Theology

This volume contributes to the reconstruction of the history of ancient Christians on the basis of an exemplary selection of Greek inscriptions. Fifteen essays discussing inscriptions from Asia Minor and Greece offer striking insights into the lives, beliefs, and diversity of Christian communities that literary sources largely pass over.

Mark S. Smith maps four decades of Psalms research, foregrounding cultural contexts, pilgrimage motifs, and embodied emotion. He explores genre-bending poetics and argues for the Psalter as a carefully composed whole, shaped by its Levitical compilers and structured like an opera in five movements.

In twelve revised and expanded essays on the Johannine writings, Michael Theobald takes up central debates - the genesis of the Corpus Iohanneum, the Johannine Lord's Supper - and turns his attention to questions of reception history, such as the interpretation of the Gospel in mysticism.

Gotthold E. Lessing's literary work reveals a profound theological dimension. Especially in his early writings, the pastor's son engages critically and intensely with Christianity. Christian anthropology however is, as Steffen Götze's analysis shows, a cornerstone of Lessing's literary oeuvre.