Testament Gospels Research Articles

Mod mytologisk realisme i Nikodemusevangeliet

The Gospel of Nicodemus had its heyday in the Middle Ages. Today it attracts attention by only a few historians and practically no Biblical scholars. It is, however, a charming example of creative Biblical rewriting. The article provides an introduction to the text and its use of the New Testament gospels. It is possible to locate in it a number of typical narrative techniques and tendencies. This Gospel supplies the New Testament gospel narrative with new episodes and expands the known figures into new narratives. It aims to tell every detail from the New Testament in concrete narratives. In this way it moves in the direction of realism. At the same time it enhances the supernatural featuresof the narrative. In this way it moves in the direction of mythology. Thus, the Gospel of Nicodemus may tentatively be seen as a specimen of mythological realism.

Editorial: Introducing this Issue and the Interpretation of Mark’s Gospel

Mark, arguably the least read of the four New Testament Gospels throughout most of the history of Christianity, has been the subject of vigorous discussion and research in the last two centuries. With the emergence of the view that this was the earliest of the Gospels, historical interest in the life and mission of Jesus, apart from dogmatic-theological interpretations, gave this Gospel heightened significance. In more recent scholarship, though, it is especially Mark’s distinctive literary qualities that have drawn interest. In the wake of the pioneering narrative-critical study by Rhoads and Michie (1982), an entire generation of scholarship on Mark’s Gospel pursued synchronic literary analysis of the narrative as a whole.1

Jesus and Rabbinic Schools: Implications for Adventist Education

The New Testament Gospels present Jesus as a great Rabbi known for His exceptional wisdom and revolutionary teachings. Though not obvious, the same Gospels hint at Jesus’ lack of “formal” education in rabbinic schools of His time. The study seeks to highlight the contrasts between Jesus’ education and teachings and that of the religious teachers and leaders of His time. It stresses that Jesus stood out as a great Teacher because He drew directly from the fountain of Scripture, lived out its principles practically in His life and served relationally to people around Him. Adventist teachers and educators should recognize and emphasize these key principles as they make disciples for the kingdom of God in the 21st century.

Is <i>rewritten Bible/Scripture</i> the solution to the Synoptic Problem?

New Testament scholars have for centuries posited different solutions to the Synoptic Problem. Recently a new solution was proposed. Mogens Müller applies Geza Vermes’s term rewritten Bible to the canonical gospels. Accepting Markan priority, he views Matthew as rewritten Mark, Luke as rewritten Matthew, and John as additional source. This article examines Müller’s hypothesis by first investigating the history of the controversial term rewritten Bible/Scripture and its recent application to the New Testament Gospels. Müller’s hypothesis is then compared to other solutions to the Synoptic Problem, such as the Augustine, Griesbach, and Farrer-Goulder Hypotheses. The Two Document Hypothesis is discussed and Müller’s 2nd century Luke theory is compared to Burton Mack’s almost similar stance and tested with the argument of synoptic intertextuality in view of the possible but improbable early second century date for Matthew. Lastly, the relationship between the synoptic Gospels is viewed in terms of literary intertextuality. Müller suggests proclamation as motivation for the Gospels’ deliberate intertextual character. This notion is combined with the concept of intertextuality to suggest a more suitable explanation for the relationship between die Gospels, namely intertextual kerugma. This broad concept includes any form of intertextuality in terms of text and context regarding the author and readers. It suitably replaces rewritten Bible, both in reference to genre and textual (exegetical) strategy.

A Comparative Handbook to the Gospel of Mark: Comparisons with Pseudepigrapha, the Qumran Scrolls, and Rabbinic Literature. Edited by BRUCE CHILTON, DARRELL BOCK, DANIEL M. GURTNER, JACOB NEUSNER, LAWRENCE H. SCHIFFMAN, and DANIEL ODEN.

