Mark-Nanos

In addition to the Boccacci and Segovia and Rodríguez and Thiessen volumes, Fortress Press has kindly, if accidentally, passed along a review copy of Mark Nanos and Magnus Zetterholm’s edited volume Paul within Judaism: Restoring the First-century Context to the Apostle(2015). According to the book’s blurb:

In these chapters, a group of renowned international scholars seek to describe Paul and his work from “within Judaism,” rather than on the assumption, still current after thirty years of the “New Perspective,” that in practice Paul left behind aspects of Jewish living after his discovery of Jesus as Christ (Messiah). After an introduction that surveys recent study of Paul and highlights the centrality of questions about Paul’s Judaism, chapters explore the implications of reading Paul’s instructions as aimed at Christ-following non-Jews, teaching them how to live in ways consistent with Judaism while remaining non-Jews. The contributors take different methodological points of departure: historical, ideological-critical, gender-critical, and empire-critical, and examine issues of terminology and of interfaith relations. Surprising common ground among the contributors presents a coherent alternative to the “New Perspective.” The volume concludes with a critical evaluation of the Paul within Judaism perspective by Terence L. Donaldson, a well-known voice representative of the best insights of the New Perspective.

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The latest reviews from the Review of Biblical Literature include:

Jewish Scriptures and Cognate Studies

• Gary M. Beckman, Trevor R. Bryce, and Eric H. Cline, The Ahhiyawa Texts, reviewed by Paul Sanders
• Walter Brueggemann, David and His Theologian: Literary, Social, and Theological Investigations of the Early Monarchy, reviewed by Andrea Ravasco
• James L. Crenshaw, Reading Job: A Literary and Theological Commentary, reviewed by Norman Habel
• Jonathan Grossman, Esther: The Outer Narrative and the Hidden Reading, reviewed by Kelly A. Whitcomb
• Irene Schulmeister, Israels Befreiung aus Ägypten: Eine Formeluntersuchung zur Theologie des Deuteronomiums, reviewed by Peter Porzig

New Testament and Cognate Studies

The folks at Zondervan sponsored this year’s Institute for Biblical Research meeting reception. In addition to the deserts there, they very kindly provided attending members with a copy of the recent (2012) Counterpoints volume on Paul, edited by Michael Bird. According to the publisher’s description:

The apostle Paul was a vital force in the development of Christianity. Paul’s historical and religious context affects the theological interpretation of Paul’s writings, no small issue in the whole of Christian theology.

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