Leo Perdue has applied Victor Turner's anthropological model of separation, liminality, and reaggregation to elucidate the social function of ancient wisdom texts. Ancient wisdom texts project the rhetorical situation of liminality upon their recipients in the course of imparting instruction, the effect of which is to integrate recipients at a new level into social structure. Using Turner's model, correlated with Berger's and Luckmann's model of resocialization, this paper argues that John's threshold speech functions to throw Q's recipients into a state of liminality. It thus creates the conditions necessary for reception of Jesus’ wisdom which follows. These results are used to critique stratigraphies of Q which are based upon the notion that the juxtaposition of John's and Jesus’ speeches is anomalous.

Scholars tend to view the Markan Peter as a relatively impersonal figure, to a large extent blended with the group of the disciples. The idea that first-century society possessed a weak sense of the individual, the prevalence of typical figures in Greek literature, the special nature of the Gospel material, and Mark's lack of attention to Peter's future role are factors which contribute to this perspective. A survey of Mark's characterization of Peter, however, and comparison with the evangelist's portrayal of other disciples and the disciples as a group, reveals a distinctive figure and significant elements of individual human experience.

Le rapport de continuité observé dans les développements de thématiques qui se prolongent du troisième évangile au livre des Actes des Apôtres sont des manifestations de l’unité du double ouvrage lucanien. À partir du lien établi entre les contenus de Lc 12.10–12 et d’Ac 4.16–18, cet article démontre: (1) que le rejet par le Sanhédrin du miracle opéré par Pierre et Jean, en Actes, est l’accomplissement de l’annonce du péché contre l’Esprit par Jésus, en Luc; (2) que ce rapport d’accomplissement est un lieu de vérification de l’unité théologique de Luc/Actes.

Jesus’ answer to the High Priest in 18.20 offers a key to the pattern of his ministry. Each of the pairs ‘openly: secretly’; ‘the world: the Jews’ and ‘synagogue and Temple’ function significantly in the Gospel, but the last named are most important. In each of the Gospels, ‘synagogue’, ‘house’, and ‘Temple’ play narrative roles in the exploration of the relationship between Jesus with his community and the community of the Scriptures and contemporary Judaism. John's use of these narrative spatial-markers is very different and does not trace the separation of John's community from the synagogue, as often supposed. Instead, the Temple is the place for divine manifestation and where Jesus must be both revealed and rejected.

L’auteur de Luc–Actes use d’un procédé rhétorique de double signification, qui oriente la lecture aussi bien vers une culture nourrie de la LXX que vers une conceptualité gréco-romaine. Exemples de cette ambivalence sémantique: Lc 23.47; Ac 4.32–4; 17.16–34; 18.13; 27.1–28, 10, etc. Ce procédé témoigne d’une volonté de fixer l’identité chrétienne entre Jérusalem et Rome, inscrivant le christianisme à la fois comme la continuité d’une histoire de salut et comme une réponse à la quête religieuse gréco-romaine. Le programme théologique qui se dessine ainsi rapproche Luc de Flavius Josèphe.

Acts 27–28 frequently points to the shipwrecks of Odysseus in Odyssey Books 5 and 12, the second of which the hero narrates in the first person. The shipwrecks of Odysseus and Paul share nautical images and vocabulary, the appearance of a goddess or angel assuring safety, the riding of planks, the arrival of the hero on an island among hospitable strangers, the mistaking of the hero as a god, and the sending of him on his way. Luke's intention in relating Paul's shipwreck to those of Odysseus was to exalt Paul and his God by comparison.

Zur Beschreibung rabbinischer ‘Soteriologie’ haben sich in der Forschung zwei konträre Modelle etabliert: Dem einen zufolge entscheiden die Werke eines Menschen über seine Teilhabe an der kommenden Welt; dem anderen zufolge entscheidet seine Zugehörigkeit zum erwählten Volk. Beide Denkmuster sind in Talmud und Midrasch reichlich belegt. Herkömmliche Hierarchisierungen, die das eine Muster dem anderen starr über- oder unterordnen, sind jedoch unangemessen. Vielmehr bringt die rabbinische Tradition Erwählung und Vergeltung in stets wechselnden Proportionen zum Ausgleich, was bis zur scheinbaren Verabsolutierung des einen und Ignorierung des anderen der beiden Prinzipien reichen kann. Rabbinische Soteriologie ist in diesem Sinne ‘optional’ strukturiert.

Das Verhältnis Kirche/Israel beschreibt Paulus in Röm 11.16–24 mittels zweier Gleichnisse. Das Gleichnis von der Teighebe legt Paulus entgegen dem traditionell jüdischen Verständnis aus, um den kultischen Begriff ‘Heiligkeit’ in seine Darstellung einzuführen: So wie im Kult ein Teil das Ganze heiligen könnte, so heiligt im Gleichnis vom Ölbaum die Wurzel (Abraham) die Zweige (Juden).

Does Rom 10.1 constitute a significant break in Paul's argument? Many commentators see 9.30–10.21 as the second of the three major sections in Romans 9–11. The subject matter introduced by the question τι oυν ερoυμεν of 9.30 is, according to them, so different from what precedes that it indicates a decisive transition point. One may ask, however, whether 9.30–3 is not better considered as the conclusion of that first stage.

Twice (John 4.29, 39), the Samaritan woman is said to have reported to her townspeople that a man had told her ‘everything’ she did. One may surmise that those whom she told knew rather well precisely what the things were that she had done, for they followed her urging to see this remarkably perceptive stranger. Precisely what did Jesus tell her that so moved her and others, and how did he go about it?

Commentators often note that the emphasis in Phil 2.6–7 on Christ's selfless giving is quite contrary to pagan concepts of divinity. N. T. Wright, for example, writes that αρπαγμoς, when construed as an abstract noun meaning ‘snatching’, ‘grasping’, or ‘getting’, ‘refers, intransitively, to a particular way of life, namely, that which characterized pagan rulers, and indeed pagan gods and goddesses such as the Philippians might have worshipped in their pre-Christian days’. Yet no commentator to my knowledge has referred to the excellent example of the grasping nature of pagan deities found in Aristophanes’ comedy the Ecclesiazusae (‘Women in Government’).