Search results for ""JCB Mohr (Paul Siebeck)""

Rudolf Richter is one of the leading pioneers in the field of the New Institutional Economics in Germany. The articles in this Festschrift were written by renowned scholars from Germany and other countries. In addition to general perspectives on the New Institutional Economics, the Festschrift also contains articles on the theory of the firm, economic contract theory, on pricing and competition, macroeconomics and monetary economics and on various aspects of law and economics.

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By employing analyses of the literary structure of ancient pseudepigraphical letters and of the logical structure of ethical argument, Lewis R. Donelson discovers in the Pastoral Epistles a consistent theological ethic which has cosmological and cultic grounding. First, an investigation of Greco-Roman religious pseudepigraphical letters identifies those literary patterns which determine the form of argumentation in the Pastoral Epistles. Second, an investigation of the structure of ethical argument produces categories for organizing and analyzing the apparently disorganized arguments in these letters. Finally, this study concludes that the author of the Pastoral Epistles builds a coherent theological ethic by falsifying Pauline history and by grounding his ethical warrants in church officers."Donelson has made important contributions to unraveling the mystery of these three small epistles, which bear the name of Paul ..."Robert J. Karries in Journal of Biblical Literature, Dec. 1988, 558ff."Dr. L.R. Donelson has written an interesting and potentially fruitful study of the Pastoral Epistles ..."Anthony Hanson in The Expository Times 12 (1986)"Insgesamt ist die vorgestellte Arbeit uneingeschränkt zu begrüßen. Sie ermöglicht einen gut fundierten hermeneutischen Ansatz für das Verständnis der Past und läßt diesen drei Briefen zugleich eine gerechte sachliche Beurteilung zukommen."Eckart Reinmuth in TLZ 7 (1990), S. 508

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This volume of Kleine Schriften reflects François Bovon's two major fields of research: Luke-Acts on the one hand, and early Christian Apocrypha on the other. He insists on the ethical and missionary practices of the early Christian communities. The apostle Paul's ethical concern is presented not as an opposition between good and evil, but as a crescendo from the good to the best. The authority of John, the author of the Book of Revelation, is described in a nonhierarchical way as the care of a brother for his brothers and sisters rather than of a father. Women ministry is attested in recently discovered portions of the Acts of Philip. This collection of essays shows also how doctrinal positions were reached in the middle of strong tensions. Such is the witness of the Fragment Oxyrhynchus 840 in favor of a spiritual purification. François Bovon is also attentive to the reception of the earliest Christian documents in the Late Antiquity period. As a whole he describes aspects of early Christianity in its variety but also in its unity.

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In this work Michael A. Daise broaches the question of the rationale lying behind the six feasts mentioned in the Gospel of John. He argues that, in an earlier recension of the Fourth Gospel, those feasts were sequenced into a single, liturgical year and, as such, furnished temporal momentum for the concurrent motif of Jesus' 'hour'. After reviewing the feasts as they appear in the narrative, then critiquing the major theories proposed for their purpose, the author presents his key premise that the Passover at John 6:4 is to be read not as a regular Passover, observed on 14 Nisan (first month of the Jewish calendar), but as the 'Second Passover' of Numbers 9:9-14, observed on 14 Iyyar (second month of the Jewish calendar). The law of "hadash" for barley (6:9) requires a date for chapter 6 after the regular Passover; the Exodus manna episode (Exodus 16), on which John 6 largely turns, dates to 15 Iyyar; the contingent character of the Second Passover explains Jesus' absence from Jerusalem in John 6; and, with John 5 and 6 reversed, the chronology of John 2:13-6:71 coheres. On such a reading, the feasts of the entire Fourth Gospel unfold within a single, liturgical year: Passover (2:13), Second Passover (6:4), the unnamed feast/Pentecost? (5:1), Tabernacles (7:2), the Dedication (10:22-23) and Passover (11:55). Inasmuch as this scheme brings chronological design to chapters 2-12, and inasmuch as those same chapters also chronicle the imminent arrival of Jesus' "hour" (2:4; 12:23), an overarching purpose for the feasts emerges; namely, to serve the motif of Jesus' "hour" by marking the movement of time toward its arrival.

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This volume is the first study of the Aramaic Dead Sea New Jerusalem text conducted in light of the complete extent of the preserved manuscript copies and with full reference to previous reconstructions. In addition to presenting an edition of the Cave Four copies (4Q554, 4Q554a, 4Q555), Lorenzo DiTommaso discusses the genre of the NJ, the order of its material, and its antecedents and parallels in ancient urban design. He suggests that its New Jerusalem is not a heavenly city and that categories of earthly and heavenly Jerusalems perhaps impose an inappropriate taxonomy on the various ancient Jewish and Christian expressions of the New Jerusalem. The author demonstrates that the NJ shares virtually no points of contact with the Temple Scroll, and that neither text is likely dependent on the other. He also argues that the New Jerusalem of the NJ is neither an eschatological focus of pilgrimage nor a mustering point for the final battle, that the text's eschatological horizon is established by a review of history and anticipates a time when once-hostile nations are humbled, and that it was conceivably composed in the first third of the second century BCE, shortly before the Maccabean revolt.

