Twenty years on from its original appearance, this ground-breaking first volume in N. T. Wright's magisterial series, 'Christian Origins and the Question of God', still stands as a major point of reference for students of the New Testament and early Christianity. This latest impression has been completely reset to make Wright's elegant and engrossing text more readable. 'The sweep of Wright's project as a whole is breathtaking. It is impossible to give a fair assessment of his achievement without sounding grandiose: no New Testament scholar since Bultmann has even attempted - let alone achieved - such an innovative and comprehensive account of New Testament history and theology.' Richard B. Hays

Time has always held a fascination for human beings, who have attempted to relate to it and to make sense of it, constructing and deconstructing it through its various prisms, since time cannot be experienced in an unmediated way. This book answers the needs of a growing community of scholars and readers who are interested in this interaction. It offers a series of innovative studies by both senior and younger experts on various aspects of the construction of time in antiquity. Some articles in this book contain visual material published for the first time, while other studies update the field with new theories or apply new approaches to relevant sources. Within the study of antiquity, the book covers the disciplines of Classics and Ancient History, Assyriology, Egyptology, Ancient Judaism, and Early Christianity, with thematic contributions on rituals, festivals, astronomy, calendars, medicine, art, and narrative.

The first monograph examining the implied metaphysics of the quest for the historical Jesus. It takes a multidisciplinary approach to historical Jesus research and making a significant, original contribution to the field.

This book offers a detailed analysis of the Gospel of Thomas in its historic and literary context, providing a new understanding of the genesis of the Jesus tradition. Discovered in the twentieth century, the non-canonical Gospel of Thomas is an important early text whose origins and place in the history of Christianity continue to be subjects of debate. Aiming to relocate the Thomasine community in the wider context of early Christianity, this study considers the Gospel of Thomas as a bridge between the oral and literary phases of the Christian movement. It will therefore, be useful for Religion scholars working on Biblical studies, Coptic codices, gnosticism and early Christianity.

Teaching the Historical Jesus in his Jewish context to students of varied religious backgrounds presents instructors with not only challenges, but also opportunities to sustain interfaith dialogue and foster mutual understanding and respect. This new collection explores these challenges and opportunities, gathering together experiential lessons drawn from teaching Jesus in a wide variety of settings-from the public, secular two- or four-year college, to the Jesuit university, to the Rabbinic school or seminary, to the orthodox, religious Israeli university. A diverse group of Jewish and Christian scholars reflect on their own classroom experiences and explicates crucial issues for teaching Jesus in a way that encourages students at every level to enter into an encounter with the Hebrew Scriptures and the New Testament without paternalism, parochialism, or prejudice. This volume is a valuable resource for instructors and graduate students interested in an interfaith approach in the classroom, and provides practical case studies for scholars working on Jewish-Christian relations.

Provides a unique and compelling examination of crucifixion as a form of sexual assault, probing ethical questions around this act unexplored before. Offers fascinating comparative anaylsis of contemporary forms of state terror and the torture of Jesus which encourages further discussion and research into a subject which is often shyed-away from. Fosters a deeper understanding of Jesus' experience which prompts more constructive ways of reading key concepts of resurrection and salvation.

The Gospel of Matthew is both deliberately deceptive and emotionally compelling.Karl McDaniel explores ways in which the narrative of the Gospel of Matthew elicits and develops the emotions ofsuspense, surprise, and curiosity within its readers. While Matthew 1:21 invites readers to expect Jewish salvation, progressive failure of the plot's main characters to meet Jesus' salvation requirements creates increasing suspense for the reader. How will Jesus save 'his people'? The commission to the Gentiles at the Gospel's conclusion provokes reader surprise, and the resulting curiosity calls readers back to the narrative's beginning.Upon rereading with a retrospective view, readers discover that the Gentile mission was actually foreshadowed throughout the narrative, even from its beginning, and they are invited to partake in Jesus' final commission.

