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This book is the first comprehensive study on the picture and use of the figure of Mary Magdalene in those second and third century Coptic and Greek Gnostic texts in which Jesus' most famous female follower gains a prominent position.
“Unheil,” curse, disaster: according to German scholar Gerhard Kittel, this is the Jewish destiny attested to in scripture. Such interpretations of biblical texts provided Adolf Hitler with the theological legitimatization necessary to realizing his “final solution.” But theological antisemitism did not begin with the Third Reich. Ferdinand Baur’s nineteenth-century Judaism-Hellenism dichotomy empowered National Socialist scholars to construct an Aryan Jesus cleansed of his Jewish identity, building on Baur’s Enlightenment prejudices. Anders Gerdmar takes a fresh look at the dangers of the politicization of biblical scholarship and the ways our unrecognized interpretive filters may generate someone else’s apocalypse.
Poetics, the study of the making of literary works, regards the gospels as literature, in contrast to the historical-critical approach. Petri Merenlahti makes the case that poetics offers a vital critical tool to interpreting the gospels. But he argues that poetics must also be 'historical', as perceptions of literary form and value are not fixed, but evolve and develop from one time and culture to another. Merenlahti provides a comprehensive account of the development and the state of the art of poetics and narrative criticsm. Through scrupulous methodological discussion and detailed analysis of gospel narratives, he also offers a potentially highly productive future programme for historical poetics in gospel studies.
While the early Christian texts discussed in this book are often treated as "gnostic" ones, they are here approached as witnesses to the views of educated Christians engaged in dialogue with philosophical traditions. Following the idea that ancient philosophical schools provided their adherents with ways of life, Ismo Dunderberg explores issues related to morality and lifestyle in non-canonical gospels and among groups that were gradually denounced as heretical in the church. He deals with the soul's progress from material concerns to a life dominated by spirit, the control of emotions, the avoidance of luxury, the ideal "perfect human" as a tool in moral instruction, classifications of humankind into distinct groups based on their moral advancement, and Christian debates about the value of martyrdom. In addition, he offers a critical review of some recent trends and attitudes in New Testament scholarship.
A literary-critical analysis is embarked to show how Matthew highlights the primacy, authority, and exclusivity of Jesus’ role as the Teacher of God’s will and how he features five long discourses in the narrative. Two cultural parallels, the Teacher of Righteousness and Epictetus, are studied for comparison. The ways in which they are remembered in the literature and in which they shape the lives of their followers provide proper historical perspectives and useful frames of reference. Finally, a social-historical reading of the three teachers and their followers, in the light of pertinent sociological theories (sociology of knowledge, group formation), indicates that Jesus the One Teacher serves four crucial functions for his readers in Matthew’s church: polemic, apologetic, didactic, and pastoral.
Formerly known by its subtitle “Internationale Zeitschriftenschau für Bibelwissenschaft und Grenzgebiete”, the International Review of Biblical Studies has served the scholarly community ever since its inception in the early 1950’s. Each annual volume includes approximately 2,000 abstracts and summaries of articles and books that deal with the Bible and related literature, including the Dead Sea Scrolls, Pseudepigrapha, Non-canonical gospels, and ancient Near Eastern writings. The abstracts – which may be in English, German, or French - are arranged thematically under headings such as e.g. “Genesis”, “Matthew”, “Greek language”, “text and textual criticism”, “exegetical methods and approaches”, “biblical theology”, “social and religious institutions”, “biblical personalities”, “history of Israel and early Judaism”, and so on. The articles and books that are abstracted and reviewed are collected annually by an international team of collaborators from over 300 of the most important periodicals and book series in the fields covered.
A STUNNING, PROVOCATIVE PERSPECTIVE ON THE DISCIPLE PETER AS DEPICTED BY MATTHEW "In this highly controversial work on Peter, Robert Gundry's intellectual gifts and remarkable powers of analysis are displayed to an even higher degree than in his previous publications. . . One need not agree with Gundry's conclusions to acknowledge that the penetrating exegesis presented here and the nature of the argumentation as a whole demand serious reflection and engagement. Those who pay close attention to this brief but unusually weighty book will not be able to read Matthew in quite the same way that they did before." --MOISES SILVA author of Biblical Words and Their Meaning "Peter, long thought to be...
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.
Peter is a fascinating character in all four canonical gospels, not only as a literary figure in each of the gospels respectively, but also when looked at from an intertextual perspective. This book examines how Peter is rewritten for each of the gospels, positing that the different portrayals of this crucial figure reflect not only the theological priorities of each gospel author, but also their attitude towards their predecessors. Rewriting Peter as an Intertextual Character in the Canonical Gospels is the first critical study of the canonical gospels which is based on Markan priority, Luke’s use of Mark and Matthew, and John’s use of all three synoptic gospels. Through a selection of ...
Forgery and Counter-forgery: The Use of Literary Deceit in Early Christian Polemics is the first major contemporary work on forgery in early Christian literature. It examines the motivation and function behind Christian literary forgeries.