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Timothy D. Finlay integrates the disciplines of form criticism and narrative criticism in an analysis of the birth report genre in the Hebrew Bible. He first establishes the standard structure of the birth report as containing an introductory setting, a conception element, a birth element, a naming element, and an etiological element. There are typical formulae associated with each element. He then analyzes how the genre of the surrounding material - genealogical list, annunciation type-scene, account of prophetic symbolic actions - modifies the standard form of the birth report. Finally, he re-examines each individual narrative containing a birth report, paying particular attention to how the marked deviations from the standard pattern of a birth report contribute to the specific narratological aims of the larger passage.

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Increased international interdependence - globalization - has also greatly increased the potential for international conflict in various areas such as trade, competition, the environment, and human rights. Observers have counted up to 40 international courts that serve to settle such conflicts. What are adequate criteria to measure the effectiveness of international courts? What factors explain the differences in their success? What factors explain the differences of nation-state governments in delegating competence to international courts in the first place? Should there be any additional courts? This volume assembles ten papers and comments that contain first steps in answering these questions. Their authors are legal scholars and economists, but also political scientists and philosophers. With this volume the "Jahrbuch für Neue Politische Ökonomie" has changed its title to "Conferences on New Political Economy".

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Nach wie vor besteht Unbehagen, eine evangelische Verhältnisbestimmung von Kirche und Staat mit Hilfe von Luthers Zwei-Reiche-Lehre vorzunehmen. Das liegt unter anderem auch daran, dass Luthers historische Voraussetzungen bislang nicht hinreichend untersucht wurden. Volker Mantey schließt diese Lücke, indem er sich der spätmittelalterlichen Traditionsgeschichte der Zwei-Reiche-Lehre Luthers widmet. Dies geschieht anhand einer Analyse der Zwei-Schwerter-Lehre ab 1300, wie sie für das Verhältnis von Staat und Kirche maßgeblich war. Sie wurde sowohl verwendet, um den päpstlichen Anspruch auf weltliche Oberhoheit zu untermauern, als auch, um sich gegen den Papst abzugrenzen und eine weltliche Eigenständigkeit zu behaupten.Der Autor stellt Luthers Zwei-Reiche-Lehre vor ihrem spätmittelalterlichen Horizont dar. Dabei zeigt sich, in welchem Verhältnis der Reformator sich theologisch zwischen Thomas von Aquin und Wilhelm von Ockham positioniert.

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Herod the Great was one of the famous builders of the classical world. Judaea, his kingdom, a crossroads between the Eastern Mediterranean countries, Mesopotamia, Arabia, and Egypt, symbolizes the transition between the Hellenistic and Early Roman periods as well as the climax of the Second Temple period, which witnessed the emergence of many religious and spiritual movements including Christianity. Beyond the influence of the matured Hellenistic architecture, the developing Roman architecture, and the local building activity of his predecessors, the Hasmonaeans, Herod's buildings benefited from his analytical mind, creative imagination, and deep understanding of the process of building and planning. The consequences are outstanding structures such as Masada's Northern Palace and Herodium's cylindrical palatial fortress, and the peak of his achievements are Caesarea Maritima with its deepwater harbor and the rebuilding of Jerusalem's Temple Mount.Having an architectural as well as an archaeological background, Ehud Netzer is able to highlight Herod's personal involvement and contributions in his building projects. This book presents, in many aspects, the first comprehensive synthesis of Herod's enterprises from archaeological and, mainly, architectural viewpoints.

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Current study of the New Testament features many new interpretations. Robert Gundry's book finds them largely wanting and defends traditional ones. Several of its essays have never been published before. Most of the rest, though previously published, have been updated and otherwise revised, sometimes heavily. Topics include theological diversity, symbiosis between theology and genre criticism, pre-Papian tradition concerning Mark and Matthew as apostolically Johannine, Secret Mark as secondary, mishnaic jurisprudence as compatible with Jesus' blasphemy, Matthew as not Christian Jewish, Matthean soteriology, criticism of H. D. Betz on the Sermon on the Mount, P. Oxy. 655 as secondary to Q 12:22b-31, resurrection as uniformly physical, criticism of nonreductive physicalism, criticism of the new perspective on Paul, nonimputation of Christ's righteousness, puberal sexual lusts in Romans 7:7-25, cruciform rather than incarnational emphasis in Philippians 2:6-11, Thessalonian eschatology, John's sectarianism, the pervasiveness of John's Word-Christology, Revelation's angelomorphic Christology, and the New Jerusalem.

