Kategoria BISAC: Religion >> Biblical Studies - General

Krause offers a reading of the second century CE pseudepigraphical letter 1 Timothy in the light of feminist critical studies and discourse analysis. Read as discourse, the claims of the letter come to life on the page and reveal contexts of great struggle within the ancient church. Demands for order, silence, and discipline are read for what they attempt to represent and for what they unwittingly reveal. From this perspective, the letter reveals the struggles of the early church regarding gender, class, church order and the meaning of tradition, and as such provides a lively ground for...

Much historical-critical work on the opponents in the Pastoral Epistles has resulted in sweeping generalizations concerning their Jewish and/or Gnostic nature. Literary analyses have been somewhat more promising in focusing on the stereotypical nature of the polemic, but either fail to do justice to the urgency of the language in the Pastorals or do not provide a convincing description of the opponents.

Here Pietersen approaches the problem of the opponents from a socio-scientific perspective. Utilizing labeling theory and social control theory from the sociology of deviance, he...

This work identifies two distinct methodological approaches in Jesus studies, as represented by the work of two prominent historical Jesus scholars, Dominic Crossan and Ben Meyer. Crossan's work is the apotheosis of a venerable approach centered on "tradition criticism." Meyer offered a critique of this approach in the form of a historiographic "holism." This work brings Meyer's proposals to light in a sharp comparison with the historiographic assumptions he criticized. It goes beyond Meyer, recognizing the full significance of narrativity in historical method.

It has long been recognized that the Greek of the Lukan infancy narrative (chapters 1-2) displays numerous Semitic features.

Although the majority of recent scholarship assumes that such features stem from an imitation of the Septuagint (imitation theory), the issue has not been settled satisfactorily. Others argue that Luke probably relied on a written source for the infancy narrative--or at least for some parts of it--and that this source material was composed in imitation of the Septuagint. Luke was not, however, merely the reviser or compiler of his source; rather, he rewrote the...

What are the antecedents of the "Antichrist" figure and its associated themes in Jewish literature prior to the New Testament? Here, Lorein offers the texts and translations of all the relevant passages, together with a discussion of their meaning and significance. He concludes that the "Antichrist" theme arises in different currents within this literature, but has its sources in the Old Testament/Hebrew Bible.

In its scope and detail, as well as in many of its conclusions and its general synthesis, this book surpasses previous scholarship on a very important aspect of New Testament...

Mason here provides a valuable basic orientation to the modern reading of these short and often difficult prophetic books. By carefully surveying and evaluating the historical critical options that have been proposed during the last century, Mason then outlines the message of these books within a post-exilic, canonical context.

In the face of differing critical opinion as to what does, and what does not, come from Micah in the book of Micah, the position taken here is that the book has to be read finally as a coherent postexilic tract which re-interprets the prophet's message in the...

The category 'magic', long used to signify an allegedly substantive type of activity distinguishable from 'religion', has nearly been dismantled by recent historical and social-scientific approaches to religious studies. While recognising and at times reinforcing this stance, the essays in this collection show that there is still much to be learned about the cultural context of early Judaism and Christianity by analysing ancient texts which either use 'magic' as a category for purposes of deviance labelling or promote behaviour of a broadly magico-religious variety.

Through...

Early Christology must focus not simply on "historical" but also on theological ideas found in contemporary Jewish thought and practice. In this book, a range of distinguished contributors considers the context and formation of early Jewish and Christian devotion to God alone-the emergence of "monotheism." The idea of monotheism is critically examined from various perspectives, including the history of ideas, Graeco-Roman religions, early Jewish mediator figures, scripture exegesis, and the history of its use as a theological category.

The studies explore different ways of conceiving...