scholarly journals Hoe kan God dit toelaat? ’n Bibliologiese verryking van die teodiseevraagstuk uit ’n vergelyking tussen Openbaring en 4 Esra

2011 ◽  
Vol 45 (2/3) ◽  
Author(s):  
J.A. Du Rand
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
Old Testament ◽  
History Of Philosophy ◽  
Human Suffering ◽  
Book Of Revelation ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Intertestamental Literature

How can God allow it? A bibliological enrichment of the theodicy issue from a comparison between the Book of Revelation and 4 EzraIn the process of understanding and defining the relationship between God and man, the theodicy issue frequently floats to the surface. A long strand in the history of philosophy and theology has addressed itself to the task of reconciling God’s omnipotence and benevolence with human suffering and the existence of evil. Some of the philosophical and theological views are represented in this article. According to reformed scholarly presentation, theodicy should seriously take into account the soteriological and eschatological hermeneutical views. This is confirmed by the Old Testament, intertestamental literature and the New Testament. The purpose of this article is to draw attention to the apocryphal 4 Ezra which puts surprising views about theodicy on the table.

Function and Nature of the Heavenly Sanctuary/Temple and its Earthly Counterparts in the New Testament Gospels, Acts, and the Epistles: A Motif Study of Major Passages

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Leonardo Nunes
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
Old Testament ◽  
Holy Spirit ◽  
Main Concern ◽  
Book Of Revelation ◽  
New Covenant ◽  
Final Destination ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
The Holy Spirit ◽  
Canonical Order

The present dissertation examines the function and nature of the heavenly sanctuary/temple and its relationship to the earthly counterparts in the major passages of the New Testament (NT) Gospels, Acts, Pauline and General Epistles where the sanctuary/temple motif is found (a total of twenty-two passages). After the introductory chapter, chapters 2, 3, and 4 are devoted to the exegetical analysis of these major passages following canonical order and divisions of the NT. This exegetical analysis has detected the relevance of the heavenly sanctuary/temple motif for NT studies, i.e., how its function, nature, and relationship to the earthly counterparts influence the understanding of important themes of the NT such as salvation, intercession, spiritual gifts, love, holiness, eradication of evil, among others. This investigation has identified that the heavenly sanctuary/temple in the NT function as God’s dwelling place. It is a place for reunion, reconciliation, and sending of the Holy Spirit, from where every spiritual blessing is bestowed upon the believers. In the heavenly sanctuary/temple Jesus is enthroned to exercise authority, power, sovereignty, and rulership; it is where judgment and vindication are made, the new covenant is ratified. It is a place to present praise and worship to God, celebrating Christ's victory over evil. The heavenly sanctuary/temple is where Christ presents His once-for-all sacrifice, "obtains eternal redemption," and intercedes in our behalf, giving assurance that God's salvific purpose and the heirs' hope will be fulfilled. The heavenly sanctuary/temple also functions as the motivation and ground for holy living, the driving force for sacrificial service and endurance of suffering for Christ. The heavenly sanctuary/temple is also the final destination of the Christian journey where all believers will gather together with the godhead and the angels in a festal assembly. Regarding the nature of the heavenly sanctuary/temple in the NT, the passages surveyed show that architecture is not the main concern of the NT writers. However, in tune with the Old Testament (OT), they describe the heavenly sanctuary/temple in terms of a spatiotemporal reality where the corporeal resurrected Jesus is at work and the bodily resurrected believers will live. This NT ontological perspective safeguards the actuality of the heavenly sanctuary/temple many functions. The spatiotemporal nature of the heavenly sanctuary/temple is strengthened when one looks at its relationship to the earthly counterparts. The NT passages examined demonstrate that there is structural and functional correspondence between OT and NT heavenly and earthly counterparts within a typological framework, as well as dynamic interaction among them. Chapter 5 offers a theological synthesis of the heavenly sanctuary/temple motif presented in the previous chapters. A summary of the findings is first provided followed by inferences of theological implications in the three main areas of this dissertation (function, nature, and relationship). After these concluding remarks, an appendix is provided with a brief treatment of twenty-five NT passages not dealt with in the main text (including thirteen passages in the book of Revelation) in order to give the reader a more comprehensive perspective of the pervasiveness of the heavenly sanctuary/temple motif in the NT. In conclusion, the study of the heavenly sanctuary/temple motif in the NT seems to be needed in order to have a sound and balanced understanding of NT theology.

