Heavenly Realm Research Articles

Рукопись на тодо бичиг «Sukhvadiyin oroni bayidal keyigēd irel tobči xyrāngγu» («Краткий сборник, [включающий] описание страны Сукхавати и благопожелание») из Научного архива Калмыцкого научного центра РАН: проблемы археографического описания, транслитерации и перевода

Introduction. The issues of identifying primary sources for handwritten Oirat-language (Clear Script) collections and selections of texts preserved by Kalmyks, delineating their constituent elements, finding correspondences between the former and Tibetan-language works still constitute a topical area of Oirat and Mongolian studies at large. Goals. The study aims to perform an archaeographic description, transliterate, and translate the text under consideration to introduce into scientific circulation this Oirat-language handwritten collection attesting to that the cult of Buddha Amitabha and his pure land has existed among Kalmyks. Materials. The work investigates the handwritten collection titled ‘Sukhvadiyin Oroni Bayidal Keyigēd Irel Tobči Xyrāngγu’ from scientific archives of Kalmyk Scientific Center RAS (O. Dordzhiev / Rev. Tugmyud Gavji Collection). Results. The manuscript comprises texts compiled at later stages of Clear Script’s dissemination among Kalmyks. It is characterized by erroneous spellings of graphemes, words, lack of punctuation marks, which complicates transliteration and translation efforts. It is the colophon that contains most interesting data about the author of the original Tibetan-language text which served as a basis for the Oirat translation included in the collection — Dolpopa Sherab Gyaltsen, a renown Tibetan Buddhist preacher (late 13th – mid-14th cc.). This text is evidence that Kalmyk clerics did create short collections of compositions to perform various cults and practices, including those aimed at worshiping Buddha Amitabha, his pure land, and taking vows for rebirth in heavenly realms of Sukhavati.

‘Seated at the Right Hand of the Father’: The Meaning of the Empty Tomb Narrative in Mark

The following essay argues that Mark’s empty tomb narrative taps into broader Jewish and Graeco-Roman cultural assumptions in which the disappearance of a body might suggest that the person concerned had been taken up into the realm of the gods. The purpose of Mark 16.1–8, therefore, is not to prove Jesus’s physical, fleshly resurrection, but rather to show that he is now in the heavenly realm, ‘seated at the right hand of the Father’ (14.62).

Through the Open Gate of Heavens: The Tōdaiji Objects and Salvation in Vairocana’s Lotus Treasury World

The set of eighth-century objects known as the “Tōdaiji Golden Hall Platform Pacifying Objects” (Tōdaiji Kondō chindangu 東大寺金堂鎮壇具; “Tōdaiji objects”) is among the earliest concrete evidence of ritual practice in the Nara period. This study reveals how the Tōdaiji objects transformed the space inside the temple’s colossal central statue of the Vairocana Buddha into a symbolic heavenly realm where the deceased would traverse to arrive at Vairocana’s Pure Land. Close analysis of the Tōdaiji objects within Sovereigns Shōmu’s and Kōken’s religiopolitical applications of the Kegon teaching strengthens Okumura Hideo’s argument that Kōken orchestrated the emplacement of these objects in the year 757 as part of commemorating the one-year anniversary of Shōmu’s death. I argue that the Tōdaiji objects encapsulated Kōken’s filial piety towards her father, Shōmu, by praying for his swift ascension to Vairocana’s Pure Land. The objects furthermore served as a reenactment of Buddhist repentance that not only ensured Shōmu’s salvation, but also the prosperity of Kōken’s new reign.

