Adoption in Galatians and Romans : contemporary metaphor theories and the Pauline huiothesia metaphors /
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In a new study on the Pauline adoption metaphors, Erin Heim applies a wide array of contemporary theories of metaphor in a fresh exegesis of the four instances of adoption ( huiothesia ) metaphors in Galatians and Romans. Though many investigations into biblical metaphors treat only their historical background, Heim argues that the meaning of a metaphor lies in the interanimation of a metaphor and the range of possible backgrounds it draws upon. Using insights from contemporary theories, Heim convincingly demonstrates that the Pauline adoption metaphors are instrumental in shaping the perceptions, emotions, and identity of Paul's first-century audiences.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004339873 :
0928-0731 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
God, grace, and righteousness in Wisdom of Solomon and Paul's letter to the Romans : texts in conversation /
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In God, Grace, and Righteousness in Wisdom of Solomon and Paul's Letter to the Romans , Jonathan A. Linebaugh places the Wisdom of Solomon and the Letter to the Romans in conversation. Both texts discuss the relationship of Jew and Gentile, the meaning of God's grace and righteousness, and offer readings of Israel's scripture. These shared themes provide talking-points, initiating a dialogue on anthropology, soteriology, and hermeneutics. By listening in on this conversation, Linebaugh demonstrates that while these texts have much in common, the theologies they articulate are ultimately incommensurable because they think from different events - Wisdom from the pre-creational order crafted by Sophia and exemplified in the Exodus; Paul from the incongruous gift of Christ which justifies the ungodly.
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Based on the author's thesis (doctoral)--Durham University, 2011. :
1 online resource (xii, 268 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references (p. 239-250) and indexes. :
9789004257412 :
0167-9732 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Paul and the rise of the slave : death and resurrection of the oppressed in the epistle to the Romans /
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Paul and the Rise of the Slave locates Paul's description of himself as a "slave of Messiah Jesus" in the epistolary prescript of Paul's Epistle to Rome within the conceptual world of those who experienced the social reality of slavery in the first century C.E. The Althusserian concept of interpellation and the Life of Aesop are employed throughout as theoretical frameworks to enhance how Paul offered positive ways for slaves to imagine an existence apart from Roman power. An exegesis of Romans 6:12-23 seeks to reclaim the earliest reception of Romans as prophetic discourse aimed at an anti-Imperial response among slaves and lower class readers.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004316560 :
0928-0731 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Grace and agency in Paul and second temple judaism : interpreting the transformation of the heart /
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Following recent intertextual studies, Kyle B. Wells examines how descriptions of 'heart-transformation' in Deut 30, Jer 31-32 and Ezek 36 informed Paul and his contemporaries' articulations about grace and agency. Beyond advancing our understanding of how these restoration narratives were interpreted in the LXX, the Dead Sea Literature, Baruch, Jubilees, 2 Baruch, 4 Ezra, and Philo, Wells demonstrates that while most Jews in this period did not set divine and human agency in competition with one another, their constructions differed markedly and this would have contributed to vehement disagreements among them. While not sui generis in every respect, Paul's own convictions about grace and agency appear radical due to the way he reconfigures these concepts in relation to Christ.
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1 online resource (384 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004277328 :
0167-9732 ;
0167-9732 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Scriptural interpretation and community self-definition in Luke-Acts and the writings of Justin Marty r
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Scholars of Christian origins often regard Luke-Acts and the writings of Justin Martyr as similar accounts of the replacement of Israel by the non-Jewish church. According to this view, both authors commandeer the Jewish scriptures as the sole possession of non-Jewish Christ-believers, rather than of Jews. Offering a fresh analysis of the exegesis of Luke and Justin, this book uncovers significant differences between their respective depictions of the privileged status that Christ-believers hold in relation to the Jewish scriptures. Although both authors argue that Christ-believers alone possess an inspired capacity to interpret the Jewish scriptures, unlike Justin, Luke envisages an ongoing role for the Jewish people as recipients of the promises that God pledged to Israel.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references (p. [283]-310) and index. :
9789004201590 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Persecution in 1 Peter : differentiating and contextualizing early Christian suffering /
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In Persecution in 1 Peter , Travis B. Williams offers a comprehensive and detailed socio-historical investigation into the nature of suffering in 1 Peter. While interpreters commonly portray the conflict situation addressed by the epistle as \'unofficial\' persecution consisting of discrimination and verbal abuse, Williams demonstrates the inadequacy of this modern consensus by situating the letter against the backdrop of conflict management in first-century CE Asia Minor. Drawing on a wide range of historical evidence and on modern social-psychological perspectives, this work reconstructs the conflict situation of the Anatolian audience and offers important insights regarding the legal culpability of Christians following the Neronian persecution, the roles of local and provincial authorities in the judicial process, and the variegated conflict experiences of different socio-economic groups within the Christian communities.