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Between Rome and Babylon includes over thirty papers by Aharon Oppenheimer about Jewish life in Palestine and Babylonia in the period of the Mishnah and the Talmud (1st-4th centuries), dealing with leadership and society, political and military activity, relations with the authorities and historical geography.The collection is organized around three inter-connected themes: 1 Roman Palestine and its Environs; 2 The Bar Kokhba Revolt; 3 Babylonia Judaica. About two-thirds of the papers were originally published in Hebrew. They have been selected and edited for this collection, and translated for the first time into English or German. The rest of the papers originally appeared in various different languages and contexts, and they too have been selected and edited to fit the three themes. Cross-references have been added, as well as detailed indices. The aim of the papers is to cast light on Jewish history by extracting methodically historical meaning from Talmudic sources, taking into account when they were written, where they were edited, and how far they can be presumed authentic; and by looking at them in combination with Greek, Roman, Persian and Arabic written sources as well as relevant archaeological finds.

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Fredrik Lindgård analyzes verses 4:16-5:10 in 2 Corinthians, verses which have often been used to argue that Paul's eschatology developed over time or to ascertain whether or not Paul is an anthropological dualist. Paul's concern is how the Corinthians see him. His aim is to show them that he is frank and "open" to them and that his attitude to adversities confirms that he is a real apostle. He reveals his thoughts and emotions when facing suffering. The author shows that the section and its context do not support the view that Paul changed or developed his eschatology. Instead, the text displays the unsystematic character of Paul's eschatology. Concepts which Paul normally uses separately occur side by side without elaboration. Although Paul uses both dualistic and holistic language, the dominating feature is dualism. The analysis shows that a wide rhetorical approach can be useful when trying to understand Paul.

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The Didache or Teaching of the Twelve Apostles is recognized today by virtually all scholars as a Christian text of the first or early second century. Contemporary with the nascent New Testament, it is especially important to a reconstruction of that period because its highly utilitarian nature provides not only a supplement but a complement to the canonical texts. The recovery of information from the Didache is hindered, however, by the elliptical nature of the text; apparently a certain background knowledge on the part of the ancient reader was assumed, knowledge lost, unfortunately, to the modern audience. Even the important question of its genre remains unresolved. After examining the surface structure of the Didache using text-linguistic methodology, Nancy Pardee proposes a generic identity for the Didache, a reconstruction of its composition history, and some conclusions as to what these mean for our understanding of the early church.

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The Actus Vercellenses, a Latin text preserved in only one manuscript copy, is published widely in translation under the title Acts of Peter. The Acts of Peter is thought to be the title of an ancient work, originally in Greek, which is usually said to have been composed in the second-century in Asia Minor. Accordingly, the Vercelli Acts are often treated simply as evidence for second-century Christian discourse. However, many issues relating to the study of the Actus Vercellenses qua Acts of Peter have hitherto been inadequately established, especially: the character, extent, and original time of composition of the ancient Acts of Peter ; the antiquity of the manuscript copy and the Latin version; and the proximity of the Latin Actus Vercellenses to extant Greek parallels in the Martyrium Petri, the Vita Abercii, and the Oxyrhynchus fragment. Through a detailed examination of the external evidence for ancient Petrine acta writings, through a thorough paleographical and philological investigation of manuscript Vercelli Bib. Cap. CLVIII and the Latin text of the Actus, and through an extensive synoptic comparison of all the extant Greek parallels to the Actus Vercellenses, Matthew C. Baldwin investigates and settles all of these issues. Ultimately, the results show that the Actus Vercellenses is probably best understood as evidence for fourth century Christianity in the west. In its current form, this Acts of the Apostle Peter is effectively that of a later, Latin speaking scriptor from the west.

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Nach dreißig Jahren Maoismus entwickelt sich in der Volksrepublik China seit Ende der achtziger Jahre ein Kapitalmarkt. Im Jahr 2002 haben sich die chinesischen Börsen in Shanghai und Shenzhen bereits zum zweitgrößten Aktienmarkt Asiens nach Japan entwickelt. Schrittweise wurden in China ein Regelwerk und eine Wertpapieraufsicht aufgebaut, um die Funktionsfähigkeit dieses Marktes zu gewährleisten und um Anleger zu schützen. Knut Benjamin Pißler stellt das chinesische Kapitalmarktrecht in seinem gegenwärtigen Entwicklungsstand systematisch dar und zeigt Probleme sowie die hierfür in Literatur und Praxis angebotenen Lösungen auf. Im Mittelpunkt der Untersuchung des Börsenrechts stehen die Grundlagen einer zivilrechtlichen Informationshaftung für Schadenersatzansprüche von Anlegern und der verwaltungsrechtlichen Sanktionen der chinesischen Wertpapieraufsicht gegen Insidergeschäfte und Marktmanipulationen. Im Recht der Wertpapiergeschäfte wird der rechtliche Rahmen der Emissionsgeschäfte, Eigengeschäfte, Kommissionsgeschäfte und anderer Geschäfte der chinesischen Wertpapierhändler aufzeigt. Einen Schwerpunkt bildet hier die Untersuchung einer Vielzahl von Aktienemissionen im Jahr 2001, anhand derer die Praxis des Emissionsgeschäfts in China dargestellt wird.

