In this book, Novenson gives a revisionist account of messianism in antiquity. He shows that, for the ancient Jews and Christians who used the term, a messiah was not an article of faith but a manner of speaking: a scriptural figure of speech useful for thinking kinds of political order.
The study delves into the complex identity of the apostle Paul, highlighting his Jewish roots alongside his radical Christian ideas, which sometimes appear anti-Jewish. Matthew Novenson examines Paul's unique interpretation of time, particularly his view of the end of history as a present reality rather than a future event, revealing the intricate layers of his thought and its implications for understanding his role in early Christianity.
"A collection of a decade's worth of essays in which Matthew Novenson puts contextual understandings of Paul's letters into conversation with their Christian reception history"-- Provided by publisher