The choice of the topic for this lecture* has been influenced by the publication, in the course of last year, of some significant new monographs on questions related to John 21. In several quarters of Johannine studies, we can observe a reconsideration of Chapter 21 in its relation to the Gospel, with renewed interest in the problem of the Beloved Disciple. There is alsoa revival of the source-critical approach, with new reconstructions of the traditional miracle story behind the verses 1–14. And, of course, there is continuing debate on Joh's use of the Synoptics, from which, to say the least, John 21 is not wholly absent. I begin my presentation with the first part of the Chapter, verses 1–14, and the hypothesis of a ‘pre-Johannine’ source.

It is instructive to see the similarities and the differences between the account of the origins of the synagogue in the Jewish Encyclopedia of 1907 and the more extended discussion of the subject in the Encyclopedia Judaica of 1971. In the earlier work, Wilhelm Bacher observes that by the time the synagogue had become the central institution in Judaism, it was already regarded as of ancient origin, dating back to Moses.1 He was of the opinion that the synagogue as a permanent institution originated during the Babylonian captivity,2 and conjectured that the reference in Isa 56. 7 to the temple as a ‘house of prayer’ was to be understood as connected with the term for place of prayer, proseuche, which was used during the exile and among Jews in the diaspora in later centuries. Balcher's theory continues that it was Ezra and his successors who reorganized the religious life of Israel into congregational worship, with special place for prayers and the reading of the scriptures. This development, he proposed, took place in parallel with the revival of the temple cult and led to the building of synagogues. He finds evidence for synagogues in Palestine in the pre-exilic period in Ps 74. 8, although in fact this psalm comes from the Maccabean period or even later.3 Then, astonishingly and without any attempt to explain, he asserts that the complete absence of allusions to synagogue in 1 or 2 Maccabees is the result of the author's primary concern for the purity of the temple ritual.

Though Martin Luther was doubtless not the first student of the NT to notice the apparent discrepancy between Paul's general affirmation in Galatians 3. 10a and the citation he introduces to support it in 3.10b, his statement of the problem has scarcely been improved upon in the centuries that have followed. As it stands, the Pauline text does present something of a conundrum. Whereas Paul's own statement appears to pronounce a ‘curse’ upon anyone who would attempt to live by the Jewish Torah, the biblical text to which he appeals clearly affirms the opposite: its ‘curse’ falls not on those who do the Law, but on those who fail to do it. What is Paul trying to say? Does he simply misunderstand his citation at this point? Or is there an underlying link between text and ‘interpretation’ that is not evident at first sight?

In an elegant discussion of the roles of women in the Pauline congregations, Wayne Meeks has drawn attention to Paul's apparently deliberate attempt to make parallel statements about the respective obligations of males and females in 1 Cor 7 and in 1 Cor 11. 2–16. In the same study, Meeks makes a second observation about 1 Cor 11. 2–16: ‘If the passage places most emphasis on the female, that must be because in Corinth it is the charismatic women who are donning the attire of the opposite sex’. There is indeed a fairly wide consensus that the problem underlying the instructions about head attire in 1 Cor 11 is with women. Is there a connection between the antics of the women of 1 Cor 11 and Paul's exhortations in 1 Cor 7? Are we to conclude that 1 Cor 7 also responds to a situation instigated by females? Or, does the fact that the parallelism in 1 Cor 7 is even more extensive than in 1 Cor 11 imply that, in his discussion of marriage and celibacy, Paul was equally concerned with the practices of men and women?

A satisfactory solution to the twin problems of the internal literary structure of the proclamations to the seven churches in Rev 2–3, and the external literary form to which they have the closest generic relationship continues to challenge New Testament scholarship. It is of course theoretically possible to limit a literary analysis to the texts in Rev 2–3 based on intrinsic criteria alone. In practice, however, most analyses have been dialectical attempts to understand the intrinsic literary features of the seven proclamations in the light of the clues provided by one or another comparable literary form. This kind of contextual investigation is unavoidable for Rev 2–3 in view of the many repetitive and formulaic words and phrases which, in addition to denotative or designative meanings, have a variety of connotative or associative meanings requiring exploration and assessment. Some recent candidates include the revelatory letter, prophetic speech forms, the covenant formulary or one of the types of Greek oratory.

