In this original work, Stone studies the structure and social presuppositions of several narratives from the Deuteronomistic History in which sexual activity plays a significant role. Both narratological and anthropological tools are utilized in the textual analysis. Stone interestingly notes the link between sexual activity, gender and prestige structures; the emphasis on male contest and female chastity discussed by anthropologists of honour and shame; and the role of the exchange of women in relations between men. In each story, sexual practice is primarily related to male struggles for honour and power.>

Recent years have seen a remarkable surge in interest in the book of Genesis - the first book of the Bible - and a foundational text of Western culture. In this new commentary, Thomas Brodie offers a complete and accessible overview of Genesis from literary, theological, and historical standpoints. Brodie's work is organized around three main ideas: the first is that the primary subject of Genesis is human existence - while full of historical echoes, it is primarily a sophisticated portrayal of the progress and pitfalls of human life. His second thesis is that Genesis' basic organizational unity is binary, or diptych: building on older insights that Genesis is somehow dialogical, he argues that the entire book is composed of diptychs - accounts which, like some paintings, consist of two parts or panels. Finally, Brodie contends that many of Genesis' sources still exist, and can be identified and verified.

This critically acclaimed series provides fresh and authoritative treatments of important aspects of Old Testament study through commentaries and general surveys. The authors are scholars of international standing.

Christianson uses a variety of methods from art criticism to Todorov''s actantial model to sketch a compr ehensive picture of some hitherto neglected narrative elemen ts in Qoheleth''s text. '

This latest volume in the Readings series offers a helpful guide to the shortest, and arguably the most personal, as well as enigmatic, of Paul's letters. It surveys the range of interpretations put forward over the years, and identifies the strengths and weaknesses in the traditional reading of Philemon as addressing the estrangement that has arisen between Paul's friend Philemon and his runaway slave Onesimus. Recent alternatives to this reading are assessed, with particular attention to the light they shed on Paul's own attitude to slavery and his understanding of reconciliation. Historically, the Letter to Philemon has been the focus of much debate between abolitionists and pro-slavery advocates, and the use made of the Letter in the 18th and 19th centuries is here uniquely chronicled. In addition, the story of Onesimus and Philemon, as traditionally conceived, had a great appeal to writers of historical fiction, and a number of examples of that genre are summarized. The book also highlights the way in which Philemon has featured in filmic treatments of Paul's life, including a new and fascinating film in Arabic entitled The Runaway (2006). The volume offers an excellent introduction, not only to the main historical and critical issues raised by Philemon, but also to the rich legacy that the Letter has created for subsequent generations of readers who remain fascinated by the subtlety of its depiction of human relationships.

Slater presents a study of the three major christological images of Revelation and their meanings for the original audience. Employing both historical criticism and elements of sociology of knowledge, Christ and Community explores the social functions of 'one like a son of man', the Lamb, and the Divine Warrior, identifying both similarities and dissimilarities. The study argues, on the one hand, that the religious laxity found in Revelation 2-3 reflects attempts by some Christians to accommodate to provincial social pressures, while, on the other hand, Revelation 4-19 reflect the low status of Christians in the cities of Asia Minor.

The Asaph psalms (50, 73-83) are a unity. They often call God 'Elohim' and 'El', and the people 'Joseph', as Amos does; they appeal to Israelite history, the exodus and the covenant; they are written in the face of military catastrophe. In this suggestive and brilliant work, Goulder argues that they were composed in Bethel in the 720s for use as the psalmody for the autumn festival. This gives us vital new evidence for the history of the Pentateuch: there was at Bethel a historical tradition from at least the time of the oppression in Egypt to the Solomonic Empire; the Asaphites took this tradition to Jerusalem and their descendants were the Deuteronomists.>

This exciting new study of the prophet Jeremiah attributes to him a pivotal significance in the historical period of Josiah's reign. He was, so Leuchter argues, one of the central agents of Josiah's propaganda machine and was intimately involved with the king's political agenda. Jeremiah, himself originally a member of the scribal school that composed the Deuteronomistic literature, encouraged the Shilonites of Anathoth to become active in Josiah's programme in the North following the waning of Assyrian power. Dismayed by the Shilonites' rejection of him and Josiah, and by the king's death at Megiddo, Jeremiah came to a radically new understanding of the divine purpose, encapsulated in the famous Temple sermon of Jeremiah 7 and evidenced in the prophet's debates with the political establishment in Jerusalem in the years that followed.

Hosea and the Hosean tradition play an important role in the internal Israelite dispute about the nature of God and his relation to the world and Israel. Hosea refers to traditions of the past in which the interdependence between Yahweh and Israel, and in particular Yahweh's care for his people, are recurrent themes. The prophet can presuppose that certain portions of these traditions, both "historical" and "theological", are known to his audience, but it is his claim that what is not known to Israel is the demand that is inherent in Yahweh's past dealings with his people, the demand for exclusive worship of Yahweh. In his "historical" retrospections, Hosea enphasizes time after time that Israel has been chosen, not for a life of passive retreat, but to serve Israel's God alone. This he proclaims as the true knowledge of God.