This first in a series of ‘handbooks’ on the context of the New Testament gospels is written to accompany Mark, now generally agreed to have been the first of the gospels to be composed. This is the first major difference to the series which it surely seeks to succeed, the hefty Strack–Billerbeck Kommentar zum neuen Testament aus Talmud und Midrasch, which took the gospels in canonical order. What the editors also now seek to add are elements from pseudepigrapha and, of course, the Qumran scrolls. These three categories together constitute the Judaic context of Mark, that is, ‘resources from the Judaic environment that appear useful for understanding the text’ (p. xii). They hope to avoid the ‘parallelomania’ of commentators such as Strack–Billerbeck (p. viii), and to provide ‘comparison’ (p. xi), indeed ‘not a commentary’ (p. xi), rather an aid for commentators (p. xii). Analogies may be ‘simple’, ‘topical’, ‘interpretative’, or ‘close’ (pp. viii–xi). It is, however, perhaps unfortunate that the first two examples of such analogies they provide are taken from Q, and only the latter two from Mark). This programme will allow them to place (singular) Christianity within the matrix of contemporary (plural) Judaisms (p. viii; p. 36, however, allows for the idea of plural Christianities). The final elements which the handbook seeks to add are ‘a fresh translation’ (p. vii) of Mark and an Aramaic retroversion where appropriate.

The New Testament gospels as Biblical rewritings

In 1993, in a discussion of fictionality and loyalty to tradition in the Gospel of Matthew, Ulrich Luz pointed out that the writer of Matthew had made substantial changes in the Jesus traditions as taken over from the Gospel of Mark and that in some cases he had even created traditions of his own. The author of Matthew thus consciously engaged in the fabrication of fiction. Nevertheless, according to Luz, throughout his narrative, he clearly expects his readers to accept the referentiality of what is related. This lack of awareness of the differences between fact and fiction places him outside the boundaries of ancient history writing. For parallels to this phenomenon, Luz points to the story of Moses in Deuteronomy and that of the patriarchs in Jubilees. These books, however, are examples of the “rewritten Bible.” This raises the question of whether, with regard to the question of referentiality, the New Testament gospels should be understood on the same presuppositions as the books normally categorized as “rewritten Bible,” and as different steps in a reception history through which the various traditions about Jesus were continually being rewritten and supplemented in accordance with changing theologies and churchly demands.

The Ambiguity of Judas: On the Mythicity of a New Testament Figure

This article argues that the abundance and diversity of portrayals of Judas Iscariot in literature and the fine arts lie in the contradictory views of the figure already discernible in the Bible. Since his establishment as a figure in the New Testament Gospels and the Acts of the Apostles, which already comprise a plethora of exegetical processes, Judas has been a paradigmatic figure of mythical ambiguity, combining aspects and valuations that seem mutually exclusive and provoking fresh interpretations and evaluations ad infinitum. The article shows how the figure’s potential to generate multiple narratives motivates a reception history that has been approached on the one hand with strategies of disambiguation (culminating in a denunciatory reading of Judas as ‘the Jew’) and, on the other hand, with an intent to highlight the figure’s intrinsic ambiguity. This potential for varying significations constitutes the very element of mythicity.

Jesus, Morton Smith, and the Eighth Book of Moses (PGM 13.1-734)

The late Morton Q. Smith’s innovative interpretation of PGM 13.1-734 as containing not merely two but three different versions of the Eighth Book of Moses (hereafter MosesVIII) was built on assumptions which have not been critically examined either in scholarship on that text or in critical discussion of Smith’s use of the magical papyri in his book Jesus the Magician . Critical examination of those assumptions would suggest that Smith’s negative evaluation of MosesVIII’s world-view exercised inappropriate influence both on his translation of the text and on his views concerning its sources and literary structure. As a critical alternative to Smith’s views, the present article provides new lines of support for holding, in agreement with pre-Smith scholarship, that only two versions of MosesVIII are present in PGM 13.1-734. A comparative analysis of the two versions is also offered, wherein version B (lines 343-734) is seen as representing the earlier stage in the development of the tradition, and version A (lines 1-343) is contextualized as a fourth-century CE Christianized redaction that belongs in part to the reception history of the New Testament Gospels and Acts.