scholarly journals De fremmede, Det Gamle Testamente, vi

1987 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hans J. Lundager Jensen
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
Old Testament ◽  
Ethnic Differences ◽  
A Priori ◽  
Western World ◽  
Equal Part ◽  
Nature And Culture ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
History Of

On the basis of examples of attitudes towards foreigners in the Old Testament, the internal tension between a tendency to eliminate the differences between Israel and foreigners and an insistence on maintaining the fundamental distance between Israel and foreigners, even in eschatological perspective, is presented. The a priori assumption of the Israelitic understanding of themselves is not a differentiation between nature and culture (between non-human and the human), but between the human in general and the specifically Israelitic. This difference cannot be transgressed without the break-down of the Israelitic system. Identity is understood here as establishing differences. But the dialectic between the Old Testament beginnings which are negated by the history of Israel, continues in the New Testament which negates the history of Israel and yet which allows the Old Testament to remain as an equal part of the canon. The practical universalism (modernism) of the Western world and the eradication of ethnic differences is thereby partly anticipated as a problematic in the Christian canon and partly given an important corrective.

The Church of the Reigning Lord

1948 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 66-73
Author(s):  
R. Stuart Louden
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
Old Testament ◽  
Christian Theology ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Biblical Scholarship ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
Pauline Epistles ◽  
History Of ◽  
Four Square ◽  
The Church

We can trace a revival of theology in the Reformed Churches in the last quarter of a century. The new theological interest merits being called a revival of theology, for there has been a fresh and more thorough attention given to certain realities, either ignored or treated with scant notice for a considerable time previously.First among such realities now receiving more of the attention which their relevance and authority deserve, is the Bible, the record of the Word of God. There is an invigorating and convincing quality about theology which is Biblical throughout, being based on the witness of the Scriptures as a whole. The valuable results of careful Biblical scholarship had had an adverse effect on theology in so far as theologians had completely separated the Old Testament from the New in their treatment of Biblical doctrine, or in expanding Christian doctrine, had spoken of the theological teaching of the Synoptic Gospels, the Pauline Epistles, the Johannine writings, and so on, as if there were no such thing as one common New Testament witness. It is being seen anew that the Holy Scriptures contain a complete history of God's saving action. The presence of the complete Bible open at the heart of the Church, recalls each succeeding Christian generation to that one history of God's saving action, to which the Church is the living witness. The New Testament is one, for its Lord is one, and Christian theology must stand four-square on the foundation of its whole teaching.

Psalm 2:7 and the concept of περιχώρησις

2014 ◽  
Vol 67 (2) ◽  
pp. 213-229
Author(s):  
Michael Straus
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
Old Testament ◽  
Conceptual Analysis ◽  
Son Of God ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
The One ◽  
Psalm 2 ◽  
Relationship Of ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
The Trinity

AbstractThis article takes as its springboard the well-known text of Psalm 2:7, in which the Psalmist – presumably David, king of Israel – refers to himself as a ‘begotten’ son of God by virtue of his Lord's decree. The article first explores various linguistic and theological options as to the identity of the ‘son’ to whom the passage refers; and analyses the relationship between that son and the one who is stated to have begotten him. In this context, the article addresses ways in which the passage more generally sheds light on the relationship between God and Israel, including through analysis of a number of fluctuating usages of singular and plural terms in the Old Testament to describe that relationship. Second, and against that background, the article examines texts in the New Testament which quote or refer to Psalm 2:7 to see whether they provide a better understanding of the nature of the relationship between the father and the son described in the Psalm; and further to see whether any enhanced understanding of that relationship reciprocally sheds light on the relationship of God the Father to God the Son as revealed in the New Testament. The article then seeks to determine whether these passages, taken as a whole, provide explicit, implicit, or proto-Trinitarian concepts in anticipation of those given fuller expression in orthodox Church doctrine. Finally, the article explores the concept of circumincession, or coinherence, John of Damascus’ highly abstracted and nearly poetic effort at the close of the Patristic era to provide an extra-biblical explanation of the relationship between the Father and the Son as well as the relationship among the three members of the Trinity. The article concludes by finding that his attempted articulation, and quite possibly all such efforts, will ultimately fail, leaving intact the mystery of the Trinity as one escaping, or rather surpassing, conceptual analysis.