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For at least 15 years, and with several significant works, Hugh Williamson contributed to the movement to recapture the importance of the biblical books of Chronicles, Ezra and Nehemiah. Behind his widely acclaimed commentaries on these books lay many detailed historical and exegetical studies, published in a variety of journals, Festschriften and other works. The most important of these are here collected together for the first time, providing the scholar of the post-exilic period with a valuable resource in furthering research on this formative period in early Jewish history.

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The introduction of the Erasmian pronunciation in 1528 had two dire consequences: Greek was divided into ancient and modern — a division that led to the neglect of the later periods of the language, and the pronunciation applied made impossible the detection of many communicatory aspects and obscured many text-critical problems. Chrys C. Caragounis argues for the unity of the Greek language from Mycenaean times to the present. The New Testament appears during the time of transition (335 B.C. - A.D. 565) from ancient to modern Greek. Morphological and syntactical analysis shows that the New Testament often adumbrates morphological and syntactical changes that characterize later Greek, up to Neohellenic. This means that the evidence of Later Greek is often a sine qua non for a fuller understanding of the New Testament. The Historical Greek Pronunciation helps us detect rhetorical figures, wordplays, etc. that the Erasmian pronunciation has missed, and its application on MS readings solves many text-critical cruces.

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This is a study of the symbolic meaning of arnion (lamb) in the Apocalypse of John as the central feature of the Christology of Revelation. Loren L. Johns argues that arnion did not refer to an aggressive, militant ram in extant Greek literature prior to the Apocalypse, nor did it normally denote the expiatory sacrificial lamb. Rather, it symbolized vulnerability in the extant literature.The author examines the symbolic antecedents of arnion in the Hebrew Bible, while ranging throughout the literary evidence from the ancient Near East and the Greco-Roman era, even touching on the evidence from Homer and Aesop's Fables traditions. He analyzes closely the evidence that has been offered in support of a militant lamb-redeemer figure in the apocalyptic traditions of Early Judaism and concludes that none of the writings that predate the Apocalypse and that are cited in support of this tradition is free from Christian editorializing. Furthermore, the Christology of the Apocalypse is not militant. The blood on the lamb in Rev. 19 is not from the defeated enemies of God; it is from the slaughter of the lamb.Loren L. Johns concludes that the Lamb Christology of the Apocalypse has an ethical force - that the author develops his Lamb Christology specifically to encourage his audience to the kind of faithful witness that he was convinced would result in their death as innocent lambs in much the same way that Jesus' witness did.

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Philippe Eberhard proposes a medial interpretation of Hans-Georg Gadamer's philosophical hermeneutics and draws theological implications concerning faith and our human condition from a Christian humanist standpoint. He brings into focus the middle voice as a way to articulate what it means to listen to language and the Word.His thesis is twofold. First, the hermeneutic event is medial throughout. The core of the mediality of hermeneutics is the subtle balance between the event of understanding, which happens to the subject, and the subject who understands within it. Second, the mediality of understanding is the primary reason why hermeneutics is theologically meaningful. Both understanding as well as faith and theology are medial experiences leading to an always renewed understanding of what it is to be a human being in the world.The author analyzes the notion of the middle voice from a linguistic as well as from a philosophical standpoint and establishes that the middle voice is conspicuous by its absence in most commentaries about Gadamer: usually mediality shines between the lines but does not receive any explicit treatment. The author describes understanding as an event following Gadamer's notions of play, fusion of horizon(s), and linguistic speculation and considers the same event from the standpoint of the subject within it. Though understanding is an event that happens to the subject, the subject is not passive but involved. The examination of Gadamer's use of theology leads to the argument that he tends to exclude the Christian kerygma from the hermeneutic event. Gadamer does not apply back to theology the insights he gained from it for his description of hermeneutics. Philippe Eberhard, by contrast, includes the kerygma and faith in hermeneutics and proposes a medial account of faith based on the medial interpretation of hermeneutics. Finally, the conclusion sums up the argument and goes one step further: although faith is a hermeneutic experience, it differs from hermeneutics because it is not only a constant effort to be at home in the world, but above all it keeps questioning the world that is to be our home.

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Within the New Testament, tensions have been traced with regard to the expectation that parents should be revered. There is an alleged difference between reverence towards parents among the first followers of Christ and in the settled congregations. For example, the Household Codes in the epistles to the Ephesians and Colossians, where children are addressed together with their fathers, do not mention the possibility of a justified breach between children and their parents. In contrast, there are passages in the Gospels that narrate that the first disciples of Jesus left their family homes when they followed their master.Peter Balla shows that there is no real conflict, and that Jesus' views correspond to non-biblical family ethics where, too, God takes precedence over parents. Jesus and his disciples adhered to the Fifth Commandment.

