After much toing and froing (do I really need another introduction to the New Testament in my library?) I decided to purchase N. T. Wright and Michael F. Bird’s “The New Testament in Its World: An Introduction to the History,… Read More ›
New Testament scholarship
An academic excursus: A selection of mainstream New Testament scholarly views on the Christology of the Gospel of John
I think it is important for Muslims and Christians to be aware of what responsible biblical scholars are saying about the gospel of John. This gospel more than any other has laid the christological foundation for later beliefs about Jesus…. Read More ›
Further thoughts on the Gospel of Luke: Jesus as ‘Lord’ and ‘Christ’
Above all, the two most significant christological titles for Luke are surely Lord (kyrios) and Christ (christos). The word ‘kyrios’ had a very wide range of meanings. Kyrios can be just a term of polite respect to a teacher (as… Read More ›
The Gospel of Luke teaches that Jesus, the son of God, was created by God.
The consensus opinion of historians of the New Testament is that Luke was probably written around 80-85 AD. Like Matthew, Luke in chapters 1 and 2 of his gospel adds a birth narrative to Mark’s gospel. But as Professor James… Read More ›
How the Gospel of Matthew ‘improves’ the Gospel of Mark
Historians of the New Testament usually date Matthew’s gospel to around 80-85 AD. Like Mark, the work is anonymous. The anonymous author of ‘Matthew’ (the title The Gospel According to Matthew was added later in the second century) used Mark… Read More ›
Suppose Matthew and Paul had been brought together and instructed to produce a joint position paper on whether believers in Jesus were to follow the Jewish Law. Would they have been able to hammer out a consensus?
Early and Diverging Views of Christians and Jews. Divergent understandings of Judaism were found among Christians in the mid-second century. At one extreme were the Jewish-Christian adoptionists, who continued to worship the God of Israel as the one true God… Read More ›
‘I and the Father are one’ said Jesus in John’s Gospel. What did he mean?
Now we come to the supreme claim, ‘I and the Father are one,’ said Jesus (John 10:30). What did he mean? Is it absolute mystery, or can we understand at least a little of it? Are we driven to interpret… Read More ›
When Christians Were Jews: The First Generation
Paula Fredriksen is Professor of Scripture at Boston University and Distinguished Visiting Professor of Comparative Religion at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. In her latest work When Christians Were Jews: The First Generation Fredriksen writes: ‘The Paul of history stands… Read More ›
Yale University professor of the Bible explains how Jesus came to be viewed as a god
The Issue of Worship One of the key questions in the debate about the divinity of Jesus has been whether he is worshiped in a way that “principal agents” of God are not (see Hurtado, How on Earth Did Jesus… Read More ›
Top Christian scholar explains how the early Church abandoned the religion of Jesus
‘The one big exception to this generalisation about shared moral assumptions between Christianity and Judaism was that early Christians argued with Jews about the extent to which they were bound by the specifically religious or ritual aspects of the Jewish… Read More ›
Considering afresh ‘the Church fathers very clear proof that Jesus was a divine being’
The Revd Canon Professor Richard Burridge is a Church of England priest, biblical scholar and the former Dean of King’s College London. He writes: ‘To modern eyes, it is almost inevitable that theologians of the early Church will appear to… Read More ›
Comparing the gospels of Mark and Matthew and their significantly different portraits of Jesus
This short extract gives us a good flavour of what historians have discovered about the gospels. Matthew shows a more profound learning of the scriptures than Mark and is altogether more sophisticated in his language, often polishing up Mark’s Greek… Read More ›
RIP
I have just heard the sad news that the great Jimmy Dunn has passed away! He was one the world’s greatest New Testament scholars and taught me more about the Bible (and especially Christology) than anyone else. A great loss! Just… Read More ›
