Professor Perkins compares Jesus with other types of teachers of his day: philosophers, interpreters of the law, prophets, and visionaries. Jesus is characterized as a charismatic teacher and prophet who addressed his message to all people, as opposed to the elite groups taught in formal schools in ancient times. Readers are shown how Jesus used parables, proverbs, legal and prophetic sayings t…
This book examines the social, economic, political, and cultural context of first-century Judaism. Precipitated by the coming of the Romans during the previous century, Judaism experienced a crisis of cultural erosion in the first century A.D. The author first describes the ways in which foreign domination threatened the Jewish community - for example, by causing a migration away from the count…
Argues that the time has come to dissolve the problem of history versus theology: "Both yield fictions; both seek to tell or reveal what is true." Terrence Tilley maintains that the disciplines of history and theology influence each other in ways that arent necessarily contradictory. After laying out the "problematic," he analyzes current approaches to the relationship between history and th…
The Holy Web offers entree to the world revealed by contemporary science and the difference the new models of our life on earth make to understanding Christianity. The author shows how the church's mission is to become and to nurture a dynamic "web of relationships" in which all humanity can find itself part of a wondrous whole. Wessels offers a profound reading of biblical categories. He shows…