Paul: A Brief History (Wiley Blackwell Brief Histories of Religion)
Contents:
The lack of space means that some themes get axed. Theology receives very little coverage in this book except for the main points of Luther's contention with Rome. Luther dominates the book, though he is the obvious choice if limited to one in-depth biography. Such strict principles of exclusion enable what is perhaps the book's greatest achievement, an unhurried pace.
The reader is not crowded by details and even encounters at times a wry wit.
Professor John Barclay
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There are two major textual variants of Acts, the Western text-type and the Alexandrian.
The oldest complete Alexandrian manuscripts date from the 4th century and the oldest Western ones from the 6th, with fragments and citations going back to the 3rd. Western texts of Acts are 6.
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The debate therefore continues. Acts has two key structural principles. The first is the geographic movement from Jerusalem, centre of God's Covenantal people, the Jews, to Rome, centre of the Gentile world. This structure reaches back to the author's preceding work, the Gospel of Luke , and is signaled by parallel scenes such as Paul's utterance in Acts Paul has Rome as his destination, as Jesus had Jerusalem. The second key element is the roles of Peter and Paul, the first representing the Jewish Christian church, the second the mission to the Gentiles. The Gospel of Luke began with a prologue addressed to Theophilus; Acts likewise opens with an address to Theophilus and refers to "my earlier book", almost certainly the gospel.
The apostles and other followers of Jesus meet and elect Matthias to replace Judas as a member of The Twelve. On Pentecost , the Holy Spirit descends and confers God's power on them, and Peter, along with John, preaches to many in Jerusalem, and performs Christ-like healings, casting out of evil spirits , and raising of the dead. The first believers share all property in common , ate in each other's homes, and worshipped together. Stephen is arrested for blasphemy , and after a trial, is found guilty and stoned by the Jews.
Stephen's death marks a major turning point: The message is taken to the Samaritans, a people rejected by Jews, and to the Gentiles. Saul of Tarsus , one of the Jews who persecuted the Christians, is converted by a vision to become a follower of Christ an event which Luke regards as so important that he relates it three times.
Paul: A Brief History
Peter, directed by a series of visions, preaches to Cornelius the Centurion , a Gentile God-fearer, who becomes a follower of Christ. The Holy Spirit descends on Peter and Cornelius, thus confirming that the message of eternal life in Christ is for all mankind. The Gentile church is established in Antioch north-western Syria, the third-largest city of the empire , and here Christ's followers are first called Christians. The mission to the Gentiles is promoted from Antioch and confirmed at meeting in Jerusalem between Paul and the leadership of the Jerusalem church.
Paul spends the next few years traveling through western Asia Minor and the Aegean, preaching, converting Gentiles, and founding new churches. On a visit to Jerusalem he is set on by a Jewish mob. Saved by the Roman commander, he is accused by the Jews of being a revolutionary , the "ringleader of the sect of the Nazarenes", and imprisoned.
Paul asserts his right as a Roman citizen, to be tried in Rome and is sent by sea to Rome, where he spends another two years under house arrest, proclaiming the Kingdom of God and teaching the "Lord Jesus Christ". Acts ends abruptly without recording the outcome of Paul's legal troubles.
Prior to the s, Luke—Acts was seen as a historical work, written to defend Christianity before the Romans or Paul against his detractors; since then, however, the tendency has been to see the work as primarily theological. Luke—Acts is an attempt to answer a theological problem, namely how the Messiah promised to the Jews came to have an overwhelmingly non-Jewish church; the answer it provides, and its central theme, is that the message of Christ was sent to the Gentiles because the Jews rejected it.
For Luke, the Holy Spirit is the driving force behind the spread of the Christian message, and he places more emphasis on it than do any of the other evangelists. The Spirit is "poured out" at Pentecost , on the first Samaritan and Gentile believers, and on disciples who had been baptised only by John the Baptist , each time as a sign of God's approval. On the one hand, Luke generally does not portray this interaction as one of direct conflict.
Acts of the Apostles
Rather, there are ways in which each may have considered having a relationship with the other rather advantageous to its own cause. For example, early Christians may have appreciated hearing about the protection Paul received from Roman officials against Gentile rioters in Philippi Acts Thus Paul is depicted as a moderating presence between the church and the Roman Empire. Major turning points in the structure of Acts, for example, find parallels in Luke: These parallels continue through both books. There are also differences between Luke and Acts, amounting at times to outright contradiction.
On a visit to Jerusalem he is set on by a Jewish mob. The Developing "Science" of Biblical Interpretation. He also engages with the question of a Christian's proper relationship with the Roman Empire, the civil power of the day: There are no discussion topics on this book yet. The Ethics of Historical Reconstructions.
For example, the gospel seems to place the Ascension on Easter Sunday , immediately after the Resurrection , while Acts 1 puts it forty days later. While not seriously questioning the single authorship of Luke—Acts, these differences do suggest the need for caution in seeking too much consistency in books written in essence as popular literature. Acts agrees with Paul's letters on the major outline of Paul's career: There are also agreements on many incidents, such as Paul's escape from Damascus, where he is lowered down the walls in a basket.
But details of these same incidents are frequently seen as contradictory: Acts speaks of "Christians" and "disciples", but Paul never uses either term, and it is striking that Acts never brings Paul into conflict with the Jerusalem church and places Paul under the authority of the Jerusalem church and its leaders, especially James and Peter Acts 15 vs. There are also alleged major differences between Acts and Paul on Christology the understanding of Christ's nature , eschatology understanding of the "last things" , and apostleship.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. This article is about the book in the Christian New Testament.