Athanasius Pulled Apart: Heresiology and the (Dis)membered (Fe)male Body
In this article, I engage Athanasius of Alexandria’s invocation of the infamous dismemberment of the unnamed woman found in Judg 19. By the fourth century, this story of gang rape—along with other preserved stories of sexual violence—found in Judges, were scattered throughout early Christian literat...
| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
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| Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
| Published: |
Cambridge Univ. Press
2023
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| In: |
Harvard theological review
Year: 2023, Volume: 116, Issue: 4, Pages: 514-532 |
| Standardized Subjects / Keyword chains: | B
Bible. Judge 19
/ Athanasius Alexandrinus 295-373
/ Heresy
/ Sex crimes
/ Woman
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| IxTheo Classification: | HB Old Testament KAB Church history 30-500; early Christianity NBE Anthropology NCF Sexual ethics |
| Further subjects: | B
heresiology
B Exile B heresy / orthodoxy B Athanasius of Alexandria |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) |
| Summary: | In this article, I engage Athanasius of Alexandria’s invocation of the infamous dismemberment of the unnamed woman found in Judg 19. By the fourth century, this story of gang rape—along with other preserved stories of sexual violence—found in Judges, were scattered throughout early Christian literature. Judges 19 holds a particularly troubling history in the late ancient context. The story of the rape and dismemberment of the unnamed woman in Judg 19 gave life to another story and typified a style of writing that I characterize in the article as a heresiology. The spectacle of Judges, along with other gruesome deaths of women, was one way in which heresiological discourse frames rhetorical arguments for writers like Athanasius of Alexandria. Here, I purposely draw our attention to how Athanasian orthodoxy became reliant on gender-based violence. |
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| ISSN: | 1475-4517 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Harvard theological review
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1017/S0017816023000275 |