The nature of Lukan christology has been much debated in recent years, with scholars claiming the pre-eminence of such categories as Lord, Prophet, Christ, or Isaianic Servant. In the present work the author examines one major theme within Luke's christology, that of the coming king from the line of David. A study of the Lukan birth narrative and the speeches in Acts reveals that Luke shows a strong interest in this royal-messianic theme, introducing it into passages which are introductory and programmatic for his christology as a sermon, portraying Jesus in strongly prophetic terms. The author seeks a synthesis of these seemingly conflicting royal and prophetic portraits in Luke's interpretation of the Old Testament book of Isaiah. When Isaiah is read as a unity, the eschatological deliverer is at the same time Davidic king (Isa. 9.11), suffering servant of Yahweh (Isa. 42-53), and prophet herald of salvation (Isa. 61), leading God's people on an eschatological new exodus. On the basis of this synthesis the christology of Luke-Acts is seen to be both consistent and unified, forming an integral part of Luke's wider purpose in his two-volume work.

Revision of the author's thesis (doctoral)--University of Aberdeen, 2005.

One of the earliest Christian confessions—that Jesus is Messiah and Lord—has long been recognized throughout the New Testament. Joshua Jipp shows that the New Testament is in fact built upon this foundational messianic claim, and each of its primary compositions is a unique creative expansion of this common thread. Having made the same argument about the Pauline epistles in his previous book Christ Is King: Paul’s Royal Ideology, Jipp works methodically through the New Testament to show how the authors proclaim Jesus as the incarnate, crucified, and enthroned messiah of God. In the second section of this book, Jipp moves beyond exegesis toward larger theological questions, such as those of Christology, soteriology, ecclesiology, and eschatology, revealing the practical value of reading the Bible with an eye to its messianic vision. The Messianic Theology of the New Testament functions as an excellent introductory text, honoring the vigorous pluralism of the New Testament books while still addressing the obvious question: what makes these twenty-seven different compositions one unified testament?

To Christians worldwide, the man Jesus of Nazareth is the centerpiece of history, the object of faith, hope, and worship. Even those who do not follow him admit the vast influence of his life. For anyone interested in knowing more about Jesus, study of the four biblical Gospels is essential. The second edition of Four Portraits, One Jesus has been updated throughout to meet the needs to today's students. It is a thorough yet accessible introduction to the four biblical Gospels and their subject, the life and person of Jesus. Like different artists rendering the same subject using different styles and points of view, the Gospels paint four highly distinctive portraits of the same remarkable Jesus. With clarity and insight, Mark Strauss illuminates these four books addressing the following important areas: First he addresses the nature, origin, methods for study, and historical, religious, and cultural backgrounds of the Gospels. He then moves on to closer study of each narrative and its contribution to our understanding of Jesus, investigating things such as plot, characters, and theme. Finally, he pulls it all together with a detailed examination of what the Gospels teach about Jesus' ministry, message, death, and resurrection, with excursions into the quest for the historical Jesus and the historical reliability of the Gospels. This textbook together with its workbook, video lectures, and laminated sheet gives students everything they need for a thorough and enriching study of Jesus and the Gospels.

There has been much discussion of two dimensions of the kingdom of God in scholarship: the temporal (already/not yet) and the embodied (spirit/flesh). Russell proposes that there is a third parallel dimension, a social dimension. Using Victor Turner's concepts of structure, antistructure, and liminality, Russell explores how these concepts are consistently expressed in Jesus' teaching, in Paul's writing, and through the writers of the second and third centuries. She demonstrates how, from the very beginning of the Jesus movement, Christ followers were unique, not because their members were to live liminal lives apart from structure, but because they lived out new antistructural relationships within existing structures and thus transformed them. They lived liminally within their structure.

The Book of Psalms is one of the most frequently cited books in the New Testament. The Synoptic Evangelists seem to read the Psalms not primarily as prayers but as prophecies of the future. They discovered in its language prophecies concerning the life and ministry of Jesus and attempted to show how Jesus' life was prefigured in the Psalms. Samuel Subramanian examines the topic within the broader use of the Old Testament in the New Testament, that of the prophetic reading of the Psalms in the Synoptic Gospels and in the context of Second Temple Judaism. Although others have treated individual psalm quotations as prophecy, my work is the first to examine all of the psalm quotations within the Synoptic Gospels in this light and the first to demonstrate that these excerpts were used prophetically. In some cases, these psalm quotations were used by the Synoptic Evangelists in a manner that is thought to fulfill a prophecy from or about Jesus within the gospel narratives, even though this particular use of the psalms by the Synoptic Evangelists has not been widely recognized previously. This study shows how similar exegetical techniques of looking for prophecies in the Psalms was practiced by non-Christian Jews of the period.

In Early Jewish Messianism in the New Testament Serge Ruzer takes a new tack on the investigation of early Christian polemical strategies against the backdrop of Second Temple Judaism. Complementing traditional inquiry on the subject, Ruzer focuses on those elements of Messiah- and Christ-centered ideas that bear witness to patterns of broader circulation – namely, the Jewish messianic ideas that provided the underpinning for the identity-making moves of Jesus’ early followers. The volume suggests that such attempts can be expected to reflect eschatological ideas of the Jewish ʻOtherʼ. Exploring cases where the New Testament shows itself an early witness for belief patterns found in contemporaneous or only later rabbinic sources, this volume reveals a fuller picture of Second Temple Jewish messianism.

When the ancients talked about "messiah", what did they picture? Did that term refer to a stately figure who would rule, to a militant who would rescue, or to a variety of roles held by many? While Christians have traditionally equated the word "messiah" with Jesus, the discussion is far more complex. This volume contributes significantly to that discussion. Ten expert scholars here address questions surrounding the concept of "messiah" and clarify what it means to call Jesus "messiah." The book comprises two main parts, first treating those writers who preceded or surrounded the New Testament (two essays on the Old Testament and two on extrabiblical literature) and then discussing the writers of the New Testament. Concluding the volume is a critical response by Craig Evans to both sections. This volume will be helpful to pastors and laypersons wanting to explore the nature and identity of the Messiah in the Old and New Testament in order to better understand Jesus as Messiah.

His book is a comparison of the message of Acts transmitted by Codex Bezae with that of the more familiar Alexandrian text, represented by Codex Vaticanus. For each section of Acts, there is a side by side translation of the Bezan and Alexandrian manuscripts, followed by a critical apparatus and, finally, a commentary that explores the differences in the message of the two texts. It is concluded that the Bezan text, with its interest in internal Jewish affairs and its focus on the struggles of the early disciples to free themselves from their traditional Jewish expectations and to achieve, despite their mistakes, a more accurate understanding of their master's teaching, is the earlier of the two texts.