Oil of Gladness and the Immortal High Priest in Hebrews

Abstract The anointment of Jesus with the ‘oil of gladness’ in Hebrews 1 is a puzzling feature of Hebrews’ argument. The anointment—which is drawn from Psalm 45 and connected to Christ’s messianic enthronement—is often regarded as a royal investiture that transpired after the death of Christ. The relationship with royal messianism and heavenly enthronement, however, may overshadow another significant function of the oil of gladness: high priestly consecration and bodily immortalization. In this article, the function of Christ’s anointment is explored against uses of Psalm 45 in early Judaism and Greco-Roman and Second Temple traditions that depict heavenly oil as an agent of bodily transformation. These traditions suggest that Jesus’ anointment in Hebrews may signify a priestly consecration that transforms and immortalizes the human body for the heavenly realms. The anointment of Jesus in Hebrews may therefore be connected to the incarnate Son’s inheritance of ‘indestructible life’ (7:16) and clarifies when Jesus ‘became’ a royal-priestly Messiah ‘for the ages’.

Introduction

Introduction

From Earth to Heaven

This paper investigates the architectural turn of the largest Buddhist cave complex in late-medieval Dunhuang (in Northwest China) with a focus on the contemporaneous exterior structures. The structures include timber facades that cover the caves’ antechambers cut out from the vertical cliff, timber-structured ante-halls on the ground, and earthen shrines and pagodas on the cliff top. These exterior structures, albeit mostly non-extant, constituted the comprehensive built environment of the Mogao cave site. This paper first overviews the diversity of exterior structures through a theoretical reconstruction of several building types including gable-sided facades, eave-sided facades with baosha-dormers, and compound architecture comprising a double-or-triple-level pavilion-like facade and a cliff-top shrine. I then look into one of the three zones where the multiple façade types congregate. The three zones, namely, cave cloisters centered around the Southern and Northern Colossal Buddha Caves and “the Three-Story Pavilion,” defined and redefined the appearance of the mile-long complex by means of vertical extension against the pre-existing horizontal passageways and skylines. As the paper argues, the exterior structures were a collective attempt to transform the cave site into a palatial complex amid mountains, which was motivated by a longing for synchronizing the earthly and the heavenly realms.

Zeba A. Crook, ed. The Ancient Mediterranean Social World: A Sourcebook

Zeba Crook brings together essays from members of the SBL Context Group for Biblical Research in this reference work addressing established and fresh topics with a socioscientific framework. The key contributions here are twofold: the collection of 400 primary texts with brief contextual commentary about the text and the hundreds of additional texts listed at the end of each essay, giving the reader ample room to explore the topic in their own time. This work succeeds as an excellent guide to helpful primary sources on given topics and as an excellent reference work for advanced students.The book arranges twenty essays into five parts. Part one contains essays on economy, kinship, and patronage. “Social Interactions” in part two contains essays on honor, shame, collectivism, gossip, space, and gender. Part three covers domestic rituals, public rituals, purity, healing, and alternate states of consciousness. Loyalty, friendship, gifts, limited good, and envy are addressed in part four. The topics of deviance, mockery, secrecy, and the evil eye round out the books’ essays in part five. A bibliography and short biography of the contributors conclude the book.Each essay begins with a two to three-page introduction to the topic. Twenty primary texts are divided into subcategories, introduced with a short contextual commentary about its significance, and translated into English. The texts range from around 1000 BCE to around AD 200 and include various key Greco-Roman historical narratives, letters, inscriptions, OT/NT passages, and Rabbinic commentary. Each essay also contains a list of Greek, Hebrew, and Latin vocabulary words relating to the topic, a select bibliography of six key works in the subject, and a massive list of “additional texts” divided into the same subcategories used in the essay for further exploration by the reader.“Space” by Eric Stewart with contributions by Mischa Hooker and Emil Kramer is a good example of the type of analysis offered in this book. The essay begins with an introduction to spatiality as a means of control by which certain spaces are “appropriated for only those designated tasks, often by seeking to restrict access to them” (p. 124). Discussion of space then moves into binary pairs in which one member is “favored” of the other pairing. The main example given is geography as understood in Greco-Roman thought, which, of course, benefited the Greco-Roman elite authors: “latitudinal zones, or klimata, favors those who living in proximity to the Mediterranean Sea” (p. 125) against those who lived in areas deemed too hot or cold for civilization; cities corrupted by “moral degeneration” against the “idyllic, rustic past” (p. 125) of the countryside; public spaces as inherently male against private spaces as female (a delineation challenged by Susan E. Hylen in an article published after this book). The final example of designated space is “restricted” space that might include “temples, sacred groves, certain cities (or city spaces) . . . [and] the heavenly realm of the gods” (p. 126). The twenty texts on space begin with Homer, Herodotus, and Vergil under the subcategory “The Edges, Range, and Extent of the Oikoumenē,” continue with Pliny the Elder and Claudius Ptolemy (second century AD) under “Centrality and Klimata,” followed by “City and Village,” “City and Countryside,” “Private and Public/Gendered Spaces,” and “Restricted Spaces” with examples from Strabo, 1 Maccabees, Cicero, Thucydides, Mark 6, Xenophon, Columella, Ps 24, Josephus, and Pausanias, respectively. An up-to-date bibliography precedes the “Additional Texts” section, which contains 106 passages (by my count) listed in the above subcategories.As a sourcebook, this work occupies a unique space. It is both introductory and advanced; it gives the introductory but excellent information as one might expect of a good introductory work while its commentary on primary texts and hundreds of gathered references go into more depth than a specialized encyclopedia. The downside of this approach is that some readers, particularly those new to these topics, may feel overwhelmed by the lists of primary texts, and some students may be left wanting a longer orientation to these topics before the commentary on primary texts. Still, each essay very helpfully introduces the topic at hand, and the commentary on 400 primary texts guides the reader to the topic as a way into the advanced study of that topic.This sourcebook is warmly recommended to advanced students seeking to explore social aspects of the ancient Mediterranean world, especially those ready to commit the time to exploring the massive lists of primary texts and vocabulary so helpfully given. For students just beginning their journey into contextual analysis of biblical texts, this work will supplement but not replace an introduction to the social-scientific study of the Bible, instead guiding them for years to come as a key reference work to dive deeper into the social contexts of the ancient world.