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Shiu-Lun Shum studies Paul's use of the Isaianic tradition in Romans in comparison to those of the Jewish Sibyls and the Qumranites. The comparison helps to underscore the distinctive characteristics of the Apostle's use of this tradition. The author shows that Paul, along with the Sibyls and the Qumranites, expressed a deep concern about Israel's future in utilizing the Isaianic materials. Methodically, this study also exposes the precariousness of the notion of "intertextuality" in relation to biblical studies.

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Traditional scholarship on the history of Jewish/Christian relations has been largely based on the assumption that Judaism and Christianity were shaped by a definitive 'Parting of the Ways'. According to this model, the two religions institutionalized their differences by the second century and, thereafter, developed in relative isolation from one another, interacting mainly through polemical conflict and mutual misperception.This volume grows out of a joint Princeton-Oxford project dedicated to exploring the limits of the traditional model and to charting new directions for future research. Drawing on the expertise of scholars of both Jewish Studies and Patristics, it offers an interdisciplinary perspective on the interaction between Jews and Christians between the Bar Kokhba Revolt and the rise of Islam. The contributors question the conventional wisdom concerning the formation of religious identity, the interpenetration of Jewish and Christian traditions, the fate of 'Jewish-Christianity', and the nature of religious polemics in Late Antiquity and the early Middle Ages.By moving beyond traditional assumptions about the essential differences between Judaism and Christianity, this volume thus attempts to open the way for a more nuanced understanding of the history of these two religions and the constantly changing yet always meaningful relationship between them.

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Samaritanism is an outgrowth of Early Judaism that has survived until today. Its origin as a separate religious entity can be traced back to the 2nd/1st centuries B.C.E. Samaritans were found not only in their core-area in and around Shechem-Neapolis (modern Nablus) and on neighboring Mount Gerizim, but also in other parts of Palestine as well as in various other Mediterranean countries. Oppression at the hand of Jews, Christians and Muslims decimated the Samaritan population and obliterated all Samaritan manuscripts written prior to the 10th/11th centuries C.E. For the early period of Samaritanism we must therefore rely on Christian authors. Reinhard Pummer edits Christian Greek and Latin texts about Samaritans and their beliefs and practices, dating from the second century C.E. to the Arab conquests. The passages are quoted in their original language and translated into English. In addition, they are commented on and analyzed in view of their significance for our knowledge of Samaritanism within the wider framework of early Judaism and Christianity.

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This third volume, which offers further insights into the most important source of late antique Judaism, the Talmud Yerushalmi, in relation to its cultural context, marks another step in a research project on the Talmud Yerushalmi initiated by the Institute of Jewish Studies at the Free University (Berlin) in 1994 and concluded by a conference held at Princeton University in November 2001. This volume focuses on a wide range of topics such as gender studies, aspects of everyday life, Roman festivals, magic etc., hereby reflecting on the methodological problems inherent in intercultural studies. Thus, this collection of articles could also serve as a model for similar enterprises in other studies of Judaism in various cultural contexts. From reviews of the previous volumes: "This collection reflects the state of contemporary scholarship and its struggle to understand and thoughtfully reconstruct Jewish culture in late antique Palestine. It belongs in all specialized Judaica libraries and in research libraries that collect deeply in classical civilization."Steven Fine in Religious Studies Review 3 (1999) vol. 25, p. 331f.

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The development of explicit legal concepts and principles in rabbinic literature reflects rabbinic legal thought at its most creative and sophisticated, as many of these concepts and principles deal with abstract, metaphysical entities. In this study Leib Moscovitz systematically surveys the development and impact of abstraction and conceptualization in the various legal corpora of rabbinic literature, illustrating the critical and unique role that conceptualization plays in talmudic reasoning. He demonstrates how the analysis of rabbinic conceptualization can shed light on numerous important aspects of rabbinic scholarship, such as the character and development of rabbinic legal thought, techniques of rabbinic legal exegesis, rabbinic jurisprudence, and various philological and historical issues in rabbinics, such as the chronology of the anonymous stratum of the Babylonian Talmud. Rabbinic conceptualization, though unique in many respects, shares certain features with cognate disciplines, and this study utilizes these disciplines (mainly jurisprudence, cognitive psychology, and philosophy) to illuminate rabbinic conceptualization wherever relevant. The themes addressed in this study include the use of casuistics, generalization, and implicit conceptualization in the earlier strata of rabbinic literature, classification and legal definition, legal fictions, legal explanation, analogy and association, and the development and use of explicit legal concepts and principles in the later strata of rabbinic literature.

