Early Followers Of Jesus Research Articles

Voices of fire

Early followers of Jesus and later rabbinical Jews, two divergent branches of Judaism emerging respectively from the Second Temple and Post-Second Temple eras, both drew upon the cultural memory of Sinai to establish their identity. This article examines how the author of Acts used the Sinai imagery of theophanic fire in the Pentecost narrative of Acts 2 to reinforce a continu­ation of Judaism and offer an inclusive expansion of it to gentile believers. Then it looks at how later rabbinic sources used Sinai images of fire and multiple languages to reinforce the authority of the Torah and their exclusive identity within the Sinai relationship.

Gladness and sympathetic joy: Gospel witness and the four noble truths in dialogue

Several years ago, His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Desmond Tutu published together, The Book of Joy: Lasting Happiness in a Changing World (2016). If the famed Lama was calling on notions of joy developed in and through his own Tibetan Buddhist tradition to suggest a way forward for a fraught 21st-century world, the almost equally famous South African social activist and Anglican bishop was drawing from even more ancient Christian sources regarding rapturous and jubilational delight in order to propose engaging with the complexities of a globalizing third millennium. This article seeks to dig deeper into the scriptural tributaries feeding these contemporary proposals, focusing first on the 5th-century CE Indian Buddhist thinker Buddhaghosa, in particular his teachings regarding the role of joyful equanimity for the salvation of the monastic community found in the classic text Visuddhimagga, and on the appropriation of these ideas by contemporary Buddhist practitioners, and second on the apostolic writings of St. Luke, for whom joyful prayer and worship were central expressions of a Spirit-empowered proclamation of the gospel by the earliest followers of Jesus in their sojourn to the ends of the earth that has galvanized Christian mission historically. We will find that both traditions can learn something important in this dialogical process which can, in turn, also nurture in the present age a more humble and also, paradoxically, more potent Christian witness in Buddhist environments in the present 21st-century global context.

Theodicy and the Cross of Christ: A New Testament Inquiry

This volume examines the death of Jesus as a source of NT theodicy thinking (1) by exploring its multivalent relevance and (2) by supplementing what is lacking in biblical exegetical scholarship on the topic. In ch. 1 (pp. 1–16), Holmén introduces his exegetical approach, reviews the modern philosophic-theological research, and surveys the central interpretation of the death of Jesus in the NT. He categorizes the various themes relating to the death of the Jesus in three divisions—“Soteriology,” “Identification,” and “Social Function” (pp. 13–15).The core content of the book focuses on the theodicean concepts prior to the cross in order to lay a foundation to bring to light the thinking of the early followers of Jesus, particularly the theological conflict that they wrestled with in relation to Christ’s suffering. In ch. 2 (pp. 17–55), Holmén investigates Greco-Roman and OT Jewish concepts concerning theodicy, establishing a repertoire of motives. More specifically, in the OT, theodicean ideas are viewed through the covenant, revealing a providential God who changes human beings so that they follow his will, resulting in blessing rather than suffering.In ch. 3 (pp. 57–80), Holmén analyzes the level of theological crisis that the early believers had. He finds that a novel hermeneutic of the cross emerges as a solution to the incongruence between Christ’s crucifixion and his vindication (in essence, “vindication” leads to the theodicy problem; p. 79). In ch. 4 (pp. 81–127), the Jewish theodicean leitmotif of the covenant (from ch. 2) is analyzed in relation to an understanding of the theodicy of the cross (from ch. 3). Holmén deduces that (1) the NT teaches that those with whom God sides suffer innocently; (2) after the cross, doing God’s will does not serve a theodicean purpose—especially in light of Paul’s theology where believers obey instinctively and become part of God’s saving act through Christ; and (3) the NT authors uphold the continuance of the theodicy of the covenant.In ch. 5 (pp. 129–59), specific conclusions are offered in response to six practical approaches to the death of Jesus with respect to coping with suffering. Temporary suffering is understood within the context of an eschatological perspective. Holmén emphasizes that the NT authors proclaim that Christ died for the sinfulness of humankind and not to save the world from distress—as some modern thinkers hold.For the most part, the author makes valuable contributions to the NT perspective on theodicy. For example, based on primary-source material, Holmén draws attention to the silence with reference to the curse in Deut 21:22–23 (“anyone hung under a tree is under God’s curse). He demonstrates the lack of positive interpretation of crucifixion accounts and brings awareness concerning the Jewish perspective that God did not vindicate crucified people (p. 69). Thus, the followers of Jesus Christ were “deeply engaged in the theodicean problem!” (p. 79). The main focus of Holmén’s theological considerations seem to focus on Paul’s understanding, particularly from Romans, leading to a somewhat vague discussion of election, where all are included on an “equal basis, according to the election of grace” (p. 165). But this is the difficulty in addressing the whole NT, narrowing the discussion to the most relevant passages. Tom Holmén writes descriptively with clarity without pressing his conclusions, acknowledging that the theodicy of the cross is discernible sometimes only by combining a number of discrete elements. His assessment is honest, challenging, and worth reading.