Anti-Imperial Rhetoric in the New Testament

The first of a series of three articles, this essay introduces current scholarship concerned with the use of anti-imperial rhetoric in the New Testament Gospels and the book of Acts. In the first century of the Common Era, if the powerful Roman Emperor was considered a god, what did that mean for the earliest Christians who committed loyalty to ‘another’ God? Was it necessary for the NT authors to employ subversive language, words and symbols, to conceal their true meanings from the imperial authorities in their communications to the first Christian communities? The answers to such key questions can give us a clearer picture of the culture, society and setting in which the NT was written. The purpose of this complex study is to observe how current biblical scholarship views anti-imperial rhetoric and anti-emperor implications found in the NT, assuming such rhetoric exists at all. This initial article reviews recent scholarship with respect to the background of the Roman Empire, current interpretive methods and research concerning anti-imperial rhetoric found in the NT Gospels and Acts.

The New Testament and Rabbinic Literature (review)

Reviewed by: The New Testament and Rabbinic Literature Alan J. Avery-Peck The New Testament and Rabbinic Literature, edited by Reimund Bierenger, Florentino Garcia Martinez, Didier Pollefeyt, and Peter Tomson. Supplements to the Journal for the Study of Judaism. Leiden: Brill, 2009. 544 pp. $241.00. This volume collects papers presented at a symposium on the study of Rabbinic literature and the New Testament held in 2006 at the Catholic University of Leuven. The focus is the use of Jewish writings in the interpretation of early Christian history and thought. As William Horbury points out in the introductory essay, this is not a new approach; as far back as the Church Fathers, Christian theologians and scholars recognized the value of Rabbinic writings in interpreting New Testament passages. What has changed is the spirit in which this work is done. Generations of Christian scholars, continuing into the past century, denigrated Jewish ideas as fictions that were unmasked by the perfected religious ideology preached by Jesus. But while this polemical aspect of the comparative work has faded, methodological issues increasingly have been recognized. The texts of Rabbinic Judaism derive from the third century and beyond. How on their basis are we to determine what Jews believed and practiced in the first century? And what of the diversity in early Christian thought, not to mention the temporal gap between the historical Jesus and even the earliest Christian writings? While examining Jesus and [End Page 210] the church's Jewish backdrop should be central to understanding Christianity, the approach clearly requires careful methodological consideration. In light of these issues, this collection initially focuses upon methodologies used to determine the history of Judaism in the first centuries. With this methodological foundation in place, the main sections of the book illustrate the light Rabbinic literature—both law (Halakhah) and lore (Aggadah)—sheds on New Testament writings. Horbury's introductory overview, "The New Testament and Rabbinic Study—An Historical Sketch," is followed by these topical sections and articles: Methodology in Rabbinic Studies: Isaiah Gafni, "The Modern Study of Rabbinics and Historical Questions: The Tale of the Text"; Giuseppe Veltri, "From the Best Text to the Pragmatic Edition: On Editing Rabbinic Texts"; Günter Stemberger, "Dating Rabbinic Traditions"; Catherine Hezser, "Form Criticism of Rabbinic Literature"; and Roland Deines, "The Social Profile of the Pharisees." Halakhah: Peter J. Tomson, "Halakhah in the New Testament: A Research Overview"; Lutz Doering, "Sabbath Laws in the New Testament Gospels"; Friedrich Avemarie, "Jesus and Purity"; Thomas Kazen, "Jesus, Scripture and Paradosis: Response to Friedrich Avemarie"; and Peter J. Tomson, "Divorce Halakhah in Paul and the Jesus Tradition." Midrash: Jan Joosten and Menahem Kister, "The New Testament and Rabbinic Hebrew"; Menahem Kister, "'First Adam' and 'Second Adam' in 1 Cor 15:45-49 in the Light of Midrashic Exegesis and Hebrew Usage"; and Miguel Pérez Fernandez, "Midrash and the New Testament: A Methodology for the Study of Gospel Midrash." Other Materials: Martin McNamara, " Targum and the New Testament: A Revisit"; and Crispin Fletcher-Louis, "Jewish Mysticism, the New Testament and Rabbinic-Period Mysticism." The section on methodology sets out how Rabbinic writings can be used for historical study. What sort of history is revealed by the Rabbinic literature (Gafni)? No one today takes at face value the much later Rabbinic texts' claims for events that happened hundreds of years earlier. Still, Gafni notes the general chronological and geographical consistency apparent throughout the Rabbinic literature as well as the many hard-to-account-for parallels between later Rabbinic texts and the much earlier writing of Josephus and the New Testament. This means, for Gafni, that, beyond reflecting on the history and ideology of this literature's own authors and redactors, Rabbinic documents also may at points be useful as evidence for historical events that occurred long before their redaction. While the question of how much we can know remains [End Page 211] hotly debated, important in this section is the setting out of specific approaches to writing the history that must be teased out of the Rabbinic texts. The extent to which Jesus observed, and the New Testament represents, Halakhah as it was set out by the rabbis takes up the next section. Of...

