The philosophy of faith and The fourth Gospel

The last few decades have taught us that speaking of Stoicism, Platonism, and Judaism as constituting a single context for understanding Early Christianity is not a contradiction Stoicism and Platonism here; Judaism there , but rather entirely correct. The roots of Christianity are obviously Jewish, but in the Hellenistic and Roman periods Judaism itself was part of Greco-Roman culture. Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University's objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide.

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John and Philosophy: A New Reading of the Fourth Gospel - Oxford Scholarship

Oxford Scholarship Online This book is available as part of Oxford Scholarship Online - view abstracts and keywords at book and chapter level. Ancient Israel in Sinai James Hoffmeier. Augustine of Hippo Henry Chadwick. Isaiah After Exile Jacob Stromberg. The Greek of the Pentateuch John A.

Form and content of John

Leontius of Byzantium Brian E. Fant and Mitchell G.

As indicated by both its introduction and its theological plan see The Gospel According to Luke , Acts is the second of a two-volume work compiled by the author of Luke. Both volumes are dedicated to Theophilus presumably an imperial official , and its contents are divided into periods.

In the Gospel, Luke describes first the end of the old dispensation and then the earthly life of Jesus. Near the end of the Gospel, the stage is set for the next period: This Jewish festival of the revelation of the Law on Mt. Sinai becomes the day when the Spirit is poured out. For Acts this event marks the beginning of a new era Acts 2: Although the title, Acts of the Apostles, suggests that the aim of Acts is to give an account of the deeds of the Apostles, the title actually was a later addition to the work about the end of the 2nd century.

Acts depicts the shift from Jewish Christianity to Gentile Christianity as relatively smooth and portrays the Roman government as regarding the Christian doctrine as harmless. Probably written shortly after Luke c. Luke edited his history as a series of accounts, and thus Acts is not history in the sense of accurate chronology or of continuity of events but in the ancient sense of rhetoric with an apologetic aim.

The author weaves strands of varying traditions and sources into patterns loosely clustered around a nucleus of past events viewed from the vantage point of later development. The structuring of the material by time and geography may account for the unique way in which both the Ascension of Christ to heaven 40 days after the Resurrection and the outpouring of the Spirit at Pentecost 50 days after the Resurrection became fixed and dated events.

The redactor editor of Acts composed speeches with primary primitive material within them; about one-fifth of Acts is composed in this way. This manner of using speeches was part of the style and purpose of the work and was not unlike that of other ancient historians such as Josephus, Plutarch, and Tacitus. These do not, however, necessarily point to Luke as a companion of Paul —as has been commonly assumed—but are rather a stylistic device, such as that noted particularly in itinerary accounts in other ancient historical works e.

That an actual companion of Paul writing about his mission journeys could be in so much disagreement with Paul whose theology is evidenced in his letters about fundamental issues such as the Law, his apostleship, and his relationship to the Jerusalem church is hardly conceivable. There are some Semitisms, especially when stressing Jewish backgrounds; thus, Paul is called Saul in accounts of his conversion experience on Damascus road. The outline of Acts can be roughly divided into two parts: The earlier sections deal with the Jerusalem church under Peter and the gradual spread of the gospel beyond Jewish limits in chapters 10—11, for example, Peter is led by the Spirit to baptize the Roman centurion, Cornelius.

References to Peter are abruptly ended in chapter 12; James, the brother of the Lord, has become the head of the Jerusalem church, and Philip, a Greek-speaking missionary, is commanded by the Spirit to baptize an Ethiopian eunuch.

John and Philosophy

After that, Paul is imprisoned and sent to Rome where Acts leaves him witnessing openly and unhindered in the capital of the Empire. After the Council of Jerusalem c. After Peter healed a lame man, he made a speech, in chapter 3, in which Jesus is proclaimed as the one appointed but who is now in heaven and who will come as the Christ at the Parousia Second Coming. The titles used for Jesus show both a preservation of primitive tradition and theology and a clear differentiation made by the writer between Jesus in his earthly life in Luke and reflection on him in Acts. Christ Messiah is consciously used as the title of Jesus; the title Son of man, used frequently in Luke, is used only once in Acts, at the death of the martyr Stephen, when he is granted a vision of the Lord in glory.

The more primitive Christologies and titles show not only a flexibility of traditions but also the functional nature of New Testament Christology. Acts presents a picture of Paul that differs from his own description of himself in many of his letters, both factually and theologically. In Acts, Paul, on his way to Damascus to persecute the church, is dramatically stopped by a visionary experience of Jesus and is later instructed.

In his letters, however, Paul stated that he was called by direct revelation of the risen Lord and given a vocation for which he had been born recalling the call of an Old Testament prophet, such as Jeremiah and was instructed by no man. In Acts, Paul is presented as having received from the Jerusalem apostolic council the authority for his mission to the Gentiles as well as their decision—the so-called apostolic decree According to this decree, Gentile converts to Christianity were to abstain from pollutions of idols pagan cults , unchastity, from what is strangled, and from blood referring to the Jewish cultic food laws as showing continuity with the old Israel.

Circumcision, however, was not required, an important concession on the part of the Jewish Christians. When Paul entered a new city, he went first to the synagogue. If his message of the gospel was rejected, he turned to the Gentiles. Roman authorities are depicted as treating Paul and other Christians in a just manner. The author repeatedly stressed that the Roman authorities did not find fault with the Christians but rather viewed Christian—Jewish antagonisms merely as one problem among Jewish factions.

While in Corinth, during a conflict with the Jews, the Roman proconsul of Achaea in Greece , Gallio, refused to hear the charges brought against Paul because, according to Roman law , they were extralegal. On a later occasion in Ephesus, during a conflict with the silversmiths who derived their income from selling statuettes of the goddess Diana, Paul was protected from local antagonisms and a riot by Roman authorities.

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He thus had to go to Rome to be tried, and that is the last that is heard about him in Acts. Just as Jesus started his public ministry in Luke by reading from the Book of Isaiah: That persons from many nations heard in their own tongues the mighty works of God has been viewed as a reversal of the Tower of Babel narrative, with languages no more confused and people no longer scattered.

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Although Peter, Stephen, and Paul are central figures in Acts, the piety of the humbler members of the church also permeates the book. Church structure and organization, with apostles, disciples, elders, prophets, and teachers, exhibits great fluidity. The readers, however, probably knew what had happened to them— i. We welcome suggested improvements to any of our articles.

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Previous page The Synoptic Gospels. Page 25 of Next page The Pauline Letters. Learn More in these related Britannica articles: Judaism , monotheistic religion developed among the ancient Hebrews. Judaism is characterized by a belief in one transcendent God who revealed himself to Abraham, Moses, and the Hebrew prophets and by a religious life in accordance with Scriptures and rabbinic traditions. Judaism is the complex phenomenon of a total way of…. Hebrew Bible , collection of writings that was first compiled and preserved as the sacred books of the Jewish people.

It constitutes a large portion of the Christian Bible. A brief treatment of the Hebrew Bible follows. For full treatment, see biblical literature. Bible , the sacred scriptures of Judaism and Christianity. The Christian Bible consists of the Old Testament and the New Testament, with the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox versions of the Old Testament being slightly larger because of their acceptance of certain books and parts of books considered apocryphal by Protestants.

Christianity , major religion, stemming from the life, teachings, and death of Jesus of Nazareth the Christ, or the Anointed One of God in the 1st century ce.