Christ-Believers in Ephesus: A Textual Analysis of Early Christian Identity Formation in a Local Perspective (Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen Zum Neuen Testament)

This book deals with issues relating to the formation of early Christian identity in the city of Ephesus, one of the major centres of the early Christian movement towards the end of the first century and the beginning of the second century CE. How diverse was the early Christian movement in Ephesus? What were its main characteristics? What held this movement together?

Taking these questions as a starting point, Mikael Tellbe focuses on the social and theological diversity of this early Christian movement, the process of "the parting of the ways" - i.e. issues of ethnicity - , the influence of "deviating" groups and the quest for authority and legitimacy, as well as issues of commonality and theological unity. The author argues for a textual approach and the impact of various textual "prototypes" in the task of analyzing the process of early Christian identity formation in Ephesus.