Review: Bangkok Utopia: Modern Architecture and Buddhist Felicities, 1910–1973

Review: <i>Bangkok Utopia: Modern Architecture and Buddhist Felicities, 1910–1973</i>

Тюрки в ранних арабских источниках: модусный анализ сочинения Ахмеда Ибн Фадлана о путешествии на Волгу

Introduction. The article examines the subjectivity in the representation of Turkic clans in ibn Fadlan’s famous memoirs devoted to the Arab mission trip undertaken from Baghdad to the Volga Bulgaria in early 10th c. Informed by the latest linguistic theories, the authors aim to analyze how the modus of his text, i.e. the meaning of the entire historical document, is influenced by the memoirist’s personality as a bearer of certain cultural characteristics and of specific religious beliefs, as well as by historical and everyday circumstances at the time the travelogue was written. Data and methods. Both the reconstructed Arabic original and available Russian translations and commentaries were used in a comparative mode. In addition, the authors considered the recent works of Arab scholars discussing the issue of discourse types of ibn Fadlan’s heritage in the context of the medieval Arab history and thinking. The article focuses on the prevailing themes and motifs in the text of the Arab traveler, when describing the social structures, traditions, and rituals of the Turkic ethnic groups he encountered (chiefly Oguzes), to identify the moduses (of condemnation, fear, surprise, admiration, etc.) through which these were realized, as well as the linguistic means of their expression that disturbed the neutral style of the story. The results of the analysis allow to draw a conclusion that the modus of the work was largely shaped by the medieval way of thinking and the world picture characteristic of the Arab-Muslim traveler, as well as by the official status of ibn Fadlan’s work at the court of the Abbasid Caliphate in its heyday. Also, the authors point out that there is a passage in the text that may be fictional, its morphology being largely of a fabulous character. Notably, attention should be drawn to ibn Fadlan’s attempts to find some possible commonalities between the civilizations, especially in the heavenly realm, and to promote an understanding between the peoples, even if neither cultural nor trade interaction between them existed at the time.

