Download or read book Religious Propaganda and Missionary Competition in the New Testament World written by Lukas Bormann and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2014-04-09 with total page 589 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Religious Propaganda is a pivotal concept for the Hellenistic and Roman epochs in the History of Religions. The term refers to the various competing religious and philosophical movements and currents during those periods. Renowned scholars (H. Attridge, K. Baltzer, J. Collins, A. Dewey, H. Koester, A.T. Kraabel, D. Lührmann, J. Robinson, W. Schottroff, E. Schüssler Fiorenza, A. Yarbro Collins and others) interpret Pagan, Jewish, and Christian sources with a view toward elucidating the confrontation of Jewish and Christian groups with their respective social, economic, religious, and political contexts. The authors seek to demonstrate the significance of missionary and propagandistic themes as well as strategies for the self-understanding of Jews and Christians at the turn of the eras. The articles, 25 in all, draw upon the broad expanse of scholarly work in the History of Religions pertaining to this period: the authors discuss methodology and the state of research, and they forge ahead in the exploration of the intertestamental and New Testament writings.
Download or read book Philodemus and the New Testament world electronic resource written by John Thomas Fitzgerald and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2004 with total page 456 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The fifteen essays in this volume, rooted in the work of the Hellenistic Moral Philosophy and Early Christianity Section of the SBL, examine the works of Philodemus and how they illuminate the cultural context of early Christianity. Born in Gadara in Syria, Philodemus (ca. 110-40 BCE) was active in Italy as an Epicurean philosopher and poet. This volume comprises three parts; the first deals with Philodemus' works in their own terms, the second situates his thought within its larger Greco-Roman context, and the third explores the implications of his work for understanding the earliest Christians, especially Paul. It will be useful to all readers interested in Hellenistic philosophy and rhetoric as well as Second Temple Judaism and early Christianity.
Download or read book Paul s Understanding of the Church s Mission written by Robert Lewis Plummer and published by OCMS. This book was released on 2006 with total page 232 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book engages in a careful study of Pauls letters to determine if the apostle expected the communities to which he wrote to engage in missionary activity. It helpfully summarizes the discussion on this debated issue, judiciously handling contested texts and provides a way forward in addressing this critical question. While admitting that Paul rarely explicitly commands the communities he founded to evangelize, Plummer amasses significant incidental data to provide a convincing case that Paul did indeed expect his churches to engage in mission activity. Throughout the study, Plummer progressively builds a theological basis for the churchs mission that is both distinctively Pauline and compelling.
Download or read book The Mission of the Church written by James P. Ware and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2005-11-01 with total page 402 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Illumining the Jewish context of early Christian mission, this study through close exegesis of Paul’s letter to the Philippians reveals the crucial place of the mission of the church in Paul’s thought.
Download or read book Paul and the Mission of the Church written by James P. Ware and published by Baker Books. This book was released on 2011-07-01 with total page 553 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Did Paul urge Christians to engage in mission? What would that have meant in his setting? What should the church be doing now? This essential study examines Paul's letter to the Philippians in its ancient Jewish context, making a convincing case that Paul expected churches to continue the work of spreading the gospel. Published in hardcover by Brill, it is now available as an affordable paperback.
Download or read book The New Testament and Early Christian Literature in Greco Roman Context written by David Edward Aune and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2006 with total page 495 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume is a collection of newly published scholarly studies honoring Prof.Dr. David. E. Aune on his 65th birthday. These groundbreaking studies written by prominent international scholars investigate a range of topics in the New Testament and early Christian literature with insights drawn from Greco-Roman culture and Hellenistic Judaism.
