Dear all,
I would like to remind you that the Ancient World Seminar will take place
*today*. The lecture of today will be recorded, details on the possibility
to access this recording are available upon request. The discussion
afterwards will *not *be recorded. If you have any objections to the
session being recorded, please let me know.
The online environment can be accessed from 16.00 onwards via the following
link: https://eu.bbcollab.com/guest/b86b646b94c446aea28c8824e8496fbc. During
the lecture, please turn off your microphone and camera. After the lecture,
a student will give a short response and open the discussion by asking some
questions. After this, there will be time for your remarks and questions.
If you wish to contribute to this discussion, use the 'raise hand' button.
The moderator will give you time to ask your question which can either be
done via the chat or 'live' by turning on your audio and video.
*Dr. Arjen Bakker *(Groningen University), 16.15-18.00, will give a lecture
on:
*'**Formation of the Self in Ancient Judaism**'*
*Abstract*
There has been a great deal of attention for asceticism in the Greco-Roman
world, especially for pagan and Christian manifestations in late antiquity,
and to a lesser extent for Jewish examples. One particularly influential
perspective regards Hellenistic intellectual culture as a dominant factor
that had a major impact on pagan, Christian and Jewish forms of ascetic
behaviour. It is generally assumed that ascetic dimensions in ancient
Judaism are restricted to Jewish sources in Greek and should be explained
as the result of Hellenistic influence. In this talk, building on some
recent contributions, I will argue to the contrary and demonstrate that
perfectionist aspirations are deeply embedded in Jewish works from both
Palestine and the diaspora, and across the Hebrew-Greek divide. I will
discuss a number of Jewish texts in both Hebrew and Greek that build on
Jewish interpretive traditions and develop a distinctive approach to
formation of the self, in conversation with Hellenistic models.
*About the speaker*
Arjen Bakker (PhD Leuven, 2015) is Assistant Professor of New Testament and
Christian Origins at the University of Groningen. His research focuses on
the interaction of text and practice in ancient Judaism and early
Christianity. Before coming to Groningen in 2020, he was a postdoctoral
fellow at the universities of Haifa and Groningen, and a lecturer in
biblical studies at Oriel College, Oxford. He was also programme
coordinator and associate director of the Oriel Centre for the Study of the
Bible, which aims to integrate the study of the Bible into the Humanities
by organizing a broad range of interdisciplinary programmes and events. In
his research, he is particularly interested in interdisciplinary
conversation and collaboration across the Humanities. His first monograph *The
Secret of Time: Reconfiguring Wisdom in the Dead Sea Scrolls* will appear
this year with Brill publishers.
--
Evelien de Graaf
ReMa-student Classical, Medieval and Early Modern studies.
on behalf of the CRASIS team
University of Groningen
CRASIS is the Groningen institute for Interdisciplinary Studies in Culture,
Religion and Society of the Ancient World. Follow CRASIS on Facebook
<https://www.facebook.com/rug.crasis> or find out more about us on
www.rug.nl/crasis.
