Kyrios Christos - (Library of Early Christology) by Wilhelm Bousset (Paperback)

About the Book

The first century of faith in Jesus as Christ

Book Synopsis

In Kyrios Christos, Wilhelm Bousset argues that the Hellenistic Church's declaration of "Jesus as Lord" is a transformation of the pre-Christian Judaic community's understanding of Jesus as the Son of Man. This unique distinction between the primitive Palestinian community and Hellenistic Christianity reveals how the earliest Christian beliefs were informed by existing religious influences. A well-known classic, Kyrios Christos defined the research agenda for nearly a century concerning the belief in Jesus as Lord and Christ from the New Testament through Irenaeus and his contemporaries. Bousset's landmark, with a new introduction by Larry Hurtado, is now made available for a new generation of students and scholars seeking to delve further into the ancient world of the early Christians.

Review Quotes

In what is now considered a classic study on the development of the Christ cult, Bousset's Kyrios Christos: Geschichte des Christusglaubens von den Anfangen des Christentums bis Iranaeus (1913) argued that the veneration of Jesus as a messianic object of specifically cultic devotion emerged not within the early Palestinian population but among Gentile communities, a shift that happened relatively quickly in the history of a religion. This most recent edition includes an insightful Introduction by Larry W. Hurtado, who situates the scholar and his work within Bousset's own historical context.

The major work of Wilhelm Bousset, the most important representative of the history of religions school of New Testament scholarship, Kyrios Christos still influences current discussion because it helped to define contemporary problems and areas of study.

About the Author

Wilhelm Bousset (1865-1920) was a German theologian and New Testament Scholar.