Download or read book Pauline Solidarity written by Daniel Oudshoorn and published by Wipf and Stock Publishers. This book was released on 2020-04-30 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Building on the themes established in the first two volumes of Paul and the Uprising of the Dead, Pauline Solidarity explores: (a) how the Pauline faction transforms relationships within the household unit in the new transnational family of God; (b) how dominant cultural conceptions of honor are rejected in the embrace of shame in the company of the crucified; (c) how vertical practices of patronage are replaced with a horizontal sibling-based political economy of grace; and (d) how the gospel of the Caesars is overcome by the lawlessness of the good news that is being assembled in an uprising of life among the left for dead. Along the way, many of the traditional themes associated with Paulinism (grace, justice, love, loyalty, sin, flesh, death, Jesus, spirit, life) are reexamined and understood as core components of a movement that was spreading among vanquished, colonized, oppressed, dispossessed, and enslaved peoples who were finding new (and treasonous) ways of organizing themselves in order to be life-giving and life-affirming, and in order to counter all the death-dealing structures of Roman imperialism.
Download or read book Partnership in Ministry written by Paul H. Byun and published by Wipf and Stock Publishers. This book was released on 2023-05-16 with total page 193 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What type of relationship did New Testament churches have with one another? Was it a relationship of conflict and competition? Or was it a loose aggregation of individual churches scattered across the Roman Empire? Or can it be described as a cohesive partnership for the common cause of the gospel of Christ? Most New Testament church activities are recorded in connection with Paul's ministry. In this sense, the present study started on the premise that close attention to Paul's partnership ministry would offer a richer understanding of New Testament church relationships. By exploring some ministry areas--such as Paul's coworkers, financial assistance, and communicative activities--this book demonstrates that Paul's churches, occasioned and mediated by Paul's partnership ministry, were engaged in networking and collaboration far more closely than has generally been assumed, not only among themselves but also with non-Pauline churches. Paul's partnership ministry significantly contributed to the relationship of New Testament churches.
Download or read book Religious Rivalries in the Early Roman Empire and the Rise of Christianity written by Leif E. Vaage and published by Wilfrid Laurier Univ. Press. This book was released on 2010-10-30 with total page 344 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Religious Rivalries in the Early Roman Empire and the Rise of Christianity discusses the diverse cultural destinies of early Christianity, early Judaism, and other ancient religious groups as a question of social rivalry. The book is divided into three main sections. The first section debates the degree to which the category of rivalry adequately names the issue(s) that must be addressed when comparing and contrasting the social “success” of different religious groups in antiquity. The second is a critical assessment of the common modern category of “mission” to describe the inner dynamic of such a process; it discusses the early Christian apostle Paul, the early Jewish historian Josephus, and ancient Mithraism. The third section of the book is devoted to “the rise of Christianity,” primarily in response to the similarly titled work of the American sociologist of religion Rodney Stark. While it is not clear that any of these groups imagined its own success necessarily entailing the elimination of others, it does seem that early Christianity had certain habits, both of speech and practice, which made it particularly apt to succeed (in) the Roman Empire.
Download or read book The Epistle of James and Eschatology written by Todd Penner and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 1996-05-01 with total page 331 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The aim of this book is to challenge the common view that the epistle of James is a late Hellenistic Wisdom document that has little importance for our understanding of earliest Christianity. The author undertakes two main projects: first, an examination of the various assumptions about date, setting and content that have influenced how the letter of James has been interpreted; and second, a re-reading of the letter that seeks to uncover the special character of the epistle by stressing the fusion of its eschatological framework with its ethical instruction. The literary, cultural, and social contextualization of James that emerges sheds new light on this often neglected text and its place in early Christianity.
Download or read book Mission and Moral Reflection in Paul written by Michael D. Barram and published by Peter Lang. This book was released on 2006 with total page 230 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Apostle Paul sought to exert his influence and authority over the congregations he founded long after they had been established. Such ongoing oversight by Christianity's prototypical «evangelist» has not been adequately understood. In a brief 1987 article, W. Paul Bowers challenged John Knox's assertion that Paul's «pastoral and administrative work irked him and that he wanted to be free of it». This book confirms and significantly develops Bowers's little-known thesis, examining a wide range of passages in the apostle's undisputed letters and highlighting crucial implications of Paul's broadly conceived vocation for understanding his mission and moral reflection.
