The Nicodemus story can be read as a distillation of the Gospel of John and an example of many of its key features. John 3:1–21 poses a wide range of the problems raised by this most distinctive and mysterious of the four gospels. It shows characteristic practices of John as a reader, writer and teacher. In line with John's theology of the Spirit ‘leading into all the truth’, it also shows him as a daring theologian, opening up fresh interpretations and ways of doing theology beyond the Septuagint and the Synoptic Gospels and even beyond his own Prologue (itself a remarkably daring piece of theology). That same Spirit means that John also expects his readers to be led into further truth, and to improvise on his theology as he himself did on the Septuagint and on the Synoptic traditions. His ways of reading, writing and teaching encourage such a response in the Spirit by creating a work rich in intertextuality, imagery and conceptuality which has a ‘deep plain sense’, superabundant in meaning and always inviting the reader to reread, learn more and interpret afresh. So one challenge for readers now is whether they are open not only to thinking along with John but also to thinking beyond him, in ways appropriate to different people and contexts. But this transformation in thought and imagination is not all: it is inseparable from doing the truth ‘in God’. The mutual involvement of seeing, believing/trusting, knowing and living in love is above all communicated in the drama of John's Gospel, whose backbone is a series of meetings with Jesus and the injunction to follow Jesus. More embracing and fundamental than, for example, doctrinal theology or existential decision-making, is the dramatic reality of encountering other people and following Jesus in all the complexities of life in specific contexts. In John 3:1–21 the encounter of Jesus with Nicodemus is the dramatic heart of the passage, blending into a discourse which itself culminates in the ultimate drama of ‘deeds done in God’. But to stop interpretation there would be to refuse the Johannine invitation to enter into more truth with a view to ‘doing greater things’. So the article ends with two midrashic interpretations of Nicodemus for today.

Contemporary Christian construals of the Eucharist, both in doctrine and in practice, generally tend to subordinate, de-emphasise or omit theological reference to the Jewish Passover meal. And yet the key New Testament texts in which the Eucharist's institution is variously narrated – the very texts and institution allegedly ‘remembered’ in eucharistic rites – are virtually unintelligible apart from Passover. Thus, at the heart of Christian doctrine and practical life sits a particular theological problem: namely, precisely how to relate the distinctively Jewish character of the Eucharist's origins as narrated in the New Testament to the distinctively Christian character of eucharistic doctrine and liturgy. Drawing on two Jewish thinkers, Michael Fishbane and Yair Zakovitch, in this article I offer one model for understanding the Eucharist–Passover relationship in particular, and the Christian–Jewish relationship generally, as fundamentally typological, performative and ‘subsessionist’. That is, I propose a subsessionist (as opposed to supersessionist) typological understanding of the Eucharist as a Christian rendition of Passover, at once distinct from its Jewish counterparts today and utterly dependent on the ancient Israelite festival for its intelligibility and force. From Fishbane, I draw the idea that throughout the Hebrew Bible, the exodus narrative provides a crucial interpretative key applicable to both prior and anticipated redemptions. From Zakovitch, I draw the idea that the ubiquity of exodus typology in Hebrew scripture may function to create an impression of periodic repetition in salvation history, in effect reassuring Israel that future deliverance will conform to the essential patterns of the prestigious past. The typology at play here, then, so far from being a triumphalist ‘prophecy-fulfilment’ arrangement in which the ‘old’ is valuable only insofar as it serves as a signpost pointing to the ‘new’, is rather a ‘paradigm-rendition’ typology in which the new performance is clarified and authenticated precisely insofar as it corresponds to the old, exalted original. At stake here, I contend, is not only a more fruitful framework for conceiving the relationship between Eucharist and Passover (or indeed between Christianity and Judaism), but also a crucial theological strategy for resisting what amounts to a de facto Marcionism in contemporary Christian communities.

This article argues that the Christian West's indebtedness to contractual logic in regard to marriage, as canonically depicted in 1 Corinthians 7, has resulted in a corresponding theological and pastoral myopia. The weakness of this reliance, as seen paradigmatically in Augustine's theology of marriage, consists in its articulation of marriage's constitution apart from any meaningful reference to the particular dynamics of any given marital common life. ‘Marriage’, in this sense, remains extrinsic to the living of marriage. Augustine doubly solidifies this separation by construing marriage as a contractually negotiated site for the sinful, though forgivable, expression of sexual desire, which he then roots in a christological account of sacrament whereby the sacramental bond of marriage can never be broken regardless of the lived particularities of marital life. A promising corrective can be found by way of a theological retrieval of a minor set of images suggestively employed in passages such as Ephesians 5:21–33 and Revelation 19:7–9 rooted in cultic themes such as sacrifice and consecration, which Augustine employs in describing marriage's preferred ecclesial alternative: the consecration of virginity. The constructive result is a theology of marriage in which every moment of marital life is marked by the ambivalence of vulnerably and ‘deathly’ surrendering to one another, which is pre-eminently embodied in the surrender of Christ himself upon the cross to the one he called Father. This ambivalence is characterised by the dual possibility, inherent in the posture of surrender itself, in which the result can either bear the healing fruits of love and reciprocal embrace or the tragic inhumanity of abuse, rejection and manipulation. Finally, the sacrificial and contractual elements of marriage might be ultimately reconciled in a refigured notion of ‘covenant’, which too often has been understood simply as a synonym for ‘contract’. Instead, a proper covenantal understanding of marriage emerges as a participatory analogy to the entire, complicated and contingent history of God, with God's people marked by seemingly endless cycles of sin, repentance, forgiveness and restoration. Intriguingly, this history was also founded within a temporal space outlined by a mix of contractual elements and cultic regulations. Likewise, the covenantal founding of a marriage mirrors a similar dynamic: the initial ‘contractual’ vows speak into existence a temporalised space within which a daily, mundane life of love might come to pass and bear its fruits, in due time, by God's grace and the daily improvisations of love and sacrifice.