The Desirability of Jewish Conversion to Christianity in Contemporary Catholic Thought

I argue that the authors of the December 2015 Vatican statement “The Gifts and the Calling of God Are Irrevocable” both present the Jewish Old Covenant as a good covenant (rejecting traditional Christian supersessionism) and nonetheless view Jews’ conversion to the better Christian New Covenant as desirable. I challenge the assumption that post–Nostra Aetate positive views of the Jewish covenant, including the claim that Jews are already “saved,” preclude a desire for Jews to convert to Christianity. On the contrary, I show that the authors’ claim that the New Covenant is the “fulfillment” of the Old Covenant provides a motive for contemporary Christians to emulate the efforts made by those early followers of Jesus who shared the gospel with their fellow Jews. To support my argument, I first carefully study the writings of Cardinal Walter Kasper. The authors of Gifts draw almost entirely on Kasper's nuanced and complex views regarding the desirability of Jewish conversion to Christianity, adopting even his approach to and format for presenting this controversial claim.

Jews and Christians? Second Century ‘Christian’ Perspectives on the ‘Parting of the Ways’ (Annual Deichmann Lectures 2013) by Tobias Nicklas (review)

Reviewed by: Jews and Christians? Second Century ‘Christian’ Perspectives on the ‘Parting of the Ways’ (Annual Deichmann Lectures 2013) by Tobias Nicklas Joshua Ezra Burns Tobias Nicklas Jews and Christians? Second Century ‘Christian’ Perspectives on the ‘Parting of the Ways’ (Annual Deichmann Lectures 2013) Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2014 Pp. ix + 233. €29.00. Some years ago, the conventional wisdom that was the “parting of the ways” between Christianity and Judaism was challenged on the grounds that certain self-professed Christians and Jews appear to have maintained close contact with one another for centuries after the supposed date of their separation. This trend arguably reached its fullest expression in Daniel Boyarin’s 2004 study Border Lines, in which he argued that the convergence of early Jewish and Christian thought exemplifies a hybrid a “Judeo-Christianity” free of the orthodox strictures set upon its constituent traditions following the Christianization of Rome. In the volume presently under review, Tobias Nicklas responds to that argument by returning the focus of the unsettled conversation to the abundant record of evidence indicating that many Christian authors of the second century were convinced that being a Christian meant, among other things, not being a Jew. Consequently, he contends, that position bore considerable influence upon the direction of the Church from a fairly early stage in its development. Following an introduction addressing the aforementioned critical reevaluation, Nicklas proceeds to account how early Christian authors utilized images of the Jew in their efforts to articulate their definitions of Christianity. Although the resulting characterization of the Jew as a negative antitype to the Christian did not necessarily reflect reality, it served to create a rhetorical distance between Christian and Jew no less meaningful to the subsequent history of their encounter. The second chapter delves into early Christian concepts of covenant and their attendant expressions of difference between the new Israel supposedly embodied in the Church and the old, ethnically delimited Israel that preceded it. Nicklas acknowledges that the need to account for existing Jewish ideas yielded Christian arguments variously at odds and in agreement with Judaism. But that, he maintains, is only to be expected given the lineage of the Christian enterprise. Similar insights arise in the third chapter, which Nicklas devotes to early Christian modes of exegesis. Again noting continuities and discontinuities with earlier Jewish approaches to scriptural interpretation, he assesses their Christian adaptations through the lens of the “Christ-event” (119), the moment of prophetic fulfillment when early followers of Jesus perceived the religious system inscribed upon the Jewish Scriptures to have been transformed into the new system of Christianity. Whether that transformation demanded an outright rejection of the old system or merely its adaptation elicited a debate ultimately won in favor of maintaining the Jewish Scriptures as the Christian Old Testament. Nicklas gives the fourth and final chapter to the reception of the Jewish law among early Christian communities alternatively opposed and given to its practice. He thereby recognizes that Christianity’s rejection of Judaism did not elicit a uniform response among its adherents with respect to the practical ramifications of that decision. Nicklas concludes his treatment with a summary statement affirming that the categories of Christian and Jew are not quite as clearly inscribed upon the [End Page 491] early Christian record as certain of its authors presumed to believe. Questioning, therefore, the validity of casting Christianity and Judaism as discrete religious systems in that era, he advises caution when parsing the appearance of such terms in the literature in question. In other words, although Nicklas maintains the reader’s prerogative to speak of “Christians” and “Jews” in the context of the second century, he acknowledges the methodological liabilities of accepting those distinctions at face value. The process whereby those terms took on their contemporary meanings, he therefore affirms, was more complicated than a bilateral split between two parties. But it was a process already well underway during the period under consideration. If Boyarin et al. succeeded in highlighting the subtle means by which Judaism and Christianity remained deeply enmeshed with one another following the age of the apostles, I would say that Nicklas succeeds in highlighting the more obvious means by which they grew...