Zu den Vorarbeiten für einen Kommentar zum Römerbrief gehört der Versuch, über den Zweck und den Gesamtcharakter dieses Apostelschreibens Klarheit zu gewinnen. Darum gibt es von Ulrich Wilckens einen ‘Aufsatz Über Abfassungszweck und Aufbau des Römerbriefs’, vier Jahre vor dem ersten Band seines Kommentars erschienen,2 und von Peter Stuhlmacher einen Vortrag ‘Der Abfassungszweck des Römerbriefs’,3 erwachsen aus der Vorarbeit für seinen Römerbrief-Kommentar im ‘Neuen Testament Deutsch’, mit dessen Erscheinen bald zu rechnen ist. Einen ähnlichen Stellenwert und Sinn hat für mich das folgende Referat im Blick auf die Kommentierung des Römerbriefs im Theologischen Handkommentar zum Neuen Testament, die mir übertragen worden ist. Dabei freue ich mich besonders, diesen Vortrag in eben dem kirchlich-gesellschaftlichen Raum halten zu können, in dem auch der Kommentar in erster Linie seinen Beitrag zum Verständnis und zur Wirkung des Neuen Testaments leisten soil. Daraus könnte eine Diskussion erwachsen, die meine Arbeit an der Auslegung des Briefes durch neue Gesichtspunkte anregt und vorantreibt.

Aufgabe der Textkritik ist es nach herkömmlicher Definition, den Urtextzu finden und ihn nachprϋfbar zu begrϋnden. Auch wer vielleicht beim ersten Teil dieses Satzes meint, diese Aufgabe sei doch im wesentlichen schongetan (die weitgehende übereinstimmung der Editionen des Neuen Testaments der letzten 100 und mehr Jahre könnte ihn darin bestärken), bzw. sie sei bis auf exegetisch unerhebliche Stellen getan, wird beim zweiten Teil des Satzes zugeben mϋssen, daß sie noch nicht oder noch nicht ausreichend getan ist.

Because of their early date (mid-second century) and interesting variants, the gospel citations of Justin Martyr — he almost always refers to his source as άπομνημονεύματα τν άποστόλων (‘memoirs of the apostles’), and only rarely as a ‘gospel’ — have long attracted scholars’ attention. It is self-evident that the citations contain numerous variant readings and are frequently harmonized; the dispute has been over what best explains this phenomenon. Semisch and Zahn said that the variant readings and harmonizations were due to lapses of Justin's memory. Credner argued that Justin's non-standard citations were the result of his reliance upon extracanonical gospels. Bousset opined that Justin had access to presynoptic traditions; this explained both the similarities and the differences between Justin's text and the later (revised) synoptic text. Von Engelhardt suggested that Justin used a post-synoptic gospel harmony. This position found support in the researches of Bellinzoni, who investigated the ‘sayings of Jesus’ genre in Justin. He noted passages cited more than once in exactly the same harmonized form, suggesting a written document, and passages paralleled in other early Christian sources in very similar harmonized form. Bellinzoni interpreted this as indicating that Justin had used a gospel harmony, which was also used by other early Christian writers. He noted that Justin's variant citations and harmonizations seemed especially close to those found in the Pseudo- Clementine Homilies and Recognitions. Bellinzoni concluded that this harmony was post-synoptic, excluded John, and ‘had great influence on the later manuscript tradition of Matthew, Mark and Luke’. In the last paragraph of his book, Bellinzoni speculated that the harmony used by Justin might have links with the Diatessaron: ‘Tatian was a pupil of Justin, … It is now apparent that the concept of a gospel harmony did not originate with Tatian.’

