Andy Naselli

Thoughts on Theology

Lexham Greek-English Interlinear Septuagint

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About four hours ago, I downloaded The Lexham Greek-English Interlinear Septuagint, edited by Randall Tan. A Logos employee emailed, “I believe you are the first person outside of Logos to get it.” Cool. The product is projected to ship on November 24, so the pre-pub special ($109.95) will soon elevate to a sale price ($122.95), so now is the time to lock in on the best price.

You can get a decent overview of this LXX by reading the product page.

Here are some thoughts after playing with my new toy/tool: [Read more…] about Lexham Greek-English Interlinear Septuagint

Bob Jones University “Profoundly Sorry” for Being “Racially Hurtful”

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Excerpt (emphasis added):

Bob Jones University has existed since 1927 as a private Christian institution of higher learning for the purpose of helping young men and women cultivate a biblical worldview, represent Christ and His Gospel to others, and glorify God in every dimension of life.

BJU’s history has been chiefly characterized by striving to achieve those goals; but like any human institution, we have failures as well. For almost two centuries American Christianity, including BJU in its early stages, was characterized by the segregationist ethos of American culture. Consequently, for far too long, we allowed institutional policies regarding race to be shaped more directly by that ethos than by the principles and precepts of the Scriptures. We conformed to the culture rather than provide a clear Christian counterpoint to it.

In so doing, we failed to accurately represent the Lord and to fulfill the commandment to love others as ourselves. For these failures we are profoundly sorry. Though no known antagonism toward minorities or expressions of racism on a personal level have ever been tolerated on our campus, we allowed institutional policies to remain in place that were racially hurtful.

On national television in March 2000, Bob Jones III, who was the university’s president until 2005, stated that BJU was wrong in not admitting African-American students before 1971, which sadly was a common practice of both public and private universities in the years prior to that time. On the same program, he announced the lifting of the University’s policy against interracial dating.

Read the whole thing.

Righteousness by Faith Is Accessible!

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Douglas J. Moo concisely summarizes the meaning of Romans 10:6–8 in the NLT Study Bible:

10:6-8 Here Paul quotes three phrases from Deut 30:12–14 dealing with the law, and he applies them to the Good News about Christ. We do not need to go up to heaven to find Christ (and thus to be made right with God), because God has already brought him down to earth as a man. Nor do we need to go down to the place of the dead to find Christ, because God has already raised him from the dead. To find Christ, we must simply believe in the message that is close at hand.

Bauckham on Separating from False Religion

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Richard Bauckham concludes The Theology of the Book of Revelation (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993) with a section entitled “Revelation’s Relevance Today” (pp. 159–64). His eighth of eleven “theological directions for contemporary reflection” calls for the church to separate from false religion (pp. 162–63):

Revelation’s prophetic critique is of the churches as much as of the world. It recognizes that there is a false religion not only in the blatant idolatries of power and prosperity, but also in the constant danger that true religion falsify itself in compromise with such idolatries and betrayal of the truth of God. Again, this is the relevance of Revelation’s theocentric emphasis on worship and truth. The truth of God is known in genuine worship of God. To resist idolatry in the world by faithful witness to the truth, the church must continuously purify its own perception of truth by the vision of the utterly Holy One, the sovereign Creator, who shares his throne with the slaughtered Lamb.

“The Flames of Rome”: A Documentary Novel by Paul Maier

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Last night Jenni and I finished reading Paul Maier‘s The Flames of Rome. It is outstanding! It is a bit more explicit than Maier’s Pontius Pilate (sometimes uncomfortably so, e.g., re Nero’s depravity), but overall, it is a fine tool to engage one’s mind with first-century Greco-Roman, Jewish, and Christian history in a way that is virtually impossible by reading only encyclopedia-type summaries of the day. Bravo!

I would not be surprised if both of these books become required reading for NT classes I may teach in the future. They’re that useful.

Related: “Pontius Pilate”: A Documentary Novel by Paul Maier

Scholarship Fads

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Here are some good reminders re scholarship from Rethinking the Synoptic Problem (ed. David Alan Black and David R. Beck; Grand Rapids: Baker, 2001), emphasis added:

1. Scot McKnight, “A Generation Who Knew Not Streeter: The Case for Markan Priority,” p. 66:

The unfortunate, however unintended, implication of coming to grips with modern scholarship is that in learning contemporary scholarship, students put the previous generation on the shelf. These scholars are sitting there full of chat, but, sadly, modern students don’t have time for older studies, and so the books become forlorn as the faces of the scholars become lonely, sad, and unknown. It is a fact that modern scholarship’s improvements do not necessarily make older scholarship obsolescent.

2. Grant R. Osborne, “Response,” pp. 150–51:

There are no certainties in life. It must be said that scholarship, like all other earthly endeavors, runs in fads, especially in the post-Enlightenment setting. Scholars are essentially Athenians at heart, always searching for some new thing (Acts 17:21).  The four-source hypothesis [which Osborne holds] has dominated for almost a century now, and that is a fairly long time. So we can never know when some new genius will come along and establish a new theory that will carry the day. However, it is the purpose of symposia like this to sum up the “state of the art” on the issue, and I believe we have done as well as we can. It seems to me that the evidence points clearly to the modified Streeter theory that Mark was first, and that it existed alongside a sayings source that we now call Q. Later, Matthew utilized both and supplemented them with his own (M)emory material. At the same time (it is nearly impossible to know which was first), Luke used Mark and Q along with other sources he had gathered (L), and wrote his Gospel. Again, certainty is impossible, and it is good for us to be “iron sharpening iron” as we debate the proper approach to interpreting the Gospels on the basis of the sources they used (redaction and composition criticism). The only mandate for all of us is humility. We need each other, for without these challenges we become arrogant and falsely certain of our community-shaped theories.

Con Campbell’s Blogged Mini-Series on Verbal Aspect

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One month ago I posted on “Con Campbell’s Primer on Verbal Aspect Theory.”

Constantine R. Campbell. Basics of Verbal Aspect in Biblical Greek. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2008 (coming November 1, 2008). 159 pp.

This week Campbell blogged a five-part mini-series on his book on a Zondervan blog:

Related: Andrew David Naselli, “A Brief Introduction to Verbal Aspect in New Testament Greek,” Detroit Baptist Seminary Journal 12 (2007): 17–28.