Formen und Funktionen von Polemik in den Briefen Augustins: Versuch einer Klassifikation
Due to the conventions of late-antique epistolary politeness, it is not always easy to identify polemical passages in Augustine’s correspondence. The present contribution attempts to discern and classify some recurrent techniques and strategies that are characteristic of letters the addressee of whi...
| Published in: | Zeitschrift für antikes Christentum |
|---|---|
| Main Author: | |
| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | German |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
|
| Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
| Published: |
De Gruyter
2018
|
| In: |
Zeitschrift für antikes Christentum
|
| Standardized Subjects / Keyword chains: | B
Augustinus, Aurelius, Saint 354-430, Epistulae
/ Polemics
/ Rhetoric
|
| IxTheo Classification: | CD Christianity and Culture KAB Church history 30-500; early Christianity |
| Further subjects: | B
direct and indirect polemics
rhetoric
pathos
polemical hermeneutics
Refraintechnik
paganism
Donatism
Pelagianism
|
| Online Access: |
Presumably Free Access Volltext (Verlag) |
| Parallel Edition: | Non-electronic
|
| Summary: | Due to the conventions of late-antique epistolary politeness, it is not always easy to identify polemical passages in Augustine’s correspondence. The present contribution attempts to discern and classify some recurrent techniques and strategies that are characteristic of letters the addressee of which is him- or herself the target of Augustine’s polemics, i. e. in which polemical rhetoric is blended with diplomacy. After describing some more formal techniques, such as polemical hermeneutics and Refraintechnik, I turn to the rhetorical, i. e. persuasive, functions of polemics in Augustine’s anti-pagan, anti-Donatist and anti-Pelagian letters, using the basic distinction between direct polemics (polemics against the addressee in person) and indirect polemics (polemics against the addressee’s group or friends) as a starting point. Another relevant distinction, taken into account throughout, is whether a polemical letter is primarily designed to impress the immediate addressee or to have an effect on the wider readership that Augustine had to reckon with as soon as a letter was dispatched. |
|---|---|
| ISSN: | 1612-961X |
| Contains: | In: Zeitschrift für antikes Christentum
|
| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1515/zac-2018-0012 |