1. ‘Denn als wir noch bei euch waren, haben wir euch vorausgesagt, daß wir in Bedrangnis geraten werden, wie es auch — das wißt ihr ja — eingetroffen ist’, schreibt Paulus in 1 Thess 3.4 and die junge Christengemeinde in Thessalonich. Er konnte ihr demnach bereits bei seinem Gründungsaufenthalt kommende Leidenserfahrungen ankündigen, die sich offenbar dann auch umgehend eingestellt haben (vgl. noch 1. 6; 2. 13–14). In dieser Erinnerung an Anfänge und Geschick der Gemeinde in Thessalonich spiegelt sich der auch anderswo im Neuen Testament belegte historische Sachverhalt, daß die frühen christlichen Gemeinden von Anbeginn an mit der Realität des Leidens konfrontiert waren und daß diese Leidenswirklichkeit ihren maßgeblichen Grund in der Existenz der Gemeinden an sich, d.h. in ihrem Bekenntnis zu Jesus Christus und den daraus für ihr Leben gezogenen Konsequenzen hatte. Insofern die christlichen Gemeinden als Minderheiten von den religiösen und sozialen Normen der nichtchristlichen Umwelt abwichen, teilten sie das typische Geschick gesellschaftlicher Minoritäten: Ihre Leidenserfahrungen konkretisierten sich vor allem in sozialer Isolation wie aggressiver Ausgrenzung, aber auch in blutiger Verfolgung. Dieser ursächliche Zusammenhang von Christsein und Leiden wurde auch von den frühen Christen selbst als solcher wahrgenommen. Dies macht eine Reihe von Präpositionalverbindungen sichtbar, die die Erfahrung des Leidens als ein Leiden ‘um Christi willen’ u.ä. bestimmen. Der damit gegebenen Gefahr, sich dem Leiden durch die Abwendung vom christlichen Bekenntnis zu entziehen (vgl. Mk 4.17; 8.34–38; Joh 12.42–43; 16.1; 1 Thess 3.3–4; 2 Tim 1.8, 12; 2.12–13; 1 Petr 4.16; Apk 2.13; 3.8 u.ö.), versuchen die neutestamentlichen Autoren dadurch zu begegnen, daß sie die Leidenserfahrungen ihrer Gemeinden in einer Weise theologisch deuten, die dem Leiden seinen Charakter als Differenzerfahrung nimmt und den Gemeinden eine positive Bewältigung ihrer jeweiligen Leidenswirklichkeit ermöglicht. Diese Deutung zielt darauf ab, die Gemeinden tröstend ihrer Identität als von Gott erwählter eschatologischer Heilsgemeinschaft zu vergewissern, indem sie die bedrückende Leidenswirklichkeit als ein konstitutives Element christlicher Heilswirklichkeit sichtbar zu machen sucht, d.h. als eine Erfahrung, die nicht einen heillosen Entfremdungszustand der Gottesferne markiert, sondern positiv in den Vollzug heilvoller christlicher Existenz hineingehört.

Der Abschnitt Joh 3. 22–36 gehört wirkungsgeschichtlich nicht zu den Schwerpunkten des Evangeliums. Die vorausgehende Perikope, Jesu Gespräch mit Nikodemus, hat weitaus mehr Aufmerksamkeit auf sich gezogen. Für die neuere Auslegung jedoch hielt der Text zwei attraktive Probleme bereit: Die Frage nach der Historizität der Nachricht von Jesu Tauftätigkeit neben Johannes dem Täufer und die rätselhafte Stellung der V. 31–36 als Schluß einer Täuferrede. Beide Probleme werden uns auch bei unserer Auslegung beschäftigen, sollen uns aber nicht völlig in ihren Bann schlagen. Angestrebt ist eine Auslegungsskizze, die die theologische Aussage der Perikope als ganze ins Auge faßt. Doch geben uns die genannten Fragestellungen die Gelegenheit, uns exemplarisch mit zwei wichtigen methodischen Grundfragen johanneischer Exegese zu beschäftigen: 1. die Bedeutung des historiographischen und topographischen ‘Sonderguts’ des Johannesevangeliums, wobei uns weniger seine historische Zuverlässigkeit, als vielmehr seine theologische Bedeutung für die Botschaft des Evangeliums interessieren wird; 2. die Verarbeitung literarisch disparater Traditionsstücke zu einem Ganzen in den johanneischen ‘Reden’.

