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Research program
Christianity and the Mediterranean World : Religious Plurality, Cohexistence and Conflicts. Towns and Peripheries (1th-8th Centuries)University Co-ordinator
Università degli Studi di TORINO - STORIA - ()Research Unit Leader
Giovanni FiloramoDescription
On the basis of its expertise, the Turin’s group set its planning to investigate deeply, covering the period second-sixth centuries, two different forms of “living in the difference” by Christian communities before and after the turning point of the fourth century. During the first year, privileged object of investigation will be some Christian religious marginal and/or progressively emarginated minorities from the institutional Church: the Judeo-Christian communities, the various Gnostic and Marcionite conventicles and the Manichaean standing communities in the West.Our aim would be to describe this self-perception within the framework of the life “between two different worlds”, trying to answer these questions:
a) What kind of difference are they living and how do they perceive and carry out this feeling in images or in symbols?
b) At what level do they live this difference? Individual or collective?
c) How does this self-perception, according to the place where it appears, change?
d) How do they search and find a solution for this situation? And how do they live it?
At this level, in fact, the need for an acceptable coexistence, a solution to all social conflicts and mediation to internal and outside tensions, or even the necessity to stand out through conflicting behaviours, appears fundamental.
During the second year, our research will be focused on the particular way in which this problem appears, even if in a different context, within the ancient Eastern monasticism (Egypt, Syria, Palestine) both in the coenobitic and in some other forms of communities. As the recent research pointed out, this monasticism lived very close to such important urban environments as Alexandria, Jerusalem and Constantinople. These “monastic minorities” built their identity through a continuous comparison with the “ecclesiastical majority” and the Episcopal powers, both deeply rooted in many urban realities. As an ancient author wrote, the desert has become a city: that means scholars have to study how and in which forms the monastic identity is related to the other group of the society. Some specific examples will be given afterwards.
To sum up, the principal aim of this research is to describe continuities and differences within the ideological, symbolic and practical ways in which these communities try to establish a relationship with the whole late antique religious world. Then, whether a community perceive itself – or it is perceived – as a minority
