Shepherd of Hermas : A socio-rhetorical and statistical-linguistic study of authorship and community concerns

Baker, Ian 2006. Shepherd of Hermas : A socio-rhetorical and statistical-linguistic study of authorship and community concerns. PhD Thesis, Cardiff University.

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Abstract

The Shepherd of Hermas, hereafter simply referred to as The Shepherd, is a long document that was highly prized in the early church. It gives an account of the visions and dreams that were experienced by the main character, Hermas. This gives the impression to the general reader that the text is of the genre of an apocalypse1. While Hermas 'sees' angelic figures and the visions are explained by a spiritual guide, it lacks the visions of heaven that is central to other apocalypse literature, and also, end-of-the-world catastrophic occurrences. Consequently, The Shepherd cannot be considered as apocalyptic, or even pseudo-apocalyptic. The genre of The Shepherd will be considered in a later chapter of this thesis. A description of the narrative structure is given later in this introduction.

Item Type:	Thesis (PhD)
Status:	Unpublished
Schools:	History, Archaeology and Religion
Subjects:	B Philosophy. Psychology. Religion > BL Religion B Philosophy. Psychology. Religion > BR Christianity
ISBN:	9781303205125
Date of First Compliant Deposit:	30 March 2016
Last Modified:	09 Jan 2018 20:18
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/56076

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