Getting Started in Book Reviews

I was asked recently how to get started doing book reviews.  I will give some brief remarks.  First, why do book reviews?  In my opinion, it is a great thing to do for several reasons. First, you get a free book!  Second, you learn how to read actively and critically (though not necessarily negatively).  Third, [...]

More Abstracts available for British NT Conference seminars

We have awaited three groups posting their abstracts and paper titles for the British NT conference (Durham, Sept 4-6).  Two have posted recently.
Paul Seminar

Session 1:
Dr. Paul Ellingworth (Aberdeen)
‘”Nobody Knows de Trouble I Seen”: Hardship Lists in Paul and Elsewhere’The paper surveys discussions of Paul’s hardship lists from 1910 to 2007; analyzes the lists’ distinctive vocabulary [...]

The Logic of Paul’s Ethics (Eduard Lohse)

In 1988, German Lutheran Bishop and Biblical scholar Eduard Lohse set out to write a ‘theological ethics’ of the New Testament (Theologische Ethik des Neuen Testaements; Stuttgart : W. Kohlhammer) subsequently translated into English in 1991 by E. Boring (Fortress Press).  Though Lohse attempts a synthetic approach to the whole of the NT in terms [...]

Forthcoming Books 2008 (as advertised in SBL Nov programme)

Here is a brief list of books I might be tempted to buy at SBL…maybe I will follow around Mike Bird and his shameless attempts to be gifted books since SBL falls on his birthday – I can only hope to collect the scraps that fall from his table (remember Mike, Jesus granted to the [...]

The Logic of Paul’s Ethics (Paul Sampley)

More than two decades after V.P. Furnish’s Theology and Ethics in Paul, another Methodist scholar, J.P. Sampley, set out to write a book on Paul’s moral logic. 
Walking Between the Times: Paul’s Moral Reasoning (Fortress, 1991).
This much shorter treatment (120 pages, compared to Furnish’s 300+) has a clear focus even in the title, where ‘walking between [...]

The Logic of Paul’s Ethics (beginning with V.P. Furnish)

In my research I am interacting quite a bit with the question of Paul’s hermeneutic of morality, his theology of life-walk, his moral reasoning, or, as Brian Rosner puts it, the ‘logic’ of his ethics.  Sadly there have been few throughout history that have dealt directly with this issue in Paul.  In fact, before Bultmann, [...]

Need Advice on Research (Paul and ethics)

In the next section of my research I am working on, I am doing a whirlwind tour of Paul’s ethical framework.  I aim to read the top 15-20 books on the subject.  I have created a rough list, but I was hoping any of you ethicists and/or Paulinists could draw to my attention other books.  [...]

Don Carson and the Two Kinds of Dissertations

I recently stumbled across this statement by Don Carson about two ways to approach a dissertation and it is insightful for students looking forward to doctoral research, those of us currently in progress, and professors who advise and prepare future researchers.  Carson writes:
‘I frequently tell my doctoral students as they embark on their research that [...]

Identity Crisis in New Testament Studies

In NT studies, there has been, for some time, a lot of talk about “identity” – Paul’s “Identity.” “Identity formation.” “Social identity.” In a lot of these conversations, it is presumed that identity is important and the influence and formation of it is crucial for the NT writers. But what is [...]

Towards becoming a more well-rounded biblical theologian

The more advanced you get in your own research area, it seems, the further away you get from being able to have simple and mutually beneficial dialogues with scholars from other disciplines, let alone the average bible college student or informed layperson.  AS I think about teaching in a seminary one day, I am trying [...]