This book pays special attention to the hermeneutical location where the fig-tree story appears in Mark 11; it is situated between Jesus' entry into Jerusalem and his "Temple incident" in Mark 11. The fig-tree story plays a pivotal role in understanding the stories immediatlely preceding and following it. It reverses the mode of Jesus' entry from being triumphal to untriumphal, and convinces the first Markan readers to feel at ease in confronting Jesus' outrage in the Temple. The way in which Jesus entered Jerusalem contradicts the common description of the entry as a triumphant one. Additionally, the story finds a proper solution to the problem of Jesus' actions in the Temple being shockingly in contrast to his overall character as revealed through the Markan Gospel.

Study Hebrews in its Second Temple Context Following the proven model established in Reading Romans in Context, Reading Mark in Context, and Reading Revelation in Context, this book brings together a series of accessible essays that compare and contrast the theology and hermeneutical practices of the book of Hebrews with various early Jewish literature. Going beyond an introduction that merely surveys historical events and theological themes, this textbook examines individual passages in Second Temple Jewish literature in order to illuminate the ideas and emphases of Hebrews' varied discourses. Following the rhetorical progression of Hebrews, each chapter in this textbook: pairs a major unit of Hebrews with one or more sections of a thematically related Jewish text introduces and explores the historical and theological nuances of the comparative text shows how the ideas in the comparative text illuminate those expressed in Hebrews In addition to the focused comparison provided in the essays, Reading Hebrews in Context offers other student-friendly features that help them engage broader discussions, including an introductory chapter that familiarizes students with the world and texts of Second Temple Judaism and a glossary of important terms. The end of each chapter contains a list of other thematically-relevant Second Temple Jewish texts recommended for further study and a focused bibliography pointing students to critical editions and higher-level discussions in scholarly literature they might use to undertake their own comparative studies.

The guides in this series by Tom Wright can be used on their own or alongside his New Testament for Everyone commentaries. They are designed to help you understand the Bible in fresh ways under the guidance of one of the world's leading New Testament scholars. Thoughtful questions, prayer suggestions, and useful background and cultural information all guide you into a deeper understanding of the Christian story and the Christian life. What is Christianity? A philosophy? A set of ideas? A path to spirituality? A rule of life? Is it even a political agenda? Christianity is none of these things, yet it includes and, indeed, gives energy to them all. Christianity is a way of life. It is rooted in the good news revealed by an event that rocked the world. And those who believe this good news and live by it experience deep and lasting change. This is Paul's message to the Corinthians - and to us today. These studies on 1 Corinthians encourage us truly to engage in leadership, love and worship, as those who are being transformed by the resurrected Jesus.

Sparkling reflections by our most popular Christian author, from Advent to Christmas

This is a comprehensive and essential introductory textbook on the New Testament by an eminent professor in the field."The New Testament in Context" is the fruit of a scholarly life teaching the New Testament to undergraduate students.George Shillington, now Emeritus Professor at Canadian Mennonite University, has written a textbook on the New Testament which stresses the varying social, rhetorical and theological contexts of these twenty-seven texts. He introduces the book by emphasizing the importance of 'context' for reading 'texts'. The discussion then moves onto a description of the socio-rhetorical and theological approach, illustrated by exploring a text from one of Paul's letters. The usefulness of a socio-rhetorical reading is often limited by neglecting to recognize the theological aspect of a text. Shillington's textbook addresses this tendency by never losing sight of the theological dimension. The discussion is then broadened out to explore the larger context of the New Testament world within which the various documents were written.In addition to leading the students into the texture of the texts, Shillington encourages them to engage in interpretation, e.g. for writing an exegetical essay on a given text. The terms of reference are defined along the way, and different schools of thought on given subjects are brought to light. Each chapter concludes with suggestions for further research on the particular material.

How might late second/early third century readings of Paul illuminate our understanding of the first century texts? A close comparison of Tertullian and Paul reveals the former to be both a dubious and a profoundly insightful interpreter of the latter. With growing interest in the field of patristic exegesis, there is a need for examination of Tertullian's readings of Paul. Tertullian, the first among the significant Latin writers, shaped generations of Christians by providing both a vocabulary for and an exposition of elemental Christian doctrines, wherein he relied heavily on Pauline texts and appropriated them for his own use. This new collection of essays presents a collaborative attempt to understand, critique, and appreciate one of the earliest and most influential interpreters of Paul, and thereby better understand and appreciate both the dynamic event of early patristic exegesis and the Pauline texts themselves. Each chapter takes a two pronged approach, beginning with a patristic scholar considering the topic at hand, before a New Testament response. This results in a fast paced and illuminating interdisciplinary volume.