Dare We Speak of Hope

This book is a welcome addition to the field of restorative justice. Allan Aubrey Boesak's contribution includes a reminder that the church, in its too frequent collaboration with empire, has fallen short of the biblical hope of the prophets, the Gospels, the Apostle Paul, and Boesak's more current mentors—Nelson Mandela, Desmond Tutu, a cadre of other South African religious leaders, as well as Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Martin Luther King Jr., Parker Palmer, and Chicago Pastor Jeremiah Wright. Biblical prophets warn of the easy road, a false hope where Israel, and later the early followers of Jesus, sometimes opted for the path of least resistance, identifying hope as shallow improvement, going along to get along, what Johann Galtung refers to as negative peace. We continue this misconception of hope today. Boesak reminds us that “if one says Jesus, one also has to say justice” (p. 14). For the comfortable, hope reaches for certainty and accomplishment, and if those do not prevail, then disappointment, despair, and cynicism result. Boesak insists, “This we know, the poor and the powerless cannot ever let go of hope; that luxury is for the rich and powerful” (p. 14).

A Boat in Restless Seas: Mission from the Margins

theme The salt of the earth: mission from the evokes a wonderful picture of the church receiving energy and help from those pushed to the periphery. picture it brings to my mind though, is of a large and secure centre with a smaller, more vulnerable edge, rather like the fringe on the border of a shawl. This doesn't seem to match the reality that there are a lot more people on the margins than at the centre; in other words, the fringe is larger than the scarf. I would therefore like us to explore the same issues with a different metaphor, using the language of the little boat on the vast and restless sea. Listen while I tell you a story we all know, using my own Jamaican language, considered by many to be a marginal patois. One time, long, long time ago, Jesus followers them get into a boat, and Jesus make them sail off without him. Well, friends, big storm blow up when them in the middle of the water. And them frighten frighten frighten. Then just when them feel things couldn't get any worse, them see something coming towards them on the water. Some bawling loud loud duppy! Ghost! Some praying, help we! Where Jesus when we need him? Then a voice say, Calm yourselves. Is me, Jesus! And them recognize him. And them shame shame shame because them wasn't looking to see him outside in the wild water. And Peter, him take brave heart and say, is you, make me come to you walking on the water too. And Jesus say, Come. And Peter get out and was walking good good on top of the water, then him see the waves and start to sink. And Jesus tell him, You was doing alright till you start to lose confidence! And him lead him back into the boat. (1) Now when we were in theological college in Jamaica, a long long long time ago, a wise man, a bishop called Neville DeSouza, used this story as an allegory to remind us that sometimes we, Jesus' disciples, see ourselves in a beautiful little boat with a red cross on the sails, battered by the winds and waves of chaos, bringing Jesus to the people on the edges of the lake. But when we look around, Christ is not in the boat with us. There is something scary out there! It's coming closer! It is Jesus, but we did not recognize him because he is coming from the sea where we never expected to find him. Jesus, the Holy Word, the second person of the Trinity, who was and is involved in creation, cannot be confined. He was and is there in the glorious chaos of the making of the world, so wondrously good, and he comes to us dancing on the tempestuous seas. Our question is, how do we recognize this God, who is not confined to our boat, to our concepts of gender or space or time or even species, who dances to meet us on the waves? We will only recognize him, our dearest friend, if we are attentive and open to hearing and looking and tasting and smelling and seeing strange and unusual things in peculiar places. All our cultures contain our own old testament Another wise man, a bishop called Jonathan from Rwanda, explained to me that all our cultures contain our own Testament. If we pause a moment, we realize that this makes sense. early followers of Jesus interpreted their experience of Christ in the light of the thoughts and teachings about God that they knew best, the teachings of the Jewish people. uniquely Christian collection of books we call the New Testament is full of references to the Jewish teachings and of arguments about how they should be used. Jesus' followers seem to have spent a lot of time arguing about food laws and circumcision, for instance. Even after the Jerusalem meeting seemed to reach a consensus about food sacrificed to idols, Paul still stated his own rather more radical views in the first letter to the Corinthians. early Christians didn't always agree about how to use the Jewish scriptures we call the Old Testament, and indeed we, their successors, still don't. …