The Doctrine of Creation: A Constructive Kuyperian Approach

The Doctrine of Creation: A Constructive Kuyperian Approach

Wim Wenders’ Wings of Desire: Anticipating Uberveillance

Abstract This article uses Wim Wenders’ romantic fantasy film Wings of Desire (1987) to contrast the roles of angels with uberveillance. Varying points of view are considered in the surveillance spectrum, demonstrating that while we can artificially fabricate omnipresence, omniscience still belongs to the heavenly realm. Humans will continue to encroach on personal privacy through the latest technological exploits penetrating the human within, while the angels will stand by their limitations acknowledging their role as listeners but not intruders. This article acts as a reminder of the intrinsic worth of human life in synergy with love, beyond the quantification of advanced technologies that seek to decorporealize and propel us to gamify our existence. What is important? It is the human connection; the ability to hold out our hand to another and have it clasped in reciprocity. This will reunify the world faster in compassion than any other technological marvel thrust upon us.

The Limited Impact of Pentecostal Interracialism on Systemic Racism in the USA

The centennial of the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre demands a careful review of the impact of systemic racism on Christian communities. This study starts by looking at early Pentecostal interracialism in the USA. There is a striking difference between those churches that founded the Pentecostal Fellowship of North America (PFNA) and those who were not invited or even barred. The renewed ascendancy of white supremacy forces a review of black Pentecostal victims who suffered discrimination, violence, even death. Pentecostals who would extend Jim Crow laws into the heavenly realm need to revisit the founders’ emphasis on repentance, reform, and restitution.

So Great a Salvation: A Dialogue on the Atonement in Hebrews

So Great a Salvation: A Dialogue on the Atonement in Hebrews

Visual Forms and Color Palette of Francesca Romana’s Holiness at Tor de’ Specchi in Rome

This article explores the two fresco cycles devoted to Saint Francesca Romana (Francesca Bussa de’ Leoni 1384-1440) in the monastery of Tor de’ Specchi in Rome, founded in 1433. The two cycles, created by different painters twenty years apart, are situated in two adjoining spaces of the monastery. The first, attributed to Antoniazzo Romano, was frescoed in 1468 in a space used for prayer and mass (the Oratorio) and represents her charitable actions, miracles, and celestial visions. The second cycle dated to 1485, in terra verde technique, is situated in the ancient refectory and depicts Francesca Romana’s encounter with demonic creatures. Intriguingly, although Francesca was not canonized until 1608, she is presented as a saint in both cycles. We analyze the two parietal decorations in relation to their sources, the Tractato delli visioni di santa Francesca Romana and Tractato delle bactaglie. These two texts were written in Roman vulgar by Francesca’s confessor, Giovanni Mattiotti, in 1447 to record her divine visions and battles with evil. By focusing on selected scenes from both the cycles, we ascertain how closely the images adhere to Mattiotti’s written accounts or, instead, the autonomy of the images. The aim is to grasp how images and words work together in dialogue and how, thanks to this interaction, the different polarities inherent to holiness can be rendered visual. Indeed, whereas the colorful scenes show aspects of holiness linked to a vivifying dimension - Francesca is welcomed into the heavenly realm in the presence of Christ and the Virgin - the terra verde images depict a noxious dimension characterized by light deprivation, indoor spaces, and opposition to the Devil’s torments. Ultimately, by investigating visual forms, material aspects, and narrative strategies, we unearth how Francesca’s sainthood status has been translated and codified.

