Not maintaining a regular study or writing habit for multiple years has led to rusty language skills of both input and output. Life as a software manager instead of an individual contributor who designs and implements logical solutions via c++ structure and syntax has led to a felt lack of mental acuity in problem definition and solution design. Implementation for me is often a refinement of the solution design phase as well as an instantiation of the actual solution. I am rather an iterative problem solver by nature.
Writing is the equivalent of software implementation. Penning words about the topics found here is for me likewise often a process of refinement of understanding as much as the description of a solution and may lead even to the discovery of previously undetected unappreciated problems of interest. So lack of penning has led to staleness of mind in multiple ways.
And so, after such a discontinuity of mental production a warm up exercise was called for. The 2022 year end break from work provided opportunity for such. And so I present my first item of production for Rhetorica Christiana, “‘Away with the Atheists’: Anti-Christian Rhetorica In Pre-Christendom”. It is a somewhat unfocused meandering survey of language and history from the pre-Christendom period without any one point to promote or push. It touches upon a number of my touch points of interest making a nice warm up and first pitch exercise, namely:
- Rhetorical or linguistic elements involved in the development of early Christianity either by or against the church
- Early Christian creedal and testimonia history
- First, second, and third century Roman society as intellectual and societal context for early Christianity
- Early Jewish Christianity
The essay also provides glimpses at a number of interesting sub-topical nuggets of size that could reappear here in time with some development.
And so without further promotion, here it is:
“‘Away with the Atheists’: Anti-Christian Rhetorica In Pre-Christendom”