Recognition of the parallels between Q material and the Epistle of James has developed in recent years, and has convincingly attested to James’ literary dependence upon Q. If James does constitute an independent witness to the Sayings Gospel, there indeed may be some merit to a limited deployment of the Jacobean epistle in studies of the Synoptic Problem. The present contribution considers the reconstruction of Q through comparison with several of its Jacobean parallels, surveying the extent to which James can be fruitfully deployed. While scholars should certainly exercise caution in using James to reconstruct Q, selective comparison may offer us some new insights, particularly in adjudicating discrepancies between Matthew and Luke. Although the Epistle’s utility is limited because of its lack of verbatim citation of Q, James may be particularly helpful in the contentious debate about the inclusion of the Lucan woes (Q/Luke 6.24–6) into Q and offers some force to the minority position that the woes constituted an original component of Q’s Beatitudes.

Eusebius’ much-discussed catalogue of ‘acknowledged’, ‘disputed’ and ‘spurious’ works (Historia Ecclesiastica 3.25) is a key passage in the history of New Testament canon formation, but it is often extracted from its literary context and consequently misunderstood. This passage is in fact a summary of conclusions that Eusebius has already reached in the contributions to apostolic biography with which he supplements the Book of Acts in HE 2.1–3.24. Biographical passages relating the conclusion of the apostolic lives of James, Peter, Paul and John are accompanied by statements about the texts they authored or authorised, or that have been falsely attributed to them. This biographical context for differentiating genuine works of prestigious figures from their pseudepigraphal counterparts has its roots in Greco-Roman literary culture, as exemplified in the Lives of the Philosophers of Diogenes Laertius. Eusebius’ crucial contribution to the formation of the New Testament canon is thus rooted not in exclusively Christian concerns but in the wider literary culture of Late Antiquity.

The article deals with two topics that are neglected in the Gospel of Luke: miracles and praise. In Luke 5 – 18, the acts of praise appear almost always in the miracle stories and most frequently in the mouth of the crowd – four times. These acclamations reveal the gradual recognition of Jesus’ identity. The crowd’s perception of Jesus as a miracle worker (5.26) and prophet (7.16) at the beginning has changed to seeing in him the Son of David and Messiah (18.38, 39, 43). This progression of the Jewish crowd in understanding Jesus’ identity is the thesis of this article.

This article evaluates a potential angelomorphic tradition in Acts 12.15c. It demonstrates that the most common interpretation of the phrase ὁ ἄγγελός ἐστιν αὐτοῦ (‘it is his angel’, 12.15c) as referring to Peter’s guardian angel fails to account adequately for the evidence. After surveying several different proposals for interpreting the phrase, it argues that angelomorphy/angelisation is the most plausible option available to Luke and his earliest readers. Finally, this article demonstrates how an angelomorphic interpretation of Acts 12.15c is congruent with both the broader concern for angelomorphy/angelisation throughout Luke-Acts, as well as the use of humour and irony in Acts 12.12–15.1

Most commentators, as well as the editors of both the NA28 and UBS5, identify Acts 3.22–3 as a composite citation of Deut 18.15–19 and Lev 23.29. Problems arise, however, when they try to explain why Luke combines these two texts. Luke’s typical practice for composite citations is to combine texts which share a common theme or otherwise mutually interpret each other, but none of the suggested connections between Deut 18.15–19 and Lev 23.29 have proven convincing. This paper demonstrates that while scholars have correctly identified Deut 18.15–19 as one of the texts cited, the text with which Luke combines it ought to be identified as Num 15.30 rather than Lev 23.29. Both Deut 18.18–19 and Num 15.30–1 describe the consequences of deliberately rejecting the ‘word of the Lord’. Correctly identifying these texts confirms Luke’s general practice in composite citations and also clarifies the function of this citation in its context in Acts 3.12–26. Using this composite citation, Peter warns those who had previously acted in ignorance against now opposing God deliberately.