The phrase 'works of the law' occurs only in the Dead Sea Scrolls and in Paul, but it has a different connotation in each corpus. At Qumran, the 'works of the law' are deeds of obedience to God's law, and are ultimately inspired by God. They function as a means of atonement, whether for the individual who performs them or for the sins of others. For Paul, on the other hand, the 'works of the law' are quintessentially the works of Abraham. Though they are indeed good deeds, Abraham himself was a sinful man, and so his deeds could not make atonement for himself or for others. In fact, Paul is reacting against the idea of Abraham as a redeemer figure that was held by some of his contemporaries. The phrase 'works of the law' thus takes on a negative coloration in Paul, as a deceptively false means of salvation. Against Qumran, Paul's position is that justification must be effected 'apart from works of the law', and thus by Jesus Christ. Abraham is no 'second Adam', as some were thinking, and his good deeds, epitomized in his sacrifice of Isaac, had no atoning value. This closely reasoned study makes an important contribution to the study of New Testament theology; it undertakes to settle some long-standing debates about Paul's soteriology by proposing an alternative both to traditional interpretation of Paul and to the 'New Perspective on Paul'.

Classic IVP series now rejacketed and retypeset

In this challenging book, Craig Smith propounds the novel thesis that the famous lines in 2 Timothy 4 where 'Paul' announces that the time of his departure has come have been misunderstood. This is no farewell speech, Smith avers, and Paul is not intending to pass on the baton to his younger colleague, Timothy. Deploying epistolary analysis and rhetorical criticism, Smith shows that these verses (4.1-8) do not have the literary structure or the vocabulary of a testament or a farewell; rather, they are a 'charge', an authoritative command, comprised of five specific formal elements. This charge form is found also in the exorcism command and in some magical texts, Christian and non-Christian. From this perspective, Paul's being poured out as a libation is his experience of preaching to the Gentiles at his first trial, his 'departure' is the imminent release from prison that he is expecting, the fight he has fought and the race he has finished are his trial that he has withstood. Far from appointing Timothy as his successor, he is contemplating a continued companionship and collegiality as they continue their ministry together.

In his commentary, Ralph Martin singles out two themes that are high on today's agenda of theological and practical inquiry and planning. These themes are the cosmic dimensions of Christological teaching and the role of the church as God's locus and agent of reconciliation. In this examination, the author allows Paul's voice to be heard again on these important themes.

Interpretation: A Bible Commentary for Teaching and Preaching is a distinctive resource for those who interpret the Bible in the church. Planned and written specifically for teaching and preaching needs, this critically acclaimed biblical commentary is a major contribution to scholarship and ministry.

Tom Wright has completed a tremendous task: to provide comprehensive guides to all the books of the New Testament, and to furnish them with his own fresh translation of the entire text. Each short passage is followed by a highly readable commentary with helpful background information. The format makes it appropriate also for daily study.

"The Gospel Behind the Gospels portrays all the major areas of current discussion and debate regarding the early source of Jesus' sayings known as Q. Sixteen gospel scholars have advanced the debate about this source's nature, history and significance.
Contributors discuss Q's existence, its relationship to Mark's gospel and to the Gospel of Thomas, its genre, its redactional history with special reference to the Son of Man and to wisdom and prophetic traditions, its social history with respect to family structures and the Cynics, a feminist analysis of Q, its significance for the historical Jesus and for Jesus' parables.
The volume sheds important light on Jesus and Christian origins as well as upon Q itself, and it is significant for the diversity of major North American, European and Japanese scholarship which is represented.

"'Isaiah in the New Testament' brings together a set of specially commissioned studies by authors who are experts in the field. After an introductory chapter on the use of Isaiah in the Dead Sea Scrolls and second temple literature, each of the New Testament books that contain quotations from Isaiah are discussed: Matthew, Mark, Q, Luke-Acts, John, Romans & Galatians, 1 & 2 Corinthians, Hebrews, 1 Peter, Revelation. The book provides an overview of the status, role and function of Isaiah in the first century. It considers the Greek and Hebrew manuscript traditions and offers insights into the various hermeneutical stances of the New Testament authors and the development of New Testament theology."

In this highly interdisciplinary work, linguist Anna Wierzbicka casts new light on the words of Jesus by taking her well-known semantic theory of "universal human concepts"- concepts which are intuitively understandable and self-explanatory across languages-and bringing it to bear on Jesus' parables and the Sermon on the Mount. Her approach results in strikingly novel interpretations of the Gospels. Written in dialogue with other biblical commentators, What Did Jesus Mean? is scholarly, rigorous, and yet accessible.

Galatians is a polemical letter which contains a substantial amount of argumentative passages. Paul evidently wanted to persuade by using the best arguments possible to convince his addressees. Using a state-of-the-art method from the discipline of argumentation analysis, Paul's argumentation can be analysed with a precision that standard exegetical methods cannot provide. The pragma-dialectical method developed in Amsterdam facilitates an analysis which is both descriptive and normative. On the one hand, Paul's argumentation can be described, such as the relationship between premisses and conclusions, the structure of the arguments, and features relating to rhetorical strategy. On the other hand, the method makes it possible to evaluate Paul's argumentation against a set of rules for sound reasoning. Fallacies and problematic arguments can be described accurately. The spiritual nature of Paul's matters do not relieve him of rationality, and Paul himself does not argue as if it did. Paul's argumentation is found problematic in several respects. There is a tension in the text: Paul works a great deal to argue his claims while at the same time giving the impression that he merely wants to declare his standpoints and does not want to carry out an argumentation at all. Many of the conclusions are presented as self-evident, even when they are not. Paul's style is far from an ideal model of the resolution of a dispute. Paul relies heavily on an argumentative strategy with maximal use of rhetorical devices. The analysis shows that a contemporary method of argumentation analysis provides tools necessary to adequately describe and understand both individual arguments and the overarching strategy of the argumentation in a Pauline text.

The Saviour of the World covers each incident and each saying in the Bible and converts them to either a single poem, blank verse or rhymed stanza, according to the subject. This volume, called The Kingdom of Heaven, was originally published in 1909. This book will be of interest to students of both religious studies and English literature.