증산 강일순의 신명(神明)사상

Jeungsan, Kang Il-Sun (hereafter, Jeungsan)’s perspective on divine beings can be characterized by the philosophical notion of divinity, which recognizes a variety of divine entities. Jeungsan insisted that all things embrace divine entities. Furthermore, he claimed that the backgrounds of all incidents were influenced by these gods. Jeungsan thought that the universe consists of the heavenly realm, the earthly realm and the underground realm. He insisted that there were many gods in each realm. And Jeungsan defined his times as the era of divine beings, which meant that the age was a time for divine beings to actively interact with one another and take the lead in world affairs. Divine beings were briskly involved in human affairs and could either reciprocate gratitude or attain revenge. They were also divine beings that could change the acts and perception of humans as well as judge human acts. However, Jeungsan predicted that by the time the paradisiacal land of immortals was established in the Later World, divine beings would instead run errands for humans. In addition, he forecast that divine beings would be entities likely to harbor grievances just like humans, yet they would ultimately become perfected beings in the Later World. Jeungsan further suggested a multitude of various concepts such as the mutual relationship wherein the realm of divine beings and the realm of humanity interrelate with each other, the mutual responses and functions between them, mutual itineration, co-existence, and the homogeneity of divine beings and humans, which described how both have the same innate characteristics. Jeungsan proposed the concept that ‘Divinity is an existential state experienced after one’s death.” In this regard, he is the one who formulated a new perspective of divinity. Moreover, Jeunsan stressed the immortality of humans (continuity or eternality) and the co-existence of divine beings and humans. He emphasized that divinity is intrinsically immanent and the realm of divine beings has a hierarchical system that maintains order and is akin to that of the human realm. Jeungsan recognized a revolutionary change and perspective based on humanity by suggesting a unique view of humanity. In other words, he was a religious figure who introduced an ingenious view of divinity and dramatically transformed this pattern of reasoning. In conclusion, Jeungsan re-interpreted traditional views of divinity in Korea and systemized them into a new concept of divinity in an ingenious way.

The Faithfulness of the Risen Christ: Pistis and the Exalted Lord in the Pauline Letters by David J. Downs and Benjamin J. Lappenga

Reviewed by: The Faithfulness of the Risen Christ: Pistis and the Exalted Lord in the Pauline Letters by David J. Downs and Benjamin J. Lappenga Julien Smith david j. downs and benjamin j. lappenga, The Faithfulness of the Risen Christ: Pistis and the Exalted Lord in the Pauline Letters (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2019). Pp. xvii + 163. $39.95. Nearly forty years after Richard B. Hays's seminal monograph The Faith of Jesus Christ: An Investigation of the Narrative Substructure of Galatians 3:1–4:11 (SBLDS 56; Chico, CA: Scholars Press, 1983; 2nd ed., Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2002), the meaning and significance of the Pauline phrase pistis Christou continue to be debated. David J. Downs and Benjamin J. Lappenga make a novel contribution to this conversation by illuminating the way in which the faithfulness of the risen and exalted Christ coheres within the framework of Paul's participationist soteriology. They argue that "the Pauline expression pistis Christou and related variants refer primarily to the faithfulness of the risen Christ Jesus who will remain faithful to those who, in their own faith, are justified through union with Christ, raised and exalted" (p. 3). Taking the subjective genitival reading of pistis Christou as their starting point, the authors argue against the majority of scholars who see in the phrase a reference primarily (if not exclusively) to Christ's faithful and obedient death. Without discounting the importance of Christ's death within Pauline soteriology, D. and L. insist that salvation for Paul entails participation in the life of the risen Christ. Pistis Christou, therefore, denotes the risen Christ's faithfulness toward those who share in his pistis, thereby empowering them to live faithfully. This thorough exegetical study of pistis Christou in six Pauline epistles (Philippians, 1–2 Corinthians, Galatians, Romans, and Ephesians) approaches the meaning of pistis within the linguistic framework of relevance theory. The authors reject as problematic the assumption of polysemy—that the context of a given text leads the reader to disambiguate among multiple, distinct senses of a word—because it "prematurely imposes restrictions on word usage" (p. 28). D. and L. instead opt for the "monosemic bias" of relevance theory, which contends that discourse shapes both the meaning of words and the expectations of readers. The utility of this approach is evident throughout the study, perhaps most prominently in their examination of pist- language in Philippians 1–2, which demonstrates that the "sense" of obedience is nowhere activated by pist- terminology. Although the obedience of Christ unto death is clearly in view in Phil 2:8, there is no reason to single out this verse as comprising the full extent of Christ's pistis. Reading Phil 3:9 in light of Rom 1:1-4, 16-17, the authors argue that the faithfulness of Christ, whereby God's dikaiosynē is revealed through the gospel, includes not only Jesus's death but his resurrection (pp. 58, 62). The importance of the resurrection in Paul's participationist soteriology is emphasized throughout. The authors' claim with respect to Galatians is echoed frequently: "participation in Christ is inconceivable without the risen Jesus" (p. 95; emphasis original). Examination of pistis in the Corinthian correspondence (in which the phrase pistis Christou does not occur) demonstrates that the nature of pistis is participatory, reciprocal, and relational; importantly, this relationship, within which individuals experience the faithfulness of God, is maintained by the faithfulness of the risen Christ (p. 66). In Romans, Paul's "in Christ" language, collocated with references to pistis, places "clear emphasis on the resurrection and the ongoing advocacy and intercession of the risen Christ" (p. 110). The life of Christ, no less than his death, is central to Paul's articulation of the gospel; this claim is reinforced by the authors' argument that Paul's reference to Christ's blood in Rom 3:25 connotes [End Page 705] Christ's life rather than his death. Pistis Christou in Rom 3:21-26 therefore "indicates that the faithful Christ is the risen and ascended Jesus who offers his atoning sacrificial life to God in the heavenly realm" (p. 124, emphasis original). The argument of this book provides a convincing response to a challenge...