Uncovering the Kingdom of Heaven: Archaeological Exploration and the Gospel of Matthew

The ‘Kingdom of God’ is a common term found in the New Testament Gospels as a descriptor of the reign of God, but the Gospel of Matthew uniquely and consistently replaces this term with the ‘Kingdom of Heaven.’ Interestingly, the mosaic art uncovered in a number of second to fifth century CE synagogues excavated over the last sixty years in Israel-Palestine also portray the heavens symbolically using the form of zodiacs and surrounding them with symbols of Israel’s ancient story. In particular, the story board of the mosaic floor of an excavated fifth-century CE synagogue in Zippori (Sepphoris) shows remarkable similarities with a narrative structure discernible within the Gospel of Matthew. This may point to a period of common cultural understanding, and even dialogue, between Rabbinic Judaism and Early Christianity.

The Quest for the Cinematic Jesus: Scholarly Explorations in Jesus Films

This article looks at an emerging research trend in biblical studies: Jesus and film. Within the past two decades, New Testament scholars have been attracted to the numerous films about Jesus not merely as a source of illustrations, but as an avenue to interpret the New Testament Gospels—or as Larry Kreitzer proposes, ‘reversing the hermeneutical flow’. With a growing interest in this new discipline to the task of biblical interpretation, it has become an accepted critical approach to the study of Jesus and the Gospels. This article surveys some various ways in which scholars have explored Jesus films, such as with a view to provide refreshing insights into difficult scholarly issues (e.g. the Synoptic problem). Furthermore, the article examines how scholars have begun in recent years to function as critics of controversial Jesus films and also as consultants for new film projects.