Within the story-world of Mark, the religious authorities — the scribes, Pharisees, Herodians, chief priests, elders, and Sadducees — form a united front opposed to Jesus61 and therefore constitute, literary-critically, a single, or collective, character. If Jesus is the protagonist, they are the antagonists, and both Jesus and they exhibit a ‘root character trait’, that is, a character trait from which all other traits spring. Thus, Jesus, as the Messiah Son of God, is characterized as ‘uniquely related’ to God. As such, he is endowed with divine authority and ‘thinks the things of God’, which is to say that he views reality from a divine perspective. In contrast, the religious authorities are characterized as being ‘without authority’, which is to say that they ‘think the things of men’ and view reality from a purely human perspective. Consequently, the conflict between Jesus and the authorities in Mark's story is an extended clash over ‘authority’. Instead of receiving Jesus as God's Messiah and Son, they oppose him throughout his ministry.

The most recent addition to the library of books on John the Baptist is that of Josef Ernst, Johannes der Taufer, Interpretation-Geschichte-Wirkungsgeschichte. Like many of its predecessors, it is wide-ranging in scope, extensive in documentation, thorough in analysis, and clear inits conclusions. But also like them it has its blind spots. There are questions thatarenot asked, and answers that are given too glibly. In both cases we are deprived of valuable information.

In his now programmatic article, ‘Die Legitimität des Apostels’, E. Käsemann drew attention to the fact that the issue at stake in 2 Corinthians was Paul himself and that, of all the accusations being levelled against him, Paul was especially being blamed for his supposed ‘Selbstlob’. From his opponents' perspective, Paul's μέτρον το κανόνος; (10. 12 ff.) and his δοκιμή (13. 3, 6) appeared questionable, lacking the obvious and objective power and authority associated with apostleship. His boasting was thus viewed to be irresponsible, illegitimate, and deceitful (5. 12; 11. 16; 12. 16). Specifically, Paul lacked a ‘fixed μέτρον’, i.e. an objective evidence for his legitimacy, which was ‘controllable’. For, in contrast to the apostles in Jerusalem, Paul could not point to a commissioning from the earthly Jesus, the miraculous signs of an apostle, or financial support from churches to support his claims. Hence, ‘seinem Apostolat fehlt die nachprüfbare Eindeutig-keit’.

Some scholars continue to argue on compositional grounds that the Two-Document Hypothesis is to be preferred to the view that Luke first copied Matthew and that Mark then copied Matthew and Luke. The best way to answer such claims is to take a test case and discuss the matter in detail. It will be argued that the evidence indicates that there are serious difficulties with the view that Matthew and Luke independently copied Mark, a view essential to the Two-Document Hypothesis. It will further be argued that the view that Luke knew Matthew and that Mark used both Matthew and Luke is, in comparison to the Two-Document Hypothesis, the hypothesis to be preferred on compositional grounds.

This paper seeks to shed some light on 1 Thess 5.14–15, Paul's command to the Thessalonians to ‘admonish the disorderly, comfort the faint-hearted, help the weak, be patient with all’, and not to retaliate. In an earlier study, I focused primarily on Paul's role in nurturing the Thessalonian church. Here, I wish to develop what I discussed only very briefly in that study about the Thessalonians' own care for each other.

When scholars discuss the compositional processes of the Gospel of Mark, one of the important questions is the extent to which the evangelist drew on earlier sources. Mark seems to have collected and reordered a great amount of disparate material and given it his own stamp in order to produce something new. But the details of this process of collection, redaction, and composition are not at all clear. To what extent were those traditions already gathered or collected before Mark? Were the pre-Marcan materials transmitted in oral or written form? What degree of freedom did the gospel writer employ in taking over, adapting, or rewriting earlier sources?