Civic Longing: The Speculative Origins of U.S. Citizenship by Carrie Hyde

Reviewed by: Civic Longing: The Speculative Origins of U.S. Citizenship by Carrie Hyde Kevin Butterfield (bio) Keywords citizenship, slavery Civic Longing: The Speculative Origins of U.S. Citizenship. By Carrie Hyde. (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2018. Pp. 308. Cloth, $46.50.) What are we to make of the fact that Attorney General Edward Bates, writing during the Civil War, was utterly and justifiably perplexed as to "what constitutes a citizen of the United States?" The meaning of citizenship was, for Bates in 1862, "as little understood in its details and elements, and the question as open to argument and to speculative criticism, as it was in the beginning of the government" (1). Only with the passage of the Fourteenth Amendment, in 1868, could Americans finally see citizenship in their own nation as a codified, clarified concept. Carrie Hyde has stepped into this field of uncertainty in a provocative and ambitious study of the contested possibilities of citizenship in the early United States. She explores how and why Americans turned to speculative traditions like theology, natural law, and fictional literature in order to create and defend wholly new notions of what citizenship ought to mean. And this really is her key point: Nebulous and imprecise definitions of citizenship "did not inhibit its cultural idealization; it actually facilitated it" (19). In a stratified, post-Revolutionary United States in which slavery, dispossession, and oppression were daily realities for many of its inhabitants, the lack of legal specificity of what was meant by the term citizen created powerful opportunities for imaginative and often radically more inclusive visions of American belonging. Hyde's first chapter is the most law-focused section of the book, laying the groundwork for the claim that incoherence and open-endedness in Americans' conceptions of citizenship before 1868 gave writers an especially open field in which to aspire, critique, and challenge. The author's [End Page 162] strengths lie in her close reading of literary texts, which means that her account of the diverse array of laws governing citizenship and alienage is relatively abbreviated and superficial compared with, say, James Kettner's still-definitive work on The Development of American Citizenship, 1608–1870 (Chapel Hill, NC, 1978). But it also means that, when Hyde does turn her interpretive eye to words that lay at the heart of these questions, fresh insights abound. Roger Taney's tortured originalism in Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857) gets an incisive reading, for instance, in part because she situates Taney's words as being, themselves, suggestive and speculative. In fact, Taney serves as evidence that speculation and creativity could just as easily work against inclusivity as for it. Somewhat strangely, though, Hyde never addresses at all what exactly the case was about. To be sure, readers of this journal hardly need any reminder of who Dred and Harriet Scott were and why the suit mattered. But the omission of even a brief mention that this was a case in which enslaved people were suing for their freedom is a sign that this book is—and of course was always intended to be—rewarding only for those with a firm knowledge of the period. For those readers, though, the book is exceptionally rewarding. Each of the final four chapters dives deeply into how vague legal and constitutional descriptions of citizenship afforded particularly salient opportunities for Americans to raise new possibilities or even to challenge the existing order. Chapter 2 considers the simple fact that one of the most common uses of the word "citizen" in the Founding era had nothing to do with an earthly polity at all. Rather, it concerned affiliation in the kingdom of God. It was at this time that translations of the New Testament began to find in Philippians 3:20 a reference to the idea that, for Christians, "our citizenship is in heaven." (Previous translations had referred to "conversation," not citizenship, in the heavenly realm.) Critiques of our world founded in this Christian estrangement from mundane things like political life "provided a way of authorizing visions of citizenship that exceeded the racialized, gendered logic of the still-emergent juridical citizen," though they could of course also serve to reinforce "existing...