Jesus in Sasanian Babylonia

Jesus in Sasanian Babylonia PETER SCHAfer. Jeaiut in the Talmud. Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2007. Pp. xv + 210.AS PETER SCHAfer informs us in this important, powerful, and absorbing volume, Christian anti-Semitism and supersessionism on the one hand and Jewish apologetics on the other have marred earlier scholarly attempts to study Jesus 's portrayal in the Talmud. Most misguided, however, are those scholars, chief among them Johann Maier, who dismiss the talmudic traditions about Jesus as nonsensical rubbish on the grounds that they contain no reliable information about the historical Jesus. Maier, in fact, concludes that rabbinic literature refers in most instances to a Jesus other than Jesus of Nazareth, thinking thereby to have concluded the discussion and to have consigned the talmudic traditions to oblivion.1Schafer argues convincingly (1) that the talmudic traditions are speaking about Jesus of Nazareth; (2) that they contain no historically reliable evidence about the founder of Christianity independent of what can be found in Christian traditions; and (3) that these conclusions represent only the beginning of the story rather than the end. What the Talmud has to say on the subject, Schafer proposes, is of crucial importance because of what it tells us about fourth-century (and later) Jewish attitudes toward Jesus and Christianity. What the rabbis of Babylonia had to say about Jesus is not simply to be dismissed as bizarre nonsense but rather is to be appreciated as the rabbis' brilliant but bitter polemical responses to Christianity, the development and maturation of which had immense political, social, and religious consequences for Jews and against which they were engaged in a life and death struggle. The comments of the rabbis are couched in an idiom that is often foreign to nonspecialists, and these comments are often transmitted in the context of larger discussions concerned primarily with issues that seem strange to the uninitiated. It is necessary, therefore, to decipher the rabbis' comments and make them intelligible to those not immersed in rabbinic patterns of argumentation, and this is perhaps Schafer's most important contribution. In addition, Schafer repeatedly shows himself to be a skilled and sensitive exegete. Particularly innovative are his demonstrations of the interpretive importance of close attention not only to the immediate context of scriptural verses cited in rabbinic midrash but to the fuller context, whether the surrounding verses, the entire chapter, or even an entire biblical book.2As Schafer reads the evidence, the Talmud supplies us with fragments of a counter- Gospel, a Jewish perspective on the events of Jesus 's life, despite the fact that this counternarrative is preserved haphazardly and scattered throughout the pages of the Bavli, no more than a drop in the proverbial sea of the Talmud. This Jewish Gospel derives from a point of view hostile to Christianity and sympathetic to Judaism as understood and taught by the rabbis, in contrast to the New Testament Gospels, which are all, to differing degrees and in varying ways, hostile to Jews and Judaism. Schafer passionately insists that what the Talmud has to say about Jesus is important in its own right, and not simply for what it teaches us about Christian origins. The Talmud's statements about Jesus are often ferocious and at times even obscene (pp. 13, 82-94), but never gratuitously so, since these statements were the rabbis' ammunition against Christianity's core beliefs, which they used to make the case that Christianity was utterly false and that Jesus and his followers were hopelessly deluded. Those interested in the history of Jewish- Christian relations will find in these statements a perspective without parallel in other literatures, since the rabbis uttered these statements from a position of relative strength vis-a-vis the more vulnerable Christian communities of Sasanian Persia. …

The Messiah Myth: The Near Eastern Roots of Jesus and David (review)

Reviewed by: The Messiah Myth: The Near Eastern Roots of Jesus and David William Arnal The Messiah Myth: The Near Eastern Roots of Jesus and David, by Thomas L. Thompson. New York: Basic Books, 2005/London: Jonathan Cape, 2006. 414 pp. $35.00. Thomas L. Thompson's Messiah Myth: The Near Eastern Roots of Jesus and David, is an openly revisionist effort to re-think the biblical narratives as metaphoric or parabolic intellectual exercises, which reflect on virtue, personal piety, and the individual's relationship to the divine by means of decidedly [End Page 176] non-historical presentations of characters such as the Patriarchs, David, Job, or Jesus. Of particular note is the royal imagery that permeates these presentations, and that serves as the guiding framework within which a whole host of individual motifs (piety, humility, the orderliness of creation, the gulf between the human and transcendent, war as holy war, and so on) find their place. When we look at biblical texts, therefore, in terms of atomized source analysis, or to provide information about history or historical figures, we are misreading them. They represent, rather, a conversation—scribal and deeply intellectual—among themselves, with the core images and ideals of Ancient Near Eastern piety and its royal ideologies. The biblical texts, including the gospels, are, in short, fundamentally exegetical rather than historical. This basic argument is applied throughout the book to a host of biblical themes, which are explored in sometimes-extravagant detail in terms of their place within the larger complex of Ancient Near Eastern royal ideologies (and the theological corollaries thereof ). Among such themes are humility, poverty, holy war, destruction and re-creation, cosmic order, resurrection, and the Messiah. In each case, Thompson explores these themes intertextually within the bible, and in terms of comparison with analogous or identical themes elsewhere in Ancient Near Eastern literature, and argues that such motifs have been misunderstood in mainstream biblical scholarship, misinterpreted too literally or historically, rather than as the intertextual and exegetical metaphors they really are. An excellent example of this treatment is Thompson's impressive handling of apocalypticism in the New Testament. Rather than viewing apocalyptic motifs in the New Testament gospels as oral testimonies to the actual teaching of the historical Jesus, or, conversely, as secondary accretions added because of later anticipations of Jesus' return, Thompson sees apocalyptic motifs as intrinsic and inseparable aspects of a much larger complex of motifs, a complex both older and broader than the New Testament (or the Hebrew Bible, for that matter) and its specific context. The actual point of reference of, e.g., Jesus' proclamation of the coming Son of Man is not popular expectation of a literal apocalypse. Rather, the whole presentation is part of a larger literary tradition of the contrast between human and divine realities, with specific reference to the interpretation of this motif as it appears in Isaiah. The apocalypse is an intertextual image of human and worldly distance from the divine, not an actual popular expectation. The book, and the argument it proposes, have some significant weaknesses. Like many scholarly mavericks, Thompson overstates his case and underestimates the scholarship he criticizes. Particularly the opening sections of the book are filled with gross misrepresentations of gospel scholarship. Thompson criticizes source analysis of the synoptic gospels, and in particular [End Page 177] the Q hypothesis, on the grounds that it atomizes texts in terms of thematic differences; in fact, the basis for synoptic source criticism is literary patterns of detailed agreement and disagreement in sequence and wording, and so Thompson's criticism is directed at a straw man. He is clearly unfamiliar with, or has badly misunderstood, the work he targets here. This is particularly unfortunate in light of the ammunition such scholarship could provide him. Recent scholarship on Q, for example, has stressed its scribal character, its nature as a school product, its intellectual and textual-exegetical orientation, and its point of reference to a literary rather than actual world—all points that would mesh nicely with Thompson's basic argument and approach. Thompson also entirely neglects the work of Jonathan Z. Smith, a profoundly unfortunate omission in light of Smith's important work on the...

