Book contents
- The Evil Inclination in Early Judaism and Christianity
- The Evil Inclination in Early Judaism and Christianity
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- Contributors
- 1 Introduction
- 2 Reconsidering the Semantics of the “Inclination” (yeṣer) in Classical Biblical Hebrew
- 3 The “Inclination” (yeṣer) as Rendered in the Septuagint
- 4 “Fleshly Spirit” and “Vessel of Flesh” in 4QInstruction and the Thanksgiving Hymns
- 5 Theological Anthropology in the Enochic Tradition
- 6 The Perils of Philosophical Persuasion: Philo on the Origin of Moral Evils
- 7 The Evil Inclination (yeṣer ha-ra‘) in Tannaitic Literature: Demonic Desires and Beyond
- 8 Conflicting Intrapersonal Powers in Paul’s Letters
- 9 The “Two Inclinations” and the Double-Minded Human Condition in the Letter of James
- 10 An Evil Inclination in the Early Targums to the Pentateuch and Prophets?
- 11 “Gnostic” Theologies of Evil
- 12 The Rabbinic “Inclination” (yeṣer) and the Christian Apocrypha
- 13 Origen on the Origin of Sin
- 14 Augustine on the Diabolical Suggestion of Sin
- 15 Jerome and the “Inclination” (yeṣer): The Evidence of the Vulgate
- 16 Rabbinic Inclinations and Monastic Thoughts: Evagrius Ponticus’ Doctrine of Reasoning (logismoi) and Its Antecedents
- 17 “Inclination” (yaṣrā) in the Syriac Tradition
- 18 Evil, Sin, and Inclination (yeṣer) in Jewish and Christian Poetic Disputes between the Body and Soul
- 19 The Wizard of Āz and the Evil Inclination: The Babylonian Rabbinic Inclination (yeṣer) in Its Zoroastrian and Manichean Context
- 20 The Evil Inclination in the Targums to the Writings
- References
- Index of Names
- Index Locorum
1 - Introduction
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 February 2021
- The Evil Inclination in Early Judaism and Christianity
- The Evil Inclination in Early Judaism and Christianity
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- Contributors
- 1 Introduction
- 2 Reconsidering the Semantics of the “Inclination” (yeṣer) in Classical Biblical Hebrew
- 3 The “Inclination” (yeṣer) as Rendered in the Septuagint
- 4 “Fleshly Spirit” and “Vessel of Flesh” in 4QInstruction and the Thanksgiving Hymns
- 5 Theological Anthropology in the Enochic Tradition
- 6 The Perils of Philosophical Persuasion: Philo on the Origin of Moral Evils
- 7 The Evil Inclination (yeṣer ha-ra‘) in Tannaitic Literature: Demonic Desires and Beyond
- 8 Conflicting Intrapersonal Powers in Paul’s Letters
- 9 The “Two Inclinations” and the Double-Minded Human Condition in the Letter of James
- 10 An Evil Inclination in the Early Targums to the Pentateuch and Prophets?
- 11 “Gnostic” Theologies of Evil
- 12 The Rabbinic “Inclination” (yeṣer) and the Christian Apocrypha
- 13 Origen on the Origin of Sin
- 14 Augustine on the Diabolical Suggestion of Sin
- 15 Jerome and the “Inclination” (yeṣer): The Evidence of the Vulgate
- 16 Rabbinic Inclinations and Monastic Thoughts: Evagrius Ponticus’ Doctrine of Reasoning (logismoi) and Its Antecedents
- 17 “Inclination” (yaṣrā) in the Syriac Tradition
- 18 Evil, Sin, and Inclination (yeṣer) in Jewish and Christian Poetic Disputes between the Body and Soul
- 19 The Wizard of Āz and the Evil Inclination: The Babylonian Rabbinic Inclination (yeṣer) in Its Zoroastrian and Manichean Context
- 20 The Evil Inclination in the Targums to the Writings
- References
- Index of Names
- Index Locorum
Summary
So Strack and Billerbeck began their excursus on the yeṣer in their influential Kommentar zum Neuen Testament aus Talmud und Midrasch. They attempt to trace the origins of the rabbinic concept of an internal struggle between two forces within the human being, one inclination that is good and one that is evil, finding an equivalent in earlier Hellenistic concepts. Their comments exemplify two of the major methodological weaknesses that dogged earlier scholarship on the Evil Inclination – a tendency on the one hand to read rabbinic sources from different times and places as an undifferentiated synthesis, and an overenthusiasm for perceiving in superficial similarities concrete parallels and the marks of direct borrowings, on the other.
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- Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2021