New-Testament

Some time ago, Larry Hurtado posted some thoughts about how Jesus is characterized as ἐκ δεξιῶν or ἐν δεξιᾷ. Recently, he’s followed up with “another possible factor” for how the language coalesces and a “bonus” post on the importance of being data-driven in developing hypotheses about such phenomena. ...

On 30 June–1 July, Tyndale House is set to host a workshop on Greek prepositions that focuses on cognitive linguistics, lexicography, and theology. Registration opens 1 March. For further discussion and background, see Septuaginta &c.

Access to the Journal of the Jesus Movement in its Jewish Setting is open and available online. JJMJS is: a peer-reviewed academic open access journal, published electronically (immediate free online availability) in co-operation with Eisenbrauns, with support of McMaster University and Caspari Center…. The journal aims, uniquely, to advance scholarship on this crucial period in the early history of the Jewish and Christian traditions when they developed into what is today known as two world religions, mutually shaping one another as they did so. JJMJS publishes high-quality research on any topic that directly addresses or has implications for the understanding of the inter-relationship and interaction between the Jesus movement and other forms of Judaism, as well as for the processes that led to the formation of Judaism and Christianity as two related but independent religions. ...

Today, Logos Bible Software has Louis Berkhof’s Introduction to the New Testament for free.

Logos Bible Software’s free book of the month for December is now live. The selection is Stephen Fowl’s Ephesians from the New Testament Library series. Also deeply discounted to $1.99 is Luke Timothy Johnson’s Hebrews volume from the same series. ...

From Dan Wallace: New manuscripts digitized by the Center for the Study of New Testament Manuscripts (CSNTM) have just been added to our searchable collection. These include 10 new manuscripts from the National Library of Greece in Athens, the site of our ongoing digitization project for 2015–16. ...

From ETC: Today, the Center for the Study of New Testament Manuscripts (CSNTM) launched their new and vastly improved website at CSNTM.org. For details about the reboot see ETC’s post and the CSNTM website. ...

Chris Stevens has the latest article in the Journal of Greco-Roman Christianity and Judaism, “John 9.38-39a: A Scribal Interjection for Literary Reinforcement.”

In the Journal of Greco-Roman Christianity and Judaism, Raymond Jachowski discusses “The Death of Herod the Great and the Latin Josephus: Re-examining the Twenty-second Year of Tiberius.”

Harrington, Revelation (Sacra Pagina) Verbum’s free book for October is Wilfrid Harrington’s Sacra Pagina volume on Revelation: More than any other New Testament writing, the Book of Revelation demands commentary. Its often-bewildering text is easily open to less-than-scholarly interpretation. Wilfrid Harrington brings his scholarship to the Book of Revelation and conveys its Christian message. He puts the work in its historical and social setting—a first-century CE province of the Roman Empire—and explores its social and religious background and its literary character. Through Harrington we hear clearly the challenge of John, the prophet, to the churches of his time—and to ours—not to compromise the Gospel message. ...

Advice from Murray Harris: As for the study habit that has proved most helpful in my academic career, it is this. There is no better way to become proficient in Greek, to gain a “feel” for the language, and to become enriched by the theology of the New Testament than the regular memorization of the Greek text. Paste a photocopy of verses or sections of the text on to cards and carefully reflect on it as you go about your daily exercise. ...

The Logos blog has a couple minute and slightly humorous segment from Darrell Bock on the importance of background information for New Testament Studies.

At the end of chapter 1, “Questions of Truth and Epistemology,” in her Comical Doctrine: An Epistemology of New Testament Hermeneutics (Paternoster, 2006), Rosalind Selby summarizes: If this chapter has concluded with an appropriate understanding of the logical structure of grace and faith as we contemplate how it is that we know God, it must be important to pursue it in terms of the relationship between the individual and the community. The community of the ‘church’—however we define that—is founded by and founds its texts. This is a dialectic which itself rests in the priority of the founding acts of God. The priority over community, individual and the textual conveying of revelation always belongs with God; and the Christian will take that fundamentally seriously. ( 52; emphasis added) ...

In her Comical Doctrine: An Epistemology of New Testament Hermeneutics (Paternoster, 2006), Rosalind Selby has several insightful observations. Summarizing the thought of Karl-Otto Apel, Selby comments: Apel himself proposes a dialectical mediation of objective-scientistic and hermeneutical methods with a critique of ideology. Philosophical hermeneutics is reflexive in as much as the subject must self-objectify in order to be self-critical and avoid any hidden prejudices. ( 36) ...

