Paul's visit to Athens, in particular the Areopagus speech, is one of the most well known excerpts of early Christian literature. It is the most significant speech by Paul to a Gentile audience in Acts functioning as a literary crest of the overall narrative. Yet critical analyses also describe it as an ad hoc blend of Greek and Jewish elements. In this study, Clare K. Rothschild examines how the nexus of popular second-century traditions crystallizing around the Cretan prophet Epimenides explains these seemingly miscellaneous and impromptu aspects of the text. Her investigation exposes...

The present volume offers a glimpse at one currently thriving expression of the distinguished history of religions school approach to the New Testament and early Christian literature. Begun circa 1884 at the University of Gottingen and pioneered by scholars such as Albert Eichhorn, Wilhelm Bousset, Johannes Weiss, and William Wrede, today applications of this approach are diverse. In North America, the University of Chicago has long been a hub of this type of investigation. Over the last century, many of these studies have produced groundbreaking results. Essays in this collection apply this...