The first publication in a new series-Christian Arabic Texts in Translation, edited by Stephen Davis-this book presents English-language excerpts from thirteenth-century commentaries on the Apocalypse of John by two Egyptian authors, Bulus al-Bushi and Ibn Katib Qas.ar. Accompanied by scholarly introductions and critical annotations, this edition will provide a valuable entry-point to important but understudied theological work taking place at the at the meeting-points of the medieval Christian and Muslim worlds.

In this study the methods of social concept criticism, poststructuralism, and social memory theory are innovatively and rewardingly combined with a revalued component of Greimas' system, the morpho-syntactic and actantial model. Analysis clearly reveals that the Lukan author reconceptualized social memory of the covenant and employed it as a literary device by following a sequence of the Exodus motifs culminating in the altered Exodus goal of covenant service/worship. The Lukan author also employed the reconceptualized covenant as a theological device that provided thematic links in the logical flow of the story, organizing the collective memory of Israel, through which perceived social needs are addressed and a call is issued for a mimetic response to the salvific activity of servant Jesus. The actantial model accurately illustrates the organizing capacity of the covenant, mapping the covenant's strategic placement and function to structure the plot-episode story and interrelate themes which articulate the servant identity of the Christian community. Researchers and academics alike will engage with this study that demonstrates the organizational capacity of the covenant concept in Lukan compositional design.

Since David Hume, the interpretation of miracle stories has been dominated in the West by the binary distinction of fact vs. fiction. The form-critical method added another restriction to the interpretation of miracles by neglecting the context of its macrotexts. Last but not least the hermeneutics of demythologizing was interested in the self-understanding of individuals and not in political perspectives. The book revisits miracle stories with regard to these dimensions: 1. It demands to connect the interpretation of Miracle Stories to concepts of reality. 2. It criticizes the restrictions of the form critical method. 3. It emphasizes the political implications of Miracle Stories and their interpretations. Even the latest research accepts this modern opposition of fact and fiction as self-evident. This book will examine critically these concepts of reality with interpretations of miracles. The book will address how concepts of reality, always complex, came to expression in stories of miraculous healings and their reception in medicine, art, literature, theology and philosophy, from classic antiquity to the Middle Ages. Only through such bygone concepts, contemporary interpretations of ancient healings can gain plausibility.

Hansen argues that unity formula employed in "Gal 3.28", "1 Cor 12.13" and "Col 3.11" offers equality between competing social groups. Hansen argues against prevalent views that the unity formula employed in "Gal 3.28", "1 Cor 12.13" and "Col 3.11" reflects either a Hellenistic anthropology of ideal androgyny or a modern liberal conception of social equality. Rather, Hansen contends, attention to function and context demonstrates each epistle's vision of social unity. Insights from ethnic theory elucidate how the epistles characterize this unity in terms of a new social identity, and the practices warranted by that identity. Furthermore, Hansen claims that because identity construction is continual, dynamic and discursive, alternate identities (e.g. ethnic, gender, religious, economic) within the new Christian communities, may be seen as influencing one another and may be termed as the collective Christian identity. Hansen employs theories from Ethnic study as tools for assessing how such overlapping identities persist and interact with one another. His analysis thereby demonstrates that the social unity promoted by this formula opposes cultural dominance by any particular group and, conversely reinforces the persistence of marginal social identities within new communities. The issue is then not one of gender equality, but of the equality that Paul wishes to develop between competing social groups. Formerly the "Journal for the Study of the New Testament Supplement", a book series that explores the many aspects of New Testament study including historical perspectives, social-scientific and literary theory, and theological, cultural and contextual approaches. "The Early Christianity in Context" series, a part of JSNTS, examines the birth and development of early Christianity up to the end of the third century CE. The series places Christianity in its social, cultural, political and economic context. European Seminar on Christian Origins and "Journal for the Study of the Historical Jesus Supplement" are also part of JSNTS.