The latest reviews from the Review of Biblical Literature include: Daniel I. Block, Beyond the River Chebar: Studies in Kingship and Eschatology in the Book of Ezekiel, reviewed by Sven Petry Reinhard Feldmeier, Power, Service, Humility: A New Testament Ethic, reviewed by David Briones David G. Firth, 1 and 2 Samuel: A Kingdom Comes, reviewed by Ralph Henson Martha Himmelfarb, Between Temple and Torah: Essays on Priests, Scribes, and Visionaries in the Second Temple Period and Beyond, reviewed by L. Michael Morales Cornelia Linde, How to Correct the Sacra Scriptura?: Textual Criticism of the Bible between the Twelfth and Fifteenth Century, reviewed by Jeffrey L. Morrow Kim Lan Nguyen, Chorus in the Dark: The Voices of the Book of Lamentations, reviewed by Charles William Miller Jesse E. Robertson, The Death of Judas: The Characterization of Judas Iscariot in Three Early Christian Accounts of His Death, reviewed by Lee M. Jefferson Michael Trainor, About Earth’s Child: An Ecological Listening to the Gospel of Luke, reviewed by C. Jason Borders David Trobisch, A User’s Guide to the Nestle-Aland 28 Greek New Testament, reviewed by Michael W. Holmes and by Jan Krans

Rob Bradshaw has made available George Milligan’s essay, “The Greek Papyri: With Special Reference to Their Value for New Testament Study,” Journal of the Transactions of the Victoria Institute 44 (1912): 62–78.

Research@StAndrews:FullText is: [A] digital repository of research output from the University of St Andrews. Since 2006 the University has required theses to be submitted to the repository. . . . The Research@StAndrews Portal provides links to the full text of research publications which are stored in Research@StAndrews:FullText. From the School of Divinity, 160 theses are available. ...

The latest reviews in the Review of Biblical Literature include: Jewish Scriptures and Cognate Studies Richard J. Clifford, Wisdom, reviewed by Lawrence M. Wills David J. A. Clines and J. Cheryl Exum, eds., The Reception of the Hebrew Bible in the Septuagint and the New Testament: Essays in Memory of Aileen Guilding, reviewed by Benjamin J. M. Johnson Joan E. Cook, Genesis, reviewed by Jonathan L. Huddleston Avraham Faust, Judah in the Neo-Babylonian Period: The Archaeology of Desolation, reviewed by Gert T. M. Prinsloo James E. Harding, The Love of David and Jonathan: Ideology, Text, Reception, reviewed by Katherine Low Irene Nowell, Numbers, reviewed by Timothy R. Ashley Naomi Steinberg, The World of the Child in the Hebrew Bible, reviewed by Karin Finsterbusch New Testament and Cognate Studies ...

As a follow up to noting Rob Bradshaw’s additions of Charles Simeon and John Lightfoot’s works in conveniently accessible PDF files, some other possibly helpful resources across which I’ve recently stumbled (sometimes apparently afresh) include: Keil and Delitzsch’s Old Testament commentary via Internet Archive; Various helpful texts via University of Pennsylvania’s Online Books Page; and The overall, searchable list of “Hosted Articles, Monographs, and Books” at BiblicalStudies.org.

The latest reviews in the Review of Biblical Literature include: Jewish Scriptures and Cognate Studies Tremper Longman III, Job, reviewed by Richard G. Smith Donald P. Moffat, Ezra’s Social Drama: Identity Formation, Marriage and Social Conflict in Ezra 9 and 10, reviewed by Hannah K. Harrington Daniel C. Owens, Portraits of the Righteous in the Psalms: An Exploration of the Ethics of Book I, reviewed by Beat Weber Franz Sedlmeier, Das Buch Ezechiel: Kapitel 25-48, reviewed by Michael S. Moore Stefan Seiler, Text-Beziehungen: Zur intertextuellen Interpretation alttestamentlicher Texte am Beispiel ausgewählter Psalmen, reviewed by Gert T. M. Prinsloo New Testament and Cognate Studies ...

The latest reviews in the Review of Biblical Literature include: Jewish Scriptures and Cognate Studies Peter Enns, The Evolution of Adam: What the Bible Does and Doesn’t Say about Human Origins, reviewed by Paul Korchin Kai Kaniuth et al., eds., Tempel im Alten Orient, reviewed by Jason M. Silverman Christoph Körner and Hans-Winfried Jüngling, eds., "…denn das ist der ganze Mensch": Jüdische Feste: Kohelet, Ester, Hoheslied, Rut, Klagelieder, reviewed by Andreas Lehnardt Michael Pietsch, Die Kultreform Josias: Studien zur Religionsgeschichte Israels in der späten Königszeit, reviewed by Peter Porzig New Testament and Cognate Studies ...

