The title of this paper calls for qualification and explanation. A distinguished Swedish theologian once remarked that the rise of a school in any department of theological study can be inimical to the best interests of scholarship, since the members of a school tend to be concerned rather with the defence of positions already assumed than with impartial inquiry into truth. Diversity of opinion on certain problems among the Uppsala group of Old Testament scholars would in itself acquit them of this charge; and it may therefore be questioned whether the term ‘school’ can be accurately applied to them. If we do so use it, we must take it to indicate a common approach to Old Testament problems rather than detailed agreement in the solution of these problems. Again, the use of the term ‘Uppsala’ is open to criticism. The common approach just mentioned confessedly owes much to work done outside Scandinavia and in other parts of Scandinavia. Neither form criticism nor tradition history originated in Sweden; and the importance of the cult in Old Testament religion and of the place of the king in the cult was first maintained elsewhere than in Uppsala.

It is now some fifty-two years since the first modern edition appeared of any part of Hephaistion of Thebes' compendium of astrology. The editor very properly collected in his introduction the scanty facts relative to the author and the unknown friend to whom he dedicates his work. But, apparently a little annoyed by the too positive assertion of Salmasius that all astrologers of that date were pagans, he put forth the hasty theory that this astrologer was a Christian. He had indeed no difficulty in proving that a somewhat unorthodox or lax Christian might have been a devotee of astrology at the time, about A.D. 381, when it is likely that Hephaistion wrote; but he went too far in the further statement that “das Werk des Hephaestion selbst bietet sicherlich keinen positiven Anhaltspunkt, dass der Verfasser desselben Nicht-Christ gewesen sei.” This has been echoed by later writers, as A. Bouché-Leclercq, who says “Il est possible qu'Hephestion de Thebes … fût chrétien,” and Fr. Boll, writing shortly before 1912, when a good deal more of our author had been printed in the C(orpus) C(odicum) A(strologicorum) G(raecorum). He sums up Engelbrecht's arguments, that the work begins σὺν θεῷ and is dedicated to one Athanasios, who is called ὁσιώτατος (and by other complimentary superlatives) and so may have been a Christian priest, concluding that the theory of the writer's Christianity is arrived at “wohl mit Recht.” As it seems to me remarkable that three learned men, of whom one had edited the astrologer and the others had certainly read him, should have overlooked the cogent evidence that he was a pagan, I think it worth while to set forth the proofs, positive and negative.

In the West, the best known Armenian Canon lists are those transmitted by Mechitar of Ayrivank˓, an Armenian savant of the thirteenth century (1222-1307 C.E.). The translation of these lists, which was first publicised in Europe by Theodor Zahn, has been reprinted in various works.

The time may appear to many persons inopportune for the launching of a Journal of Theology. The tide of theological interest may seem to have ebbed so low as to leave no channel for such a venture; the profession of the ministry fails to win recruits; the queen of the sciences is deposed from her throne; critics are announcing the rout of the theological schools. The machinery of the churches, it is true, revolves with energy, but it does not seem to be geared into the wheels of the working world; and the deliberations of the theologians are frankly regarded by great numbers of people with indifference, if not with contempt. A distinguished railway president, on being informed that a promising youth had undertaken the study of theology, remarked, “Why does not so gifted a man devote himself to something that is real?”

Since the Enlightenment ennui and despair have been among the most dominant themes in western literature. In the twentieth century there scarcely exists a single major work of fiction which views man's nature and destiny under the aspect of hope or fulfillment. Why this should be so is the subject of interminable discussion which, generally speaking, locates the deeper cause in the breakdown of virtually all genuine religiousness with an attendant rise of meaninglessness and emptiness. This development in turn is linked to the various revolutions, particularly the Industrial, that have combined to undermine traditional occidental modes of thought and living. While some critics hold that it is merely a question of modern society becoming gradually accustomed to the blessings so precipitously conferred upon it by technology, thus comparing its present growing pains to those of an adolescent, few seem to disagree on the prevailing exhaustion and anxiety. In addition to the note of doom struck by the best intellectuals of our day — and its fashionableness is no argument against its truth — it would appear that the unreflecting masses independently of being exposed to this literature do not know how to redeem their leisure time, have lost a great deal of capacity for spontaneous participation, and seek despairingly if not eagerly for something vital to which they can relate themselves and through which find renewed structure in their lives.

The basis of theistic belief is fortunately broader than the theistic arguments. People believe in God before they argue in favor of His existence, and the fortunes of theism are not inseparably bound up with any of the arguments framed in its support. No one, however, who is interested in the rational basis of theology can be indifferent to the fate of an argument which, whatever the philosophical objections to be brought against it, has in all ages of the world made a powerful appeal to human reason.

