Theology

The contributors to this volume examine the identity and roles of presbyters in early Christianity in the 1st and 2nd centuries. They explore biblical, Jewish, and Greco-Roman contexts and trace the development from age-related authority to formal leadership.

Christian Kamleiter shows how Rudolf Otto's theory of religion is based on extensive reflections on the possibilities and limits of religious communication. He places a special focus on Otto's unpublished lecture on dogmatics and reconstructs how Otto's theory of religious communication is an actualization of concepts prefigured by Friedrich Schleiermacher.

When and how do the disciples in the narrative development in the Gospel of John get into a relationship with and attain knowledge of Christ? Stefan Zorn develops a model of a multi-stage process of relationship and knowledge that includes crises and reaches its climax in encountering the Risen Christ.

In the Book of Ezekiel, the term »midst/middle« appears with the highest frequency in any book of the Hebrew Bible. In line with Ancient Near Eastern ideas of cosmic order, the concept of »center - periphery« serves to illustrate the prophet's message of doom and restoration for 6th century Israel.