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First Converts: Rich Pagan Women and the Rhetoric of Mission in Early Judaism and Christianity » (1)

Book cover image of First Converts: Rich Pagan Women and the Rhetoric of Mission in Early Judaism and Christianity by Shelly Matthews

Authors: Shelly Matthews
ISBN-13: 9780804735926, ISBN-10: 0804735921
Format: Hardcover
Publisher: Stanford University Press
Date Published: October 2002
Edition: 1

Author Biography: Shelly Matthews

Shelly Matthews is Assistant Professor of Religion at Furman University.

Book Synopsis

It has often been said that rich pagan women, much more so than men, were attracted both to early Judaism and Christianity. This book provides a new reading of sources from which this truism springs, focusing on two texts from the turn of the first century, Josephus’s Antiquities and Luke’s Acts.

	Abbreviations of Classical Works
	Introduction	1
1	Crimes of Passion: Religion, Sex, and State Subversion in Antiquities 18.65-84	10
2	Ladies' Aid: Gentile Noblewomen as Saviors and Benefactors in the Antiquities	29
3	"More than a Few Greek Women of High Standing": "God-Fearing" Noblewomen in Acts	51
4	First Converts: Acts 16 and the Legitimating Function of High-Standing Women in Missionary Propaganda	72
	Conclusion	96
	Abbreviations of Works Cited	103
	Notes	105
	Works Cited	143
	Index	161