Roy D. Kotansky* argues in ‘The Star of the Magi: Lore and Science in Ancient Zoroastrianism, the Greek Magical Papyri and St. Matthew’s Gospel’ that the pericope in the M Source regarding the star of Bethlehem reflects Zoroastrian traditions about Magi who divine from a star seen falling to Earth the birth of a coming saviour, who will deliver the world from bondage and inaugurate the blessing of a new millennium. Following Nikos Kokkinos’ chronology for Jesus’ birth, Kotansky argues that the star of Bethlehem is not part of a midrash fulfilling the prophecy that ‘a star shall come forth out of Jacob’ (Num 24.17), but Halley’s comet, which appeared twice (perihelion) in the sky in 12 bce during the rulership of Herod the Great. According to Kotansky, the author of the Gospel of Matthew integrated Zoroastrian interpretations of this astronomical phenomenon with Jewish messianic and Bethlehemic segments such as Mic 5.2 (Matt 2.6). As Kotansky acknowledges, his interpretation results in two Synoptic dates for Jesus’ birth – (1) 12 bce with the appearance of the comet (Matt 2.2, 9, 10), and (2) 6/7 ce at the time of the census by Quirinius (Luke 2.2). This essay explores whether the messianic and Bethlehemic segments of Matthew 2 refer to a lost tradition of the birth of John the Baptist that took place in 12 bce at the time of Halley’s comet, suggesting a separate tradition of Jesus’ birth in 6 ce at the time of the ‘first census’.

In John 4.9, most translations render the phrase οὐ γὰρ συγχρῶνται Ἰουδαῖοι Σαμαρίταις as ‘Jews do not associate with Samaritans’. However, the ancient evidence that is presented for this translation consists of examples that are ambiguous, or that use συγχράομαι with one of its other common meanings. However, the history of translation into Latin and other languages, as well as some early interpreters, provide some limited evidence for the traditional translation. A few newer translations (NRSV, NET) and many commentaries, following a 1950 article by D. Daube, render the phrase as ‘Jews do not share vessels with Samaritans’. The translation ‘share vessels’ has two main problems. First, it is grammatically almost impossible, since συγχράομαι always takes the dative as an object, not as a co-ordinate subject. Thus, the dative object Σαμαριταῖς must function as an actual object, not as a co-ordinate subject. Second, as with the traditional translation, all of the proposed examples are either ambiguous or lend themselves much better to one of the other known meanings of συγχράομαι. Strangely, the major lexica all have demonstrably mistaken references to ancient literature in support of these proposed translations. However, there are many ancient examples of συγχράομαι meaning ‘get help from’ when the dative object is a person. This proposed translation makes sense in the passage, as the Samaritan woman is surprised at Jesus seeking help from a Samaritan. It is also consistent with Josephus’ criticism of Samaritans that they do not help Jews in times of need.

The Gothic translation of Phil 2.6–8 differs from the Greek in three ways: it says that Christ did not think it robbery to be ‘like God’; it breaks the parallelism between the ‘form of God’ and ‘form of a slave’; and it states explicitly that Christ was obedient ‘to the Father’. Scholars have focused exclusively on the first element, crediting it to the Homoian ‘Arian’ prejudices of the translator, Wulfila, or to his opposition to modalist tendencies in pro-Nicene thought of the 340s. Neither interpretation is satisfactory, the first because the Gothic displays no generalised Homoian bias, the second on philological grounds. When the passage is viewed as a whole, an explanation can be found in the history of exegesis. Homoian churchmen, who followed a theology close to the elderly Wulfila’s, seem to have construed ἁρπαγμός (Gothic wulwa, English ‘robbery’) as res rapienda, in the typology developed by N.T. Wright. Christ did not ‘seize’ equality with God. Incompatible with this view, the Gothic is a better fit for res retinenda (Christ did not ‘hold fast’ his divine status). In an ancient analogue to modern ‘functional equivalence’, it is representing the meaning of the text, as agreed among Greek exegetes, on the translation’s surface. Just why Wulfila did this remains obscure: certainly to clarify the passage’s Christology, but possibly also to head off misinterpretation in his Gothic context. Either way, the Gothic text shows a more flexible approach to translation than scholarship, still focused on stereotyped ‘Arianism’ and lexical equivalence, has yet recognised.