For two centuries scholars have sought to discover the historical Jesus. Presently such scholarship is dominated not by the question 'Who was Jesus?' but rather 'How do we even go about answering the question, "Who was Jesus?"?' With this current situation in mind, Jonathan Bernier undertakes a two-fold task: one, to engage on the level of the philosophy of history with existing approaches to the study of the historical Jesus, most notably the criteria approach and the social memory approach; two, to work with the critical realism developed by Bernard Lonergan, introduced into New Testament studies by Ben F. Meyer, and advocated by N.T. Wright in order to develop a philosophy of history that can elucidate current debates within historical Jesus studies.

Considering the importance of pneumatological themes for interpreting Paul's argument of Galatians, Grant Buchanan explores how Paul draws from Jewish traditions of creation and the Spirit and presents a fresh cosmogony to the Galatian church. He suggests that Galatians outlines an epistemological shift in how Paul sees past, present, and future reality in light of Christ and the presence of the Spirit in the lives of the believers. Central to this new cosmogony is the centrality of the Spirit in Paul's argument in Galatians 3:1-6:17, with Buchanan's exegesis revealing that the Spirit, the Galatians' identity as children of God and the new creation motif are not merely elements of Paul's argument but central to it. Examining Galatians through a pneumatological lens, Buchanan demonstrates that Paul renders Jewish and Gentile identities no longer valid, instead revealing that God's favour and election is already with them by stating that those who have the promised Spirit are all children of God. He examines Jewish biblical and Second Temple extra-biblical texts that explicitly connect the Spirit to creation themes, including Genesis, Ezekiel, the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Wisdom of Solomon. Taking Galatians 6:11-17 as the body-closing of the letter, the new creation motif directly implies the activity of the Spirit in the creation of Christian identity. Analysing 6:15 from this pneumatological perspective, Buchanan argues that the new creation motif represents a key aspect of Paul's generative cosmogony and pneumatology, denoting a far broader socio-cosmic transformation than previously assumed and becomes a key to understand Paul's argument.

Pauline- and Gospel-centred readings have too long provided the normative understanding of Christian identity. The chapters in this volume features evidence from other, less-frequently studied texts, so as to broaden perspectives on early Christian identity. Each chapter in the collection focuses on one or more of the later New Testament epistles and answers one of the following questions: what did/do these texts uniquely contribute to Christian identity? How does the author frame or shape identity? What are the potential results of the identities constructed in these texts for early Christian communities? What are the influences of these texts on later Christian identity? Together these chapters contribute fresh insights through innovative research, furthering the discussion on the theological and historical importance of these texts within the canon. The distinguished list of contributors includes: Richard Bauckham, David G. Horrell, Francis Watson, and Robert W. Wall.

Despite its rich history in the Latin tradition, Christian monasticism began in the east; the wellsprings of monastic culture and spirituality can be directly sourced from the third-century Egyptian wilderness. In this volume, John Binns creates a vivid, authoritative account that traces the four main branches of eastern Christianity, up to and beyond the Great Schism of 1054 and the break between the Catholic and Orthodox churches. Binns begins by exploring asceticism in the early church and the establishment of monastic life in Egypt, led by St Anthony and Pachomius. He chronicles the expansion, influence and later separation of the various Orthodox branches, examining monastic traditions and histories ranging from Syria to Russia and Ethiopia to Asia Minor. Culminating with both the persecution and the revival of monastic life, Binns concludes with an argument for both the diversity and the shared set of practices and ideals between the Orthodox churches, creating a resource for both cross-disciplinary specialist and students of religion, history, and spirituality.

Mark, Manuscripts, and Monotheism is organized into three parts: Mark's Gospel, Manuscripts and Textual Criticism, and Monotheism and Early Jesus-Devotion. With contributors hailing from several different countries, and including both senior and junior scholars, this volume contains essays penned in honor of Larry W. Hurtado by engaging and focusing upon these three major emphases in his scholarship. The result is not only a fitting tribute to one of the most influential New Testament scholars of present times, but also a welcome survey of current scholarship.

Like other volumes in the New Testament Guides series, James offers a concise and accessible introduction to a New Testament text, in this case aimed specifically at undergraduate-level students. Kloppenborg introduces the reader to a series of critical issues bearing on the reading of James and provides a balanced presentation and assessment of the range of scholarly views, with guidance for further reading and research.

