The Logos blog has a couple minute and slightly humorous segment from Darrell Bock on the importance of background information for New Testament Studies.
Tag: Jewish Backgrounds
Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 55, no. 3
The Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 55, no. 3 includes:
- David W. Chapman and Andreas Köstenberger, “Jewish Intertestamental and Early Rabbinic Literature: An Annotated Bibliographic Resource Updated (Part 2)
- Abraham Kuruvilla, “The Aqedah (Genesis 22): What Is the Author Doing with What He Is Saying?”
- Greg Goswell, “The Temple Theme in the Book of Daniel”
- Charlie Trimm, “Did YHWH Condemn the Nations When He Elected Israel?: YHWH’s Disposition toward Non-Israelites in the Torah”
- Steve Walton, “What Does ‘Mission’ in Acts Mean in Relation to the ‘Powers That Be’?”
- Michael D. Fiorello, “The Ethical Implications of Holiness in James 2”
Translation and Rewriting
In his translator’s comments on Cicero’s Nature of the Gods, H. C. P. McGregor makes the following observation about the task of translation:
One can . . . choose verbal accuracy at any price, translate each sentence word for word, and so produce a safe bud deadly crib. In an opposite extreme, one may throw all scholarly impedimenta overboard, let vocabulary and syntax go, seeking only to preserve in English dress the sense and argument of the original. . . . A third method goes beyond translation altogether and creates a new work in the image of the old, as Pope and Chapman did with Iliad and Odyssey. (64)
Although his main interest in this introduction lies elsewhere, the passing reference to “creat[ing] a new work in the image of the old” seems also to be some good, vivid language for describing what happens in “rewritten Bible” texts from the Second Temple period.
Donnerstag Digest (August 19, 2010)
This week in the blogosphere:
- James McGrath helpfully notes that John Byron, Associate Professor of New Testament at Ashland Theological Seminary, is now blogging at The Biblical World.
- Sadly, Gerald Hawthorne passes away (HT: John Byron).
- Helen Bond discusses the composition of the Sanhedrin in first-century Palestine.
- Trevor provides a good summary of a variety of different ways to add records to Zotero.
- Happy Dissertating suggests priming the writing pump as necessary via 750 Words. Based on what the site provides, it looks like a fully private blog could also be used in much the same way, but particularly for those who would prefer not to need to ensure for themselves that all their privacy settings are correct or who might enjoy some of the other features that 750 Words offers, the site may be worth a look.
- Pat McCullough begins a bibliography of resources about the application of Social Identity Theory to biblical studies and invites suggestions for additions.
Meerson, “One God Supreme”
Michael Meerson has the latest article in the Journal of Greco-Roman Christianity and Judaism, “One God Supreme: A Case Study of Religious Tolerance and Survival.” In this article, Meerson “attempt[s] to combine the consideration of both [θεὸς ὕψιστος and εἷς θεός]” as these titles are found in a sundial inscription from Mount Gerizim (32). For, although
[a] picture of a sundial with a Greek inscription was published in the 33rd (2000) issue of Qadmoniot, as an illustration to the essay of Y. Magen, ‘Mount Gerizim—A Temple City’ . . . the sundial’s inscription, neither transcribed nor translated, failed to provoke commentary. And yet the inscription is remarkable in many ways: one of only five Greek inscriptions from the Hellenistic era ever found on Mount Gerizim, it was discovered outside any architectural context. The inscription addresses θεὸς ὕψιστος, the God Most High, which would have provided the archaeologists of Gerizim with a doubly difficult quest: to identify the ‘nationality’ of the so-called god, and to find a temple in which this sundial would have stood—Samaritan, Seleucid or Roman. Inscriptions bearing the εἷς θεός invocation present a similar problem (32).
Creation in Second Temple Judaism
Joel Watts has a very intriguing “showcase [of] several motifs in Second Temple Jewish thought” related to the creation narrative in Genesis 1–3. To read the three-part series, click below.
As a whole, the series “survey[s] . . . how certain authors interpreted and perhaps used the Creation account as a means to [their own] end[s].”