs to the heresy-hunters' toolbox and thus does not say much about the opposed groups' social outlook is carefully crafted and merits serious attention. This book is a must for all those interested in ancient intellectuals, early Christian polemics and the roots of Christian identity formation."--Ismo Dunderberg, author of Beyond Gnosticism: Myth, Lifestyle and Society in the School of Valentinus

"Highly recommended." --CHOICE

"I and other historians of early Christianity will benefit from the book s productive questioning of what we think we know and its close examination of the diverse ways in which some Christian authors identified, listed, and demonized other people and ideas as one strategy in the complex story of early Christian identity formation."--David Brakke, Journal of Religion

About this edition

• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Publication date: 2014
• ISBN 10: 0199386781
• ISBN 13: 9780199386789
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 216