The latest reviews in the Review of Biblical Literature include: Jewish Scriptures and Cognate Studies William Goodman, Yearning for You: Psalms and the Song of Songs in Conversation with Rock and Worship Songs, reviewed by T. Michael W. Halcomb David Weiss Halivni, The Formation of the Babylonian Talmud, reviewed by Joshua Ezra Burns Isaac Kalimi, ed., Jewish Bible Theology: Perspectives and Case Studies, reviewed by Ginny Brewer-Boydston Vita Daphna Arbel, Forming Femininity in Antiquity: Eve, Gender, and Ideologies in the Greek Life of Adam and Eve, reviewed by F. Scott Spencer Víctor Morla, Los manuscritos hebreos de Ben Sira: Traducción y notas, reviewed by Nuria Calduch-Benages Peter W. Flint, The Dead Sea Scrolls, reviewed by George J. Brooke New Testament and Cognate Studies ...

The latest reviews in the Review of Biblical Literature include: Jewish Scriptures and Cognate Studies Jenny R. Labendz, Socratic Torah: Non-Jews in Rabbinic Intellectual Culture, reviewed by Joshua Schwartz Thomas L. Thompson, Biblical Narrative and Palestine’s History: Changing Perspectives 2, reviewed by Ralph K. Hawkins New Testament and Cognate Studies ...

Ben Witherington, Through June 16, Ben Witherington’s What’s in the Word: Rethinking the Socio-Rhetorical Character of the New Testament (Baylor, 2009) is available for free from Logos Bible Software. In sum, “Expanding on the work in which he has been fruitfully engaged for over a quarter century, Witherington challenges the previously assured results of historical criticism and demonstrates chapter by chapter how the socio-rhetorical study shifts the paradigm.” The volume discusses concerns related to orality and canon, and includes several chapters treating particular texts or phrases within the New Testament. ...

Kevin Vanhoozer, ed., For this week, Kevin Vanhoozer’s edited volume on the Theological Interpretation of the New Testament is free from Logos Bible Software when users join a Baker-related email list (HT: Tayler Beede). The volume provides a focused selection of the book-specific entries from the larger Dictionary for Theological Interpretation of the Bible. ...

The latest reviews in the Review of Biblical Literature include those below. In biblioblog time, some of these reviews date back almost to eternity past, but I’m going ahead and posting them here for future reference. Update (5/13): The following now includes the April 24 listings I’d missed out previously. March 14 Jewish Scriptures and Cognate Studies Alan Appelbaum, The Rabbis’ King-Parables: Midrash from the Third-Century Roman Empire, reviewed by Rachel Adelman Magnar Kartveit, Rejoice, Dear Zion!: Hebrew Construct Phrases with “Daughter” and “Virgin” as Nomen Regens, reviewed by Peter Bekins Tyler D. Mayfield, Literary Structure and Setting in Ezekiel, reviewed by Richard G. Smith New Testament and Cognate Studies ...

[caption id=“attachment_2129” align=“alignright” width=“87”] Richard Bauckham[/caption] In his 2006 Jesus and the Eyewitnesses, Richard Bauckham suggests: that we need to recover the sense in which the Gospels are testimony. This does not mean that they are testimony rather than history. It means that the kind of historiography they are is testimony. An irreducible feature of testimony as a form of human utterance is that it asks to be trusted. This does not mean that it asks to be trusted uncritically, but it does mean that testimony should not be treated as credible only to the extent that it can be independently verified. There can be good reasons for trusting or distrusting a witness, but these are precisely reasons for trusting or distrusting. Trusting testimony is not an irrational act of faith that leaves critical rationality aside; it is, on the contrary, the rationally appropriate way of responding to authentic testimony. . . . It is true that a powerful trend in the modern development of critical historical philosophy and method finds trusting testimony a stumbling-block in the way of the historian’s autonomous access to truth that she or he can verify independently. But it is also a rather neglected fact that all history, like all knowledge, relies on testimony. ( 5; italics original) ...

Baker and the Stone-Campbell Journal were kind enough to provide a copy of Tom Schreiner’s The King in His Beauty: A Biblical Theology of the Old and New Testaments. According to the publisher’s description, Schreiner: ...

As their free book of the month, Logos Bible Software is giving away volume 5 of the Expositor’s Greek Testament, edited by W. Robertson Nicoll. Volume 5 includes: J. H. A. Hart, “The First Epistle General of Peter” R. H. Strachan, “The Second Epistle General of Peter” David Smith, “The Epistles of John” J. B. Mayor, “The General Epistle of Jude” James Moffatt, “The Revelation of St. John the Divine” For more information about the text and to download this volume, please see here. ...

Christian Book Distributors now has the 10-volume Theological Dictionary of the New Testament on sale for $99.99. Orders for the product should ship on or after October 1.