Romans 3 is a treasure trove of theological riches, a thematic junction where nearly every major theme in this complex epistle emerges. Yet for this same reason, exegetically it is one of the most notoriously difficult passages in the New Testament. The focused and interdisciplinary approach to this one particular chapter in Romans allows for greater depth of research than is generally possible in commentaries, and the variety of methodological approaches employed shines light from different angles to bring out the numerous facets of these verses. Those who write commentaries or do research on Romans, and especially on Romans 3, will find in this book a wealth of information. Likewise, it will be of value to students in advanced exegetical classes and to those doing postgraduate research on Romans 3 and related topics.

The essays collected in Revelation and Leadership in the Kingdom of God intend to honor Professor Ian Arthur Fair, a distinguished biblical scholar and leader in Christian education, known for his groundbreaking research on the Book of Revelation and church leadership. Scholarly contributions included in the Festschrift mirror Fair’s own scholarly interests, including biblical studies, with particular attention to the New Testament apocalyptic traditions, philosophy of missions, theology of worship, history of the Restoration movement, and modern theology. The content of the Festschrift thus closely follows Fair's own spiritual and scholarly journey and also reflects the breadth and scope of his influence on the church and the academy.

How can one distinguish between narrative, which records a sequence of events, and a narrator's comment on these events, in the form of notes, clarifications, and retellings? Syntax of Targumic Aramaic: A Text-Linguistic Reading of 1 Samuel applies the insights of Functional Sentence Perspective and Text Linguistics to Targum 1 Samuel. Through this analysis, Condrea answers key questions about Aramaic syntax and recovers the voice and contributions of the text's narrator.

Biblical theology is confronted with tensions between love and justice. There are sometimes attempts to avoid these tensions by dissolving one side of the opposing concept. One such attempt is to identify love and mercy as the essence of Christian theology, overcoming law and reciprocal justice. However, such a dissolution is irresponsible not only ethically, but also theologically—as the discussion in a number of the studies collected in the present volume will demonstrate.

This volume explores storm-/warrior-god motif as found in non-biblical ANE texts, followed by an analysis of the language and imagery in several noteworthy theophanic passages in the Hebrew Bible. These characteristics and vocabulary are used in later chapters to identify and analyze similar motifs in the Twelve Prophets, especially focusing on Mic 7:7-20; Habakkuk 3; and Zech 9:9-16 as test cases. By tracing the use of the storm-/warrior-god motif and language associated with it, a detectable shift is apparent in the use of the motif in the HB that corresponds with the development of monotheism within Ancient Israelite religion.

This monograph assesses John’s creative interaction with imagery from his cultural context (Roman emperor worship), from the key writings of his apparent religious heritage (the Old Testament), and from convictions shared within the wider early Christian community in his depiction of Jesus in Revelation.

Psalms containing lexemes derived from the Hebrew root צרר (to bind, be in distress) reveal a previously-unnoticed generic subgroup in the Psalter. Through structural and cognitive linguistic principles, Rasmussen explores issues related to genre, Hebrew grammar, and syntax in order to arrive at a set of three cognitive domains of “powerlessness,” “palpable threat,” and “entreaty” which are relatively unique to psalms that include צרר lexemes. Rasmussen also makes suggestions about the editorial process of the Hebrew Psalter, concluding that after the Babylonian exile, distress was more strongly associated with divine discipline and displeasure, whereas before the exile it was more associated with declarations of innocence.

Scholars have long noted the importance of Isaiah in the Gospel of John, though few have focused exclusively on John’s use of Isaiah. The Servant of the Lord from Isaiah has also received much attention over the years, but commentators often only make passing reference to the Servant of the Lord in John. Day provides a systematic analysis of the Isaianic Servant in the Gospel of John.

The Coup of Jehoiada and the Fall of Athaliah explores the discursive and historiographical techniques used to incorporate 2 Kings 11 into the larger deuteronomistic history. More specifically, this book explores how and why the report of Athaliah’s execution was not incorporated into the deuteronomistic history the same way as other Ahabite death reports found in 1 Kings 14 – 2 Kings 10.

Scholars have long debated the identity of the servant in the first servant poem of Isaiah. This present volume provides a fresh reinvestigation of the identity of the servant in Isaiah 42:1-9 and its role among the other servant poems, also examining other relevant “servant” passages in Isaiah—particularly in Second Isaiah. The result reveals a thorough linguistic, intratextual, and thematic framework for interpreting the identity and role of this servant.

This study begins with a comprehensive survey and analysis of divine motive in the Hebrew Bible. Building on the survey it explores divine motive in Jeremiah and Ezekiel, which contain 25% of the divine motive statements in the Hebrew canon.

This monograph employs Toulmin’s model of argumentation analysis to examine how the Apocalypse of John motivates its hearers to respond to John’s prophetic apocalyptic exhortation. John’s visions of salvation and judgment provide the positive and negative grounds for motivational argumentation.

This book examines various rhetorical ways in which the motif of Yahweh’s Kingship functions in the Book of Ezekiel and explores what these arguments contribute to our understanding of the prophetic book as a whole.