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At its deepest, philosophical skepticism questions the sense of language. Skepticism manifests itself in different forms, three of the most powerful being logical, external-world, and religious skepticism. How has philosophy of religion addressed these challenges? The attempt to answer this question leads Lance Ashdown to a consideration of three prominent contemporary philosophers of religion: Richard Swinburne, John Hick, and William Alston. The author shows that these philosophers are indeed open to the criticisms of the three types of skepticism mentioned above. According to Ashdown, they are rightly to be considered as 'anonymous skeptics'. Readers familiar with the work of the theologian Karl Rahner will recognize an echo of his famous doctrine that non-Christian religious believers are really 'anonymous Christians', i.e., Christian believers who do not recognize themselves as such. In a similar way, the philosophers of religion under consideration are skeptics who most certainly would not identify themselves as such. They are anonymous skeptics in the sense that their epistemologies create the very conditions that allow for the severe and, on their own terms, unanswerable challenges of skepticism. At the same time, none of these philosophers thinks that skeptical objections pose a devastating or unanswerable threat to their epistemologies. For example, each of them is an avowed believer in God and is fully aware of the challenge of religious skepticism, yet none believes that skepticism need cause a rational Christian to abandon his or her beliefs. Nevertheless, each of the three philosophers adheres to a philosophical theory that remains open to the devastating critique of Philo in David Hume's essay "Dialogue Concerning Natural Religion" - who argues at his deepest that talk of God is meaningless.

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As a knowledgeable contemporary of the later Second Temple, Philo of Alexandria's approach to worship and his view of the essence of Jewish worship are of particular interest to the study of that period. Jutta Leonhardt discusses his views on the Jewish festivals, especially the Sabbath, on prayer, psalms, hymns, praise and thanksgiving, and on Temple offerings, sacrifices and purification rites. These aspects are presented with their parallels in Jewish and pagan traditions and in Greek and Hellenistic philosophy. Jewish worship in Philo has never been studied as a coherent whole before. Only individual aspects of worship, such as prayer of petition, or thanksgiving, or Philo has been used in studies on Second Temple Judaism as a quarry for general examples of acts of worship.Philo accepted and participated in Jewish worship, and even knew about details of various Jewish traditions of his time. His writings, however, do not refer to them directly and cannot easily be used to reconstruct Jewish rituals of his time. His main aim is to discuss the rites as collected in the Mosaic Torah, since these are binding for all Jews. These laws are frequently presented using the terminology of pagan cults and interpreted with recourse to Greek philosophy. In this philosophical description of actual rites there are parallels to Plato's references to religion in the ideal state in the Nomoi. Philo presents Judaism as the ultimate Hellenistic cult, which combines the various aspects of the different pagan cults in a sublime and perfect form to represent mankind and the universe in the worship of the one God who created the world.

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Jeffrey Wisdom interprets Paul's citation of Genesis and Deuteronomy in Gal 3.8-10. He surveys the promise to Abraham to bless all nations and the curse of the covenant in the Jewish scripture.Blessing for the nations is an important part of God's covenant purpose for Abraham's descendants from the start. The curse of the covenant is consistently connected with the motifs of failure to do all the law and of the abandonment of the Lord for other gods. Jeffrey Wisdom then identifies and analyzes the various strands of the postbiblical Jewish literature that cite the promise of blessing for the nations and the curse of the covenant. He further argues an interpretation of Gal 3.8-10, in which the importance for Paul's argument of blessing for the nations and the curse on those who are disloyal to the Lord is stressed. Paul's call to preach the gospel to the gentiles and his defense of the truth of the gospel provide the context for the connection between the gospel and the promise to Abraham of blessing for the nations in Gal 3.8, a blessing which has always been God's purpose for Abraham's descendants. The interpretation of Gal 3.10 then builds on this insight. Those who are of works of the law are identified as the troublemakers who have preached another gospel to the Galatians and thereby have been disloyal to God and his purpose for Abraham's descendants. Paul cites Deut 27.26 to support this assertion that they have been disloyal to God and therefore are under the curse. Jeffrey Wisdom traces this interpretation of Gal 3.8-10 through to 3.13-14 and supports it by other traces of the same perspective on the gospel and the curse in Galatians.

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There is unanimity among Johannine scholars that one distinctive characteristic of the Fourth Gospel is the fact that the evangelist presents Jesus as caught in long-drawn out juridical confrontations between himself and 'the Jews'.Martin Asiedu-Peprah examines the two Sabbath conflict narratives in the Fourth Gospel from a narrative-critical perspective and thus takes a fresh look at the Johannine juridical metaphor. In doing so, he attempts to pursue a three-fold objective. First, he determines the precise nature of the juridical metaphor used in the two narratives and on the strength of it, he undertakes a critical reading of the texts under study with the view to shedding new light on their meaning. Then he examines the role of this specific juridical metaphor in the two narratives. The question here is: for what purpose and how is this specific juridical metaphor used within the narrative framework of the two narratives? Finally, he explores the historical setting of the two narratives and infers from it the social function the juridical metaphor would have played within the Johannine Sitz im Leben. In the light of his results, Martin Asiedu-Peprah makes an attempt to examine very briefly the entire section of John 5:1-10:42 to see if the presence of the juridical controversy pattern in this section can throw light on one crucial issue in Johannine research, namely, the purpose of the Gospel in its present form.