«Да будут светильники ваши готовыми»: коллективная идентичность и индивидуальная судьба в перспективе эсхатологии (по материалам Московского спиритического кружка)

The aim of this study is to highlight the links between eschatological ideas and social/ethical beliefs of the Moscow spiritist circle who viewed their fellowship as a religious eschatological community. Eschatological doctrine of the group could be characterized both as “catastrophic” and “progressive” millennialism. Eschatological social project suggested the elimination of the border between the earthly and heavenly realms and a shift towards egalitarian social model through a total renewal of the present world. The analysis of the documents demonstrates that the circle members considered themselves as active participants of the eschatological process. According to the catastrophic worldview of the circle’s members, the final battle of Good and Evil, which involves both human and spirits, is already in progress. In advance of the Apocalypse, ethical questions were crucial, because the realization of the ethical ideal was a key to salvation. The members of the circle perceived the outside world as a hostile environment and tended to redraw the boundaries between the community and the “infected” world.

Listen, Understand, Obey: Essays on Hebrews in Honor of Gareth Lee Cockerill ed. by Caleb T. Friedman

Reviewed by: Listen, Understand, Obey: Essays on Hebrews in Honor of Gareth Lee Cockerill ed. by Caleb T. Friedeman Jason Whitlark Caleb T. Friedeman (ed.), Listen, Understand, Obey: Essays on Hebrews in Honor of Gareth Lee Cockerill (Eugene, OR: Pickwick, 2017). Pp. xx + 187. $25. This volume is a collection essays published in celebration of Gareth Cockerill’s scholarship and his ministry for over thirty years at Wesley Biblical Seminary. Over the course of his career, Professor Cockerill has made several contributions to the study of the Letter to the Hebrews, culminating in his substantial 2012 commentary on Hebrews in the New International Commentary of the New Testament series. Many of the contributors are from the Wesleyan tradition. The nine essays are grouped around three headings. Essays 1–4 focus on the interpretation of Hebrews proper: Rick Boyd, “The Use of Psalm 8 in Hebrews”; Scott D. Mackie, “‘Let Us Draw Near . . . But Not Too Near’: A Critique of the Attempted Distinction between ‘Drawing Near’ and ‘Entering’ in Hebrews’ Entry Exhortations”; Matt O’Reilly, “Rest Now or Not Yet? Temporal Aspects of Social Identity in Hebrews 3:7–4:11”; Jon C. Laansma, “The Living and Active Word of God: A Theological Reading of Hebrews.” Essays 5–7 examine topics in Hebrews in conversation with other [End Page 164] NT texts: Caleb T. Friedman, “‘You Are My Son’: Climactic Revelation in the Son of God in Mark and Hebrews”; Amy L. Peeler, “If Son, Then Priest: The Filial Foundation of Ordination in Hebrews and Other New Testament Texts”; Carey B. Vinzant, “Preexistence, Kenosis, and Exaltation in Hebrews, John, and Paul: Distinctive Explications of a Common Underlying Narrative.” Essays 8–9 consider Hebrews in light of both systematic and historical theology: Thomas H. McCall, “‘Son Though He Was, He Learned Obedience’: The Submission of Christ in Theological Perspective (in Dialogue with Thomas Aquinas and Karl Barth)”; and Christopher T. Bounds, “Early Methodist Theology in the Book of Hebrews.” I will be able only to highlight representatives from each of these groups. From the first group, Mackie examines whether there is a distinction between the use of proserchomai and eiserchomai in Hebrews. Proserchomai is used with reference to the believers’ approach to God, while