Theology

Manse Rim examines the relation between messiah and righteousness in ancient Jewish texts and in the letters of Paul, aiming to offer a fresh perspective on the current impasse regarding Pauline justification. By tracing moral, administrative, and eschatological dimensions, he redefines the framework for understanding Pauline righteousness.

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.

Simon Birol examines the conceptions of Jacob of Serugh regarding the ascetic life, both as a solitary and within the community, and situates them within the development of early Syriac monasticism. The basis for this study consists of two Syriac texts by Jacob, including the work On the Solitaries, here critically edited for the first time.

Philippa Townsend argues that early Christian sacrificial ideas were shaped by a widespread discursive association between ethnicity and sacrifice in ancient Mediterranean texts. Christians used sacrificial rhetoric to establish and perpetuate their identity as a people in ways that have shaped modern ideas about race and religion.