Religious Studies

Serhii Smahlo investigates Jesus' table fellowship with outcasts in light of Jewish eschatological expectations. He explores how Jesus' inclusion of »unexpected participants« embodied the concept of reversal - »the last will be first and the first will be last« - and how this enactment sparked conflict and ultimately led to Jesus' rejection.

The problem of natural theology has become more acute in late modernity. With impulses from the philosophy of religion, problem-historical analyses and contemporary systematic-theological reflections, the contributors to this volume undertake a reassessment of the problem field of natural theology.

Although scriptural discourses in late antiquity are eminently characterized by forms of wisdom thinking, wisdom is not yet an established category in Qur'anic and Islamic studies. The contributors to this volume explore traces of wisdom thinking, teaching, and interpretation in an interreligious perspective from the Hebrew Bible to the gospels and Hellenistic and late antique literature, and ask for its continuing presence in the context of Islam.

Tyler Hallstrom engages in the debate about the meaning of Jesus's dramatic disturbance in the Jerusalem Temple. He provides an in-depth study of the relevant biblical texts, historical context, and socio-economic factors and concludes that Jesus's indignation was indeed directed at economic exploitation in the temple.