Vivid Rhetoric and Visual Persuasion

A major scholarly collaboration exploring vivid visual rhetoric in the New Testament

From Jesus’s miraculous walk on water to the graphic horrors of hell, New Testament authors make vivid and unforgettable images appear before their audience’s eyes. In the past decade, scholarship on early Christian use of ancient rhetorical techniques has flourished. One focus of rhetorical criticism of the New Testament has been the function of ekphrasis, or vivid visual description. In this landmark collection, leading New Testament scholars come together to probe the purpose and import of ekphrasis in early Christian literature.

The research in this collection explores the relationship between vivid rhetoric and genre, taking into account technical features, authorial intent, and audience response. Specific topics include:

     • The New Testament’s rhetoric compared against Greco-Roman rhetorical handbooks

     • Juxtaposition between vivid and non-vivid rhetoric

     • The use of energeia in John’s Gospel to draw upon the reader’s multiple senses

     • Aesthetics and the grotesque in Revelation

     • The use of travelogue to create a virtual journey for the audience

     • Vivid rhetoric in early martyr literature

Vivid Rhetoric and Visual Persuasion is a must-read for scholars of early Christianity and rhetorical criticism. Readers will find this collection indispensable in understanding a complex facet of the New Testament in its historical context.

Contributors

Bart B. Bruehler, Diane Fruchtman, Meghan Henning, Martina Kepper, Susanne Luther, Harry O. Maier, Gudrun Nassauer, Nils Neumann, Vernon K. Robbins, Gary S. Selby, Aldo Tagliabue, Sunny Kuan-Hui Wang, Annette Weissenrieder, Robyn J. Whitaker

Table of Contents

    1. “Before the Eyes”: A History of Vivid Rhetoric and and Ekphrasis in the New Testament, by Meghan Henning and Nils Neumann

    2. Experiencing Deadly Peril: Vivid Rhetoric in the Account of Jesus Walking on the Sea (Matthew 14:22–33), by Nils Neumann

    3. Apocalyptic Ekphrasis and the Afterlife in Matthew 25: Vividness, Verisimilitude, and Mixed Messages, by Meghan Henning

    4. Images of Women: A Study on Vivid Christology in Luke-Acts, by Gudrun Nassauer

    5. Seeing Creation of God’s Divine Plan: Unseeable Being Becomes Visible in John, by Vernon K. Robbins

    6. Visualizing the Resurrection of Lazarus: Human Senses and Vivid Rhetoric in John 11, by Sunny Kuan-Hui Wang

    7. Vivid Description in the Narrative of Luke-Acts: Possibility, Patterns, and Purposes, by Bart B. Bruehler

    8. Architecture and Medialized Presence: Jerusalem and Its Temples in Acts 21:27–30 and Ephesians 2:14, by Annette Weissenrieder with Martina Kepper

    9. Of Walls, Temples, and Long Journeys: Image and Emotion in the Conversion Narrative of Ephesians 2:11–22, by Gary S. Selby

   10. Vivid Vignettes: Lakes of Fire, Grotesque Feasts, and the Idea of Hell in Revelation 19:17–21, by Robyn J. Whitaker

   11. Topographies of Conduct? Ethical Implications of the Ekphrastic Description of Jerusalem in Revelation 21, by Susanne Luther

   12. Making a Spectacle: Vivid Spatiality and Early Christian Martyrology, by Harry O. Maier

   13. Experience of Martyrdom: Immersion, and Lack thereof, in Pontius’s Life of Cyprian, by Aldo Tagliabue

   14. Salvific Suspense: Cinematic Ekphrasis in Paulinus of Nola’s Natalicium of 401, by Diane Fruchtman