Prodigals’ Dreams: John McGahern’s That They May Face the Rising Sun

In this article I focus primarily on Irish writer John McGahern’s last novel, That They May Face the Rising Sun (2002) and develop the argument that the parable of the Prodigal Son from the New Testament gospel of Luke offers a way to read McGahern’s novels, an approach secured with his last novel. To give Rising Sun the necessary context for the prodigal discussion, I review the author’s first five novels and briefly point out the journey motif in them. The longer discussion of That They May Face the Rising Sun then examines the various ways the parable offers us a lens through which to understand the return to Ireland of McGahern’s protagonists. The article addresses recent scholarship, in particular Eamonn Hughes’s study of Rising Sun in the Spring/Summer 2005 special edition ofThe Irish University Review dedicated to McGahern.

Er løsningen på “menneskesøn”- problemet fundet?

This article presents the results of Maurice Casey, The Solution to the ‘Son of Man’ Problem, and their impact on the understanding of the expression in the New Testament gospels. The probable background is seen in an Aramaic mode of speech where bar nash means nothing more than ‘man’, used by the speaker either about himself, or about himself and others, or about somebody whose identity becomes clear through the context. Thus there is nothing Messianic about the expression in itself.

Gerard David’s The Rest on the Flight into Egypt

Gerard David’s <i>The Rest on the Flight into Egypt</i>

The Written Gospel (review)

