Greek

2020 ◽  
pp. 13-56
Author(s):  
Coulter H. George

To lay the foundations for the linguistic discussion found in the remainder of the book, this chapter begins with a systematic introduction to some of the main features of Ancient Greek, explaining the necessary technical terms along the way. First comes a discussion of the sounds of Greek, focusing on those that are particularly characteristic of Greek, as well as the development of Greek from the Proto-Indo-European parent language. The chapter then introduces some of the ways Greek words, especially nouns and verbs, change their forms to suit the grammatical context, since such morphological richness will come up repeatedly in the book. Excerpts from three texts are then discussed: first, the Iliad, to show how formulaic language marks its origins as an oral composition; second, Thucydides, to highlight the abstract language that characterizes his history; third, the New Testament, to show how much translators sometimes need to rearrange the structure of a sentence in order for the syntax to make sense in English.

1975 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 32-51 ◽  
Author(s):  
B. A. Mastin

Because the term θεóς is used so infrequently of Jesus in the New Testament, it is not surprising to find that there are relatively few discussions of it as a christological title. However, it may be of value to investigate the way in which the Fourth Gospel speaks of Jesus as ‘God’ since its usage differs somewhat from that of the rest of the New Testament. First, the extent to which the New Testament describes Jesus as God will be surveyed, and this will be contrasted in general terms with the approach of the Fourth Evangelist. Then the passages in the Fourth Gospel which may call Jesus ‘God’ will be examined in more detail, and an attempt will be made to establish the way in which this designation is used by the evangelist. Next it will be asked how the distinctive usage of the Fourth Gospel came to be adopted. Finally the view that the word θεóς expresses a functional christology will be considered.


2019 ◽  
pp. 292-318
Author(s):  
Robert C. Roberts

That a virtue should be called magnanimity suggests that souls come in sizes. But what makes for this sizing? This chapter is framed between the Homeric heroic ideal embodied in the megalêtôr and the gentle but resolute American hero, the magnanimous Abraham Lincoln, interacting along the way with the other chapters in the volume. This chapter compares conceptions of greatness of soul (heart, spirit, mind), touching on Socrates, Aristotle, the New Testament, Stoicism, Yaḥyā ibn ‘Adī and al-Rāghib al-Iṣfahānī, Thomas Aquinas, Descartes, the Scottish Enlightenment, Kant, and Nietzsche. The story is one of diversity, indeed in some cases mutual exclusion, with overlap and continuities. But in the end the chapter suggests a certain evolution of our conception of human greatness in which the virtues of strength and toughness are integrated with those of generosity and compassion.


2017 ◽  
Vol 41 (2) ◽  
pp. 152-159
Author(s):  
Gary M. Burge

Kenneth E. Bailey (1930–2016) was an internationally acclaimed New Testament scholar who grew up in Egypt and devoted his life to the church of the Middle East. He also was an ambassador of Arab culture to the West, explaining through his many books on the New Testament how the context of the Middle East shapes the world of the New Testament. He wed cultural anthropology to biblical exegesis and shaped the way scholars view the Gospels today.


1969 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 24-38 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. A. Kirk

The following essay is an attempt to examine the manner in which the writer of the Epistle of James uses the concept of Wisdom; and to study the suggestion that the way in which he uses it is more or less interchangeable with that in which other writers of the New Testament use the concept of the Holy Spirit.


2015 ◽  
Vol 44 (4) ◽  
pp. 501-515
Author(s):  
Don Schweitzer

This paper examines Jean-Luc Marion’s notion of a saturated phenomenon and assesses some of its strengths and weaknesses as a way of understanding Jesus’ resurrection. It argues that Marion’s notion is very helpful for understanding the uniqueness and decisiveness of Jesus’ resurrection, its resistance to objectification, its transformative power and its excess of meaning. However, Marion’s assertion that a person is completely passive in receiving a saturated phenomenon does not fit with the way Jesus’ resurrection is described in the New Testament. This paper offers a correction to Marion’s notion on this point, arguing that people do have the freedom to play an active role in their reception of Jesus’ resurrection and in their constitution by it, a freedom founded by Jesus’ resurrection itself.


