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This study traces Jesus' attitude to impurity within the historical context at the end of the Second Temple period, when practices of ritual purity came to play an increasing role in Jewish society and an expansionist trend gained in influence and support. The traditional focus on sayings material and criteria of authenticity in historical Jesus-research is modified, narrative traditions with implicit purity issues are appealed to, and extra-canonical traditions are included. The main areas examined are the most important "fathers" of impurity: "leprosy" (skin diseases), genital discharges, and corpse-contamination. Jesus is found to have acted in ways that could have been understood by some...
Natalie Mylonas uses Ezekiel 16 as a case study in order to reveal the critical relationship between space, emotion, and identity politics in the Hebrew Bible. Drawing on interdisciplinary research that emphasises how space and emotions are inextricably linked in human experience, Mylonas explores the portrayal of Yhwh's wife, Jerusalem, in Ezekiel 16 as a personified city who feels emotion. She foregrounds purity and gender issues, as well as debates on emotions in the Hebrew Bible, emphasising that spatiality is a key component of how these issues are conceptualised in ancient Israel. This book argues that the power struggle between Jerusalem and Yhwh in Ezekiel 16 is a struggle over the c...
In this collection of essays, leading New Testament scholars reassess the reciprocal relationship between Matthew and Second Temple Judaism. Some contributions focus on the relationship of the Matthean Jesus to torah, temple, and synagogue, while others explore theological issues of Jewish and gentile ethnicity and universalism within and behind the text.
This study traces the emergence of the concept of the body as a sanctuary from its biblical roots to its expressions in late Second Temple Judaism. Harrington's hypothesis is that the destruction of the first Jerusalem temple was a catalyst for a new reality vis-à-vis the temple and the emergence of increased emphasis on the holiness of the people along with concomitant standards of purity in a certain stream of Judaism. The study brings into relief elements of this attitude from exilic texts, e.g. Ezekiel, to Ezra-Nehemiah, the Dead Sea Scrolls and other Second Temple Jewish texts, including early Jesus and Pauline traditions. The goal is to provide a history of the concept of the body-cum...
Wil Rogan argues that, contrary to twentieth-century interpretation, the Fourth Gospel did not replace purity with faith in Jesus. Instead, as with other early Jewish writings, its discourse about purity functions as a way to make sense of life before God in the world. He suggests that John's Gospel employs biblical and early Jewish traditions of purity associated with divine revelation and Israel's restoration to narrate how God's people are prepared for the coming of Jesus and enabled by him to have life with God characterized by love. After evaluating different theories of purity for the interpretation of the Fourth Gospel, Rogan explores John the Baptist as an agent of ritual purification, Jesus as the agent of moral purification, and the disciples of Jesus as ones who are (or are not) made morally pure by Jesus. While purity is not one of the Fourth Gospel's primary focuses, Rogan stresses that the concept figures into some of its most significant claims about Christology, the doctrine of salvation, and ethics. Through purity, the Fourth Gospel guards continuity with the past while placing surprising conditions on participation in Israel's future.
This collection of essays by Thomas Kazen focuses on issues of purity and purification in early Judaism and the Jesus tradition. During the late Second Temple period, Jewish purity practices became more prominent than before and underwent substantial developments. These essays advance the ongoing conversation and debate about a number of key issues in the field, such as the relationship between ritual and morality, the role and function of metaphor, and the use of evolutionary and embodied perspectives. Kazen's research stands in constant dialogue with the major currents and main figures in purity research, including both historical (origin, development, practice) and cognitive (evolutionary, emotional, conceptual) approaches.
Joshua D. A. Bloor argues that the purification of the consciousness of sin, via Jesus' perpetual heavenly blood offering, is a vital motif for understanding Hebrews' sacrificial argumentation, and vice-versa. Jesus' 'objective' earthly achievements are many, yet only his 'subjective' heavenly blood offering purges the heavenly tabernacle and subsequently the consciousness of sin. Bloor views the Levitical cult as having a positive role in Hebrews, with Levitical 'guilt' foreshadowing and informing Hebrews' notion of the 'consciousness of sin'. Levitical sacrifices could purge the consciousness, but only Jesus' heavenly blood can offer complete perpetual purgation. This blood is a qualitativ...
Lectures and seminar discussions of the Nordic New Testament Conference, Aug. 18-22, 2007 at Sundsgeardens Folkheogskola.
Moral Infringement and Repair in Antiquity, is a series of publications related to a project on Dynamics of Moral Repair in Antiquity, run by Thomas Kazen and Rikard Roitto between 2017 and 2021, and funded by the Swedish Research Council. The volumes contain stand-alone articles and serve as supplements to the main outcome of the project, the volume Interpersonal Infringement and Moral Repair: Revenge, Compensation and Forgiveness in the Ancient World, forthcoming on Mohr Siebeck in 2023. Supplement 1: Emotions and Hierarchies, contains four articles and chapters by Thomas Kazen. Three of them are republished in accordance with the publishers' general conditions for author reuse. The fourth has not been published before. 1. Emotional Ethics in Biblical Texts: Cultural Construction and Biological Bases of Morality. 2. Viewing Oneself through Others' Eyes: Shame between Biology and Culture in Biblical Texts. 3. Law and Emotion in Moral Repair: Circumscribing Infringement. 4. Retribution and Repair in Voluntary Associations: Comparing Rule Texts from Qumran, Collegia, and Christ Groups.
While Jesus and Purity (2002, corrected reprint 2010, 2021) aimed to present an unfolding argument, this volume does not aspire at such coherence. It consists of articles and papers on various issues of impurity in early Judaism. A few of these have been previously published, the rest not. Some chapters develop and further expand on topics discussed in Jesus and Purity and much focus lies on questions of the impurity of discharges and the practice of hand-washing before meals. Both literary and historical methods are used, as well as approaches based on cognitive science. The analysis covers texts from the Pentateuch, Qumran, the New Testament, and some Jewish Hellenistic authors. By bringing these articles together, they are made available and can be easily found by potential readers. Together with the recently published collection Impurity and Purification in Early Judaism and the Jesus Tradition (SBL Press, 2021), Issues of Impurity represents Kazen's continuous work on purity issues through two decades. The reader of both volumes will see how the author's views have gradually evolved through the years.