What is it? In a nutshell, this volume attempts to bring together all the primary sources from the Jewish world (broadly defined) that are of relevance in the study of messianic ideas leading into and following shortly after the era of the apostolic church. It aims to be the go-to resource for anyone who wants to study the background of the development of early Christian ideas about Jesus Christ from the perspective of primary sources themselves, not just what so-and-so scholars say about them. As such, it includes ~300 passages that are regularly cited in the study of “Messiah” terminology, messianic metaphors, “wisdom” and “logos” speculation, and so on.
Nicholas Reid and I are pleased to announce the release of a new volume that is dedicated to our RTS-Orlando friend and colleague, Chuck Hill, on the occasion of his 65th birthday and retirement (at the end of this semester):
Given that it has been quite some time since my last post (COVID, etc.), I thought I’d do a quick synopsis of the various things I’ve had the privilege of working on over the past 12 or so months (rather than doing individual posts for everything).
New Book
In the latter part of 2020, my most recent book came out, entitled Is Jesus Truly God? How the Bible Teaches the Divinity of Christ. This was my first full-length project with Crossway, and it was a joy to work with Justin Taylor, David Barshinger, and several others on their team.
Today, Will Ross and I announced our forthcoming book, A Book-by-Book Guide to Septuagint Vocabulary, which hits the shelves in a few weeks. This book is aimed at students who have learned some beginning Greek (typically for NT studies) and want to branch into the Greek OT (commonly called the Septuagint).
You can find out more about what the book entails by visiting the post below!
We are pleased to announce that our new book, A Book-by-Book Guide to Septuagint Vocabulary (Hendrickson), is releasing in the coming weeks. It is currently on pre-order sale for 50% off as well!
What Is It?
This book fills an important gap in the market by providing a tool to help those reading the Septuagint “get up the learning curve” with Septuagint vocabulary. Surprisingly, there’s no comparable resource out there in an accessible form.
The book consists of 28 chapters that present vocabulary lists for specific sections of the Septuagint corpus. Within each chapter, vocabulary is arranged according to frequency for that section of the Septuagint, which allows users to focus on the most important words (by frequency) within sections of most importance to them. Each list consists of twenty words, which we deemed to be an ideal size for memorization. And each chapter includes enough lists (typically over a…
Probably his innumerable sufferings, his insufferable friends, his desire to speak to God, and his dust-and-ashes when God speaks back.
But what probably does not come to mind is this:
Job said to his friends, “Be silent! Now I will show you my throne and the glory and the majesty that is among the holy ones. My throne is in the upper-cosmos, and its glory and majesty is from the right hand of the Father. The whole world will perish and its glory will be destroyed, and those who cling to it will partake in its overthrow. But my throne exists in the holy land, and its glory is in the era of the unchanging. … My kingdom is forever and ever, and its glory and majesty exists in the chariots of the Father.”
A few months ago I saw an advertisement for the fourth edition of Bill Mounce’s Basics of Biblical Greek. I had learned Greek during seminary on the third edition of Mounce (with the “Professor” clippy thing and other foibles), and it is the edition from which I have taught for a few years at RTS-Orlando. With syllabi due for my summer courses, I knew I had to develop a perspective on the new edition as quickly as possible in order to decide whether to upgrade (and assign it to my incoming class).
Over at our church website, I have written a reflection on the significance of Mother’s Day (coming up this weekend!) for the entire body of Christ.
As a “life-stage” holiday, Mother’s Day is often a difficult time for many women (and men) in the church. But wherever someone is in life (a bereaved mother, a single mom, a single woman, an adoptive mother, etc.), Scripture has a clear voice that bestows enormous dignity on wherever God has you right now. Mother’s Day, by the logic of the kingdom of God, is for all women: for all ultimately become spiritual mothers within the church body.
Among scholars and laypersons alike, it is often though that Jesus was simply a human prophet or even failed apocalypticist. Maybe the Messiah of Israel, too. The idea that he is fully divine came into the picture later, as numerous Greek or other pagan influences infiltrated the church. Such is the thesis behind, say, Bart Ehrman’s How Jesus Became God. The culmination of this process, so the theory goes, is the Council of Nicaea (325AD), which produced the Nicene Creed affirming the full deity of Jesus.
But are there reasons to question this paradigm? I would argue quite strongly “YES!” The idea that the full divinity of Jesus didn’t just evolve at Nicaea but is found throughout the NT documents (and the OT as well) was central to my doctoral work and other research/teaching. In this short video that is part of RTS’s #WisdomWednesday series, I articulate a few of the reasons why.
Over at the River Oaks Church website (where I serve as Associate Pastor), I have written up a fairly detailed examination of the historical reasons why it is rational to believe in the bodily resurrection of Jesus.
It is well-known that only the NT and Christian sources indisputably record the claim that Jesus was resurrected from the dead. While many secular sources affirm his existence and his death, they are silent — apart from the disputed Testimonium Flavianum (attributed to Josephus) — on the empty tomb.
In late 2018 (in the UK), Christian Focus released my short book entitled How We Got the Bible. It is part of their “Christian Pocket Guides” series of books that target an educated layperson / pastor / student audience with accessible but still academically-rich content.
In this short volume (~107 pages), I try to distill down to the essentials the vast landscape of issues pertaining to how Scripture came together and made it to the present day church.
