English 116B: New Testament Literature

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English 116B New Testament Literature

• Texts
• New Testament and Other Early Christian Writings,
  2nd edition, ed. Bart D. Ehrman
• The New Testament a Historical Introduction to
  the Early Christian Writings, by Bart D. Ehrman,
  3rd edition, 2004.
• Reader available today from Grafikart in IV.

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Requirements

• Two essays (due dates on syllabus) on topics to
  be assigned.
• Participation in discussion section.
• Midterm exam.
• Final exam.
• Lecture attendance is important please be on
  time and as a courtesy to fellow students and the
  lecturer, please do not leave before the lecture
  is over.
• Youll find the percentages of each assignment on
  class webpage

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What is The New Testament?

• Part 2 of The Bible. Bible ta biblia, the
  books.
• 27 books in NT, some long, some very short.
• All written in Koiné Greek (as opposed to the
  Hebrew of Old Testament or Hebrew Scriptures.)
• Four gospels, written by anonymous authors
  traditionally designated Matthew, Mark, Luke, and
  John.
• Acts of the Apostles, originally Part II of a
  large work that began with Gospel of Luke.
• Then the Epistles, 21 books ranging from the
  lengthy theological treatise of Romans to short,
  one-page letters like Philemon, some by St. Paul,
  some by others, including the anonymous Letter to
  the Hebrews.
• Finally, Revelation to John, or The Apocalypse, a
  radically symbolic, visionary book.

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The Law and the Prophets

• Two-part division of Hebrew Scriptures as
  understood in time of Jesus.
• Refers to the Law, or Torah, the first five books
  of Hebrew Bible, and the second part, the
  prophetic and wisdom writings.
• In ordering of NT, are four gospels and Acts
  intended as analogous to Law/Torah?
• And Epistles plus Revelation equivalent to
  Prophets?

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The Canon and the non-canonical texts

• Canon measuring rod.
• Canon of NT scriptures only emerged three
  centuries after time of Jesus and apostles, in
  fourth century C.E.
• But previous lists indicate that not all 27 books
  were always accepted everywhere.
• E.g., lots of doubt about Revelation.
• And some early Christian communities accepted
  other books.
• After discoveries of Nag Hamadi documents, we
  know there was a huge variety in what early
  Christians believed, what books they read,
  valued.
• Lots more books than the canonical 27!
• Well read Gospel of Thomas and some fragments of
  other non-canonical gospels.

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Central idea of each part of Bible

• In Hebrew Scriptures that God is one and that he
  revealed himself over time to Israel.
• That the Law (639 precepts) contain his will for
  Israel, that Israels history similarly manifests
  his design for Israel.
• In (canonical) New Testament that God revealed
  himself definitively in one man, Jesus, an
  itinerant rabbi from Nazareth.
• This one man and the question of his identity is
  at the center of all NT books.

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Jesus/Yeshua

• Actual name in Aramaic Yeshua, a variation of
  Joshua.
• Christ a title, not his last name!
• From Greek christos, anointed one.
• Which translates messiah, a title of kings in
  Hebrew Scriptures.
• In later biblical times, messiah referred to a
  king or warrior who would liberate Israel from
  first Greek, then Roman dominance.
• So Christos makes a particular claim about
  Yeshua . . .
• . . . one that doesnt necessarily include a
  claim about divinity, divine sonship, etc.

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Relationship of Old and New Testaments

• On one hand, Jesus was a devout Jew, whose
  identity was founded on the Hebrew Scriptures.
• All of his immediate followers similarly were
  Jews, who revered the Hebrew Scriptures.
• But many gentile ( non Jewish) followers in
  second generation would not have understood or
  valued Hebrew Scriptures.
• In second century, nascent Christianity was
  tempted to sever the link to Judaism, Hebrew
  Scriptures.

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Marcion

• In middle of second century, c. 144, Marcion, an
  early Christian bishop, taught that God of Hebrew
  Scriptures and God of Jesus were different,
  opposed gods.
• God of Old Testament was a harsh, judgmental
  god, entirely separate from merciful god of New
  Testament.
• Entirely rejected Old Testament and all NT
  writings except 10 Pauline epistles and an edited
  version of Gospel of Luke.
• But this was rejected as heretical by the church
  in Rome, to which Marcion presented his ideas.
• Marcion then formed his own sect, Marcionites,
  who were judged heretical.
• But survived as a separate Christian movement for
  a couple of centuries.

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Essential relation to Old Testament

• Henceforth, Hebrew Scriptures, the Old
  Testament was considered essential to Christian
  understanding.
• Understanding prevailed that Jesus was the
  messiah who emerged from Israel.
• NT writers quote Hebrew Scriptures some 1600
  times.
• In spite of tragic conflict of Judaism and
  Christianity that occurred at end of 1st century,
  the relation of Christianity to Judaism was
  preserved.

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Do all canonical books agree?

• The Canon imposes a kind of artificial sense of
  agreement on 27 books of NT.
• NT written within a 75 year time period, from
  early 50s (early letters of Paul) to first
  decades of second century (letters of Paul to
  Titus, Timothy, letters of Peter).
• But when seen individually and in historical
  development, canonical books dont always agree.
• In fact, elements of some books oppose things in
  other books.
• Some books perhaps written in opposition to one
  another!
• For example, why four gospels?
• No single, monolithic understanding of Jesus of
  Nazareth among gospels and other NT texts.
• Elements of agreement yes but also
  significant disagreement at times.

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Need to defamiliarize NT texts

• Traditional view of Bethlehem scene three magi,
  shepherds.
• But this comes of two different, partially
  opposing texts, Matthew and Luke.
• Defamiliarizing means seeing each text afresh,
  seeing each as having separate identity and
  purpose, coming from different communities.

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Before there was Mark, Matthew, Luke, John . . .

• . . . there was Q!
• Q quelle, source in German.
• Scholars hypothesize that this was originally a
  separate document that preceded the canonical
  gospel texts.
• Q, as now constituted, is extracted from Matthew
  and Luke, sayings they have in common that are
  not found in Mark.
• (Mark and Q are the sources common to both
  Matthew and Luke.)
• A non-narrative text a collection of sayings.
• We can thus call Q a sayings gospel, collection
  of sayings of Jesus.
• Q becomes for us a virtual gospel, i.e., real,
  but something that must be reconstructed
  hypothetically.

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The synoptic question

• The relationship of Matthew, Mark, Luke, the
  synoptic gospels.
• John is a separate tradition, mostly unrelated to
  M, M, L.
• Best understanding Mark came first.
• And was the narrative source, independently, for
  Matthew and for Luke.
• And Matthew and Luke shared another source, now
  lost . . .
• . . . which is Q.
• (Each also had independent source material.)
• Modern scholarship sees Q existing independently
  in various versions.

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What do we make of Q and a Q community?

• Dont take too seriously the various strata of
  Q that Burton Mack posits. Macks agenda.
• But how would we characterize the teaching of
  Jesus from Q, if all we had was Q?
• Whats missing in Q from sense of Jesus drawn
  from later, narrative gospels?
• What sort of community would value this Q version
  of Jesus.
• How do we interpret, lacking any narrative
  context?