Mark A. Jennings challenges the consensus that there is no clear single purpose that shapes the entire epistle to the Philippians; instead arguing that there is significant evidence for Paul to have written the letter with the sole intent of persuading the church to maintain its exclusive partnership with him and his gospel mission. Jennings examines each section of Philippians with standard historical-critical methods, rhetorical criticism, and social-scientific methods. Establishing that Paul's argument is rooted in three fundamental tenets, emphasis is first placed on koinonia, and the agreement that Paul and the Philippians had entered into regarding his apostolic mission. Second, Jennings looks at the repeated 'proofs' that Paul offers, that simultaneously affirm the ordained superiority of his apostolic mission and repudiate the claims of his rivals. Third, Jennings analyses the issue of finances in the epistle, discussing how Paul rhetorically transforms the Philippians' financial support into a salient indicator that they esteem his gospel mission authentic. Finally, whereas other scholars have argued that Paul entreats the Philippians to be steadfast in their commitment to the gospel of Christ, Jennings proposes that Paul urges the church to be steadfast in their commitment to his gospel of Christ. Jennings then considers how this seemingly small distinction has profound ramifications for understanding the letter, and shows the gap between these interpretations.

For many years now, the topic of the New Testament canon has been the main focus of my research and writing. It is an exciting field of study that probes into questions that have long fascinated both scholars and laymen alike, namely when and how these 27 books came to be regarded as a new scriptural deposit. But, the story of the New Testament canon is bigger than just the aEURO~whenaEURO (TM) and the aEURO~howaEURO (TM). It is also, and perhaps most fundamentally, about the aEURO~whyaEURO (TM). Why did Christians have a canon at all? Does the canon exist because of some later decision or action of the second- or third-century church? Or did it arise more naturally from within the early Christian faith itself? Was the canon an extrinsic phenomenon, or an intrinsic one? These are the questions this book is designed to address. And these are not micro questions, but macro ones. They address foundational and paradigmatic issues about the way we view the canon. They force us to consider the larger framework through which we conduct our research - whether we realized we had such a framework or not. Of course, we are not the first to ask such questions about why we have a canon. Indeed, for many scholars this question has already been settled. The dominant view today, as we shall see below, is that the New Testament is an extrinsic phenomenon; a later ecclesiastical development imposed on books originally written for another purpose. This is the framework through which much of modern scholarship operates. And it is the goal of this volume to ask whether it is a compelling one. To be sure, it is no easy task challenging the status quo in any academic field. But, we should not be afraid to ask tough questions. Likewise, the consensus position should not be afraid for them to be asked.

In this landmark study of the literary relationship between the gospel of John and the synoptic gospels, Gary Greenberg presents compelling evidence for the existence of a written pre-canonical Alpha gospel that contained almost all of the main episodes in the adult life of Jesus (excluding major speeches, such as discourses, parables, and "I Am" sayings) and which became the written source for the core biography of Jesus in Mark, Luke, John, and Matthew. While Mark used the Alpha gospel with only slight variations, John had profound theological disagreements with it, objecting to its theological message about how to obtain eternal life, the depiction of Jesus, and other matters. This induced him to rewrite the Alpha gospel so that it conformed to his own very different theological agenda. Consequently, John's gospel functions as a thorough theological critique of Mark, but the changes he introduced made it difficult to see how he and Mark worked from the same written source. By using John's theological concerns as a filter for reading and understanding what objections John would have with Mark's Jesus stories, The Case for a Proto-Gospel reverse-engineers the editorial path taken by John and reconstructs the content of the Alpha gospel. Finally, the author discusses the relationship of the other two synoptic gospels to the Alpha gospel, asserting that Luke also knew the Alpha gospel but used Mark as his primary source, and that while Matthew did not know the Alpha gospel, his use of Mark as a primary source ensured that his core biography of Jesus also derived from this earlier source.

Though much-studied, Pauline soteriology can be seen afresh by giving focused attention to the apostle's language and conception of sin. Sometimes Paul appears to present sin and disobedience as transgression, while at other times sin is personified as an enslaving power. Is there a single model or perspective that can account for Paul's conceptual range in his discussion of sin? What does careful study of Paul's letters reveal about the christological and pneumatological remedies to the problem of sin as he conceives of them? These questions are explored in the context of individual Pauline letters, building a richer understanding of the apostle's attitude to sin and its remedy.