Das Alte Testament in christlicher Perspektive

2017 ◽  
Vol 77 (2) ◽  
pp. 88-100
Author(s):  
Bernd Oberdorfer
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
Old Testament ◽  
Image Of God ◽  
Historical Criticism ◽  
Christian Perspective ◽  
Christian View ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
Human Reality ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Image Of God

Abstract According to Notker Slenczka, Jesus redefined the early Jewish understanding of God so radically that the Old Testament could not remain an adequate expression of the Christian idea of God. Moreover, in the light of historical criticism, the messianic promises of the OT could no longer be read as prophetic references to Jesus, either. The OT could hence only be seen as revelation to Jews; for Christians, however, it is valuable as paradigmatic expression of human reality and their necessity of salvation only, and to them authentic information about redemption is provided only by the New Testament. The essay discusses this position and defines a possible Christian view on the relation between Old and New Testament based on the insight that Jesus’ redefinition of the image of God can only be understood in the light of the history of God’s self-revelation to Israel, of which Jesus is a part; from a Christian perspective, the words, actions and fate of Jesus then also shed new light on the history of God’s self-revelation to Israel.

scholarly journals “The Nattation of the Miracles of Archangel Michael” by Pantoleon Deacon as the cultural point of the shapoing of the cult of Archangel Michael in Byzantium

2019 ◽  
pp. 12-27
Author(s):  
Ольга Николаевна Афиногенова
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
Old Testament ◽  
Clear Picture ◽  
Main Stage ◽  
The Bible ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
History Of ◽  
First Time

Основная цель статьи - проследить историю отождествления Ангела Господня с архангелом Михаилом и выявить основной этап формирования культа архистратига. Методом сопоставления текста Священного Писания, апокрифов и византийских агиографических текстов выявляется чёткая картина влияния апокрифической традиции на византийский культ архангела Михаила. В Ветхом Завете Михаил упомянут по имени всего три раза - в Книге пророка Даниила; в Новом Завете - только однажды в Откровении ап. Иоанна Богослова. Вместе с тем в Священном Писании есть многочисленные упоминания безымянного Ангела Господня. Ориген впервые отождествил князя Михаила из Книги пророка Даниила с архангелом Михаилом, что было воспринято поледующей традицией. В апокрифах, однако, почитание Михаила не всегда наделено теми аспектами, которые будут фигурировать в более позднее время. Возможно, то, что почитание Михаила вобрало в себя функции других архангелов, связано с популярной агиографической традицией, посвящённой архистратигу. Первый текст этой традиции, ставший широко распространённым в Византии, - «Чудо в Хонах» (VIII в.). Но наиболее исчерпывающе традиция почитания архангела отражена в «Повести» Пантолеона Диакона (IX в.). Текст демонстрирует окончательное закрепление отождествления безымянного Ангела Господня из Ветхого и Нового Заветов с Михаилом, а также приводит наиболее полное изложение аспектов почитания архангела в Византии. The main purpose of the paper is to trace the history of the identification of the Angel of the Lord with the Archangel Michael and to identify the main stage in the formation of the cult of the Archangel. By comparing the text of Holy Scripture, apocrypha and Byzantine hagiographic texts, a clear picture of the influence of the apocryphal tradition on the Byzantine cult of Michael the Archangel is revealed. In the Old Testament, Michael is mentioned by name only three times - in the book of Prophet Daniel; in the New Testament - only twice in the Revelation of John the Divine and in Epistle of Jude. However, in the Bible there are numerous references to the nameless Angel of the Lord. For the first time Origen identified Prince Michael from the book of the Prophet Daniel with the archangel Michael, which was accepted by the following tradition. In the apocrypha, however, the worship of Michael is not always endowed with those aspects that will appear later. Perhaps the fact that the worship of Michael has absorbed the functions of other archangels relates to the popular hagiographic tradition devoted to the archestrategos. The first text of this tradition, which became widespread in Byzantium, was the “Miracle in the Chonae” (8th century). But the most exhaustively tradition of worship the archangel is reflected in consolidation of the identification of the nameless Angel of the Lord from the Old and New Testaments with Michael and provides the most complete exposition of the aspects of veneration of the archangel in Byzantium.