Reviewed by Clayton Jefford St. Meinrad Seminary Markus Bockmuehl and Donald A. Hagner, editors; The Written Gospel; New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005; Pp. xxvi + 360. $75.00 (hard cover); $29.99 (paper). Though not indicated within the title, this volume was compiled in honor of Graham N. Stanton, Lady Margaret's Professor of Divinity at the University of Cambridge, for his sixty-fifth birthday. Its editors have gathered a fine collection of articles with broad reference to the compilation, nature, content, and setting of the New Testament Gospels. The text is well edited, featuring fifteen essays together with a list of Stanton's publications, a copious bibliography of sources, and extensive indices. The reader will recognize a notable list of contributors, including a preponderance of British scholars and, hence, perspectives primarily associated with schools of thought from that tradition. At the same time, there are several contributions by North American scholars and a single voice from the German tradition. The volume has been divided into three sections entitled "Before Writing" on the status of gospel questions prior to publication, "Writing the Four Gospels" on specific New Testament Gospels and their features, and "After Writing" on the early history of canonical gospel texts and their non-canonical influences. "Before Writing" includes four contributions. In an opening essay, "'Gospel' in Herodian Judaea," William Horbury presents an impressive study of semantic meanings for the term "gospel" as understood in the Hebrew-Aramaic-Greek world of the first century and concludes that the idea was widely recognized by the time of our canonical gospels. This is followed by Klyne Snodgrass's "The Gospel of Jesus," which identifies and reviews four particular foci of Jesus' own gospel message: celebration, compassion, the role of Israel, and (most importantly) the Kingdom of God. James D. G. Dunn ("Q1 as Oral Tradition") thereafter explores John Kloppenborg's earliest stratum of the hypothetical Q source, arguing for the oral nature of the tradition rather than for a strictly literary format. Finally, the volume's lone continental voice, Martin Hengel ("Eye-Witness Memory and the Writing of the Gospels: . . ."), endorses the value of community memory and oral testimony behind the preservation of the teachings of Jesus against the limitations of traditional analyses of the gospels, with a special critique of form criticism's restrictions. The middle portion of the volume, "Writing the Four Gospels," includes six [End Page 275] impressive studies. In an analysis of the persistent problems that confront readers about the background of the gospels, Richard A. Burridge ("Who Writes, Why, and for Whom?") explores varied approaches to the issue, remaining with his long-held view that the gospels belong in some sense to the ancient biographical genre. Four essays follow, each dedicated to a specific gospel text. Richard C. Beaton ("How Matthew Writes") assesses compositional technique in Matthew in comparison with Mark, concluding that the author preserves tradition yet reinterprets it to create a new gospel. Craig A. Evans ("How Mark Writes") examines the evangelist's use of misplaced gar phrases, the so-called Markan sandwich phenomenon, and the bipartite structure of the text. David P. Moessner ("How Luke Writes") reflects on what and why the author wrote, focusing upon beginnings and endings, the nature of travel motifs, and the role of the dual Gospel-Acts narrative. And Judith Lieu ("How John Writes") wrestles with the spiritual dimension of the text's reinterpretation of the gospel message as suggested by Clement of Alexandria. These articles provide a useful introduction to the nature of the canonical gospels. Lastly, Morna D. Hooker ("Beginnings and Endings") deftly inspects the openings and closings of the gospels, noting their traditional nature and unique elements strewn throughout. The final portion of the book, "After Writing," focuses on the reception of the canonical gospels within the Mediterranean setting. Companion pieces open the section. James Carleton Paget ("The Four among Jews") reviews the varied, if limited, Jewish reaction to early Christians, noting the broadly negative response found there, while...

“Your Faith Has Made You Well”: Healing Liturgies in Reformed Theological Perspective

Reading the New Testament gospels for the first time, one might well come away with the impression that Jesus of Nazareth was primarily a healer. 1 A preacher and teacher, too, a prophet and a prie...

The Gospel of Judas: from Codex Tchacos

For 1,600 years its message lay hidden. When the bound papyrus pages of this lost gospel finally reached scholars who could unlock its meaning, they were astounded. Here was a gospel that had not been seen since the early days of Christianity, and which few experts had even thought existed-a gospel told from the perspective of Iscariot, history's ultimate traitor. And far from being a villain, the that emerges in its pages is a hero. In this radical reinterpretation, Jesus asks to betray him. In contrast to the New Testament Gospels, Iscariot is presented as a role model for all those who wish to be disciples of Jesus. He is the one apostle who truly understands Jesus. This volume is the first publication of the remarkable gospel since it was condemned as heresy by early Church leaders, most notably by St. Irenaeus, in 180. Hidden away in a cavern in Middle Egypt, the codex (or book) containing the gospel was discovered by farmers in the 1970s. In the intervening years the papyrus codex was bought and sold by antiquities traders, hidden away, and carried across three continents, all the while suffering damage that reduced much of it to fragments. In 2001, it finally found its way into the hands of a team of experts who would painstakingly reassemble and restore it. The Gospel of Judas has been translated from its original Coptic in clear prose, and is accompanied by commentary that explains its fascinating history in the context of the early Church, offering a whole new way of understanding the message of Jesus Christ.