LEADER 03052nam 2200601 a 450 001 9910789805803321 005 20200520144314.0 010 $a0-674-26233-6 010 $a0-674-05889-5 024 7 $a10.4159/9780674058897 035 $a(CKB)2670000000081300 035 $a(OCoLC)733332472 035 $a(CaPaEBR)ebrary10456068 035 $a(SSID)ssj0000484671 035 $a(PQKBManifestationID)12214076 035 $a(PQKBTitleCode)TC0000484671 035 $a(PQKBWorkID)10594953 035 $a(PQKB)11522828 035 $a(Au-PeEL)EBL3300901 035 $a(CaPaEBR)ebr10456068 035 $a(DE-B1597)585467 035 $a(DE-B1597)9780674058897 035 $a(MiAaPQ)EBC3300901 035 $a(OCoLC)1301548644 035 $a(EXLCZ)992670000000081300 100 $a20100503d2010 uy 0 101 0 $aeng 135 $aurcn||||||||| 181 $ctxt 182 $cc 183 $acr 200 14$aThe Gnostics$b[electronic resource] $emyth, ritual, and diversity in early Christianity /$fDavid Brakke 210 $aCambridge, Mass. $cHarvard University Press$d2010 215 $a1 online resource (181 p.) 300 $aBibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph 311 $a0-674-06603-0 311 $a0-674-04684-6 320 $aIncludes bibliographical references and index. 327 $aImagining "Gnosticism" and early Christianities -- Identifying the Gnostics and their literature -- The myth and rituals of the Gnostic school of thought -- Unity and diversity in second-century Rome -- Strategies of self-differentiation. 330 $aBrakke writes a pioneering study of the way the demon role relates to religious thinking and to cultural anxieties. The author?s sources include biographies of exceptional monks, collections of monastic sayings and stories, letters from ascetic teachers to their disciples, sermons, community rules, and biblical commentaries. When monks imagined the resistance that they had to overcome in cultivating their selves or the temptation that offered an easier path, they saw supernatural beings that could take the shapes of animals, women, boys, and false angels in their attempts to seduce monks away from their devotion to God. And when they considered the inclinations in their own selves that opposed their best intentions, they concluded that demons introduced such problematic ?thoughts? to their minds. Although the last twenty years has seen an explosion of scholarship on early Christian asceticism, producing brilliant explorations of the body, sexual renunciation, fasting, and gender, combat with demons has been left relatively unexplored. 606 $aGnosticism 606 $aChurch history$yPrimitive and early church, ca. 30-600 615 0$aGnosticism. 615 0$aChurch history 676 $a273/.1 700 $aBrakke$b David$0476411 801 0$bMiAaPQ 801 1$bMiAaPQ 801 2$bMiAaPQ 906 $aBOOK 912 $a9910789805803321 996 $aThe Gnostics$93692392 997 $aUNINA