Knapp, Robert (2018), The Dawn of Christianity. People and Gods in a Time of Magic and Miracles. London: Profile Books Ltd.

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Freed by Love and for Love: Freedom in the New Testament

In recent decades there has been an intensively renewed interest in the origins and development of ‘christology’, or, to use a broader term intended to take into account religious practices as well as ideas/beliefs, earliest ‘devotion’ to Jesus. In general, this newer work has emphasized the early period and Jewish religious setting in which this remarkable devotion to Jesus first emerged (e.g., Newman, Davila, Lewis 1999), and scholars have thus explored in what ways Jesus-devotion may have drawn upon Jewish tradition and how it may have represented something innovative. In particular, there are questions about the means by which early believers shaped by Jewish tradition with its concern for the uniqueness of God may have accommodated devotion to Jesus as in some way bearing divine significance. The Qumran texts comprise a major and unique cache of material giving us access to second-temple Jewish religious tradition, and are, thus, integral in all of this investigation (e.g., Segal 1992)

New Testament Studies in the 20th Century

Considered diachronically, NT studies in the twentieth century is a story of vigorous scholarship. Especially after World War II, there is increasing diversification in approach and in the makeup of scholars, with a noticeable shift of centre to English-speaking settings (especially North America), and greater involvement of Roman Catholic, Evangelical, and Jewish scholars, a growing prominence of women, and a proliferation of approaches

Does Philo Help Explain Early Christianity?

To pose such a large question in the limited space provided by this essay will seem unwise, and justifiably so, and may even be mistaken as a trivializing of the issue. Whatever may be the limits of my sagacity, however, I can give the strongest assurance that I regard the question as by no means trivial. Granted, I address the question, not from the standpoint of a Philo specialist, but as someone whose primary concern is to understand Christian origins in historical perspective. But, with the benefit of a considerable body of scholarship provided by specialists in Philo, especially in recent decades, this is an appropriate point at which to consider this question, and to attempt to take stock of what we have learne

Monotheism, Principal Angels, and the Background of Christology

In recent decades there has been an intensively renewed interest in the origins and development of ‘christology’, or, to use a broader term intended to take into account religious practices as well as ideas/beliefs, earliest ‘devotion’ to Jesus. In general, this newer work has emphasized the early period and Jewish religious setting in which this remarkable devotion to Jesus first emerged (e.g., Newman, Davila, Lewis 1999), and scholars have thus explored in what ways Jesus-devotion may have drawn upon Jewish tradition and how it may have represented something innovative. In particular, there are questions about the means by which early believers shaped by Jewish tradition with its concern for the uniqueness of God may have accommodated devotion to Jesus as in some way bearing divine significance. The Qumran texts comprise a major and unique cache of material giving us access to second-temple Jewish religious tradition, and are, thus, integral in all of this investigation (e.g., Segal 1992)

The 'Meta-Data' of Earliest Christian Manuscripts

The earliest extant physical artefacts of Christianity are manuscripts, and scholars concerned with the origins of Christianity should feel more obliged to familiarize themselves with these artefacts as a matter of some priority. This obligation is not, however, sufficiently widely recognized in the field, largely because many scholars do not realize what these items have to offer. So, the aim in this short discussion is to illustrate what sorts of data early Christian manuscripts present to students of Christian origins. Within the space available, I shall merely offer some selective illustrations of the sorts of features of early Christian manuscripts that may be of significance for larger historical issues, including Jewish and Christian relations in the first three centuries. I have offered a more extended discussion of these matters in the form of a modest-sized boo