Rudolf Bultmann: Sy mees invloedryke bydrae in die 20ste eeu: ‘Urchristentum’, ‘Jesus’, ‘Johannes’-kommentaar?

Rudolf Bultmann: His most influential contribution in the 20th century: ‘Urchristentum’, ‘Jesus’, ‘Commentary on John’s gospel’? This article pays tribute to Rudolf Bultmann as a scholar of faith who fulfilled the most influential role in the interpretation of Jesus and the New Testament during the twentieth century. In the article Bultmann’s leading publications are discussed against the background of the question of which one has been the most significant. Three important publications are identified, namely his book on the socio-cultural environment of the earliest followers of Jesus in first-century Semitic-Hellenistic world, his book on the historical Jesus, and his commentary on the Gospel of John. Various criteria are applied to value the significance of these three publications. They are Bultmann’s understanding of what the scientific nature of the theological discourse principally would entail; how modern-day believers could adhere to an ancient mythological discourse; the way in which today a historical discourse could existentially been engaged with and why Jesus of Nazareth would be regarded as theologically significant. Both the depth of Bultmann’s understanding of the substance of the theological discourse found in John’s gospel and the quality of Bultmann’s historical-critical analysis of John’s gospel lead to the finding that this commentary should be considered to be not only the most significant for the twentieth century but beyond that time even into the current phase of biblical and theological interpretation.

