Joan E. Taylor

Joan Norlev Taylor

"Historical fiction based on many real people and events, their lives woven together by the mysterious power of a tree. Set at the time of the Treaty of Waitangi in 1840, this novel tells an alternative history of New Zealand's colonial past and the beginning of the French settlement of Akaroa"--Publisher information.

Napoleon's Willow

Jesus Christ is arguably the most famous man who ever lived. His image adorns countless churches, icons, and paintings. He is the subject of millions of statues, sculptures, devotional objects and works of art. Everyone can conjure an image of Jesus: usually as a handsome, white man with flowing locks and pristine linen robes. But what did Jesus really look like? Is our popular image of Jesus overly westernized and untrue to historical reality? This question continues to fascinate. Leading Christian Origins scholar Joan E. Taylor surveys the historical evidence, and the prevalent image of Jesus in art and culture, to suggest an entirely different vision of this most famous of men. He may even have had short hair.

What Did Jesus Look Like?

David M. Hay

De Vita Contemplativa is known for its depiction of a philosophical group of Jewish men and women known as the ‘Therapeutae’. This commentary sets the treatise in its historical context and explores Philo’s aims in depicting them as he did.

Introduction, Translation and Commentary

Philo of Alexandria: On the Contemplative Life

Ilaria L. E. Ramelli

This authoritative collection brings together the latest thinking on women's leadership in early Christianity. Featuring contributors from key thinkers in the fields of Christian history, it considers the evidence for ways in which women exercised leadership in churches from the 1st to the 9th centuries CE.

Patterns of Women's Leadership in Early Christianity

Ever since the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls in caves near the site of Qumran in 1947, this mysterious cache of manuscripts has been associated with the Essenes, a 'sect' configured as marginal and isolated. Scholarly consensus has held that an Essene library was hidden ahead of the Roman advance in 68 CE, when Qumran was partly destroyed. With much doubt now expressed about aspects of this view, The Essenes, the Scrolls, and the Dead Sea systematically reviews the surviving historical sources, and supports an understanding of the Essenes as an influential legal society, at the centre of Judaean religious life, held in much esteem by many and protected by the Herodian dynasty, thus appearing as 'Herodians' in the Gospels. Opposed to the Hasmoneans, the Essenes combined sophisticated legal expertise and autonomy with an austere regimen of practical work, including a specialisation in medicine and pharmacology. Their presence along the north-western Dead Sea is strongly indicated by two independent sources, Dio Chrysostom and Pliny the Elder, and coheres with the archaeology. The Dead Sea Scrolls represent not an isolated library, quickly hidden, but burials of manuscripts from numerous Essene collections, placed in jars in caves for long-term preservation. The historical context of the Dead Sea area itself, and its extraordinary natural resources, as well as the archaeology of Qumran, confirm the Essenes' patronage by Herod, and indicate that they harnessed the medicinal material the Dead Sea zone provides to this day.

The Essenes, the Scrolls, and the Dead Sea

Ever since the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls in caves near the site of Qumran in 1947, this mysterious cache of manuscripts has been associated with the Essenes, a "sect" configured as marginal and isolated. Scholarly consensus has held that an Essene library was hidden ahead of the Roman advance in 68 CE, when Qumran was partly destroyed. With much doubt now expressed about aspects of this view, The Essenes, the Scrolls and the Dead Sea systematically reviews the surviving historical sources, and supports an understanding of the Essenes as an influential legal society, at the centre of Judaean religious life, held in much esteem by many and protected by the Herodian dynasty, thus appearing as "Herodians" in the Gospels. Opposed to the Hasmoneans, the Essenes combined sophisticated legal expertise and autonomy with an austere regimen of practical work, including a specialisation in medicine and pharmacology. Their presence along the north-western Dead Sea is strongly indicated by two independent sources, Dio Chrysostom and Pliny the Elder, and coheres with the archaeology. The Dead Sea Scrolls represent not an isolated library, quickly hidden, but burials of manuscripts from numerous Essene collections, placed in jars in caves for long-term preservation. The historical context of the Dead Sea area itself, and its extraordinary natural resources, as well as the archaeology of Qumran, confirm the Essenes' patronage by Herod, and indicate that they harnessed the medicinal material the Dead Sea zone provides to this day.

Fellow in Humanities in the Field of Religious Studies Joan E Taylor

The origins of Christian holy places in Palestine and the beginnings of Christian pilgrimage to these sites have seemed obscure. From a detailed examination of the literature and archaeology pertaining to specific sites and the region in general, the present author finds no evidence thatChristians of any kind venerated 'holy places' before the fourth century. It appears that scholarly Christians had visited certain Biblical sites out of historical and exegetical concerns, but that these sites were not considered holy, or the visitors as 'pilgrims'. Instead, the origins ofChristian pilgrimage and holy places rest with the emperor Constantine, who established four basilicas in Palestine c. 325-30 and provided two imperial matrons, Helena and Eutropia, as examples of a new kind of pious pilgrim. Pilgrimage to intrinsically sacred shrines had been a pagan practice,which was grafted on to Christianity. Many Jewish, Samaritan, and pagan sites were thereafter appropriated by the church and turned into Christian holy places. This process helped to destroy the widespread paganism of Palestine and mark the country as a 'holy land'. Very few sites are genuine,the most important being the cave (not Garden) of Gethsemane, in which Jesus was probably arrested.

The Myth of Jewish-Christian Origins

Christians and the Holy Places

The body is an entity on which religious ideology is printed. Thus it is frequently a subject of interest, anxiety, prescription and regulation in both the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament, as well as in early Christian and Jewish writings. Issues such as the body's age, purity, sickness, ability, gender, sexual actions, marking, clothing, modesty or placement can revolve around what the body is and is not supposed to be or do. The Body in Biblical, Christian and Jewish Texts comprises a range of inter-disciplinary and creative explorations of the body as it is described and defined in religious literature, with chapters largely written by new scholars with fresh perspectives. This is a subject with wide and important repercussions in diverse cultural contexts today.

Joan E. Taylor

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