Christian Gaza In Late Antiquity (Jerusalem Studies in Religion and Culture,)

257 Pages·2004·1.13 MB·English

by  Bruria Bitton-Ashkelony

Christian Gaza in Late Antiquity
Jerusalem Studies in
Religion and Culture
Editors
Guy Stroumsa
David Shulman
Hebrew University of Jerusalem,
Department of Comparative Religion
VOLUME 3
Christian Gaza in
Late Antiquity
Edited by
Brouria Bitton-Ashkelony and Aryeh Kofsky
BRILL
LEIDEN BOSTON
•
2004
This book is printed on acid-free paper.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Christian Gaza in late antiquity / [edited] by Brouria Bitton-Ashkelony & Aryeh Kofsky.
p. cm. — (Jerusalem studies in religion an culture, ISSN 1570-078X ; v. 3)
English and French.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 90-04-13868-4
1. Gaza—Church history. 2. Church history—Primitive and early church, ca. 30-600.
I. Bitton-Ashkelony, Bruria. II. Kofsky, Arieh. III. Series,
B., 1961—II. Title. III. Series.
BR113.G39C47 2004
275.31—dc22
2004047569
ISSN 1570–078X
ISBN 90 04 13868 4
© Copyright 2004 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in
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printed in the netherlands
In memory of Yaron Dan,
who explored the secrets of city life in late antique Palestine
This page intentionally left blank
vii
CONTENTS
Introduction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Pagan Festivals in Fourth-Century Gaza. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Nicole Belayche
Games and Spectacles in Ancient Gaza: Performances for the
Masses Held in Buildings Now Lost . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
Zeev Weiss
The Territory of Gaza: Notes of Historical Geography . . . . . . . 41
Leah di Segni
The Monasteries of Gaza: An Archaeological Review . . . . . . . . 61
Yizhar Hirschfeld
Heresy and Orthodoxy: The Anti-Chalcedonian Hagiography
of John Rufus. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
Jan-Eric Steppa
Imitatio Mosis and Pilgrimage in the Life of Peter the Iberian . . . 107
Brouria Bitton-Ashkelony
The Necessity of Advice: Spiritual Direction as a School of
Christianity in the Correspondence of Barsanuphius and
John of Gaza. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131
Lorenzo Perrone
La Formation au Monastère de L’abbé Séridos à Gaza . . . . . . 151
François Neyt
Moines et laïcs dans la région de Gaza au VIe siècle . . . . . . . . 165
Lucien Regnault
Barsanuphius and John of Gaza and the Origenist Controversy 173
Daniël Hombergen, O.C.S.O.
What Happened to the Monophysite Monasticism of Gaza? 183
Aryeh Kofsky
Sophists and Priests in Late Antique Gaza According to
Choricius the Rhetor. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 195
Yakov Ashkenazi
viii contents
The Ekphrasis Eikonos of Procopius of Gaza: The Depiction of
Mythological Themes in Palestine and Arabia During the
Fifth and Sixth Centuries. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 209
Rina Talgam
About the Authors. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 235
List of Illustrations. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 239
Index of Names. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 241
Index of Places. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 249
introduction 1
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 rela-
tively 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