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The use of Isaiah in the Lukan writings has long been recognized. David W. Pao examines the wider relationship between Isaiah and the theological program of Acts and thus proposes a new reading of them. As the Isaianic program draws from the foundation story of ancient Israel, the New Exodus program of Isaiah provides the hermeneutical paradigm in which the narrative in Acts can be understood.David W. Pao deals with the interpretation of the entire second volume of the Lukan narrative as well as of the individual episodes. The wider framework provided by Isaiah supplies the organizing principle for the inclusion of various individual stories; and the recognition of the Isaianic context also provides the clue to the identification of the function of the Lukan narrative.In the study of the individual Isaianic quotations and allusions that frame the Lukan narrative, one can appreciate the dramatic reversal of the Isaianic judgment-salvation scheme only when examined against the wider context of Isaiah. In the delineation of the theme of restoration, the coherence of the first half of Acts becomes apparent. And in tracing the conquest journey of the hypostatized Word of God and its relationship to its community, one is forced to reevaluate the traditional understanding of the main characters of the narrative; and this focus on the Word also provides striking parallel to the journey of Jesus in the Gospel of Luke. The study of the opponent of the Word in Acts can then reveal the importance of the underlying anti-idol polemic. Finally, the examination of the role of the nations in Isaiah will also highlight the ways in which the Lukan project moves beyond the Isaianic vision.

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Joseph S. Park examines the various indications of belief in or denial of afterlife in the Jewish funerary inscriptions found throughout the Mediterranean world, mostly during the Hellenistic and Roman periods. He reveals a wide variety of conceptions of and attitudes toward death and afterlife. Besides such well-known ideas as resurrection and the peaceful state of the deceased prior to it, there also seem to be indications of a denial of meaningful afterlife, often associated with a generally Sadducean alignment on the part of the deceased.These findings are then compared with corresponding indications in the Pauline epistles. The comparison shows, after taking into account the basic difference in purpose between the two types of evidence, a substantial agreement, and moreover seems to shed light on some aspects of the interpretation of Paul. For example, the indications of a denial of afterlife in the inscriptions points to the possibility of a similar background for those who are said in 1 Corinthians 15 to deny the resurrection. In addition to providing new insights in both areas in reference to afterlife beliefs, this comparison also sheds some light on the larger methodological issues affecting both bodies of evidence.In addition to specific implications such as this, Joseph S. Park demonstrates that both the Jewish inscriptions and Paul are best interpreted in reference to a background of ideas which is neither strictly Jewish nor pagan, but the result of free interaction between the two. This conclusion has obvious implications for the wider questions of Judaism and hellenization.

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Jeffrey R. Asher examines the themes of polarity and change in Paul's argument in 1 Corinthians 15:35-57. He demonstrates that Paul uses a didactic method of argumentation to demonstrate to some of the Corinthians that there will be a resurrection of the dead. Given the nature of Paul's argument, it is quite likely that certain members of the Corinthian church denied the doctrine of the resurrection of the dead because they believed that it is impossible for a terrestrial body to be raised to the celestial realm. In addition they considered the two cosmic realms to constitute a polarity. Using a didactic method of accommodation in verses 35-49, Paul demonstrates to these Corinthian intellectuals that the doctrine of the resurrection complies with the polarity that exists between the celestial and terrestrial realms. In verses 50-57, he corrects their false conclusion regarding the resurrection by showing that the body will be changed to conform with the strictures of heavenly existence.

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C. Marvin Pate examines the undisputed Pauline writings and demonstrates that wherever Paul employs the theme of wisdom, he does so to reverse the Deuteronomic curses and blessings. The covenantal blessings rest on those whose faith is in Christ, the wisdom of God, while the covenantal curses abide on those who attempt to obey the Torah. All of this results from Paul's separation of Christ, God's wisdom, from the law of Moses.In addition, the author deals with two secondary themes. First of all, he calls the 'new perspective' on Paul into question. Secondly, a revised form of the 'Tübingen theory' is put forth. Both of these points call scholarship back to a more Lutheran reading of the subject of Pauline theology, emphasizing the importance of law and gospel therein.

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This volume continues the studies on the most important source of late antique Judaism, the Talmud Yerushalmi, in relation to its cultural context. The text of the Talmud is juxtaposed to archaeological findings, Roman law, and contemporary classical authors. The attitude of the Rabbis towards main aspects of urban society in the Mediterranean region of late antiquity is discussed. Hereby Rabbinic Judaism is seen as integrated in the cultural currents prevalent in the eastern part of the Roman Empire. From reviews of the first volume: "The essays in this volume do not seek to establish a global approach to the task, or any general methodological principles. Caution is everywhere apparent. ... This is an excellent beginning, and more is promised. It would be good if this initiative prompted more Talmudic scholars to take the Greek background of Palestinian rabbinism seriously, and finally put paid to the tendency to consider it as in some way separated from or in conflict with late antique Hellenism."N.R.M. De Lange in Bulletin of Judaeo-Greek Studies Winter 1998/99, no. 23, p. 24

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International scholars and specialists in Jewish, German, British and European history offer this first comparative approach to the study of German and British Jewish history from the late 18th century to the 1930s. The volume's comparative dimension goes beyond a parallel exploration of the Jewish experience in the two societies by examining British and German Jewries in equal measure and discussing a broad spectrum of social, political, cultural and economic issues.

