Religious identities in the Levant from Alexander to Muhammed
Subtitle: continuity and change
By: edited by Michael Blömer, Achim Lichtenberger, and Rubina Raja
Contributors: Blömer, Michael (Archaeologist), editor; Lichtenberger, Achim, editor; Raja, Rubina, 1975- editor; Danish Institute in Damascus
Series: Contextualizing the sacred -- volume 4; Contextualizing the sacred -- v. 4.
Publisher: Brepols
Published: 2015
Place of publication: Turnhout, Belgium
Language: eng; fre; ger
Number of pages: 422
ISBN-13: 9782503544458
Copyright date: 2015
Subjects: 15.59 history of great parts of the world, peoples, civilizations: other; Lieux sacrés; Congrès; Religion; Civilization; Religious architecture; Civilisation; Sacred space; History; Art and religion; Architecture religieuse; Identification (Religion); Histoire; Congresses; Art et religion; 11.10 ancient religions: general
Other titles: Continuity and change
Description: "This volume addresses questions of continuity and change in the religious life of the Levant between Alexander's conquest of the Middle East until the end of the Umayyad period, a topic which has received growing attention over the last decade within the fields of ancient history, archaeology, philology, and religious studies. The volume pulls together the efforts of scholars from all of these fields, and its central concerns include the representations and expressions of religious identity in sacred architecture, iconography, and texts. These representations and expressions are explored through literature, inscriptions, and iconography, and though the architectural as well as the functional development of sanctuaries, churches, and mosques. The volume includes papers on themes such as definition, creation, dissolution, and interconnection between sacred sites, as well as access and audience. These developments are examined through the lenses of aspects of continuity and change in material and literary culture. With a point of departure in the development of urban, sub-urban, and extra-urban sanctuaries, churches, and early mosques, as well as their associated cults and religions, the contributions in this volume explore the shaping and development of the religious identities of individuals, groups, and societies, and assess how these categories of religious identity were interrelated and shaped by a variety of circumstances. The volume aims at underlining the importance of interdisciplinary studies to the comprehensive understanding of this complex field and at opening up discussions of methodological and theoretical approaches which can be used across these disciplines."--
Notes: "This volume stems from the conference Continuity and change: religious identities in the Levant from Alexander to Muhammed held at the Danish Institute in Damascus in March 2010"--Page 1.

Includes bibliographical references and indexes.

In English, French, and German.
Table of contents: title: Part I. General.; title: Les signes du changement: réalités et faux-semblants  -- Maurice Sartre; title: "Familiar strangers": gods and worshippers away from home in the Roman Near East  -- Ted Kaizer; title: Gymnasia: aspects of a Greek institution in the Hellenistic and Roman Near East  -- Frank Daubner; title: The assembly rooms of religious groups in the Hellenistic and Roman Near East: a comparative study  -- Inge Neilsen; title: The God who is called IAO: Judaism and Hellenistic mystery religions  -- Lester L. Grabbe; title: Conversion, apologetic argumentation, and polemic (amongst friends) in second-century Syria: Theophilus' Ad Autolycum  -- Jakob Engberg; title: Politicising the religious, or, How the Umayyads co-opted classical iconography  -- Nasser Rabbat -- Part II. Northern Syria.; title: The re-emergence of Iron Age religious iconography in Roman Syria  -- Guy Bunnens; title: Religious continuity? the evidence from Doliche  -- Michael Blömer; title: The Jebel Khalid Temple: continuity and change  -- Graeme Clarke; title: A Laodicean on Mount Casius  -- Julien Aliquot; title: Defining new gods: the daimones of Antiochus  -- Margherita Facella; title: Images of priests in north Syria and beyond  -- Michael Blömer; title: Perduration, continuity and discontinuity in the sanctuary of Atargatis in Hierapolis (Syria)  -- Alejandro Egea; title: The transformation of a saintly paradigm: Simeon the Elder and the legacy of stylitism  -- Volker Menze -- Part III. The Desert and Mesopotamia.; title: Babylon in achaemenidischer und hellenistischer Zeit: eine Stellungnahme zur aktuellen Forschungsdiskussion  -- Wolfgang Messerschmidt; title: Bel of Palmyra  -- Michal Gawlikowski; title: Cult images in cities of the Syrian-Mesopotamian desert during the first three centuries CE: continuity and change  -- Lucinda Dirven; title: St. Sergios in Resafa: worshipped by Christians and Muslims alike  -- Dorothée Sack -- Part IV. Southern Syria.; title: Continuity and change of religious life in southern Syria during the Hellenistic and Roman periods  -- Klaus Stefan Freyberger; title: Nouveaux dieux et dieux noveaus dans le Hauran (Syrie du sud) à l'époque romaine  -- Annie Sartre-Fauriat; title: New archaeological research at the sanctuary of Sî' in southern Syria: the Graeco-Roman divinities invite themselves to Baalshamîn  -- Jacqueline Dentzer-Feydy -- Part V. Palestine.; title: The Hellenistic-Roman sancturary at et-Tell (Bethsaida) and the question of tradition in the layout of the holy place  -- Ilona Skupinska-Løvset; title: More on the intentionally broken discus lamps from Roman Palestine: mutilation and its symbolic meaning  -- Oren Tal and Marcio Teixeira Bastos -- Part VI. Arabia.; title: From Nabataea to the province of Arabia: changing religious identities and the cults of Dushara  -- Peter Alpass; title: Romanisation through coins: the case of provincia Arabia  -- Cristina M. Acqua; title: The last phases of the Cathedral Church of Jerash -- Beat Brenk-- Index.