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Issue 9,2 (Fall 2020)
Gender as a Lens to Interrogate Second-Century Jesus Movements

Full Text (2 MB)

Preface / read online here

Thinking through Gender in the Second-Century Jesus Movements
— Celene Lillie

The Gender of Martyrdom
— Virginia Burrus

(Re)reading Regulating Sex in the Roman Empire One Year Later
— David Wheeler-Reed

Women: Their Visibility and Agency and Loss of Agency in Early Christian Texts
— Joanna Dewey

Issue 9,1 (Spring 2020)
The Value of Rhetoric in the Ancient Christian Context

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Preface / read online here

Learning from Rhetoric in the Study of Paul: Gal 1:10–20
—Nina E. Livesey

Is Jesus YHWH? Two De-Judaizing Trajectories of Marcion and Justin
—David E. Wilhite

Prophecy, Christology, and Anti-Judaism in Justin Martyr
—Robert J. Miller

Re-defining “Solitude”: Monastic Registers of Fictive (and Factual) Family
—Lillian I. Larsen

Issue 8,2 (Fall 2019)
Christianity Seminar: Estimating Authority and Ritual Practice

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Preface / read online here

Cursing and the Apostle – The Fight for Authority in Early Christianity
—Tony Burke

The Contested Authority of Paul in the Second Century
—Jason Beduhn

Changing Courses – Eucharistic Origins
—Andrew McGowan

The Ritual of the Hellenistic Meal  – Early Christian Everyday Practice as an Exegetical Challenge
—Soham Al-Suadi

Issue 8,1 (Spring 2019)
Christianity Seminar: Religious Identity, Violence, and Roman Power

Full Text (3.85 MB)

Preface / read online here

Judith Perkins and “Christian” Identity Formation
—Richard S. Ascough

Difference and Similarity
—Nina e. Livesey

Hidden Transcripts of Violence and Partial Recovery in the First Two Centuries
—Hal Taussig

The Arch of Titus
—Bernard Brandon Scott

Issue 7,2 (Fall 2018)
God Seminar: The Displacement of Theology

Full Text (1.36 MB)

Preface / read online here

The Meaning of Heresy for Today: On Theo-Political Resistance from Spinoza to Prince
—Jeffrey Robbins

Surveying Heidegger for Theology’s Future
—David Galston

Paul Tillich and the Discourse of Political Theology
—Clayton Crockett

Archive Theology and the God of Paul
—David Galston

Issue 7,1 (Spring 2018)
Christianity Seminar: Musings on Christian Origins

Full Text (2.89 MB)

Preface / read online here

The Quest for Christian Origins
—Burton Mack

The Labors of Burton Mack: Scholarship That’s Made a Difference
—Ron Cameron

Where We Go Next—Big Questions for the Big Picture: A Response to Burton Mack, and Reflections on the Future of the Christianity Seminar
—Maia Kotrosits

In the Beginning Was the House: Part One: How Social and Identity Formation of Early Christian Groups Took Place
—Dennis E. Smith

In the Beginning Was the House: Part Two: The Exegetical Data
—Dennis E. Smith

Issue 6,2 (Fall 2017)
Christianity Seminar: The Language of Apocalyptic

Full Text (2.19 MB)

Preface / read online here
—Arthur J. Dewey

God, ReTALIation, and the Apocalyptic Scenario
—Lane C. McGaughy

Switchback Codes: Paul, Apocalyptic, and the Art of Resistance
—Arthur J. Dewey

From the Herodians to Hadrian: The Shifting Status of Judean Religion in Post-Flavian Rome
—Heidi Wendt

Judean Diaspora, Judean War: Class and Networks
—John W. Marshall

Issue 6,1 (Spring 2017)
Christianity Seminar: Rethinking Martyrdom in Early Christian Identity

Full Text (1.43 MB)

Preface
—Carly Daniel-Hughes

Producing and Contesting Martyrdom in Pre-Decian Roman North Africa
—Carly Daniel-Hughes

Gladiators and Martyrs: Icons in the Arena
—Susan M. (Elli) Elliott

What Do Fiction, Mass Crucifixions and Killer Seals Add Up To?: Summarizing Breakthroughs in Martyrdom Scholarship Since 1990
—Hal Taussig

Sovereignty in Ruins: The Death of Ignatius and Ecologies of Destruction
—Maia Kotrosits

Issue 5,2 (Fall 2016)
God Seminar: Opening the Discussion on God and the Human Future

Full Text (2 MB)

Preface (David Galston)

Contending with Postmodern Hermeneutics and Biblical Criticism: Thinking Philosophical Theology with the Jesus Seminar (David Galston)

A Short Précis of The Weakness of God and The Insistence of God (John D. Caputo)

Moving Words: Theology and the Performance of Proposing (Joseph Bessler)

Plato and Christian Belief (John Kelly)

Hylotheism: Life as a Slide Show (Jarmo Tarkki)

Issue 5,1 (Spring 2016)
Reflections on the Category Gnosticism

Full Text (2.3 MB)

Preface (Maia Kotrosits)

Questioning the Category of Gnosticism for the Rewriting of the History of Early Christianity: An Appreciation and Extension of the Work of Karen King (Hal Taussig)

But What Do We Call It?: The Secret Revelation of John and Crises of Categories (Maia Kotrosits)

What Categories Are Left?: A Conversation with Karen King’s What is Gnosticism? (Bernard Brandon Scott)

“Are you, or have you ever been, a gnostic?”: Caricatures, Blacklists, and Understanding the Aspirations and Lives of Real People (Michael Williams)

