Stephan J. Joubert (South African academic and visionary): His response to questions related to his academic views

This article reflects a conversation between Jan G. van der Watt and Stephan Joubert. The article serves as the introduction to the Special Collection: ‘From timely exegesis to contemporary ecclesiology: Relevant hermeneutics and provocative embodiment of faith in a Corona-defined world – Festschrift for Stephan Joubert, sub-edited by Willem Oliver (University of South Africa)’. Following a brief bio-statement as introduction, the following issues are discussed: the collection for the Jerusalem church; relevance of theology for society; social-scientific exegesis; the ancient concept of grace; Bible translation in South Africa; public theology on the electronic platform; biblical examples of leadership and electronic media in religious activities and education.Contribution: This Festschrift represents current trends in biblical scholarship and ecclesial leadership. It contributes to the public discourse in church and society, especially the role of the electronic media in current Fourth Industrial Revolution.

Jesus Christ and the New Testament

A unifying motif of the New Testament and one that renders it sacred in the eyes of Christian faith is its assertion of the unique identity of Jesus Christ. While much of modern biblical scholarship has attempted to reconstruct the actual historical circumstances of Jesus in his first-century Jewish context, the New Testament writings themselves find their sacred character in their affirmation of the unique character of the Jesus of faith as both human and divine. This is affirmed in a variety of ways in the Four Gospels as they consider in diverse ways the ultimate origin of Jesus, the “theophanies” that occur during Jesus’s ministry, various titles assigned to him, and the nature of his death and resurrection. While biblical scholarship legitimately explores the historical context of Jesus’s life and teaching, Christians strive to see the intrinsic connection between the historical circumstances of Jesus’s life and the faith affirmations of early Christianity about his unique identity.

A Decolonial (Re)turn to Class in South African Biblical Scholarship

South African Black Theology of the 1960-1980s characterised its primary site of struggle as the racial capitalism of apartheid. Intersecting race and/as class has been a distinctively South African contribution to African biblical scholarship. Less common, but equally significant, is the intersection of culture and/as class. This article analyses this trajectory, reflecting on how three South African biblical scholars (Gunther Wittenberg, Makhosazana Nzimande and Hulisani Ramantswana) have discerned the need for the African decolonial project to recognise and recover the class divisions within a culture. A recurring cultural trope across the three scholars is their use of proverbs to discern class distinctions within culture. The works of each of these three scholars and their dialogue partners in South African Contextual Theology and South African Black Theology are interrogated for how they intersect notions of class and culture.

Professor David Tuesday Adamo's Biblical Scholarship on Women: Reflections from an African-South African Mosadi

One of the prolific writers in the discipline of African Biblical Hermeneutics is the Nigerian Old Testament (OT) scholar, Professor Tuesday David Adamo. In his tireless efforts to unlock the OT reality for African contexts, persuaded by his commitment to decolonise the subject of Biblical Studies, Adamo has made successful efforts to reflect on the African presence in the Old Testament. The present study seeks to engage Adamo's concept of African Biblical hermeneutics in order to investigate whether the author sufficiently discussed the theme of gender in his discourses. This research attempts to respond to the following two main questions in view of Adamo's discourses: (1) In Adamo's concerted effort of confirming the presence of Africa and Africans in the Hebrew Bible, does the woman question feature? (2) If so, how does Adamo navigate the question?

Iho Ayo/ Mekgolokwane/Ululations/Festschrift: Dedicated to Prof David Tuesday Adamo, the Decoloniser of Old Testament Studies in Africa

A powerful voice from the Western part of the continent of Africa! A voice that could be heard not only through the presence of its owner at our annual Old Testament Society of South Africa (OTSSA) meetings but also more importantly, for the purpose of this introduction, in several issues of Old Testament Essays (OTE), one of our prestigious journals locally and continentally. It is the journal that now contains the ululations (read: Festschrift) to honour this voice. This is the voice of none other than one of our very own Nigerian African Old Testament scholar, Professor David Tuesday Adamo. He is one of the key scholars who have made important contributions to the field of African Biblical Hermeneutics. Adamo's refreshing voice, given the American and Eurocentric training and orientation which have shaped and continue to shape biblical scholarship on the African continent, has been loud and clear. Adamo's persuasion that there is African presence in the Christian Scriptures, that is, both in the Hebrew Bible and in the Second Testament, has been felt, as will also become evident from the essays contained in this special issue and his curriculum vitae as well as in his numerous research publications including his books and journal articles.

It is Re-Written: Lessons from Chester Brown’s Mary Wept on Biblical Traditions and Biblical Scholarship in the Wild

Chester Brown’s critically acclaimed 2016 graphic novel, Mary Wept Over the Feet of Jesus: Prostitution and Religious Obedience in the Bible, raises important questions about the right—and the right way—to interpret religious traditions outside sanctuary doors, and Religious Studies outside the Ivory Tower. With the help of generous notes and appendices, which take up a full third of the book, Mary Wept reworks Bible stories and biblical studies for a general audience to create a conspiracy-theory-based Christian apology for sex work. This article provides an introduction to Brown’s book and its relevant book-and-Bible-related contexts, and argues that Mary Wept represents neither Bible adaptation nor popularized biblical scholarship per se. Brown’s book is instead, I argue, best understood as a new species of “rewritten Bible” claiming the authority of scholarship as surrogate religious authority. It is therefore a pop culture weather vane of great interest to Religious Studies scholars, not least as a reminder of our public image and our professional responsibilities.

From Chronology to Genealogy

Broughton’s interests in chronology and translation converged in one final field that, despite being the most obscure to a modern reader, had a surprising impact on one of the most famous texts of the period: the King James Bible (or Authorized Version, 1611). This field is the academic study of biblical genealogy, and it is represented in the extensive genealogical diagrams that begin the AV. These diagrams have long remained mysterious to historians. It is commonly presumed that Broughton, along with the antiquarian John Speed, was responsible for their production, but many other questions about their creation and meaning have yet to be answered. In answering such questions, this chapter offers the first account of the purpose and sources of the AV genealogies, as well as introducing previously unknown drafts that testify to their composition. Moreover, it argues that this early genealogical work with Speed represented the beginning of a broader, more persistent concern that would preoccupy Broughton for the rest of his life: how to make cutting-edge biblical scholarship accessible to a wider public.

Introduction

The introduction begins by outlining how Broughton’s modern reputation as an angry puritan was created over two centuries by a series of historians with various confessional motivations. Next, it analyses Broughton’s early life as a promising scholar at Cambridge, and explains key issues such as how his beliefs about scripture affected his attitudes to the Hebrew and Greek texts of the Bible. Finally, it summarizes the three major interventions of this book. The first concerns the relationship between scholars’ beliefs about scripture and the methods they used to study it. Broughton shows that it was possible to be an innovative exponent of the historical-philological method, while also believing that the Bible was infallible and verbally inspired; and that these positions could be mutually reinforcing. But while scholars like Broughton have generally been used as proof of the ‘unintended consequences’ theory of change from the Reformation to the Enlightenment, the introduction uses him to critique this theory. The second intervention concerns the relationship between confessional identity and historical scholarship, building on recent works that have emphasized the impossibility of theologically ‘neutral’ scholarship in this period by extending their findings into new areas such as chronology. Lastly, the third intervention concerns the relationship between elite neo-Latin biblical scholarship and vernacular lay religious culture in this period. It argues that biblical scholarship, even of the most demanding kind, deeply appealed to ordinary readers of scripture, and posits Broughton as a pioneer in the field of accessible, vernacular-oriented— but still highly scholarly—biblical criticism.