The Christology of Early Christian Practice

(ProQuest: ... denotes formulae omitted.) This article suggests that an early view of Jesus as an eschatological could serve as a to which most other christological conceptions may be related. It explores the possibility of confirming an early prophet typology1 through examining the practice of early groups of Christ-believers2 as reflected in NT texts. It is suggested that the practice of early followers of Jesus to a large extent could be viewed as a christopraxy3 and that such a christopraxy is based on experience; believers related their own social and religious experiences to historical (primary) experiences of the earliest Jesus movement, through narrative (secondary) experiences, mediated by the Jesus tradition, whether orally or as texts. While a developing is frequently associated with expressions and doxological language, traces of social action in imitation of Jesus' own practice point in a different direction, reflecting Jesus' actions as an eschatological of the kingdom. As we will see, such traces are found both in Pauline letters and in later texts. In the shadow of the history-of-religions school, christological developments were often seen as results of syncretism; ideas of Jesus' divinity developed as the Palestinian Jesus movement met Hellenism and paganism. Honorific titles of various kinds were ascribed to Jesus in a manner similar to the apotheosis of Greek and Roman heroes.4 From the mid-twentieth century onward, however, we find several studies of tracing historical impulses to christological development from various types of both Hellenistic and Jewish environments.5 As a result, a number of expressions used to identify Jesus have been shown to originate in Palestinian Jewish traditions, with no ontological connotations of divinity attached to them.6 As research on the historical Jesus took a new orientation-the so-called third quest-focusing on the Jewish environment, there was an increased interest in studying not only the words but also the acts of Jesus for clues to the type or role with which he was identified.7 A number of studies have explored the eschatological as such a model, and there is also evidence of this model carrying messianic connotations.81 find the model of Jesus as an eschatological of God's kingdom convincing, not least because it is grounded in experience-the historical experience of first-century Jews as well as religious expectation based on then current interpretations of Scripture.9 This interest in experience is shared by many scholars, such as Edward Schillebeeckx, Marinus de Jonge, James D. G. Dunn, and Larry Hurtado.10 In 1980, when Dunn described early christological development in Christology in the Making, he drew a picture of a relatively slow process, in which a clear theology of incarnation did not appear until the end of the first century, as in the Gospel of John. Although Jesus is given a crucial role in Paul's christology, not even Phil 2:6-11 is considered to reflect a high christology in an ontological sense.11 Although Dunn was still basically working from tides, the role of experience is emphasized and it becomes more obvious in later publications.12 Hurtado's focus is explicitly on experience, in particular on worship, and he enlarges the idea of early to incorporate devotion to Jesus in a broad sense. In contrast to Dunn, he regards christological development as a quick explosion, taking place within a few years or even months, finding evidence for this in early Christian prayer, confession, baptism, Eucharist, hymns, and prophecy.13 Although including devotional or liturgical experience, I want to focus in the present article on early Christian practice as christopraxy, with an emphasis on its social and ethical aspects. However quickly or slowly the veneration of Jesus as a divine being developed, I think there is evidence from early Christian practice for an underlying root model being constitutive for various strands of early Christbelief. …

Taught by God: Divine Instruction in Early Christianity

A dissertation investigating one aspect of early Christian self-understanding: the conviction of some early followers of Jesus that they were being taught by God, in fulfilment of OT prophetic promises.

Messianism among Jews and Christians: Twelve Biblical and Historical Studies (review)

Reviewed by: Messianism among Jews and Christians: Twelve Biblical and Historical Studies Wayne A. Meeks William Horbury . Messianism among Jews and Christians: Twelve Biblical and Historical Studies. London and New York: T and T Clark, 2003. Pp. ix + 417. Early in the Gospel according to John, a vivid scene portrays John the Baptist interrogated by emissaries from "the Pharisees" in Jerusalem. "Who are you?" the latter ask. "I am not the Anointed One," he replies. "What then, are you Elijah?" "I am not." "Are you the Prophet?" "No." "Who are you then, that we may answer those who sent us?" (John 1.20-22). Almost uniquely among early Christian documents, this scene suggests the wide diversity of speculation among some Jews in the early Roman period about special messengers who might be sent by God at "the end of days." Reminders of that diversity of eschatological hope fit the rhetorical strategy of the Fourth Evangelist, but most Christian apologetics for the following nineteen centuries would follow a simpler construction, first clearly laid out in the two-volume work comprising the Gospel of Luke and the Acts of the Apostles. Its central theme may be summed up in a syllogism: The scriptures of Israel predict the coming of a single Messiah whose expected character and actions those scriptures delineate. The story of Jesus fits that prophecy perfectly. Therefore all sensible and honest Jews should have recognized him as the Messiah. Although the origins of this scheme in Christian apologetics are evident, some parts of it have continued to influence the common picture of Judaism in antiquity, even in nineteenth- and twentieth-century scholarship. The notion has persisted that some kind of Jewish "orthodoxy" existed, despite evidence for considerable variety in belief and practice, and that expectation of a Messiah was an important element in that orthodoxy. In recent decades the ground has shifted. Modern scholarship has tended more and more to emphasize the diversity of Jewish eschatological beliefs in the early centuries of the common era and, moreover, to suggest that such beliefs were less central to the lives of most Jews than Christians have assumed. While the identity of the early followers of Jesus was centered on the confession of his identity as "Messiah," the identity of most Jews was centered on their practical appropriation of the Torah—variously construed by various groups—and on their general allegiance to their ethnic communities in towns of the Diaspora. William Horbury, professor of Jewish and Early Christian studies at the University of Cambridge, has been laboring to reverse the current trend. He [End Page 336] argues that "messianism" is a central and defining theme in Judaism throughout the period "roughly from Haggai to Bar Kokhba," that it arises directly from themes in the Hebrew Bible, and that it is a feature of the "great stream of biblical interpretation" that can be discerned already in the translations of the Septuagint and then in the apocryphal and pseudepigraphical writings, in writings of the Jewish Greek-speaking Diaspora, in early as well as late rabbinic literature, and of course in early Christian documents. The twelve essays included here were originally published between 1981 and 1998. In 1998 Horbury also published a book drawing together their substance under the general theme "Jewish Messianism and the Cult of Christ."1 Because Horbury has updated the essays for the new publication, to some extent taking account of criticisms of the earlier book, the present volume represents the latest stage in an ongoing argument—if "argument" is the right word, for in fact there is surprisingly little argument in the book. Rather, there are repeated assertions of the main theses, juxtaposed without very clear logical connection with a treasure of mostly quite interesting evidence from an unusually broad spectrum of sources. Some of the scholars who interpret the evidence differently are mentioned, but only rarely does Horbury engage them in pertinent debate. There is very much that is valuable in the essays. Horbury is a keen reader of texts, and he has read from an assortment of literatures that for most of us are separated by the boundaries of academic disciplines or linguistic competence. His sources range across Greek...