Issue 4,2 (Fall 2015)
Challenging Common Conceptions of Early Christianity

Full Text (1.39 MB)

Preface (Nina E. Livesey)

John’s Radical Rewriting of Luke-Acts (Dennis R. MacDonald)

Acts in Ephesus (and Environs) c. 115 (Richard I. Pervo)

How Acts Constructed the Itinerary of Paul: Conclusions Excerpted from the Acts Seminar Report (Dennis E. Smith)

The New Marcion: Rethinking the “Arch-Heretic” (Jason BeDuhn)

Social Fragmentation and Cosmic Rhetoric: Interpretations of Isaiah in the Nag Hammadi Codices (Maia Kotrosits)

Second-Century Imaginations of Social Unity: A Survey of the Gospel of Truth, the Letter of Peter to Philip, the Post-Pauline Letter to the Ephesians, and The Thunder: Perfect Mind (Hal Taussig)

Issue 4,1 (Spring 2015)
Early Christianity in its Mediterranean Contexts

Full Text (PDF, 2 MB)

Preface (Christine Shea)

Per Omnia Saecula Saeculorum: Worlds Colliding and Created (Arthur J. Dewey)

Roman Apocalypses: Death, Doom, and Delight in the Early Empire (Christine Shea)

Women in the Authentic Letters of Paul (Nina Livesey)

The Old Testament and Second-Century Christians (Joseph B. Tyson)

By the Book: Canon Formation among the Romans (Christine Shea)

Issue 3,2 (Fall 2014)
Looking Back: Assessing the work of Rudolf Bultmann

Full Text (PDF, 1.05 MB)

Preface (Lane C. McGaughy)

The Legacy of Rudolf Bultmann and the Ideal of a Fully Critical Theology (Schubert M. Ogden)

Reflections on Konrad Hammann’s Biography of Rudolf Bultmann—with Implications for Christology (Philip Devenish)

Demythologizing and Christology (William O. Walker, Jr.)

Kêrygma and History in the Thought of Rudolf Bultmann (Gerd Lüdemann)

The ‘Gospel’ and the Emperor Cult: From Bultmann to Crossan (Jon F. Dechow)

Issue 3,1 (Spring 2014)
Syria and Christian Origins

Full Text (PDF, 1.44 MB)

Preface (Clayton N. Jefford)

Paneas/Caesarea Philippi and the World of the Gospels (John Francis Wilson)

Peter’s Antiochene Apostasy—Re‐Judaizing or Imperial Conformism? An Inter‐textual Exploration (Brigitte Kahl)

Locating the Didache (Clayton N. Jefford)

Visualizing the Christian Community at Antioch: The Window of the Didache (Nancy Pardee)

“That By His Passion He May Purify the Water”: Ignatius of Antioch and the Beginning of Mark’s Gospel (Charles A. Bobertz)

Story and Ritual as the Foundation of Nations (Helmut Koester)

Issue 2,2
Rethinking the Book of Acts

Full Text (PDF, 1.4 MB)

Preface (Nina E. Livesey)

Religious Practices of Early Christian Converts according to Acts 2:41-47 (Dennis E. Smith)

Is There a There There? Looking for Antioch in the Former Antioch Source (Richard I. Pervo)

What Athens Has in Common with Jerusalem: The Speeches in Acts as Historical Record (Richard I. Pervo)

Circumcision as a Means of Testing the Historicity of Acts 16:1-5 (Nina E. Livesey)

‘And so we left Troy/Troas’: Pseudo-Luke’s Imitation of We-Voyages in Homer’s Odyssey (Dennis R. MacDonald)

Historical Issues in Acts 28:11-31 (Gerd Lüdemann)

Issue 2,1
Galilee and Christian Origins

Full Text (PDF, 1.2 MB)

Preface (Stephen J. Patterson)

The Trouble with Q (William Arnal)

Postcolonial Issues Post-Calvary: Which Imperial Overlay Defined Galilee—the Roman-Herodian, or the Judean-Hasmonean? (Marianne Sawicki)

A Galilean Provenance for the Gospel of Mark? (Joanna Dewey)

First-century Christianities: Galilee (James M. Robinson)

Issue 1,2
The Quest of Christian Origins

Full Text (PDF, 1.3 MB)

Preface (Mahlon H. Smith)

When Did Christianity Begin? (Philip E. Devenish)

Did Christianity Begin with the Resurrection? (Joseph A. Bessler)

The Resurrection of Jesus and Christian Origins (Daniel A. Smith)

Acts – A Myth of Christian Origins (Joseph B. Tyson)

Did Christianity Begin at Pentecost?: Reflections on the Question (Shelly Matthews)

Did Christianity Begin at Pentecost?: Beginnings and the Ends Thereof (Todd Penner)

“13 Ways of Looking at a Blackbird”: Paul and the Origins of Christianity (Arthur J. Dewey)

Christian Origins Seminar Voting Record

Issue 1,1
Reconstructing Historical Context

Full Text (PDF, 855 KB)

Preface (Mahlon H. Smith)

Writing and Imitation: Greek Education in the Greco-Roman World (Rubén R. Dupertius)

Education in Roman Palestine (Christine Shea)

The Implications of a Late Date for Acts (Joseph B. Tyson)

The Apocalypses and Acts of Paul: Do They Know the Pauline Epistles? (Robert M. Price)

Evidence for a Christian Goddess: The Bendis-Zodiac Relief at Philippi (Valerie Abrahamsen)

Acts Seminar Voting Record