Title: SIMILES ANANIAE, AZARIAE ET MISAHELI EXSTITERUNT. THE RECEPTION OF DANIEL TALES IN EARLY CHRISTIANITIES (II - IV CENTURY)
Abstract: The subject of the present work is the study of the paleochristian exegesis of the “tales” included in the Book of Daniel, in a pluridisciplinary perspective which examines the evidences coming from both iconography and literature. The work takes into account the documentation from the origins of iconography (end of the II century), to the so-called “Constantinian period”, including materials coming from every geographic context of ancient Christianity. The research is divided in three sections, according to the principal hermeneutic traditions of the “typological”, “allegoric” and “literary” reception of the biblical text, mainly highlighting the role assumed by the “tales” in the formation of the ancient martyrdom theology. The analysis assumes an historical-critical method, mainly focusing on the comparison between two different documentary categories, which attest the variety and the heterogeneity of the biblical interpretation activated in the first communities. The inclusion of the figurative source derives from its revaluation: more than “biblia pauperum”, the ancient iconography, produced in the context of liturgy, expresses an independent and original tradition of the “tales” reception. Under this point of view, the complex interpretation of the Book of Daniel offers a good paradigm to understand, in a wider sense, the processes determining the formation of paleochristian thought.
Publication Year: 2016
Publication Date: 2016-05-04
Language: en
Type: dissertation
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