2012. július 9.-e és július 20.-a között, "Polemos/Pulmus: Ways of Confrontation in Judaism, Paganism, and Christianity in Late Antiquity" címmel zajlott a Közép-Európai Egyetem egyik nyári posztgraduális kurzusa. Intézetünk munkatársa és a kurzus egyik programigazgatója, Turán Tamás három elõadást tartott:
- Facets of God: Polymorphous Imagery in Ancient Rabbinic Theology
- Oikoumene and Oylem: Spheres of the Rabbinic Universe
- “Seventy Nations, Seventy Angels“ – A Rabbinic Concept of World History
Az ókori kereszténység, rabbinikus zsidóság és a különféle "pogány" vallási és filozófiai irányzatok komoly belsõ viták, az egymással folytatott - hol békés, hol békétlen - dialógus és versengés révén alakitották ki a maguk arculatát a késõ-ókorban. A kurzus arra a kérdésre kereste a választ, hogy ezek az alakulófélben lévõ vallási-szellemi áramlatok milyen módokon asszimilálták a kivülrõl jött impulzusokat, és milyen stratégiákkal kezelték belsõ-külsõ konfliktusaikat.
"Struggle is the father of all things", as the popular Greek saying has it, and religious or philosophical debates in Late Antiquity provide ample proof of this. The aspirations of religion to dominate space and time in our period invited various forms of rivalry, mostly precluding peace or even a dialogue for peace. The religious conflicts between, and within Christianity, Judaism and Paganism often involved political action and overt struggles – legislations, excommunications, persecutions, pogroms, revolts, or wars. People in the Roman Empire, even in the period of Pax Romana, knew all too well that the Gates of Janus can be opened any time, peace proving itself to be the continuation, with different means, of war - polemos in Greek, and pulmus as a loanword in Rabbinic literature.
The course aims at exploring the nature and various ways of confrontation between and within Early and RabbinicJudaism, the Early Church, and Pagan religious movements and schools of thought. Judaism was rarely an explicit third party to the religious polemic that was to shape the political and intellectual landscape of the Mediterranean for centuries to come. It was a silent and yet senior partner in this polemic. Its religiously motivated resistance to the idea of the empire called for contempt or awe; and yet it also offered a different paradigm by the attractive force of its history, law and Scripture. Pagan Hellenism had a special role in this polemic: as a conglomerate of philosophical schools and religious movements it did not only provide a cultural background and a conceptual framework, but also posed immense challenges for Judaism and emerging Christianity from a variety of directions – while it also had to defend itself against the emerging new religion. Christianity itself had to navigate the straits between its Biblical heritage and its Hellenistic context; at the same time, its novelty and success provoked various reactions from Jews and Pagans alike.
Programigazgatók/Course Directors:
- Buzási Gábor - ELTE BTK Assziriológia és Hebraisztika Tanszék / Central European University
- Geréby György - Medieval Studies Department, Central European University
- Turán Tamás - MTA TK, Kisebbségkutató Intézet
Meghívott elõadók voltak:
- Daniel Boyarin - Departments of Near Eastern Studies and Rhetoric, University of California at Berkeley, USA
- Shaye J. D. Cohen - Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations, Harvard University, Cambridge, USA
- John M. Dillon - Department of Classics, Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland
- Mark Edwards Christ Church, University of Oxford, UK
- Guy G. Stroumsa - University of Oxford, UK / The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel
A kurzusnak 22 résztvevõje volt: doktoranduszok, poszt-doktoranduszok, fiatal kutatók: négyen Magyarországról, öten Kelet-Európából, hatan Nyugat-Európából, öten Észak-Amerikából, ketten Izraelbõl.