<i>Ad fontes</i> – terug na die Skrif, of na Jesus, of na die belydenis?

Ad fontes – back to Scripture, or to Jesus, or to Dogma?A critical approach to the New Testament, its origins, and the development of theological trajectories in the early Jesus movements have caused historians to look for the foundational authority beyond the biblical canon as the decisive authority of Christianity. Some have indicated Jesus as the primary authority for the earliest followers of Jesus. Others have identified doctrinal traditions as authoritative before the canon was finally established. This study challenges the church as institution to consider a foundational authority beyond the written and canonised Scripture as a normative source for Christian faith and life.

The Evolution of a Pauline Toxic Text

The earliest followers of Jesus authored their identity narrative within the metanarrative of Jewish faith, thereby creating a new Jewish-Jesus sect. The Christian identity narrative arose as a new story and could not call upon either a Jewish or a Pagan metanarrative for its justification. It was a new creation inspired by the Spirit and authored by Paul. With his guidance, the Pagan followers of Jesus, Christians, articulated their personal and communal experiences of empowerment by the Spirit in a new identity narrative that would in time establish itself as the dominant metanarrative for Western civilization. Members of the Jewish-Jesus community in Jerusalem immediately denied the validity of the Christian narratives. They sought to subjugate the new story to their official and dominant story: that one had to be Jewish in order to follow Jesus. Paul urges the Christians to remain faithful to their personal stories of empowerment by the Spirit. Unfortunately, he also resorts to the use of toxic texts to disenfranchise his Jewish opponents.

Healing in the New Testament: insights from medical and Mediterranean anthropology

How are we to read and understand stories of Jesus healing the lame, deaf, blind, and those with a variety of other maladies? Pilch takes us beyond the historical and literary questions to examine the social questions of how the earliest followers of Jesus and ancient Judeans understood healing, what roles healers played, and the different emphases on healing among the gospels. In his comparative analysis, the author draws on the anthropology of the Mediterranean as well as the models employed by medical anthropologists to understand peasant societies and their health-care systems.Utilizes social-science modelsFeatures a complementary web- site with additional resources

The Social History of Satan, the “Intimate Enemy”: A Preliminary Sketch

The figure of Satan has been a standing puzzle in the history of religion. Where did this figure originate, and what is its role? Satan is scarcely present in traditional Judaism to this day and is not present at all in classical Jewish sources—at least not in the form that later Western Christendom knew him, as the leader of an “evil empire,” of an army of hostile spirits who take pleasure in destroying human beings. Yet images of such spirits did develop and proliferate in certain late antique Jewish sources, from ca. 165 BCE to 100 CE. Specifically, they developed among groups I shall call “dissident Jews,” which included the early followers of Jesus; within decades, the figure of Satan and his demons became central to Christian (and later to Islamic) teaching. How did this occur?