The Jewish Apocalyptic Tradition and the Shaping of New Testament Thought

The Jewish Apocalyptic Tradition and the Shaping of New Testament Thought
Author: Benjamin E. Reynolds
Publisher: Fortress Press
Total Pages: 393
Release: 2017-04-01
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1506423426

The contemporary study of Jewish apocalypticism today recognizes the wealth and diversity of ancient traditions concerned with the “unveiling” of heavenly matters‒‒understood to involve revealed wisdom, the revealed resolution of time, and revealed cosmology‒‒in marked contrast to an earlier focus on eschatology as such. The shift in focus has had a more direct impact on the study of ancient “pseudepigraphic” literature, however, than in New Testament studies, where the narrower focus on eschatological expectation remains dominant. In this Companion, an international team of scholars draws out the implications of the newest scholarship for the variety of New Testament writings. Each entry presses the boundaries of current discussion regarding the nature of apocalypticism in application to a particular New Testament author. The cumulative effect is to reveal, as never before, early Christianity, its Christology, cosmology, and eschatology, as expressions of tendencies in Second Temple Judaism.

John among the Apocalypses

John among the Apocalypses
Author: Benjamin E. Reynolds
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 248
Release: 2020-10-22
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0191087084

The Gospel of John has long been recognized as being distinct from the Synoptic Gospels. John among the Apocalypses explains John's distinctive narrative of Jesus's life by comparing it to Jewish apocalypses and highlighting the central place of revelation in the Gospel. While some scholars have noted a connection between the Gospel of John and Jewish apocalypses, Reynolds makes the first extensive comparison of the Gospel with the standard definition of the apocalypse genre. Engaging with modern genre theory, this comparison indicates surprising similarities of form, content, and function between John's Gospel and Jewish apocalypses. Even though the Gospel of John reflects similarities with the genre of apocalypse, John is not an apocalypse, but in genre theory terms, John may be described as a gospel in kind and an apocalypse in mode. John's narrative of Jesus's life has been qualified and shaped by the genre of apocalypse, such that it may be called an 'apocalyptic' gospel. In the final two chapters, Reynolds explores the implications of this conclusion for Johannine Studies and New Testament scholarship more broadly. John among the Apocalypses considers how viewing the Fourth Gospel as apocalyptic Gospel aids in the interpretation of John's appeal to Israel's Scriptures and Mosaic authority, and examines the Gospel's relationship with the book of Revelation and the history of reception concerning their writing. An examination of Byzantine iconographic traditions highlights how reception history may offer a possible explanation for reading John as apocalyptic Gospel.

Apocalyptic and the New Testament

Apocalyptic and the New Testament
Author: Marion L. Soards
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Total Pages: 356
Release: 2015-01-29
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1474236189

A rich collection of essays exploring the meaning of 'apocalyptic' in the New Testament, by a variety of important scholars in the field.

The Method & Message of Jewish Apocalyptic, 200 BC-AD 100

The Method & Message of Jewish Apocalyptic, 200 BC-AD 100
Author: David Syme Russell
Publisher: Westminster John Knox Press
Total Pages: 486
Release: 1964
Genre: Religion
ISBN:

For Jews and Christians alike, this whole apocalyptic literature is of the utmost significance because of its claim to be "the child of prophecy". But for Christians, it has an additional importance. Not only is it, in its teaching, a continuation of the Old Testament, it is also an anticipation of the New Testament. The apocalyptic literature helps bridge the gap between the Old Testament and the New Testament and illustrates certain significant developments in religious belief, especially of an eschatalogical and messianic kind.

Apocalypticism in the Bible and Its World

Apocalypticism in the Bible and Its World
Author: Frederick J. Murphy
Publisher: Baker Books
Total Pages: 487
Release: 2012-08-01
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1441238743

Apocalypticism is not a peripheral topic in biblical studies. It represents the central, characteristic transformation of Hebrew thought in the period of the Second Temple. It therefore constituted the worldview of Jesus, Paul, and the earliest Christians, and it is the context in which the New Testament books were written. In this volume, Frederick Murphy defines apocalypticism while discussing its origins, where it comes into play in the Hebrew Bible, and how it relates to Jesus and the New Testament.

