Jewish Historiography and Iconography in Early and Medieval Christianity (Compendia Rerum Iudaicarum and Novum Testamentum, Section III, Vol 2)

Rating:
Summary: Jewish and Christian Icons- origins and development
Review: If you are interested in the origins of Jewish and Christian iconography, or in the way in which early Christians like Origen and Eusebius understood Jewish histories, then you will enjoy reading this richly illustrated book. I will quote from the jacket:

"The Jewish ancestry of Christianity is not merely a matter of religious sentiment but the object of scholarly research. One of the aims of this series is to analyse how Jewish cultural elements were assimilated by and adopted to the needs of the arising new religion. The present volume contains two seperate studies. Schrekenberg shows how successive Christian authors turned Josephus's description of the fall of Jerusalem into a confirmation of Christian superiority. Next he demonstartes how this view of the Jewish historian and his works appears in medieval Christian illustrations. In another contribution, Schubert discusses the existence of a Jewish pictoral tradition and its influence on early Christian art. Such influence was all the more likely where Christian artists were unaware of potential conflicts of the Jewish iconography with Christian doctrine. This volume is richly illustrated with reproductions of the pertinent works of art."

You may also enjoy "The Resurrection and the Icon" by Quenot.