1 Clement

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Harry Maier
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
Old Testament ◽  
Early Church ◽  
Body Of Christ ◽  
Christian Belief ◽  
Book Of Revelation ◽  
Clement Of Alexandria ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
Canonical Text ◽  
Eusebius Of Caesarea

1 Clement is a letter attributed to Clement of Rome (fl. second half of the 1st century ce). It is from a single hand, comprising sixty-five chapters, written from a body of Christ followers in Rome to those in Corinth. It is a long and often rambling writing whose chief aim does not appear until chapters 39–44. Clement, on behalf of the Roman community, advises his audience to restore harmony to the Corinthian church through the reappointment of leaders some have deposed. Parts of the early church treated it as canonical. In Codex Alexandrinus it appears, together with 2 Clement, directly after the Book of Revelation, and in a Syriac manuscript both writings appear before the Apocalypse. Clement of Alexandria quoted the letter as a canonical text. It nowhere states it is from Clement but there are three warrants for accepting the attribution: in the 2nd century Dionysius of Corinth cited him as its author; the Shepherd of Hermas, a document many argue to be contemporary with the writing, identifies a Clement who has the responsibility of sending writings to other cities (Vision 2.4.3), arguably a direct allusion to 1 Clement; the possibility of association as a freed person with the aristocratic family of Titus Flavius Clement and his wife Flavia Domitilla, the latter of whom Eusebius of Caesarea records as persecuted by Domitian for Christian belief. Its chief importance is that it is the earliest preserved Christian letter outside the New Testament. As a text that is contemporary with, if not earlier than, several canonical writings, it offers a snapshot of emergent Christianity in Rome and Corinth. Since its discovery it has played a central role in debates concerning the earliest conceptions of leadership in the ancient church and it is here where most attention has been directed. Scholarly study has also centered on its uses of rhetorical conventions, philosophical traditions, liturgical formulae, and lengthy Old Testament quotations, as well as possible echoes of New Testament texts.

scholarly journals Alttestamentliche Voraussetzungen fur das Ver-standnis des Bundesmotivs im Neuen Testament Teil 1: Fragestellung und Bedeutung des Wortes בְדִית*

1997 ◽  
Vol 53 (1/2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Petrus J. Grabe
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
Old Testament ◽  
Semantic Field ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
The Church

The Old Testament background for understanding the covenant motif in the New Testament - Part 1: Description of the question and analysis of the meaning of the word בְדִית* The concept of the covenant has once again become extremely relevant within the context of the debate on the relationship between the Old and New Testaments, as well as within the context, of the quest for determining the relationship between the Church and Israel. In this article the meaning of the word בְדִית* is discussed. It is argued that this concept has to be understood within the context of the semantic field in which it is used in the Old Testament. Certain facets of meaning in specific contexts in which בְדִית* occurs, are accentuated and discussed.  The Septuagint's translation of בְדִית*, as well as the translation of בְדִית* in the Vulgate and in some modem translations, is also discussed briefly.

Scripture and Tradition

1953 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 113-135
Author(s):  
Oscar Cullmann
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
Jesus Christ ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
The Other ◽  
Knowing How ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
The Church

The problem of the relationship between Scripture and Tradition is in the first place a problem of the theological relationship between the apostolic period and the period of the Church. All the other questions depend on the solution that we give to this problem. The alternatives—co-ordination or subordination of Tradition to Scripture—derive from the question of knowing how we must understand the fact that the period of the Church is the continuation and unfolding of the apostolic period. For we must note right away that this fact is capable of divergent interpretations. That is why agreement on the mere fact that the Church continues the work of Christ on earth does not necessarily imply agreement on the relationship between Scripture and Tradition. Thus in my thesis developed in Christ and Time as well as in my studies on the sacraments in the New Testament I came considerably nearer to the ‘Catholic’ point of view. In fact I would affirm very strongly that through the Church the history of salvation is continued on earth. I believe that we find this idea throughout the New Testament, and I should even consider it the key for the understanding of the Johannine Gospel. I would maintain, moreover, that the sacraments, Baptism and Eucharist, take the place in the Church of the miracles performed by Jesus Christ in the period of the Incarnation. And yet I am going to show in the following pages that I subordinate Tradition to Scripture.

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