Self-designations and Group Identity in the

What terms would early Christians have used to address one another? In the first book-length study on this topic, Paul Trebilco investigates the origin, use and function of seven key self-designations: 'brothers and sisters', 'believers', 'saints', 'the assembly', 'disciples', 'the Way', and 'Christian'. In doing so, he discovers what they reveal about the identity, self-understanding and character of the early Christian movement. This study sheds light on the theology of particular New Testament authors and on the relationship of early Christian authors and communities to the Old Testament and to the wider context of the Greco-Roman world. Trebilco's writing is informed by other work in the area of sociolinguistics on the development of self-designations and labels and provides a fascinating insight into this often neglected topic.

Preface	p. xi
Introduction	p. 1
What sort of terms are we looking for?	p. 1
Criteria for selecting the self-designations discussed here and the plan of this work	p. 3
The term 'Christian'	p. 3
Previous studies	p. 5
Insights and perspectives from other areas of study	p. 5
That early Christian communities created their own social dialects	p. 11
Other introductory matters	p. 13
Conclusions	p. 15
Brothers and sisters - ¿¿¿¿¿oí	p. 16
Introduction	p. 16
Background for the metaphorical use of ¿¿¿¿¿oí	p. 16
Views of ¿¿¿¿¿oí relations in the Jewish and Greco-Roman world	p. 18
Paul's use of ¿¿¿¿¿oí	p. 21
The origin of the usage of ¿¿¿¿¿oí	p. 38
Ephesians	p. 46
The Pastorals	p. 47
Acts	p. 50
The four Gospels	p. 53
Hebrews	p. 54
James	p. 57
1 Peter	p. 60
2 Peter	p. 62
Johannine Letters	p. 62
Revelation	p. 64
Conclusions	p. 65
The believers	p. 68
Introduction	p. 68
Context	p. 68
Paul	p. 72
Origin of believer-designations	p. 90
Ephesians	p. 99
The Pastorals	p. 100
Acts	p. 103
The Synoptics	p. 111
Hebrews	p. 113
1 Peter	p. 113
John and 1 John	p. 114
Jude	p. 117
Revelation	p. 118
Conclusions	p. 118
The saints û oi¿¿ioi	p. 122
Usage	p. 122
The wider context	p. 122
Paul	p. 128
Saints in Acts	p. 137
The origin of the use of the term	p. 140
Ephesians	p. 147
The Pastorals	p. 149
Matthew	p. 149
Hebrews	p. 150
Jude	p. 154
Revelation	p. 154
Abbreviation	p. 158
Conclusions	p. 159
The assembly - ¿ ¿kk¿¿¿í¿	p. 164
Introduction	p. 164
Was ¿kk&¿¿¿í¿ used as a self-designation?	p. 165
Context	p. 165
Paul's usage	p. 169
Acts	p. 180
Origin of the Christian usage of ¿kk&¿¿¿í¿	p. 183
Ephesians	p. 198
The Pastorals	p. 199
Matthew	p. 200
Hebrews	p. 201
James	p. 202
3 John	p. 203
Revelation	p. 203
Lack of usage elsewhere	p. 205
Conclusions	p. 205
Disciples - ¿¿¿¿¿¿í	p. 208
Introduction	p. 208
Jesus' 'disciples'	p. 208
The meaning and use of ¿¿¿¿¿¿í	p. 209
Jesus and 'the disciples'	p. 218
If talmîdayyaÆ was a term Jesus used, why did ¿¿¿¿¿¿í not become popular in early Christianity?	p. 225
Why do the Evangelists keep using ¿¿¿¿¿¿í and do they modify its usage at all?	p. 232
The use of ¿¿¿¿¿¿í in the Apostolic Fathers	p. 242
Conclusions	p. 245
The Way - ¿o¿os	p. 247
Introduction	p. 247
Usage in Acts	p. 247
Context	p. 249
The origin and use of ¿o¿os as a Christian self-designation	p. 253
Conclusion	p. 270
'Christian' û X¿i¿¿i¿vós	p. 272
The use of the designation in 'Christian' texts	p. 272
The use of X¿i¿¿i¿vós by outsiders in Rome and elsewhere	p. 272
Origin of the term	p. 276
The use of X¿i¿¿i¿vós by insiders	p. 283
Alternative outsider-facing designations?	p. 294
Conclusions	p. 296
Conclusions	p. 298
The way key self-designations were used	p. 298
The power of language	p. 300
The earliest terms?	p. 300
Horizontal and vertical axes	p. 303
Insider terminology, outsider-facing designations, outsider language	p. 303
General observations about insider self-designations	p. 304
Early 'Christian' language in relation, to the Old Testament and the Greco-Roman context	p. 307
Different terms used in different books	p. 311
What term should we use?	p. 313
Bibliography	p. 315
Indexes	p. 347
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Self-designations and Group Identity in the New Testament

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