1938 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 179-187
Author(s):  
Roland H. Bainton

The period of the Reformation is one in which the editing and publication of new documents may be expected to necessitate a periodic revision of the general works. In a sense this is true of every period, but the unpublished sources for the age of the New Testament are slight and not often does the investigator turn up a Didache or the Odes of Solomon. In the Reformation period, however, discoveries are frequent and critical editions incomplete for even the great figures like Luther and Calvin. Zwingli is still in process in the Corpus Reformatorum. Traugott Schiess did not live to finish Bullinger. Some ten years ago M. Aubert showed me at Geneva the materials for the correspondence of Beza, but so far as I have observed nothing has appeared. Thomas Müntzer was in luck with the publication of his letters by Boehmer and Kirn in 1931 and his works by Otto H. Brandt in 1933. The Anabaptists have been favored only with a beginning. The Verein für Reformationsgeschichte has brought out one large volume on Württemberg and a smaller one on Brandenburg, but eleven more are still in the loins of Abraham. The Kommission zur Erforschung der Geschichte der Reformation und Gegenreformation published the letters of Peutinger and Cuspianus and selected works of Erasmus (edited by Annemarie and Hajo Holborn now of Yale), but further work on the humanists has been dropped. If only we might revive it in this country! Among us the Corpus Schwenckfeldianorum has been wallowing in the trough of foreign exchange. The fourteenth volume happily is out. Bender, Yoder and Correll have the material for a volume of Grebeliana if only the way opens to make friends with the mammon of unrighteousness.


1995 ◽  
Vol 2 (3) ◽  
pp. 283-296
Author(s):  
M.M. Jacobs

AbstractIn the light of the current emphasis on interdisciplinary research as well as the religious nature of the New Testament documents it becomes not only possible but also meaningful for a New Testament scholar to pay some attention to modern religious works of literature. This article looks at the way in which the religious quest is dealt with in Patrick White's 'Riders in the chariot'.


Scrinium ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 181-214
Author(s):  
Carl Johan Berglund

The reflections of Origen of Alexandria (ca. 185–254 CE) concerning the nature of the New Testament Gospels may be better understood if viewed in relation to a scheme of standard introductory questions used by ancient Greek philologists in their commentaries on classical Greek literature. While this scheme did not include questions about the form or genre of the writings to be analyzed, Origen repeatedly added such reflections when he adapted the scheme in his commentaries on biblical writings. These reflections inform us of his expectations of the Gospels. Using a modern concept of genre as a system of expectations shared between author and reader, and frequently intended to shape the worldview of the readers, Origen’s views of the nature of the Gospels can be expressed as their simultaneous participation in two genres: Christian teaching and ancient historiography.



1970 ◽  
Vol 15 ◽  
pp. 283-294 ◽  
Author(s):  
Olaf Steen

The sarcophagus in the church of S. Ambrogio in Milan is dated to about 390. The lid of the sarcophagus shows scenes and symbols connected to the New Testament. On the front and rear sides, we find Christ represented among the Apostles. Figures from the Old Testament are shown on the two short sides. In this way, the narrative scenes are well arranged, and the arrangement differs from other early Christian sarcophagi in which scenes from the Old and New Testament are places together without any apparent connection between the scenes. Rows of city-gates run around all four sides, forming the background for the reliefs. The city-gates invite the beholder to read the images not as isolated scenes, but as parts of a connected whole. In this paper, I will argue that the iconography of the sarcophagus can be interpreted as a complete programme. The programme emphasizes the teaching of Christ and the Apostles’ teaching-mission given by Christ. Taking into consideration the monument’s funerary context, the programme of the sarcophagus focuses on the Word or the teaching of Christ as the way to salvation.


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