Our redemption by the death of Christ on the cross is summed up in the credal statement of 1 Corinthians 15.3, ‘that Christ died for our sins (ύπέρ τν άμαρτιν ήμν)’, or very simply ‘for us (ύπέρ ήμ⋯ν)' (Rom 5.8). The meaning of this ύπέρ could be either vicarious: he died in our place; or atoning: he died on our behalf. But, whereas the ‘for our sins’ formula can be understood only in the atoning sense, the ‘for us’ one can be taken in both the vicarious and the atoning sense. Moreover, the ‘for us’ formula is logically — though not necessarily chronologically — prior to the ‘for our sins’ one. The latter might well have had its origin on Palestinian soil under the influence of Isaiah 53. 4–5,10.

The problem which I offer for your discussion may be raised in the following terms: if one assumes that the Golden Rule constitutes the basic moral rule about which the wisest may agree, what happens to this rule when it is put within a religious perspective, more precisely, within the perspective delineated by the symbolic network characteristic of the Jewish-Christian scriptures?

The conviction that God is good, that he takes ‘no pleasure in the death of the wicked’ (Ezek 18. 23), that he ‘desires all men to be saved’ (1 Tim 2. 4), and that Christ ‘gave himself as a ransom for all’ (1 Tim 2. 4), belongs to the main thrust of Christian soteriology. Although there have been soteriological pessimists (Thomas Aquinas, the Angelic Doctor, was an optimist on the salvation of the angels, but a pessimist on the salvation of human beings) and optimists (Karl Barth construed Paul's universalist teleology as a flat guarantee of universal salvation), most Christians have had to content themselves with an affirmation of God's at least antecedently universal salvific will, with the hope for the salvation of many and even of all, and with a straightforward agnosticism respecting whether the finally lost will be ‘any’ or ‘many’ or something in between. But, in the word of Matt 22.14 (l.v. 20. 16), Jesus himself speaks, and he seems (a) to evoke election = predestination = salvation, (b) to reduce the number of the elect = predestined = saved to ‘few’, and (c) to suggest that the differentiation between the called and the elect is not the outcome of human acts but of divine decision. All three factors — final salvation is at stake, few are saved, and this by God's sovereign decision — say why this word has been a crux interpretum.

The bulk of these chapters is invariably understood as a general, or as it were abstract, exposition of Christian virtues, without particular reference to a situation at Rome. We read in Luther, for example, that ‘the apostle is about to teach a Christian ethic’ when he begins chapter 12. Nygren states that none of Romans is aimed at circumstances peculiar to Rome, and that chapters 12–13 contain Paul's ‘central view of the ethical life of the Christian’. Käsemann regards 12–13 as general exhortation, only 14.1–15.3 being directed at problems in Rome. According to E. P. Sanders, nothing in Romans is called forth by the situation of the letter's recipients. ‘It seems best’, he writes, ‘to view Romans as being Paul's reflection on the problem of Jew and Gentile, in the light of the coming encounter in Jerusalem’. There are, however, several difficulties with this view. One is that the chapters do not include areas of Christian ethics with which we know Paul was concerned, such as marriage (1 Cor 7; Col 3.18 ff.), slavery (Col 3.22 ff.; Phlm), slander (1 Cor 6.10), suffering for Christ (2 Cor 1.7), generosity (2 Cor 8.6 ff.), avoiding witchcraft and gluttony (Gal 5.20; Phil 3.19), working hard (1 Thess 4.9–11). If Paul were writing a deliberately general ethic, we should have expected perhaps more system and certainly a greater range of items.6 More importantly, the view leads to fussy, artificial or disjointed divisions of the chapters into a multiplicity of exhortations which fail to grasp the broad sweep of Paul's thought. In particular the precise relevance of 13.1–7 is left obscure.