The Wiley Blackwell Companion to Christian Martyrdom (eBook)

Paul Middleton is Professor of New Testament and Early Christianity at the University of Chester, UK. He has published extensively on the topic of martyrdom, especially in early Christianity, as well as in Judaism and Islam. He is the author of Radical Martyrdom and Cosmic Conflict in Early Christianity; Martyrdom: A Guide for the Perplexed; and The Violence of the Lamb: Martyrs as Agents of Divine Judgement in the Book of Revelation.

List of Contributors viii

Acknowledgments xiii

List of Abbreviations xv

I. Introductory Matters 1

1 Introduction 3
Paul Middleton

2 Creating and Contesting Christian Martyrdom 12
Paul Middleton

II. Early Christian Martyrdom 31

3 The Roman Persecutions 33
James Corke-Webster

4 Martyrdom and Persecution in the New Testament 51
Paul Middleton

5 Early Jewish and Christian Martyrdom 72
Jan Willem van Henten

6 Martyrdom in Roman Context 88
L. Stephanie Cobb

7 Themes and Intertextualities in Pre-Nicene Exhortations to Martyrdom 102
Paul A. Hartog

8 Early Christian Theologies of Martyrdom 120
Jane D. McLarty

9 Augustine and the Remaking of Martyrdom 135
Annemaré Kotzé

10 Legenda aut non legenda? The Quest for the Literary Genre of the Acts of the Martyrs 151
Danny Praet

11 Martyrdom and Gender 184
Robert Paul Seesengood

12 Martyrdom and the Creation of Christian Identity 199
Matthew Recla

III. Martyrdom in the Medieval and Reformation World 215

13 Early Christian Martyr Cults 217
David L. Eastman

14 A Middle (Byzantine) Martyr: The Power and Point of Productive Suffering 236
Brenda Llewellyn Ihssen

15 Bohemian Martyrdom at the Dawn of the Reformation 255
Thomas A. Fudge

16 Does the Cause make the Martyr? Sebastian Castellio and John Calvin Debate the Execution of Michael Servetus 271
Nicholas Thompson

17 Anabaptist Martyrdom 287
Lloyd K. Pietersen

18 England's Eusebius: John Foxe and the Acts and Monuments 305
Sarah Covington

19 The Elizabethan Martyrs 322
Victor Houliston and Aislinn Muller

20 The Blood of the Martyrs is the Seed of the Nation: Martyrdom in Reformation England 338
Susan Royal

IV. Martyrdom in Global Perspective 355

21 Martyrdom in Roman Catholic Perspective 357
Lawrence S. Cunningham

22 The Franciscans 365
Christopher MacEvitt

23 Christian Martyrdom in Asia: Bearing Testimony to the Love of God 381
Peter C. Phan

24 Christian Martyrdom in Korea 406
Franklin Rausch

25 Christian Martyrdom in Africa 421
Kevin Ward

26 "Dying Well" in Latin America: Christian Martyrdom, Religion and Politics 437
María Soledad Catoggio

27 Martyrdom in Modern America 454
Scott W. Hoffman

V. Legacies of Martyrdom 469

28 Martyrdom Discourse in Contemporary U.S. War-culture 471
Kelly Denton-Borhaug

29 Digital Representations of Martyrdom 485
Jonas Kurlberg and Jolyon Mitchell

30 The Legacy and Future of Christian Martyrdom 501
Michael P. Jensen

Index 514

"Overall, this volume presents a needed correction to the sensationalist studies of martyrdom that have dominated the topic since the dawn of the 'War on Terror.'"
--Journal of Jesuit Studies, Volume 8: Issue 1

"A good Companion helps you to realise how multi-faceted a topic is and to explore several new dimensions of an area of study hitherto only skimmed. This one does exactly that."
--Anabaptism Today 3.1 April 2021

"This substantial and impressive volume delivers to readers dozens of compelling and diverse approaches to studying Christian martyrdom, the foci of which collectively span more than two millennia, virtually the entire globe, and an unexpectedly wide array of cultural and religious traditions."
--Church History, Volume 9: Issue 4, December 2021