Clement of Alexandria and the Shaping of Christian Literary Practice Book contents
- Clement of Alexandria and the Shaping of Christian Literary Practice
- Clement of Alexandria and the Shaping of Christian Literary Practice
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- 1 Introduction
- 2 Clement’s Miscellanism and the Scholarly Trope of Christian Difference
- 3 Studying Ancient Miscellanism
- 4 Early Imperial Cultures of Miscellany-Making
- 5 Self-Introductions and Clement’s Miscellanistic Vocation
- 6 Miscellany Titles and Clement’s Divine Paratexts
- 7 The Miscellanist’s Trope of Deselecting Titles and Clement’s Conversion of Imagery
- 8 Muses in the Miscellanists’ Frame
- 9 Clement’s Theology of Hiddenness and the Logic of Christian Miscellanism
- 10 Mystery Initiation and Clement’s Literary Paideia
- 11 Poikilia
- 12 Conclusion
- Appendix The Literary Sequence of Protrepticus, Paedagogus, Stromateis (and Hypotyposeis)
- Bibliography
- Index
12 - Conclusion
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 16 December 2020
- Clement of Alexandria and the Shaping of Christian Literary Practice
- Clement of Alexandria and the Shaping of Christian Literary Practice
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- 1 Introduction
- 2 Clement’s Miscellanism and the Scholarly Trope of Christian Difference
- 3 Studying Ancient Miscellanism
- 4 Early Imperial Cultures of Miscellany-Making
- 5 Self-Introductions and Clement’s Miscellanistic Vocation
- 6 Miscellany Titles and Clement’s Divine Paratexts
- 7 The Miscellanist’s Trope of Deselecting Titles and Clement’s Conversion of Imagery
- 8 Muses in the Miscellanists’ Frame
- 9 Clement’s Theology of Hiddenness and the Logic of Christian Miscellanism
- 10 Mystery Initiation and Clement’s Literary Paideia
- 11 Poikilia
- 12 Conclusion
- Appendix The Literary Sequence of Protrepticus, Paedagogus, Stromateis (and Hypotyposeis)
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
The conclusion draws together the threads of the argument to reflect on the relationship between Classical and Christian traditions. Earlier generations celebrated Clement as a missionary, liberal or humanist; this book has shown that he is rather a skilled literary artist who draws his readers closer to God by reinterpreting the Classical genre of the miscellany and relocating it within Christian tradition. Whereas Roman miscellanists often wrote in order to appropriate and transform Greek culture, Clement wrote to appropriate and transform pagan culture for Christianity. Among later Christians in antiquity, his project was read and admired from the desert to the library, and he was known as the Stromatist par excellence.
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- Information
- Clement of Alexandria and the Shaping of Christian Literary PracticeMiscellany and the Transformation of Greco-Roman Writing, pp. 376 - 381Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2020