A gripping historical biography, which will appeal to believer and non-believer alike

This book argues for the integrity of the Pauline Corpus as a complex, composite text. Martin Wright critiques the prevailing tendency to divide the Corpus in two, separating the undoubtedly authentic letters from those of disputed authorship. Instead, he advocates for a renewed canonical hermeneutic in which the Corpus as a whole communicates Paul's legacy, and the authorship of individual letters is less important, stressing that that current preoccupations with authorship have a distorting effect on exegesis, and need to be reconsidered. Wright uses Ephesians as a focal text to illustrate the exegetical potential of this approach. He critically investigates the history of the prevailing hermeneutics of pseudonymity, with particular attention to the theological and confessional partiality with which it is often inflected. And constructively, he proposes a new hermeneutical model in which the Pauline Corpus is read as a continuous interpretative dialogue, leaving the question of authorship to one side. In two substantial exegetical studies, Wright offers new readings of passages from Ephesians and other Pauline letters, amplifying the proposed approach and illustrating its value.

The essays included in this volume present Larry W. Hurtado's steadfast analysis of the earliest Christian manuscripts. In these chapters, Hurtado considers not only standard text-critical issues which seek to uncover an earliest possible version of a text, but also the very manuscripts that are available to us. As one of the pre-eminent scholars of the field, Hurtado examines often overlooked 2nd and 3rd century artefacts, which are among the earliest manuscripts available, drawing fascinating conclusions about the features of early Christianity. Divided into two halves, the first part of the volume addresses text-critical and text-historical issues about the textual transmission of various New Testament writings. The second part looks at manuscripts as physical and visual artefacts themselves, exploring the metadata and sociology of their context and the nature of their first readers, for the light cast upon early Christianity. Whilst these essays are presented together here as a republished collection, Hurtado has made several updates across the collection to draw them together and to reflect on the developing nature of the issues that they address since they were first written.

Exploring the New Testament is a survey perfect for use in Bible classes and seminaries; used by thousands of students in Africa.

A life long teacher of the New Testament distills the most important themes, background, and content of each New Testament book.

Familiar chapters of the Bible take on new dimensions when you see them as part of a sweeping panorama of the Bible.

This volume examines characters in the Fourth Gospel and provides an in-depth look at different approaches currently employed by scholars working with literary and reader-oriented methods. Divided into two sections, the book first considers method and theory, followed by exegetical character studies using a literary or reader-oriented method. It summarizes the state of the discussion, examines obstacles to arriving at a comprehensive theory of character in the Fourth Gospel, compares different approaches, and compiles the diverse methodologies into one comparative study. Through this detailed exegesis, the various theories will come alive, and the merits (or deficiencies) of each approach will be available to the reader. This volume is both a comprehensive study in narrative/reader-oriented theories, and a study in the application of those theories as they apply to characterization. Summing up current research on characters and characterization in the Fourth Gospel, this book also provides a comprehensive presentation of different approaches to character that have developed in recent years.

New Testament theology raises many questions, not only within its own boundaries, but also in relation to other fields such as history, literary criticism, sociology, psychology, history, politics, philosophy, and religious studies. But, the overarching question concerns the relevance of two thousand year old writings in today's world. How does one establish what is and is not relevant in the New Testament? How does one communicate the ancient ideas, presented in an alien language, alien time, and alien culture to a contemporary audience? This book is intended to serve as a methodological introduction to the field of New Testament theology, aimed at a range of readers-undergraduate and Seminary students, clergy, and laypersons interested in the relevance of scripture. It is a guide which aims to help readers understand how practitioners of New Testament theology have wrestled with the relationship between historical reconstruction of the New Testament, and its interpretation in the modern world.

This book describes the development of the Christian understanding of God from the second to the eighth century as witnessed by major theologians who gradually realized that the Incarnate Word made flesh was not the God of the philosophers. They helped construct the great dogmas of the Christological councils. Beginning with the Apologists and ending with Maximus Confessor, the theological tradition overcame the notion of impassible deity in favor of the humble God of Christian faith, the Word made flesh.

Scholars have often read the book of Revelation in a way that attempts to ascertain which Old Testament book it most resembles. Instead, we should read it as a combined and imitative text which actively engages the audience through signalling to multiple texts and multiple textual experiences: in short, it is an act of pastiche. Fletcher analyses the methods used to approach Revelation's relationship with Old Testament texts and shows that, although there is literature on Revelation's imitative and multi-vocal nature, these aspects of the text have not yet been explored in sufficient depth. Fletcher's analysis also incorporates an examination of Greco-Roman imitation and combination before providing a better way to understand the nature of the book of Revelation, as pastiche. Fletcher builds her case on four comparative case studies and uses a test case to ascertain how completely they fit with this assessment. These insights are then used to clarify how reading Revelation as imitative and combined pastiche can challenge previous scholarly assumptions, transforming the way we approach the text.