This book is a response to the popular counter-reading of Ecclesiastes in the 1980s and 90s as a book of “joy” (rather than a pessimistic book). It examines the seven “joy statements” of Qoheleth in the light of analogies with scepticism and the literary form of irony. Irony, like scepticism, has the function to induce doubt and questions. The joy statements of Qoheleth are likely analogous to expressions of complex irony—whereby what is said is both meant and not meant. This examination highlights the complexity of the biblical book—while demonstrating how unlikely the “joy reading” may be.

This study provides background on wisdom forms, the key Qumran sectarian texts, and wisdom studies related to the Dead Sea Scrolls. 4QInstruction includes poetic discourses, hymnic material, and short wisdom sayings and admonitions. A major focus is placed on the admonitions, which are discussed in terms of their structure, wisdom forms, and setting. The admonitions are expressed in biblical wisdom forms, showing a familiarity with and acceptance of traditional Hebrew wisdom, including a focus on traditional themes. Yet, when read from the sectarian perspective, 4QInstruction reinforces the guidelines and theology of the key Dead Sea Scroll documents.

Has the Old Testament Psalter been purposefully arranged? Does this arrangement convey an overall message? This book enters into the growing discussion regarding the canonical arrangement of the Psalms by examining Book IV (Pss 90-106) and considering the book's overall theological and thematic message within the literary context of the Psalter. This volume argues that Psalms 90-106 have been purposely arranged as a rejoinder to the previous three books, in response to the rise and fall of Davidic kingship. This hypothesis is tested by examining how Psalms 90-106 may have been purposely organized as a collection.

This volume combines Targum studies with Judaic studies. The author assigns different Targums each to a respective particular “Sitz im Leben”, stressing the close connection between Targum and Midrash literature. She challenges the assumption that all extant Targums were compiled for the Synagogue. Instead, she suggests that Targum Onqelos might have fulfilled a function in the context of the early beth din and demonstrates that Pseudo-Jonathan can be linked with the rhetorical practices which abounded in later amoraic, educational circles.

Aside from being the content of speeches by characters in narrative, how do passages of laws in the Pentateuch interact with the surrounding narratives? This book proposes that certain passages of law in Leviticus and Numbers offer direction for the interpretation of adjacent segments of narrative. This 'direction' may serve to emphasize select themes and concepts in narrative. Alternatively, it may misdirect readers, or suggest alternative options to more accessible interpretations for a stretch of narrative.

This interdisciplinary study integrates textual analysis of the Hebrew Bible and comparable ancient Near Eastern material with social theory and archaeology in order to articulate the ancient Israelites' taken-for-granted understandings of natural disasters, their intellectual and theological challenges to those understandings, and their intellectual and theological reconstructions thereof.

Since its inception at the beginning of the twentieth century, form criticism has diminished in popularity and use in recent years. Bryan H. Cribb’s studies demonstrates that, if appropriately modified, form criticism still has much to add to Old Testament studies. Using a synchronic and inductive approach to the text, Cribb engages in a form critical study of nine “death stories” in the Old Testament. In so doing, he not only provides substantial support for the existence of this genre, but he also shows how remarkably fruitful such a study can be in revealing the messages of these accounts.

An emerging consensus maintains that the exile was not as extensive as the Old Testament claims. However, that it held singular importance for the book of Jeremiah is beyond question. Modine argues that Jeremiah represents a range of options for understanding and responding to the events surrounding the destruction of Jerusalem and its temple. This volume reads the diverse contents of Jeremiah as a kind of dialogue between competing perceptions of the exile. The author argues that coherence is to be found precisely in the incoherent, as it reflects the communal trauma of exile.

This book argues that it is the rejection of Paul’s claims to be an apostle in the same sense as the other apostles that ultimately underlies his “mission to the Gentiles.” This argument is advanced through a careful analysis of Paul’s references to his “conversion” in Galatians 1:15-17 and 1 Corinthians 15:8, paying particular attention to Paul’s evocative use of the language of abortion. The contextualization of this curious self-description in 1 Corinthians 15:8 draws upon a growing body of work concerning an area of ancient life that continues to fascinate and perplex moderns; the exposure of unwanted infants.

This book argues that the genre of the seven messages in Revelation 2–3 is a hybrid prophetic oracle. This oracle is influenced by the Old Testament covenantal elements functioning as a set of lawsuit exhortations. Graves defends this by demonstrating the influence of the Ancient Near Eastern vassal treaty structure in the seven messages. Written in a readable format this work is both an excellent introduction to the book of Revelation as well as a fitting work for the apocalyptic specialist.

The Coups of Hazael and Jehu offers a narrative reconstruction of the events surrounding the rise of Hazael to the throne of Aram-Damascus and Jehu to the throne of Israel in the mid-eighth century. These near-simultaneous dynastic changes were parts of a major shift in the political, military, and economic structure of the Levant, which took place as the mighty armies of Assyria pushed into the region. The book argues that Jehu’s bloody overthrow of Joram and Hazael’s irregular seizure of power after the death of his predecessor were not independent events, but responses to the Assyrian threat.

Profound in its conclusions and targeted toward the exegete, this volume offers a clear method for establishing flow of thought, text hierarchy, and literary macrostructure in biblical Hebrew prose. The study contributes both to hermeneutical theory and to the study of Deuteronomy by arguing for the application of discourse linguistics alongside stylistic and semantic analysis in the interpretation of OT texts. It includes a brief literary-structural and theological commentary on Deuteronomy 5–11 that models the text grammatical approach and shows its benefits for exegesis.