Tom Finney | The University of Sheffield (original) (raw)

Papers by Tom Finney

The singular construct of afterlife within the Hebrew Bible is Sheol, a desolate place where, to ... more The singular construct of afterlife within the Hebrew Bible is Sheol, a desolate place where, to the lament of many, the souls of both the righteous and the wicked reside. Yet there are striking developments within the periods of Second Temple Judaism, the New Testament and the post-apostolic Christian era. Within Second Temple Judaism, Sheol is transformed into a place of differentiation: the souls of the righteous depart to a place of blessing, the wicked to a place of torment. For the New Testament writers, this concept remains, but the soul is now conjoined to the physical body, and in the later post-apostolic period there is accentuated terror for the wicked in vivid descriptions of the eternal ires of hell. The modern understanding of a tortuous afterlife is drawn from the imagery of the church fathers, which was further accentuated within mediaeval Christendom. Yet the polemical and apologetic context of this development needs to be recognized. Within Judaism, changes were ma...

Many recent studies in contemporary social anthropology have noted the vital import of the concep... more Many recent studies in contemporary social anthropology have noted the vital import of the concepts of honour and shame and how these are able both to generate ideas of social identity within a community, and, in particular, to elucidate patterns of social behaviour. This has been notably evident amongst the communities of the Mediterranean littoral. At the same time, multidisciplinary research exploring the communities of the Ancient Near East, especially those undertaken by social historians investigating the ancient societies of Israel, Greece, and Rome, have revealed that these, too, lived within the social constraints of honour and shame. These twin concepts are said to have had a profound influence upon such ancient communities, and, for some, are seen to represent the pivotal values of Greco-Roman social life. Unsurprisingly then, these same values are also evident within the narrative discourses of the Old and New Testaments, and a wide number of studies have sought to examine a particular text or social scenario through the lens of honour and shame. But despite having had a voluminous number of monographs and articles written on it, the letter of 1 Corinthians has remained relatively untouched by studies of honour-shame; yet it presents a unique expose of numerous aspects of social life in Greco-Roman first-century CE culture. My aim here is to examine the extent to which the social constraints of honour and shame may have had a direct influence upon the multifarious problems of social behaviour so evident within the community (not least the factionalism and strife which caused so many internal problems). In so doing, it presents a fresh reading of the letter, and the thesis it proposes is that the honour-shame model provides an appropriate and compelling framework within which to view the letter holistically within its social context. li/G/O'f Date: ~~-J-_~.l-_ _ ~_~_~' Signature of Supervisor In submitting this thesis to the University of St Andrews I understand that I am giving permission for it to be made available for use in accordance with the regulations of the University Library for the time being in force, subject to any copyright vested in the work not being affected thereby. I also understand that the title and abstract will be published, and that a copy of the work may be made and supplied to any bona fide library or research worker.