This essay might seem inappropriate for this volume, but it is not. Krister Stendahl is particularly distinguished by a catholicity of mind and spirit which enables him to look with understanding, sympathy, and empathy on all sorts and conditions in what he once unpejoratively called “God's menagerie of religions.” That Mormons do not belong to the main bodies of Christians does not exclude them from his purview. But apart from this, the Mormons are in fact highly germane to the theme of this volume. Uniqueness is always hard to substantiate: Christians, Jews, and Gentiles have been related in many varied and complex ways. But there seems to be no parallel to the way in which Mormons—while claiming to be Christians—assert as well that they are genealogically connected with Jews and that they are therefore physically a rediscovered, restored, and reinterpreted “Israel.” As far as I am aware they constitute a very special, if not unique, case of Christians among Jews and Gentiles since by implication they have redefined all three of these terms. This is the justification for the inclusion of this essay in this volume. We here reflect on one aspect of Mormon life: their fixation of their own “canon.”

The following Armenian text of Athanasius's Letter to Epictetus is found in two manuscripts of the Mechitarists at Vienna:

A. Cod. 629, ff. 66a–73b, 19th century, notragir, copied from an 18th century archetype at Ispahan.

B. Cod. 648, ff. 102b–105b, paper, 14th century, bolorgir, without word division and badly worm-eaten.

The version is different from that published by Tajezi, and belongs to an Armenian corpus of Athanasian writings compiled early in the eighth century. I have added a collation with Ludwig's edition of the Greek, but have deliberately refrained from discussing at length its relation to other textual authorities.

The fragment which is described and published in the present article was bought in Cairo in February, 1931, for Yale University. It is known as P. Yale Inv. 415, and in the late Professor Gregory's list of New Testament manuscripts it is designated P49. It seems safe to assume that the fragment was copied somewhere in Egypt, but it cannot be assigned to any particular locality. Furthermore, nothing is known as to the place where it was found.

A recent article by George B. Murray draws the attention of philosophers and theologians to a problem in the thought of Teilhard de Chardin which they often tend to overlook. The “synthetic theory” of evolution held by the majority of contemporary biologists, Father Murray points out, is not to be found in Teilhard's scientific writings. Instead, Teilhard proposes a theory of orthogenesis, a word and concept now almost universally rejected by biologists. This discrepancy between Teilhard and the best contemporary biological thought is often ignored by those who find his writings a promising approach to the reconciliation of science and Christianity or to problems of science and philosophy. Father Murray gives a very useful analysis of probable reasons for Teilhard's insistence on retaining the word “orthogenesis” in the face of opposition from fellow-scientists and in spite of the fact that his modifications of the meaning of orthogenesis might have been more readily acceptable had he described them by a different name. However, much more important than the reasons why Teilhard insisted on the use of the word “orthogenesis” is the question, which Murray does not discuss, of the importance and place of orthogenesis in Teilhard's thought, whether it is legitimate for philosophers and theologians to accept the general outline of Teilhard's theories and leave this technical scientific question to the scientists, or whether Teilhard's whole system of thought stands or falls with a discredited theory of biology.

Whenever Western Semitic people, i.e., primarily Phoenicians and Hebrews, and later Jews, considered it advisable or faced the necessity to adjust their social groupings to virtually superior institutions of the Greek-speaking realms of the Eastern Mediterranean, they were soon confronted with the problem of how to reproduce the respective Greek sociological terms in their native tongue.

Regarding this kind of Semitization of terms as a consequence of Hellenization, my interest was recently drawn to the relationship of hayyaḥad and to koinon. This apparently deserves further examination.

Christianity arose in an environment which was, on the one hand, still dependent upon the traditions of the Jewish Church but, on the other, wide open to Hellenistic civilization. There exists today a strong and in many respects very healthy tendency to test the Gospels for Aramaic origin, the results of which are at the same time stimulating and challenging. However, even if the view that major portions of the four canonical Gospels are translations from the Aramaic be accepted, we are still faced with the question where the ideas behind the words came from. For it is not only risky to assume that the translations themselves were uncritical, quasi-mechanical versions, especially in view of the fact that the contemporary Greek translations of the Old Testament as well as the early translations of the Greek New Testament into other languages show a fair amount of skill; but also the Aramaic original itself may have been influenced by Greek ideas and in this way may have determined the translator's method. The original Aramaic language does not also guarantee the Semitic origin of the thought expressed thereby.

The use of the term άλεεῖς άνθρώπων, “fishers of men” at Mark 1:17 (on which depends Matthew 4:19 but only indirectly Luke 5:10) has often been treated as a self-evident metaphor. “The words of Jesus summon Simon and Andrew to become disciples and heralds of the Kingdom of God,” Vincent Taylor says. Other figures might have sufficed for this dual purpose and the peculiar nature of the metaphor is not explored when the terms “disciples” and “heralds” are used. What is the relationship of disciples to Jesus and how heralds were related to the Kingdom is not made clear although the Markan term may have been intended to do something of this kind. It is insufficient to observe that, since the four men are depicted as fishermen, the summons is appropriately phrased.The metaphor has a Biblical background which provides some clue to the nature of their new calling or, since they are already fishermen, to a new type of fishing and a new catch. Riesenfeld underlines the importance of the phrasing of the call but does not enquire into its meaning.