Apocalyptic Interpretation of the Bible

Apocalyptic Interpretation of the Bible
Author: Gerbern S. Oegema
Publisher: A&C Black
Total Pages: 208
Release: 2012-01-19
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0567622088

An examination of Apocalypticism from one of the leading lights in the field.

Apocalyptic Thinking in Early Judaism

Apocalyptic Thinking in Early Judaism
Author: Cecilia Wassen
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 236
Release: 2018-02-12
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 9004358382

It has been over 30 years since John Collins’ seminal study The Apocalyptic Imagination first came out. In this timely volume, Apocalyptic Thinking in Early Judaism: Engaging with John Collins’ The Apocalyptic Imagination, leading international experts of Jewish apocalyptic critically engage with Collins’ work and add to the ongoing debate with articles on current topics in the field of apocalyptic studies. The subjects include the genre and sub categories of apocalypses, demonology, the character of dream visions, the books of Enoch, the significance of Aramaic texts, and apocalyptic traditions in the Dead Sea Scrolls as well as in Paul’s writings. The volume ends with Collins’ response to the articles.

The Fate of the Dead

The Fate of the Dead
Author: Richard Bauckham
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 446
Release: 2014-04-09
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 9004267417

These studies focus on personal eschatology in the Jewish and early Christian apocalypses. The apocalyptic tradition from its Jewish origins until the early middle ages is studied as a continuous literary tradition, in which both continuity of motifs and important changes in understanding of life after death can be charted. As well as better known apocalypses, major and often pioneering attention is given to those neglected apocalypses which portray human destiny after death in detail, such as the Apocalypse of Peter, the Apocalypse of the Seven Heavens, the later apocalypses of Ezra, and the four apocalypses of the Virgin Mary. Relationships with Greco-Roman eschatology are explored. Several chapters show how specific New Testament texts are illuminated by close knowledge of this tradition of ideas and images of the hereafter.

The Jewish Apocalyptic Heritage in Early Christianity, Volume 4

The Jewish Apocalyptic Heritage in Early Christianity, Volume 4
Author: James C. VanderKam
Publisher: Fortress Press
Total Pages: 312
Release: 1996-12-07
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 9781451403091

The question of apocalyptic influence on Jesus and early Christianity is again strongly contested. The issues connected with this question include terminology, genre, historical reconstruction, sectarian self-definition, and many others. This book provides a fresh assessment of the nature and significance of early Christian appropriation of Jewish apocalyptic material.

The Oxford Handbook of Apocalyptic Literature

The Oxford Handbook of Apocalyptic Literature
Author: John Joseph Collins
Publisher: Oxford Handbooks
Total Pages: 565
Release: 2014
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0199856494

Apocalypticism arose in ancient Judaism in the last centuries BCE and played a crucial role in the rise of Christianity. It is not only of historical interest: there has been a growing awareness, especially since the 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States, of the prevalence of apocalyptic beliefs in the contemporary world. To understand these beliefs, it is necessary to appreciate their complex roots in the ancient world, and the multi-faceted character of the phenomenon of apocalypticism. The Oxford Handbook of Apocalyptic Literature is a thematic and phenomenological exploration of apocalypticism in the Judaic and Christian traditions. Most of the volume is devoted to the apocalyptic literature of antiquity. Essays explore the relationship between apocalypticism and prophecy, wisdom and mysticism; the social function of apocalypticism and its role as resistance literature; apocalyptic rhetoric from both historical and postmodern perspectives; and apocalyptic theology, focusing on phenomena of determinism and dualism and exploring apocalyptic theology's role in ancient Judaism, early Christianity, and Gnosticism. The final chapters of the volume are devoted to the appropriation of apocalypticism in the modern world, reviewing the role of apocalypticism in contemporary Judaism and Christianity, and more broadly in popular culture, addressing the increasingly studied relation between apocalypticism and violence, and discussing the relationship between apocalypticism and trauma, which speaks to the underlying causes of the popularity of apocalyptic beliefs. This volume will further the understanding of a vital religious phenomenon too often dismissed as alien and irrational by secular western society.