It is a fact: we are ‘the unforeseen readers’ of Paul's first letter to the Corinthians, which moreover was written ‘more for the ear than the eye’. The present article follows the epistle through from beginning to end, taking account of those things that our academic habits sometimes make us forget. Attention is directed, among other things, towards the manner in which the apostle – conscious of his lack of authority over some of his audience – is seized from the outset of the epistle by the need to convince the Corinthian community that they must be true to themselves, following the call of the God who has ultimately chosen to make himself known by Christ crucified. For each of the themes addressed by Paul throughout the epistle a range of impressions, questions or hypotheses are noted.

1 Cor 15.28 is often regarded as problematic for ‘divine Christology’ in Paul, because the Son's final submission to the Father is held to tell against his ontological equality with the Father. The current article argues that this conclusion involves a category mistake. The ‘grammar’ of Paul's Christology requires that we distinguish between what Paul says of and on the basis of Christ's divinity, and what Paul says of and on the basis of Christ's humanity, a strategy sometimes called ‘partitive exegesis’. The article evaluates recent solutions to this problem, warrants partitive exegesis from within 1 Corinthians, and offers a partitive reading of 1 Cor 15.28: the Son submits to the Father as the final act of an office he holds as a human, in order to perfect the human vocation of vicegerency over creation.

Did Tatian write his gospel in Greek or Syriac? Treatments of this most beleaguered crux in Diatessaronic studies have largely depended on a now defunct approach to the source material. The ‘New Perspective’ on Tatian's Diatessaron wants for a new study of this old question. A problematic arrangement of textual data at Luke 19.4 offers unrecognised evidence that Tatian composed in Greek – namely, contradictory testimonia to the Syriac word for Zacchaeus’ ‘sycamore’ in Tatian's gospel reflect different etymological translations of a distinctive, Greek textual variant.

A survey of the current state of research shows that scholars are at an impasse regarding the text of Matt 16.2b–3. A fresh application of reasoned eclecticism to the unit uncovers new evidence supporting the longer reading. A reappraisal of the Greek manuscripts, early versions and early Christian literature shows that the longer and shorter readings are of approximately equal antiquity as far as can be established from presently available evidence. Analysis of the Eusebian apparatus strongly suggests that the shorter reading was often the result of intentional scribal change. Of the various explanations for such change, the most persuasive view is that proposed by Scrivener, Tregelles and Weiss – the shorter reading was probably an assimilation to Matt 12.39.

By portraying Jesus both as a son of David through Joseph and as virginally conceived, Matthew and Luke suggest that Joseph adopted Jesus into the Davidic line. Most modern interpreters assume that Joseph adopted Jesus through some Jewish law or custom. However, Yigal Levin has argued that adoption did not exist in Judaism and therefore the First and Third Evangelists must have appealed to Roman law (implying a gentile provenance for Matthew and Luke). This article reviews and critiques Levin's study and argues that early Jews did have a concept and practice of adoption and therefore an appeal to Roman law is unnecessary.

1 Tim 5.3–16 defines which women may be registered for financial support at church expense. It is integrated around four ‘household rules’, but is not concerned to regulate an ‘order’ or ‘office’ of widows. Rather, it clarifies that the church should not supplant households in financial matters, and should be responsible only for destitute widows who have no other network support. Since χήρα can mean ‘woman without a man’, the instructions in 5.11–15 are best interpreted as directed against young women who have chosen celibacy. By contrast, the author conceives of the church as a network of Christian households connected by mutual economic support.

The Synoptics narrate a single Passover during Jesus’ ministry, whereas John's Gospel spans three Passovers. The Diatessaron harmonised the Four Gospels, but previous scholarship has misapprehended Tatian's chronology of Jesus’ ministry. The Diatessaron included all the Johannine festivals, but Tatian rearranged the order of events. Distinctively resolving a significant disagreement between John and the Synoptics, Tatian innovated a narrative sequence wherein Jesus’ temple disruption occurs at the second of three Passovers.

The present article argues that 666 in Rev 13.18 is best related to the notice of Solomon receiving 666 talents of gold (1 Kgs 10.14 // 2 Chr 9.13), which is, in turn, an important notice of this king's wayward and unjust practices: his inordinate wealth, exploitation of his own people and eschewing of God's law.