In his 1923–4 lectures on the theology of Friedrich Schleiermacher, Karl Barth offered a strikingly negative verdict on Schleiermacher's doctrine of justification, lamenting that it was radically discontinuous with the theology of the Reformation. The core purpose of this article is to assess this verdict in detail. The introduction presents in outline Barth's criticism of Schleiermacher's doctrine of justification from these lectures. The first section of the article provides a summary of the doctrine of justification as it is found in Schleiermacher's mature work, The Christian Faith, together with a brief consideration of the related doctrines of conversion and sanctification, and an exposition of the dogmatic location and inter-relation of the three loci. In the second section, the article proceeds to investigate closely whether three of the central criticisms of Barth pertaining to Schleiermacher's doctrine of justification reflect an accurate reading and adjudication of the underlying material. The criticisms explored are: that for Schleiermacher there is no justification as a free act of God but only a justification which takes place according to the law of nature; that in the event of justification Schleiermacher considers both God and the human being to be active; and that the doctrine of Schleiermacher repeats the heresy of essential righteousness after the fashion of Andreas Osiander. The common theme underlying each charge is that Schleiermacher has departed significantly (and lamentably) from the tradition of the Reformation. The third section of the article proceeds to explore these charges carefully in light of a close reading of Schleiermacher's dogmatic work on justification and related doctrines. In the case of each of the criticisms directed at his doctrine of justification, it is argued that there are strong grounds for asserting that Barth's concerns may be rather misplaced and that – true to his word – Schleiermacher indeed remains in broad dogmatic continuity with the Reformation tradition. In the conclusion, two further theological possibilities are noted. First, it is suggested that, far from leaving the Reformation tradition behind, Schleiermacher's work on justification resonates strongly with one particular reading of Calvin's work which has much currency in contemporary theology. And second, it is suggested that, far from Schleiermacher being the one to depart from the Reformation tradition on justification, it might actually – ironically – be Barth who is more guilty of that charge in view of his own doctrine of justification in the Church Dogmatics.

Social scientists in disparate fields are now employing the construct of honour to ameliorate various social problems, such as immorality, failed states, international discord, poverty and mental illness. Moreover, historians of global religion cite Christianity's shift towards cultures shaped by the values of honour and shame. Despite this growing prominence of honour in social theories and the emergence of Christianity in honour–shame cultures, the notion of honour remains absent from theological discourse. In light of these global realities, we explore how God's active transformation of humanity from shame to honour can interpret both salvation-history and Christian theology. To this end I first explore the nature of humanity's problem of shame before God, using anthropological and biblical insights. Throughout the Old Testament, God's covenant initiatives with Abram, Moses and David, along with the common socio-literary pattern of God exalting a servant from unjust shame, reveals the dignified status God intends for humanity. God's programme to restore people from shame to honour climaxes in Jesus, who embodies honour in the incarnation, mediates dignity to the marginalised by healings and public fellowship, elaborates God's new code of honour which reinterprets social stigmas, and procures an exalted status for all peoples by atoning for shame and resurrecting to exaltation. Romans and 1 Peter are interpreted in their socio-historic contexts as apostolic instruments which expound the social implications of God's honour code. To unify the fractured Romans for the upcoming Spanish mission, Paul confronts social imperialism by replacing false honour claims with God's status now available by faith through grace in Christ. Meanwhile, 1 Peter assures maligned Christians of their exalted status and outlines honourable social relations. Then, in closing, we examine a soteriology of honour diachronically and systematically. In particular, how: biblical metaphors symbolise believers’ status transposition, group incorporation is key to New Testament soteriology, Eastern Orthodoxy's doctrine of theosis articulates the infusion of divine status, and other theological categories could be interpreted through honour-shame social values. These reflections towards an exegetical soteriology of divine honour are offered as an initial theological platform for addressing social issues where honour values prevail.

This is an impressive work. It is not a book just about Augustine's work ‘On the Trinity’, but on Augustine's trinitarian thought as a whole. It is a mature work, not written within a couple of months, but with years of thinking and rethinking. All this time has helped make the book what it is. I am pleased that it is a historical work, mainly for two reasons: (a) it sketches the development of Augustine's thought (this old model of German historical approach is always helpful), and (b) it places Augustine's trinitarian thought in a specific place in the history of theology. Of course, there are warnings in the Introduction that the book has neither the aim to offer a complete ‘history of Augustine's Trinitarian thought’ nor does it set out to be a monograph about the whole of De trinitate. In fact, the monograph starts with the early Augustine, sketching the ‘origins’ of his trinitarian thought, and the chapters about De trinitate intend to set out the fundamental lines of Augustine's thought in De trinitate. So I think we are allowed to read this book as a new approach to an old problem: how did Augustine's trinitarian thought develop into the mature form found in De trinitate? If we follow Ayres’ approach, three problems appear. I ask: (a) what about philosophy, (b) what about Manichaeism and (c) what kind of theology is regarded as the background to Augustine's trinitarian thought?