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Reference Type: Journal Article
Author: Bărbulescu, Ana
Year: 2012
Title: Dynamics of identity construction. Jews and Christians in Late Antiquity
Translated Title: [Dyn amics of Identity Construction-Jews and Christians in Late Antiquity]
Journal: Buletinul Centrului, Muzeului şi Arhivei Istorice a Evreilor din România
Issue: 14-15
Pages: 64-79
Language: English
Keywords: Jewish minority, interdisciplinary, religion, religious identity, Christianity, Iudaism, theology
Abstract: (En) If we search into a contemporary dictionary for terms such as Christian and Jew, we will find two definitions that acknowledge the existence of two distinct and non-congruent groups: a Jew is an individual belonging to continuation through descent or conversion to the ancient Jewish people, one whose religion is Judaism; a Christian is defined as one who professes the belief in Jesus Christ. However, despite of today's clear-cut conceptual discrimination, things were not so obvious in the beginning. It was a time when Jewishness could not be reached through conversion, biological descent followed the line of the father (and not, as nowadays, that of the mother), the followers of Christ described themselves as Yehudim (Jews) and the word Christianos (Christian) was not invented yet.
Acknowledging these facts, I focused on the process of identity construction specific to both Judaism and Christianity in the first six centuries of the Common Era, looking with equal interest to the way how the image attributed to the Other was part of this process, as well as to the element against which the image of self would be built. The entire research was circumscribed to the phenomenological paradigm, initiated by Schultz and developed by Berger through his sociology of knowledge. Moreover, the approach was a systemic one, which means that the analysis of the two groups (Jews and Christians) depends on the social, political and religious environment which incorporates them, in the same time, being interested in the dynamic of the analyzed social phenomenon.
URL: http://www.csier.jewishfed.ro/public_html/documente/buletine/buletin14-15.pdf