The essays in this volume explore specific aspects of the associations, synagogues, and Christian communities in the cities of the Roman empire from the first to the third century CE and provide a profile of their individual characteristics and their relationships to one another.

A striking phenomenon in the cities of the Roman empire from the first to the third century CE was the predominance of voluntary associations of like-minded people who regularly met together. These Greco-Roman associations, such as professional collegia and religious cult groups, were similar in many respects to Christian communities and Jewish synagogues in organization and in the social relationships among members and between members and outsiders. There are, however, notable differences in their religious orientation, specific behavior patterns, and moral concepts. The essays in this volume explore specific aspects of the associations, synagogues, and Christian communities and provide a profile of their individual characteristics and their relationships to one another.

Inhalt
T. Schmeller : Zum exegetischen Interesse an antiken Vereinen im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert - A.J.B. Sirks : Die Vereine in der kaiserlichen Gesetzgebung - V. Hirschmann : Heidelberg Macht durch Integration? Aspekte einer gesellschaftlichen Wechselwirkung zwischen Verein und Stadt am Beispiel der Mysten und Techniten des Dionysos von Smyrna - D. Brabant : Persönliche Gotteserfahrung und religiöse Gruppe - die Therapeutai des Asklepios in Pergamon - S. Sommer : Religion und Vereinigungsunruhen in der Kaiserzeit - D. Schinkel : "Und sie wußten nicht, warum sie zusammengekommen waren" - Gruppen und Gruppeninteressen in der Demetriosepisode (Apg 19, 23-40) - J.M.G. Barclay : Money and Meetings: Group Formation among Diaspora Jews and Early Christians - D.-A. Koch/D. Schinkel : Die Frage nach den Vereinen in der Geistes- und Theologiegeschichte des 19. und 20. Jahrhunderts unter besonderer Berücksichtigung des zeitgenössischen Vereinswesens und der "Wende" in der protestantischen Theologie nach 1918 - R.S. Ascough : Voluntary Associations and the Formation of Pauline Christian Communities: Overcoming the Objections