Scholars of religion have long assumed that ritual and belief constitute the fundamental building blocks of religious traditions and that these two components of religion are interrelated and interdependent in significant ways. Generations of New Testament and Early Christian scholars have produced detailed analyses of the belief systems of nascent Christian communities, including their ideological and political dimensions, but have by and large ignored ritual as an important element of early Christian religion and as a factor contributing to the rise and the organization of the movement. In recent years, however, scholars of early Christianity have begun to use ritual as an analytical tool for describing and explaining Christian origins and the early history of the movement. Such a development has created a momentum toward producing a more comprehensive volume on the ritual world of Early Christianity employing advances made in the field of ritual studies. The Oxford Handbook of Early Christian Ritual gives a manifold account of the ritual world of early Christianity from the beginning of the movement up to the end of the fifth century. The volume introduces relevant theories and approaches; central topics of ritual life in the cultural world of early Christianity; and important Christian ritual themes and practices in emerging Christian groups and factions.

Scholars across many fields have come to realize that ritual is an integral element of human life and a vital aspect of all human societies. Yet, this realization has been slow to develop among scholars of early Christianity. Early Christian Ritual Life attempts to counteract the undervaluing of ritual by placing it at the forefront of early Christian life. Rather than treating ritual in isolation or in a fragmentary way, this book examines early Christian ritual life as a whole. The authors explore an array of Christian ritual activity, employing theory critically and explicitly to make sense of various ritual behaviors and their interconnections. Written by leading experts in their fields, this collection is divided into three parts: • Interacting with the Divine • Group Interactions • Contesting and Creating Ritual Protocols. This book is ideal for religious studies students seeking an introduction to the dynamic research areas of ritual studies and early Christian practice.

"The conceit in the title of this volume is that ritual, however expansively it may be defined, is ineluctably tethered to religion and worship. It has a primal connection to the idea that a transcendent order - numinous and mysterious, supranatural and elusive, divine and wholly other - gives meaning and purpose to life. The construction of rites and rituals enables humans to conceive and apprehend this transcendent order, to symbolize it and interact with it, to postulate its truths in the face of contradicting realities and to repair them when they have been breached or diminished. The focus of this Handbook is on ritual and worship from the perspective of biblical studies, particularly on the Hebrew Bible and its ancient Near Eastern antecedents. Within this context, attention will be given to the development of ideas in Jewish, Christian, and Muslim thinking, but only insofar as they connect with or extend the trajectory of biblical precedents. The volume reflects a wide range of analytical approaches to ancient texts, inscriptions, iconography, and ritual artifacts. It examines the social history and cultural knowledge encoded in rituals, and explores the way rituals shape and are shaped by politics, economics, ethical imperatives, and religion itself. Toward this end, the volume is organized into six major sections: Historical Contexts, Interpretive Approaches, Ritual Elements (participants, places, times, objects, practices), Underlying Cultural and Theological Perspectives, History of Interpretation, Social-Cultural Functions, and Theology and Theological Heritage"--

Informed by the paradigmatic shift in ritual and liturgical studies, this volume offers analyses of key ritual traditions in early Christianity. The case studies focus on the dynamic formation and transformation of rituals in the context of Greco-Roman religion, Judaism, and Islam.

The rise of early Christianity has been examined from a myriad of perspectives, but until recently ritual has been a neglected topic. Ritual and Christian Beginnings: A Socio-Cognitive Analysis argues that ritual theory is indispensable for the study of Christian beginnings. It also makes a strong case for the application of theories and insights from the Cognitive Science of Religion, a field that has established itself as a vigorous movement in Religious Studies over the past two decades. Risto Uro develops a 'socio-cognitive' approach to the study of early Christian rituals, seeking to integrate a social-level analysis with findings from the cognitive and evolutionary sciences. Ritual and Christian Beginnings provides an overview of how ritual has been approached in previous scholarship, including reasons for its neglect, and introduces the reader to the emerging fields of Ritual Studies and the Cognitive Science of Religion. In particular, it explores the ways in which cognitive theories of ritual can shed new light on issues discussed by early Christian scholars, and opens up new questions and avenues for further research. The socio-cognitive approach to ritual is applied to a number of test cases, including John the Baptist, the ritual healing practiced by Jesus and the early Christians, the social life of Pauline Christianity, and the development of early Christian baptismal practices. The analysis creates building blocks for a new account of Christian beginnings, highlighting the role of ritual innovation, cooperative signalling, and the importance of bodily actions for the generation and transmission of religious knowledge.

The Oxford Handbook of Early Christian Archaeology brings together expert work by leading scholars of the archaeology of Early Christianity and the Roman world in the Mediterranean and surrounding regions. The thirty-four contributions to this volume survey Christian material culture and ground the history, culture, and society of the first seven centuries of Christianity in archaeological method, theory, and research. The essays emphasize the link between archaeological fieldwork, methods, and regional and national traditions in constructing our knowledge of the Early Church and Christian communities within the context of the ancient Mediterranean, Near East, and Europe. Three sweeping introductory essays provide historical perspectives on the archaeology of the Early Christian world. These are followed by a series of topical treatments that focus on monuments and environments ranging from Christian churches to catacombs, martyria, and baths, as well as classes of objects of religious significance such as ceramics, lamps, and icons. Finally, the volume locates the archaeology of the Early Christian world in fifteen regional studies stretching from Britain to Persia, highlighting the unique historical contexts that have shaped scholarly discussion across time and space. The thorough, carefully-researched essays offer the most intensive, state-of-the-art treatment of recent research into the archaeology of Early Christianity available.

An Important Study on the Worship of the Early Church This introduction to the origins of Christian worship illuminates the importance of ancient liturgical patterns for contemporary Christian practice. Andrew McGowan takes a fresh approach to understanding how Christians came to worship in the distinctive forms still familiar today. Deftly and expertly processing the bewildering complexity of the ancient sources into lucid, fluent exposition, he sets aside common misperceptions to explore the roots of Christian ritual practices--including the Eucharist, baptism, communal prayer, preaching, Scripture reading, and music--in their earliest recoverable settings. Now in paper.

The Oxford Handbook of Medieval Christianity takes as its subject the beliefs, practices, and institutions of the Christian Church between 400 and 1500AD. It addresses topics ranging from early medieval monasticism to late medieval mysticism, from the material wealth of the Church to the spiritual exercises through which certain believers might attempt to improve their souls. Each chapter tells a story, but seeks also to ask how and why "Christianity" took particular forms at particular moments in history, paying attention to both the spiritual and otherwordly aspects of religion, and the material and political contexts in which they were often embedded. This Handbook is a landmark academic collection that presents cutting-edge interpretive perspectives on medieval religion for a wide academic audience, drawing together thirty key scholars in the field from the United States, the UK, and Europe. Notably, the Handbook is arranged thematically, and focusses on an analytical, rather than narrative, approach, seeking to demonstrate the variety, change, and complexity of religion throughout this long period, and the numerous different ways in which modern scholarship can approach it. While providing a very wide-ranging view of the subject, it also offers an important agenda for further study in the field.

This Handbook introduces the theology of the sacraments from a variety of perspectives. It contains historical overviews, biblical discussion, philosophical and theological reflection, as well as ecumenical discussion. It is one of the most comprehensive overviews of the sacraments throughout the tradition of the Christian church.