Ignatius, Ad Polycarp. 4.3 and the Corporate Manumission of Christian Slaves
This study exegetes the passage in the second-century letter of the bishop Ignatius of Antioch to his fellow bishop Polycarp in Smyrna that concerns the liberation of baptized slaves. It argues that Ignatius does not prohibit private manumissions of Christian slaves by individual slaveowners in gene...
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| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
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| Interlibrary Loan: | Interlibrary Loan for the Fachinformationsdienste (Specialized Information Services in Germany) |
| Published: |
1993
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| In: |
Journal of early Christian studies
Year: 1993, Volume: 1, Issue: 2, Pages: 107-142 |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) |
| Parallel Edition: | Non-electronic
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| Summary: | This study exegetes the passage in the second-century letter of the bishop Ignatius of Antioch to his fellow bishop Polycarp in Smyrna that concerns the liberation of baptized slaves. It argues that Ignatius does not prohibit private manumissions of Christian slaves by individual slaveowners in general, but seeks to curb abuses of common chest (or corporate) manumissions by local house churches in particular. The study, then, locates the passage within the context of Greco-Roman rhetorical and literary commonplaces alarming audiences to the dangers of slave recruitment. The thesis is that Ignatius's apprehension about the corporate manumission of Christian slaves reveals not his so-called social conservatism on slavery, but his wider apologetic stratagem for social acceptability and internal unity under his own terms as bishop. |
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| ISSN: | 1086-3184 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Journal of early Christian studies
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1353/earl.0.0178 |