Old Age in Ancient Judaism, Early Christianity, and Their Contexts - Senescence and Its Significations

The collection of essays in this volume explores the significance of old age for Jews and Christians as well as Greeks and Romans in antiquity. Of interest for students and scholars of religion, as well as scholars in classical studies and ancient history.

List of contents

Foreword (Mira Balberg)
Introduction
Section 1: Old Age, Wisdom, and Authority
1. Old and Young in Philo's Legatio ad Gaium (Pieter B. Hartog)
2. "O Glorious Wisdom in an Ugly Vessel": Old Age, Wisdom, and Wine in Rabbinic Literature (Lieve M. Teugels)
3. Old Age and Political System Change in Ancient Rome (Christoph Michels)
Section 2: Old Age, Gender, and Social Dynamics
4. Beyond Gender: Polycarp's Martyrdom at the Intersection of Old Age and Masculinity (Peter-Ben Smit)
Albertina Oegema)
Section 3: Old Age, Anxiety, and Familial Discourse
6. Dying in Peace: Old Age and Death Anxiety in the Hebrew Bible and in the Ancient Near East (Klaas Spronk)
7. Diverse Representations of Old Age in Literary and Iconographic Works of Classical Athens (Silvana Dayan)
8. Old Age and the Ethical Discourse of Familial Reciprocity among the Aramaic Documents from Elephantine (Seth A. Bledsoe)
Section 4: Old Age, the Body, and Disability
9. Ambivalences in the Process and Prolongation of Ageing in the Hebrew Bible (Hugh Pyper)
10. A Disabled Patriarch: John Chrysostom's Use of Disability Discourse in His Characterization of Abraham (Chris L. de Wet)

About the author

Albertina Oegema is Postdoctoral Researcher in New Testament Studies at the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, Germany.
Seth A. Bledsoe is Assistant Professor of Ancient Judaism at Radboud University, Nijmegen, the Netherlands.

Product details

• Authors: Albertina Bledsoe Oegema
• Assisted by: Seth A. Bledsoe (Editor), Albertina Oegema (Editor)
• Publisher: Taylor & Francis Ltd.
• Languages: English
• Product format: Hardback
• Release: 08.08.2025
• EAN: 9781032665047
• ISBN: 978-1-0-3266504-7
• No. of pages: 280
• Subjects: Humanities, art, music > History > Antiquity; HISTORY / Ancient / Rome, HISTORY / Middle East / General, HISTORY / Ancient / General, SOCIAL SCIENCE / Gerontology, Ancient Greece, RELIGION / Christianity / History, RELIGION / Judaism / History, SOCIAL SCIENCE / Anthropology / General, HISTORY / Ancient / Greece, RELIGION / Ancient, Religion: general, Christianity, Psychotherapy, History of Religion, Psychology of ageing, Judaism, Child & developmental psychology, Ancient Rome, Child, developmental and lifespan psychology, Geriatric medicine, Ancient History, Classical history / classical civilisation, Church history, Ancient religions & mythologies, Ancient religions and Mythologies