Download PDF | Bruria Bitton-Ashkelony, Arieh Kofsky - Christian Gaza In Late Antiquity (Jerusalem Studies in Religion and Culture,) (2004).
257 Pages
INTRODUCTION
In mid-October 2000 a conference on Christianity in the region of Gaza in late antiquity was to take place in Jerusalem and Gaza. The groundwork had been laid during the time of rapprochement between Israelis and Palestinians, and hopes for future collaboration between Arab and Israeli scholars were high. Many scholars from various countries shared our enthusiasm for this topic—hitherto relatively neglected—and expressed their willingness to participate in the conference.
Unfortunately, two weeks before the opening day, the al-Aqsa intifada broke out, resulting in the indefinite postponement of the conference. This book is based on some of the papers originally intended for the conference. Its aim is to launch a discussion on this ancient center of Christianity. Most of the articles are revised versions of the original papers; a few, however—for various reasons—retain their original informal nature, that of a conference presentation.
Gaza and its environs were the last pagan stronghold in late antique Palestine. From the early fifth century on, the city developed into a flourishing and important Christian center with a celebrated school of rhetoric and leading monastic communities scattered around it.
Much scholarly energy has been devoted to exploring the transition from paganism to Christianity in Gaza as well as its school of rhetoric and its prominent figures. Sporadic studies have treated the Gazan monastic center, and since the 1960s, new editions of texts and modern translations of its literature have appeared, thanks especially to the efforts of the monks of Solemes. Nevertheless the picture we have of this flourishing Christian community remains partial, and the story of Christianity in Gaza and its surroundings merits further investigation of the various aspects of its social, spiritual, and material history. ‘The last decade has witnessed a growing interest in the topic, especially on the part of young scholars; several have chosen the topic for their dissertations and some of them have contributed to this volume.
It is not by chance that the book opens with a study of pagan culture in Gaza. Pagan festivals and spectacles survived well into the city’s Christian era, forging its public life into a unique synthesis of the new and old worlds. Nicole Belayche’s detailed depiction of pagan festivals in fourth-century Gaza testifies to pagan vitality in the city up to the beginning of the fifth century. She demonstrates the extent to which the pagan mentality had persisted in the Christian community. Although buildings devoted to entertainment have not yet been found in Gaza, Zeev Weiss argues for their existence. He too, then, claims the continuity of pagan culture in Christianised Gaza.
Geographical and administrative aspects of the territory of late antique Gaza are traced by Leah Di Segni, emphasizing the difficulty inhering in any attempt to determine the exact administrative and ecclesiastical boundaries, and the changes they underwent in this period. Her article contains the first publication and analysis of a precious late-sixth century inscription from Horvat Gerarit, that plausibly reflects already existing rival ecclesiastical organizations of Chalcedonians and Monophysites in the village. A geographical and archaeological survey of the monasteries of Gaza by Yizhar Hirschfeld is presented here, for the first time. In addition to tracing the historical-geographical background of the monasteries, Hirschfeld, on the basis of their geographical location and archaeological remains, sketches their character.
Between the fourth and seventh centuries a monastic colony developed in the region of Gaza that continued the tradition of Scetis yet at the same time had its own intellectual profile. This uniqueness is reflected in its spiritual leaders and their literary works. Seven articles in this volume deal with various aspects of this prominent monastic center. With its consolidation in Gaza in the first half of the fifth century, and in the wake of the Council of Chalcedon, this monastic community became the stronghold of Monophysite resistance in Palestine. Jan-Eric Steppa and Brouria Bitton-Ashkelony devote their articles to this turbulent phase of Gazan monasticism, tackling especially the anti-Chalcedonian hagiography of John Rufus, Monophysite propagandist and biographer of Peter the Iberian. While Steppa focuses primarily on Rufus’ Pleroforiae as a work of polemical propaganda, Bitton-Ashkelony concentrates on Rufus’ Life of Peter the Iberian, analyzing the function of pilgrimage and the motif of zmitatio Mosis, integral to Rufus’ polemical tactics.
In the time of emperor Justin (518-527), Gazan monasticism changed its image and adopted a Chalcedonian stance. The new status of the leaders of Gazan monasticism in the sixth century can be seen especially in the rich Correspondence of Barsanuphius and John. This unique and fascinating collection is a gold mine for the study of late antique social and religious history in Palestine. Lorenzo Perrone explores the cultivation of the monastic value of spiritual direction and argues that the Correspondence of Barsanuphius and John reflects a “school-situation”—one in which the great masters bequeath their monastic paideta of spiritual dynamism to their disciples.
Perrone further perceives this spiritual direction as a “school of Christianity.” The particular components of the monastic education in this circle are elaborated upon by Francois Neyt. According to Neyt, it revolved primarily around the study of the Holy Scriptures and emulation of the example set by the desert Fathers and recorded in their vitae and in the Apophthegmata. Another important aspect of the Correspondence raised by the late Lucien Regnault, is that of the social interaction between monks and laymen in the region of Gaza in the sixth century. Regnault emphasizes the secular and practical nature of the questions addressed by laymen to the holy men; theoretical questions were seldom raised.
Another theme present in the Correspondence of Barsanuphius and John is the second Origenist controversy of the mid-sixth century, which greatly troubled the Palestinian monastic world. Daniél Hombergen’s article is devoted to the group of letters in the correspondence dealing with this issue and compares it with Cyril of Scythopolis’ treatment of the controversy. Hombergen argues that the sixth-century Origenist controversy was also a clash of different conceptions of the spiritual life.
A further question concerning the monastic center of Barsanuphius and John, particularly its rise, is the disappearance of the Monophysite monastic centers of Gaza in the early sixth century. In the face of the scant extant evidence, Aryeh Kofsky speculates on what may have taken place in the monastic circle of Barsanuphius, John, Seridus, and Dorotheus: in reaction to the changing political ecclesiastical climate in the empire and in the region, there was a transformation into a kind of crypto-Monophysitism, the adoption of a Chalcedonian or neo-Chalcedonian veneer. The success of this dissimulating tactic can be seen in the absorption of these figures into Byzantine monastic orthodoxy in the ensuing centuries.
The classical legacy of fifth-and sixth-century Christian Gaza, and its challenge to the Christian community, is the subject of the two closing articles of this book. Yakov Ashkenazi discusses the interaction between the secular intelligentsia of Gaza—centered on the school of rhetoric—and the local ecclesiastical leadership. Ashkenazi focuses on Choricius, examining the attitude of the sophists to the Church and to religious life in Gaza. Rina Talgam’s study explores the preservation of classical culture in Palestine and Arabia through an analysis of the Ekphrasis Eikonos of Procopius of Gaza. She traces the manner in which mythological scenes were addressed in Byzantine art in the region, by comparing the case of Gaza with finds from the Christian city of Madaba, and from Sepphoris, a predominantly Jewish city of mixed population. The paintings and mosaic floors reveal the wide spectrum of ways in which the Byzantine artists treated themes derived from pagan mythology.
We would finally like to thank all the participants in this volume for sharing with us their enthusiasm for this topic. We also thank Jonathan Cahana for his valuable help in preparing this volume for publication. A special debt of gratitude is owed to Evelyn Katrak for her rigorous editing of the manuscript.
Three institutions encouraged and supported the publication of this book: the Greek Orthodox patriarchate of Jerusalem, especially Archbishop Aristarchos Peristeris of Constantina; the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Greece, and the Israel Science Foundation founded by the Israel Academy of Science and Humanities. To all of them we extend our heartfelt gratitude for their generosity.
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