A New era in Septuagint studies began in the autumn of 1891. In November of that year Hort drew up a scheme for the larger Cambridge edition: a few days later Lagarde, just before the operation from which he died on December 22, showed to his young pupil Alfred Rahlfs the works on which he was engaged, and explained his plans for their completion and publication. In these two schemes three scholars have found an arduous and self-sacrificing life-work. When A. E. Brooke and Norman McLean undertook the preparation of the Cambridge edition in 1895, they hoped that the Octateuch might be completed in five years: the final part of this first volume did not appear until 1917. But strenuous and untiring as their toil was through long years, it is now bearing rapid fruit. It is astonishing that the intricate editions of Samuel and Kings should have been published within the four years 1927–30, and Chronicles at the beginning of 1932.

The researches of the last three decades have conclusively shown that toward the end of the third century B.C. a profound change occurred in the spiritual life of the Jews. Literary prophecy, which had been declining since the time of Haggai and Zechariah (ca. 518 B.C.), now definitely came to an end. The noble tradition had been in its death throes for no less than three centuries. In vain did the Joels, the Obadiahs, and the Deutero-Zechariahs seek to save it from complete eclipse. Its hour had passed. In the meantime, new forces were arising to contend for its place in the spiritual leadership of Israel.

Judging from his relatively few surviving letters, Paul—whether as Jew or Christian—was a person with both outer and inner conflicts. We know much less than we would like about these external confrontations and inner struggles, but time and again his letters show evidence of his wrestling with one or another serious ambivalence. Actually, it is not often a present struggle that is portrayed or revealed, for Paul writes with a remarkable maturity and with the confidence of one who has moved well beyond the tossing and turning of a continuing inner struggle. Yet at times, most notably in Romans 9–11, Paul's simple statement of a mature judgment still evokes, in the very restating of his conclusions, the intensity of the original ambivalence and conflict. A further indication that Paul was this kind of person is found, if only incidentally, in his dialectical mode of thinking: if he mentions “death,” at once he thinks of “life”; if he refers to “flesh,” immediately “spirit” crosses his mind, or if he speaks of “slaves” or “slavery,” then “sons” or “freedom” is instantly present.

It often happens that the papers of a departed master are gathered and winnowed by a faithful disciple in search of one last harvest of truth: an act of respect mingled with a desire for reflected glory. But in Jonathan Edwards's editing of the diary of David Brainerd the elder served the younger.

The myth of Môt and ʼAlʼeyan Baʻal, who is Hadad, recounted in the texts unearthed at Ugarit, is a work of the schematizing imagination, and expressive of the ordered relations of natural phenomena conceived as embodied in gods. The systematic organization of the events in which the gods are caught, or which they dominate, shows that the myth arose from “observation of the great annual fluctuations of the seasons and a desire to explain them,” and that the authors or revisers, “brooding over the mystery of external nature,” sought “to lift the veil and explore the hidden springs that set the vast machine in motion.” We are well aware that “the civilized nations of western Asia and Egypt pictured to themselves the changes of the seasons, and particularly the annual growth and decay of vegetation, as episodes in the life of gods, whose mournful death and happy resurrection they celebrated with dramatic rites.” But in our texts we are introduced to subtle variations. Here the lapse, absorption and return of the rain are interfused with the regeneration and decline of plants in a rhythmic process to which no parallel is to be found among extant documents of similar purport and provenance. And the investigation of “nature's plan,” however cumbered with besotted notions, is so diligent as to bring the resulting depiction close to the twilight zone between mythology and the speculations of the early physical philosophers.

In the essay “Creed or Chaos?” written in the midst of the turmoil of World War II, British mystery novelist Dorothy L. Sayers defended the relevance of the creeds produced during the doctrinal debates of the fourth and fifth centuries to the lives of modern Christians. The theological dogmas contained in such documents as the Nicene Creed (325) or the Chalcedonian Definition (451) are not, she notes wittily, “a set of arbitrary regulations invented a priori by a committee of theologians enjoying a bout of all-in dialectical wrestling,” but were “hammered out under pressure of urgent practical necessity” to resolve theological controversies that had real impact on the discipleship of ordinary Christians. To put matters at their simplest, the trinitarian controversies revolved around the question of whether Christ was divine, and so capable of saving humankind from sin and death. The christological controversies, at least in their earliest stage, debated whether Christ was really human, truly the God-made-man capable of healing wounded humanity and providing aviable role model for Christians to follow in the living of a redeemed life. At stake in both controversies was a convincing explanation of the central Christian tenet that “Jesus saves” for those who profess to be his followers.

In Laws 8.835b–842a Plato puzzles over the question of how the lawgiver is to inculcate proper behavior in matters of sexual activity. The problem is made more difficult by the fact that he would like to define proper sexual activity much more narrowly than any Greek legislator before him ever had. He would limit it to acts between man and wife which are capable of resulting in conception (838e–39a). Every other sexual manifestation, homosexual or heterosexual, is to be forbidden.