In the early 1950s a cartoon appeared in Punch depicting a British motorist able at last to resume touring the continent after World War II. The first scene shows a straight, tree-lined chaussée, with the driver saying to his passenger, ‘Now for these lovely straight French roads’. In the next scene they quickly come to a barrier with the warning, ‘Déviation 19 kilomètres’.

In den fünfziger Jahren gab es im Blick auf die Aussagen über Jesu Tod und Auferstehung in der Apostelgeschichte einen erstaunlich weit verbreiteten Konsens: Diese Aussagen galten als Bestandteil des alten urchrist-lichen Kerygmas. Umfang und Inhalt dieses Konsenses möchte ich an der Position von Haenchen verdeutlichen. Seine Neubearbeitung der Apostelgeschichte im Meyerschen Kommentarwerk erschien zum erstenmal im Jahre 1956. Was an diesem Kommentar neu war, hat Haenchen selbst spater so gesehen: ‘Hier kam endlich die Bedeutung der schriftstellerischen Komposition des Lukas zur verdienten Geltung, der bisweilen fast ex nihilo zu schaffen scheint.’ Zu den Reden der Apostelgeschichte meinte Haenchen, wie schon mancher vor ihm, Lukas habe ‘von dem Vorrecht des antiken Historikers kräftig Gebrauch gemacht, seinen ‘Helden’ Reden in den Mund zu legen’; freilich verwende Lukas ‘das Kunstmittel der Reden fast immer völllig anders’ als jene Historiker, trage er doch in den Missions-reden ‘die Grundzüge der christlichen Verkündigung’ vor, während jene mit ihren Reden ‘den Charakter des Redners durchsichtig’ machten oder ‘die übergeschichtliche Bedeutung des Augenblicks’ herausstellten.

Le prologue est le passage du IVe évangile qui a été le plus discuté, le plus souvent commenté. Dans les monographies des trente dernières années, deux grandes questions dominent la recherche: celle de la formation de cet hymne au Logos et celle de sa structure. Le premier problème, qui est celui de la critique littéraire, est au cœur des débats dans l'exégèse de langue allemande. Par centre, c'est en français qu'ont été écrites la plupart des études sur la structure; quelques-unes cependant ont aussi paru en anglais: les deux dernières en date sont celles de R. Alan Culpepper et de Ch. Homer Giblin. Nous voudrions, à notre tour, présenter une analyse de la structure du prologue, mais d'un point de vue à la fois littéraire et théologique.

Das Thema ‘Gesetz und Freiheit’ ist zweifellos einschlägig für die paulinische Theologie. Besonders die Beschäftigung mit den Briefen des Paulus an die Galater und an die Römer stellt den Exegeten vor die Frage, wie Paulus als gebürtiger Jude zu einer solchen Einschätzung des Gesetzes kommen konnte, so daß er es eindeutig in ein Gegenüber zur befreienden Kraft des Evangeliums von der Rechtfertigung des Sünders stellt. Gesetz und Evan-gelium, Gesetz und Glaube an Christus, Gesetz und Freiheit, das ist in der Tat das Problem, das den Apostel in seinen theologischen Bemühungen um die Erhellung des Kreuzesgeschehens und um die Erschließung des λόγος του˜ στανρόυ˜ (1 Kor. 1. 18) am meisten beschäftigt hat und das dem Exegeten zu erforschen aufgegeben ist, wenn er die Konstituenten der pauli-nischen Theologie zu ermitteln und zu systematisieren sucht. In neuerer Zeit sind zahlreiche Artikel, Monographien und Kommentar-Exkurse erschienen, die sich um das Problem des Gesetzes bemühen und die bei der Vielfalt ihrer Ansätze zugleich auch zeigen, daß die Interpretation des Gesetzes bei Paulus zu immer neuen Fragen führt. Dennoch erweist sich die Beschäftigung mit ihnen als sehr fruchtbar - sowohl für eine neutestamentlich-christliche als auch für eine gesamtbiblische, jüdisch-christliche Theologie.

The problem of continuity between Jesus and Paul is an old one, not least with regard to their respective attitudes towards the law. For example, in a private conversation some years ago Ernst Käsemann maintained a typically provocative position: (1) that Jesus' attitude to the law lies very much at the heart of Jesus' distinctiveness; (2) that Paul's attitude to the law was in fact the same; and (3) that Paul was independent of Jesus at this point. The conversation unfortunately had to end before we could pursue such further questions as whether in that case Paul was as religiously significant (distinctive? unique?) as Jesus. But it highlights an important problem: if Paul's attitude to the law, with its coordinate teaching about grace and justification, is central to the Christianity of the Gentile mission, then in what sense or degree is his teaching continuous with or dependent upon the traditions which stemmed from Jesus - if at all?

It is not our purpose to re-open the discussion on the linguistic character of the different Semitic elements in the New Testament and to go into the problem whether a particular word spoken by Jesus such as εφφαθα is either Hebrew or Aramaic. Neither do we again want to raise the question of how many languages Jesus could speak or understand and which of these he normally used.1 Finally it is also not our intention to ascertain the exact meaning of such a debated phrase as Mαραναθά, whether this is ‘our Lord has come’ or ‘our Lord, come’.

Anyone about to explain a text faces the vexing problem of how precisely to pose the state of the question. His initial option will determine the results of the inquiry and will also immediately capture the interest of his readers or lose it. Initial options in approaching an apocalyptic text like Rev. 11. 1–13 boggle the mind. Valuable analyses have appeared,1 but a cutting-edge of criticism is difficult to discern.2 I propose to try a new method, namely, to explain the narrated action and discourse of Rev. 11. 1–13 by considering the ‘causes’ of the text. The initial option to focus on narrative should prove welcome, if only because no one else seems methodically to have attempted it.3 This approach will require addressing the key issues of the climactic point of a given story, the way the elements of the story (who, what, where, when, etc.) build to that climactic point, and the integration of the story into a set of related, sequential narratives.

So much has been written about the Prologue that it must seem unlikely that anything new could be said about it with some claim to credibility. It is not that all problems have been resolved, or that all that needs to be said has been said. But perhaps, on the basis of existing evidence, it seems that what can be said with some probability has been said. Yet many issues remain unresolved. Are the form and content of the Prologue the consequence of the evangelist's use of a source hymn? Or was the Prologue a specially written introduction for the Gospel? If the Prologue is based on a source hymn: What was the origin of the hymn? How did it come to the evangelist and why did he use it? What was in the hymn and what was added by the evangelist? Answers to these questions are fundamental to a precise understanding of the Prologue and could throw light on the history of the Johannine community.

The historian has difficulty detecting the personal influence exercised in the post-Easter community by ‘the apostles’, at least as this group is identified in Christian tradition. The only individuals from this group whose historical role in the church's missionary activity can be clearly discerned are Peter and Paul. Nevertheless, for the church of the second and succeeding centuries, the New Testament is a collection of ‘apostolic writings’: the twenty-seven books are attributed either to Paul, or to one of the twelve, or to a disciple of one of ‘the apostles’ – to Paul's disciple, Luke (Col. 4. 14), or to Peter's disciple, Mark (1 Pet. 5. 13). Moreover, as early as the year 96, Clement of Rome asserts that the apostles appointed their first converts to be bishops and deacons, with the condition that if these should die, other approved men should succeed to their ministry.