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E. Leigh Gibson analyses a little-known group of Greek inscriptions that record the manumission of slaves in synagogues located on the hellenized north shore of the Black Sea in the first three centuries of the common era. Through a comparison of this corpus with manumission inscriptions from elsewhere in the Greco-Roman world and an analysis of Greco-Roman Judaism's own interaction with slavery, she assesses the degree to which the Black Sea Jewish community adopted classical traditions of manumissions. In so doing, she tests the often-repeated assumption that these Jewish communities developed idiosyncratic slave practices under the influence of biblical injunctions regarding Israelite ownership of slaves. More generally, she reconsiders the extent of Jewish isolation from or interaction with Greco-Roman culture.Against the backdrop of Greek manumission inscriptions, the Jewish manumissions of the Bosporan Kingdom are unremarkable; they follow the basic outlines of Greek manumission formulae. A review of Greco-Roman Jewish sources demonstrates that biblical precepts on slaveholding were not implemented, even if they were still admired. One element of the manumissions, the ongoing obligation required of the slaves, is somewhat enigmatic and possibly indicates that the Bosporan Jewish community indeed had distinctive manumission practices. These obligations have been commonly interpreted as requiring the slave to participate in the religious life of the community as a condition of his manumission and possibly his concurrent conversion. A close analysis of the clause reveals a more straightforward interpretation: the obligation was a kind of paramone clause, a common feature of Greek manumission inscriptions.E. Leigh Gibson demonstrates that the Jews of this region incorporated Greek manumission practices into their communal life. The execution of private legal contract with the community of Jews as witness in turn suggests that the wider Bosporan community extended respect and recognition to its local Jewish community.

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Since 1977, the lines of inquiry developed by P.E. Sanders, James D.G. Dunn, N.T. Wright and others, have generated the 'New Perspective' on Paul. This perspective is profoundly tied to a certain reading of the literature of second temple Judaism which then in turn shapes what is now the dominant reading of Paul.This volume brings together an array of specialists to examine afresh the various corpora of the period. The authors analyze the highly diverse literature to determine to what extent 'covenantal nomism' is a suitable way for its categorization. The way this literature speaks of the relationship between God and Israel, election, sacrifice, the manner in which God's people are said to be rightly related to him, are all studied closely, within the genre distinctions and theological priorities of each corpus. Careful study is also devoted to 'righteousness' language.Volume 2 will apply the findings to Paul.

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In recent years a number of New Testament scholars have argued that Jewish beliefs and traditions about the principal angel hold the key to understanding why early Christians came to make such exalted claims about Jesus of Nazareth. Jewish and early Christian traditions about the archangel Michael provide a ready test for this thesis. For Michael is very often the principal figure in Jewish and early Christian angelology. Darrell D. Hannah examines Michael traditions from the Old Testament, Jewish apocalyptic, Qumran, Philo, the Rabbis, Merkabah mysticism, the New Testament, Christian apocalyptic, the New Testament Apocrypha, and the Fathers of the second century. From this mass of literature three forms of angelic Christology are evidenced. First, some early 'orthodox' Christians developed an 'theophanic angel Christology'. That is, they interpreted Old Testament passages about the 'angel of the Lord' as 'pre-incarnate manifestations' of Christ. Secondly, some 'heretical' forms of Jewish Christianity identified Christ as an incarnation of the highest archangel. Finally, some Christians found in Jewish speculations about the Principal Angel (Michael, Metatron, Yahoel, etc.) a conceptual framework within which to place a second divine figure. Principal angel traditions, particularly those about the archangel Michael, were useful for elucidating the significance of Christ. However, 'orthodox' Christians who made use of these traditions were very careful to avoid any implication that Christ possessed an angelic nature. 'Orthodox' Christians never regarded Christ merely as an angel, not even as the angel. The Shepherd of Hermas identified Christ with Michael, but would seem to have been unique in this.

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The Dead Sea Scrolls represent the remains of an ancient Jewish library which antedates 68 C.E. It is the most significant discovery of biblically related ancient manuscripts, and represents more than 600 ancient Jewish documents. This series is the definitive collection of the Dead Sea Scrolls and will conclude with a volume on the Biblical Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha, and a concordance to the collection. Forty-four scholars from Canada, Germany, Israel, the United States, and other countries serve as subeditors in the series.The second volume contains improved Hebrew texts and literal translations of CD with selected fragments of the Damascus Document from Cave 4, 5 and 6; also included are 1 QM, with the fragments of the War Scroll from Caves 1 and 4. The series is prepared with the text on the left page and the translation on the right. Critical notes help the scholar understand the text, variants, philological subtleties, and translation. Other documents relating to rules are also contained in the second volume.

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