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1 online resource (xxvii, 483 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references (p. [387]-446) and indexes. :
9789004242012 :
0167-9732 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Jesus and other men : ideal masculinities in the Synoptic Gospels /
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In Jesus and Other Men , Susanna Asikainen explores the masculinities of Jesus and other male characters as well as the ideal femininities in the Synoptic Gospels. She studies the masculinity of Jesus vis-à-vis his opponents, disciples, and women. She also considers the impact of Jesus' emotions and suffering on his masculinity. Arguing that there were several competing ideals of masculinity, she sets out to trace what strategies the early Christian masculinities used in relation to the hegemonic masculinities of the ancient Greco-Roman world. She shows that the Gospel of Luke is close to the ancient Greco-Roman ideal of self-controlled masculinity while the Gospels of Mark and Matthew portray Jesus and the disciples as examples of voluntarily marginalized masculinity.
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1 online resource (ix, 248 pages) : illustrations. :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004361096 :
0928-0731 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Birthing salvation : gender and class in early Christian childbearing discourse /
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In Birthing Salvation Anna Rebecca Solevåg explores the theme of childbearing in early Christian discourse. The book maps the importance of women's childbearing in Greco-Roman culture and shows how childbearing discourse interfaces with salvation discourse in three early Christian texts: the Pastoral Epistles, the Acts of Andrew and the Martyrdom of Perpetua and Felicitas. Issues of gender and class are explored through an intersectional analysis. In particular, the institution of slavery, and its implications for ideas about salvation in these texts are drawn out. Birthing Salvation offers fresh interpretations of these texts, including the peculiar statement in 1 Tim 2:15 that women "will be saved through childbearing."
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1 online resource (xiv, 287 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references (p. 257-274) and index. :
9789004257788 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Judgment and community conflict : Paul's use of apocalyptic judgment language in 1 Corinthians 3:5-4:5 /
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This study demonstrates that Paul in 1 Corinthians 3:5 - 4:5 is led by the rhetorical situation to emphasize God's final judgment as the affirmation of the individual Christian's work. Paul is not simply opposing his future eschatology to a Corinthian \'realized\' eschatology. Rather, he is teaching the Corinthians to adapt their inherited belief in a corporate judgment to new concerns within the community. The exegetical study is set in the context of past scholarship on the questions of Paul's eschatology, his beliefs concerning judgment, and the role of eschatology in 1 Corinthians. Chapters on the functions of divine judgment in Jewish and Greco-Roman writings help to define the way early Christians thought of God's judgment and to suggest how Corinthian sensibilities influenced Paul's application of judgment language. This book contributes to ongoing debates about the apocalyptic theology of Paul and the eschatological views of the Corinthians. It will also be useful to scholars who are interested in the role played by ideas of divine judgment in the world of the New Testament.
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Revision of the author's thesis (Ph. D.)--Yale University, 1989. :
1 online resource (xiii, 318 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references (p. 260-289) and indexes. :
9789004266964 :
0167-9732 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Historiography and self-definition : Josephos, Luke-Acts, and apologetic historiography /
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For centuries scholars have recognized the apologetic character of the Hellenistic Jewish historians, Josephos, and Luke-Acts; they have not, however, adequately addressed their possible relationships to each other and to their wider cultures. In this first full systematic effort to set these authors within the framework of Greco-Roman traditions, Professor Sterling has used genre criticism as a method for locating a distinct tradition of historical writing, apologetic historiography. Apologetic historiography is the story of a subgroup of people which deliberately Hellenizes the traditions of the group in an effort to provide a self-definition within the context of the larger world. It arose as a result of a dialectic relationship with Greek ethnography. This work traces the evolution of this tradition through three major eras of eastern Mediterranean history spanning six hundred years: the Persian, the Greek, and the Roman.
