In the final episode of the series Eva Anagnostou-Laoutides returns to the Sibylline oracles, this time in the company of Dr Ashley Bacchi, author of the award-winning book Uncovering Jewish Creativity in Book III of the Sibylline Oracles: Gender, Intertextuality, and Politics (Brill, 2020). The focus this time is on the Alexandrian Jewish community of the Hellenistic period and their adaptation of the ancient Greek Sibyl in response to contemporary cultural agendas. Keen to showcase their cultural pedigree, Alexandrian Jews put forward their own version of Sibyl, a prophetess who challenged t ..read more

In this episode, Peter Edwell and Bronwen Neil from Macquarie University discuss a range of issues connected to ancient Christian views of the end of the world and especially on the idea of the Anti-Christ. In recent times the world has witnessed a number of upheavals and predictions of calamities about to descend upon it, and in the Roman, post-Roman and Byzantine worlds, the same types of events were of concern to many. For Christians of this period interpretations were made of political, military, meteorological and geological upheavals to indicate the impending end of the world and the ret ..read more

In this episode, Dr Matt O’Farrell explores the Armenian Apocalyptic Tradition with Professor Zara Pogossian, expert in Medieval Armenian history and leader of the Armenia Entangled ERC project based at the University of Florence. The interview sketches a fascinating picture of late antiquity Armenia where Christianity provided the impetus for the invention of the Armenian alphabet, and witnessed the rise of Armenia as an important cultural centre for the dissemination of Christianity further to the east. Professor Pogossian draws attention to the interweaving of religious and political tradit ..read more

In the third episode of our series, Prof. David Konstan presents his latest book on The Origin of Sin, comparing ancient Jewish and Christian concepts of sin with Greco-Roman ideas of error (Greek hamartia or Latin peccatum). In conversation with A/Prof. Eva Anagnostou-Laoutides, they compare the story of Prometheus with that of Adam and Eve, and also of Jesus as saviors of mankind, and they look at the conception of original sin, which led to man’s exclusion from the Garden of Eden. They also discuss the concepts of punishment, repentance, and forgiveness, and the role they play in Christian ..read more

In the second episode of our series Macquarie University doctoral student Jack Hanrahan-Shirley interviews Dr Andras Kraft of the University of Vienna. Jack researches heresies in the Byzantine Empire, especially the Bogomils. Andras is a well-known researcher of Byzantine Apocalypticism. Thus, we are transferred in the eastern Roman Empire from the end of the third century onwards for a fascinating discussion of how the end of the world was used by the emperors to pose as God’s representatives on earth and by the Church to defend its ever-growing power over the state: in this context, emperor ..read more