eiserchomai is applied to Christ’s entry into the heavenly realm. Mackie argues that there is no distinction and that behind the author’s language is a mystical experiential reality of the community. He especially points to Heb 6:18–20, where the community’s entry mirrors Jesus’s “full entry” and “represents a final nail in the alleged distinction” between the community’s approach and Jesus’s entry (p. 33). Mackie is certainly right to emphasize that the exhortation to approach God has an experiential reality behind it. Even so, there still seem to be good grounds for not blurring the distinction between proserchomai and eiserchomai in Hebrews. In Heb 6:18–20, there remains a distinction between Christ’s entry on the community’s behalf as their forerunner and the hope the faithful have of realizing Jesus’s own perfection. Mackie’s discussion, as well as others in this volume, helpfully invites a renewed consideration of what the author of Hebrews understands as the “now and not yet” in his eschatological perspective. From the second group of essays, Peeler examines the connection between sonship and priesthood in Hebrews, Paul, 1 Peter, and Revelation. Her basic thesis is that sacramental ministry is a birthright predicated on belonging to the right family. Thus, all believers are given priesthood and ministry by virtue of their inclusion in God’s family through Jesus. Peeler argues that sonship is granted on the basis of Christ’s power or authority in Revelation, whereas Paul, 1 Peter, and Hebrews ground sonship in God’s indwelling Spirit (pp. 105–6). One wonders if the basis of sonship is not fundamentally grounded in God’s election or choice similar to fathers choosing sons for inheritances in the ancient Mediterranean world. Such ideas can be found in Rom 8:29; 1 Pet 1:2; and possibly Heb 3:2. Peeler goes on to ask practically what justification there is for the special ordination of some if...

The African background of Pentecostal theology: A critical perspective

African Traditional Religion (ATR) represents a primal worldview that encapsulates a certain culturally-innate sense of the world of transcendence and involves belief in a sacramental ‘enchanted’ universe in which the physical is indicative of spiritual realities, in contrast to western Christianity, that to a certain extent abandoned belief in malevolent powers. The assumption is that Africans live in an ‘intentional world’ where nothing happens by chance; all events have spiritual causes. Negative events can be resisted by imprecatory prayers and curses. Sacred and secular realities are inseparable. For this reason, it is argued that pneumatic Christianity is close to the grain of African culture and its worldview resonates with the indigenous worldview. In this article, the African background of Pentecostal theology is investigated. By operating within a worldview that allows ample space for the invisible world determining what happens in the visible world, African Pentecostalism was endeared to Africans. For Africans, what happens on earth is directly interrelated with what happens in the dimension of the spiritual, agreeing with the cosmic principalities and powers that provide the mystical causality of a worldview found in the New Testament. The African Pentecostal narrative is concerned with the solution of personal and societal problems that is interpreted in terms of the African view of rulers, authorities, evil powers, cosmic powers, and spiritual forces in the heavenly realm that focuses on how the spirit world impinges on the visible world to hinder or foster human flourishing. Pentecostalism’s pneumatic spirituality is discussed from a critical theological perspective.