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1 online resource (xiv, 500 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references (p. 394-426) and indexes. :
9789004266940 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
The afterlife imagery in Luke's story of the rich man and Lazarus /
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Despite the keen scholarly interest in the Gospel parables, the afterlife scenery in the story of the rich man and Lazarus has often been overlooked. Using insights from the orality studies and intertextuality, the author places the Lukan description of the fate of the dead into the larger Hellenistic matrix, provided by a large number of Greco-Roman and Jewish sources, both literary and epigraphic. Moreover, she challenges several conventional stances in Lukan studies, such as tracing the original of the story to Egypt, or maintaining that eschatology is a key for understanding Luke's work and the purpose for writing it, or harmonizing Luke's eschatological thinking by positing an intermediate state between death and general resurrection. Thus, the book offers fresh insights both to the way the fate of the dead was understood in the ancient world and to the concept of Lukan eschatology.
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Revision of the author's thesis (doctoral)--University of Helsinki, 2004. :
1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references (p. [305]-329) and indexes. :
9789047410584 :
0167-9732 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
The adaptable Jesus of the fourth gospel : the pedagogy of the logos /
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In The Adaptable Jesus of the Fourth Gospel , Jason S. Sturdevant argues that the Gospel of John portrays Jesus as an adaptable teacher, who accommodates to different people in various ways to a singular end, to bring each to faith. In the same way, the Logos accommodates to humanity via the incarnation. Adaptability serves as both an interpersonal and universal category. Early Christian interpretations of John, especially that of John Chrysostom, describe the Jesus of John by echoing characterizations of the ideal Greco-Roman pedagogue, adapting to his diverse students. By looking to such interpretations, as well as illumination from the milieu of the Fourth Evangelist, Jason S. Sturdevant provides a new lens through which to understand the characterization of the Johannine Jesus.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004304239 :
0167-9732 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Paul and Philodemus : adaptability in Epicurean and early Christian psychagogy /
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As Paul guides and educates his converts he functions as a psychagogue ("leader of souls"), adapting his leadership style as required in each individual case. Pauline psychagogy resembles Epicurean psychagogy in the way persons enjoying a superior moral status and spiritual aptitude help to nurture and correct others, guiding their souls in moral and religious (re)formation. This study relates Epicurean psychagogy of late Republican times to early Christian psychagogy on the basis of an investigation which places the practice in the wider socio-cultural perspective, contextualising it in Greco-Roman literature treating friendship and flattery and the importance of adaptability in moral guidance. Pauline studies are advanced by the introduction of new material into the discussion of the Corinthian correspondence which throws light on Paul's debate with his recalcitrant critics.
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1 online resource (xiv, 414 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references (p. 337-353) and indexes. :
9789004267275 :
0167-9732 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Sight and blindness in Luke-Acts : the use of physical features in characterization /
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The ancient world often thought in terms of physiognomics-the idea that character can be discerned by studying outward, physical features. That physical descriptions carry moral freight in characterization has been largely missed in modern biblical scholarship, and this study brings that to the forefront. Specifically, this is a study of one particular physical marker-blindness. When we look at Greco-Roman literature, a kind of literary topos begins to emerge, a set of assumptions that ancient audiences would typically make when encountering blind characters. Luke-Acts makes use of such a topos in a way that becomes programmatic, serving as a kind of interpretive key to Luke-Acts that is generally unnoticed in modern scholarship.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789047432968 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Friendship, flattery, and frankness of speech : studies on friendship in the New Testament world /
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This volume deals with the topics of friendship, flattery, and frankness of speech in the Greco-Roman world. The three topics were often related, with candor or frank criticism viewed as the trait that distinguished the true friend from the flatterer. The book's eleven essays are divided into three parts. The first part introduces the volume and discusses the three topics in the thought of Philodemus and Plutarch. Part two deals with Paul's use of friendship language in his correspondence with the Church at Philippi. Part three examines the concept of frankness (parrhesia) in Paul, Luke-Acts, Hebrews, and the Johannine corpus. The volume will be particularly useful to NT Scholars, classicists, and modern theologians and ethicists who are interested in the theory and practice of friendship in antiquity.
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1 online resource (xiv, 291 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references and indexes. :
9789004267282 :
0167-9732 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.