Scholarly interest in the apocryphal Book of Wisdom has grown over the last fifty years. In addition to the main commentaries, several literary studies have been produced on sections of the text, giving new and richer insights. Moyna McGlynn examines the interwoven themes of divine judgement and divine benevolence as they are presented in the text of Wisdom. The full extent and interplay between these themes is only revealed by a literary reading of the whole text. This reading examines the poetic techniques, structures, vocabulary, verbal repetitions, and the questions the author has employed to provide a framework for a theology of justice and mercy.Further study of these themes leads to reflections upon God as creator and humans as creatures, the kindness of God in the gift of divine wisdom, and the formation and protection of Israel as the paradigm community with responsibility for teaching and demonstrating the knowledge of God to the world. These twin themes, then, provide us with an integrated and coherent reading of the text of Wisdom, and offer a new insight into the role of Israel and Jewish self-awareness just prior to the formation of rabbinic Judaism and Christianity.The Book of Wisdom falls naturally into four, major sub-divisions, with a fifth central section providing the theodicy which underpins the action and reflection of the other four. Moyna McGlynn has retained this five-fold division for her analysis.A brief Appendix, at the close of the book, outlines Wisdom's history and reception in the Jewish and Christian communities.

In God, Grace, and Righteousness in Wisdom of Solomon and Paul's Letter to the Romans, Jonathan A. Linebaugh places the Wisdom of Solomon and the Letter to the Romans in conversation. Both texts discuss the relationship of Jew and Gentile, the meaning of God's grace and righteousness, and offer readings of Israel's scripture. These shared themes provide talking-points, initiating a dialogue on anthropology, soteriology, and hermeneutics. By listening in on this conversation, Linebaugh demonstrates that while these texts have much in common, the theologies they articulate are ultimately incommensurable because they think from different events - Wisdom from the pre-creational order crafted by Sophia and exemplified in the Exodus; Paul from the incongruous gift of Christ which justifies the ungodly.

"Scott C. Ryan investigates divine conflict motifs in select Jewish literature and places the findings in dialogue with Paul's Letter to the Romans. Paul emerges as a writer who participates in Jewish divine conflict traditions even as he modifies the motifs in light of the Christ-event." --

Cornelis Bennema explains the role of the Spirit in salvation according to John's Gospel against the background of intertestamental Jewish wisdom literature. He comes to the conclusion that the salvific function of the Spirit is that of a cognitive agent who, through the mediation of life-giving wisdom, creates and sustains a saving relationship between the believer and the Father and Son.

This volume considers the emerging Jewish interest in an afterlife during the second temple period in relation to developing views of the deity and the self. In some circles God is understood as increasingly distant from the human sphere, and so justice must occur in another world or after death; at the same time, more autonomous constructions of the self in response to community breakdown suggest that reward and punishment come not only collectively, but also on the individual level in a post-mortem realm. The book traces the interconnections between these themes in Job and Ecclesiastes, Ben Sira and Daniel, then Wisdom of Solomon and 4 Ezra, crossing genre boundaries in an attempt to offer a more encompassing historical investigation.

In this study, Blake Wassell applies new Roman and Jewish contexts to a Johannine ambiguity, which is Pilate declaring Jesus both innocent and guilty of making himself King of the Ἰουδαῖοι. Pilate repeats that he finds in Jesus no basis for the accusation, and yet he also writes the content of the accusation in the inscription on the cross. The paradox leads readers into another paradox: the Ἰουδαῖοι make themselves the accused as they make the accusation, and Jesus conquers as he is conquered. The author analyses how they destroy the temple of his body, so that he can raise it and how they exalt him, so that he can reveal himself.

How did Paul's term ekklesia formulate the Christian self-understanding? Young-Ho Park finds the answer in its strong civic connotation in the politico-cultural world of the Greek East under the Roman Empire. By addressing his local Gentile congregation as ekklesia in his letters, Paul effectively created a symbolic universe in which the Christ-worshippers saw themselves as the honorable citizens who represented the city before God. (Publisher).

Hidden Criticism of the Angry Tyrant in Early Judaism and the Acts of the Apostles adds to the current literature of imperial-critical New Testament readings with an examination of Luke’s hidden criticism of imperial Rome in the Acts of the Apostles and in Paul’s speech on the Areopagus in Acts 17. Focusing on discursive resistance in the Hellenistic world, Drew J. Strait examines the relationship between hidden criticism and persuasion and between subordinates and the powerful, and he explores the challenge to the dissident voice to communicate criticism while under surveillance. Strait argues that Luke confronts the idolatrous power and iconic spectacle of gods and kings with the Gospel of the Lord of all—a worldview that is incompatible with the religions of Rome, including emperor worship.

Revised version of the author's thesis (doctoral)--University of Gloucestershire, 2009.

Andrew Brunson examines the presence and function of Ps 118 in the Gospel of John, placing particular emphasis on its interpretation in a New Exodus context which has previously not been developed in the Fourth Gospel. Following a comprehensive survey of Ps 118's Jewish setting, its role in the festivals, and its use in the Synoptic Gospels, special attention is given to the quotations in the Entrance Narrative.The author argues that John portrays Jesus as bringing an end to Israel's state of continuing exile by fulfilling the role reserved to Yahweh in the New Exodus. This culminates in the Entrance to Jerusalem where Jesus embodies the return of Yahweh to reign among his people. A literary study of the coming-sent theme in John underscores the extent to which Jesus is identified ontologically and functionally with the Father. A previously unnoticed allusion to Ps 118 and Jubilees in John 8.56 is explored, and attention is paid to establishing the presence and developing the function of several neglected allusions to the psalm in 10:7-10; 10:24-25; and 11:41-42.