Anziehung und Abstoßung

English summary: The question as to the relationship between Judaism and Christianity in the first centuries has long been answered, as a matter of course, with the explanation that a permanent boundary was drawn between the two at some point in the first or second century. The claim that such a demarcation of the two religions was established so early on has subsequently undergone critical revision because sources do actually indicate that this process took place over a much longer...
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English summary: The question as to the relationship between Judaism and Christianity in the first centuries has long been answered, as a matter of course, with the explanation that a permanent boundary was drawn between the two at some point in the first or second century. The claim that such a demarcation of the two religions was established so early on has subsequently undergone critical revision because sources do actually indicate that this process took place over a much longer period of time. Indeed, the process has been shaped by the mutual refueling of arguments to such an extent that one has to speak of "the birth of Christianity from the spirit of Judaism" as much as of "the birth of Judaism from the spirit of Christianity". Peter Schafer shows in this gripping analysis of the written traditions and interpretations of the patriarch Enoch and the archangel Metatron just how attraction and repulsion between Judaism and Christianity took shape in the formative early centuries. German description: Die Frage nach dem Verhaltnis zwischen Judentum und Christentum in den ersten Jahrhunderten hat man lange wie selbstverstandlich so beantwortet, dass irgendwann im 1. oder 2. Jahrhundert eine bleibende Abgrenzung voneinander vollzogen worden sei. Inzwischen wird eine bereits so fruh vollzogene Trennung der beiden Religionen vehement bestritten. Denn die Quellen lassen erkennen, dass sich dieser Prozess uber einen deutlich langeren Zeitraum erstreckt hat. Er ist so sehr gepragt gewesen von wechselseitiger argumentativer Befruchtung, dass man wie von der "Geburt des Christentums aus dem Geist des Judentums" auch von der "Geburt des Judentums aus dem Geist des Christentums" sprechen muss. Peter Schafer zeigt in einer spannenden Analyse der Uberlieferungen und Deutungen des Patriarchen Henoch bzw. des hochsten Engels Metatron, wie Anziehung und Abstossung zwischen Judentum und Christentum in den formativen ersten Jahrhunderten Gestalt gewonnen haben.