Download or read book From Roman to Early Christian Thessalonik written by Laura Nasrallah and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2010 with total page 458 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume brings together international scholars of religion, archaeologists, and scholars of art and architectural history to investigate social, political, and religious life in Roman and early Christian Thessalonikē, an important metropolis in the Hellenistic, Roman, and early Christian periods and beyond. This volume is the first broadly interdisciplinary investigation of Roman and early Christian Thessalonikē in English and offers new data and new interpretations by scholars of ancient religion and archaeology. The book covers materials usually treated by a broad range of disciplines: New Testament and early Christian literature, art historical materials, urban planning in antiquity, material culture and daily life, and archaeological artifacts from the Roman to the late antique period.
Download or read book Christian Identity in Corinth written by V. Henry T. Nguyen and published by Mohr Siebeck. This book was released on 2008 with total page 300 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Revision of the author's thesis (Ph. D) -- University of Aberdeen, 2007.
Download or read book Rhetoric and Ethic written by Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza and published by Fortress Press. This book was released on with total page 234 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this major study, leading feminist biblical critic Elisabeth Schussler Fiorenza focuses on Paul and his interpreters. She questions the apolitical ethos of biblical scholarship and argues for an alternative rooted in a critical understanding of language as a form of power. Modern biblical criticism, she reasons, derives much of its methodology and inspiration from an outdated notion of modern science. It professes value-neutrality and detachment from the world of politics and history. Yet, Schussler Fiorenza maintains, this posture belies an objectivity that fails to engage the sociopolitical context of both the text and today's reader. It also does not recognize the rhetorical character of biblical texts and readings. If language is understood in the sense of ancient rhetorics as a form of power that constitutes reality, then an ethics of interpretation is called for. The task of biblical studies is to identify and assess the ethical resources and moral visions of biblical religions. "Only then," Schussler Fiorenza contends, "will bibical studies be a significant partner in the global struggles seeking justice and well-being for all."
Download or read book Heralds and Community written by Bo Young Kang and published by Langham Monographs. This book was released on 2016-08-30 with total page 422 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is part of the ongoing debate about Paul’s understanding of the relationship between his own mission and the church’s. While this study endorses some previous scholarship on Paul’s silence about the church’s proactive evangelism in his letters, it argues that explanations for such silence cannot be adequately made from exegetical conclusions on related texts alone. Rather, this study suggests that constructing a plausible conception of mission as understood by Paul, influenced by the impact of the Jesus-tradition and Jewish restoration eschatology, is essential for explaining Paul’s thinking. Dr Kang proposes that Paul’s silence regarding congregational evangelism is due to his unique two-pronged conception of mission – one being the event of eschatological heralds, the other being the event of eschatological community.
Download or read book The Writings of the New Testament written by Luke Timothy Johnson and published by Fortress Press. This book was released on 2010-03-01 with total page 593 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Luke Timothy Johnson offers a compelling interpretation of the New Testament as a witness to the rise of early faith in Jesus. Critically judicious and theologically attuned to the role of the New Testament in the life of the church, Johnson deftly guides his reader through a wealth of historical and literary description and invites critical reflection on the meaning of these ancient writings for today. The third edition is carefully updated and includes new student-friendly format and features, including a new design and study and reflection questions.
Download or read book Jews Christians and Jewish Christians in Antiquity written by James Carleton Paget and published by Mohr Siebeck. This book was released on 2010 with total page 570 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The book, which consists of some previously published and unpublished essays, examines a variety of issues relevant to the study of ancient Judaism and Christianity and their interaction, including polemic, proselytism, biblical interpretation, messianism, the phenomenon normally described as Jewish Christianity, and the fate of the Jewish community after the Bar Kokhba revolt, a period of considerable importance for the emergence not only of Judaism but also of Christianity. The volume, typically for a collection of essays, does not lay out a particular thesis. If anything binds the collection together, it is the author's attempt to set out the major fault lines in current debate about these disputed subjects, and in the process to reveal their complex and entangled character.
