New: Dirt, Greed, & Sex

A recent announcement from Fortress:

Dirt, Greed, and Sex: Sexual Ethics in the New Testament and Their Implications for Today, Revised Edition

One of the most urgent tasks in contemporary discussions and controversies over sexuality, in churches and in wider society, is to put the biblical resources into their proper social and cultural contexts.

In Dirt, Greed, and Sex: Sexual Ethics in the New Testament and Their Implications for Today, Revised Edition, L. William Countryman accomplishes this task in an exemplary way, showing how biblical conceptions regarding proper sexual behavior arose from concerns for purity and from cultures in which women and children were often perceived as property. What biblical texts say about sex often arises from concerns about dirt and greed.

This new revised edition of the landmark 1988 text includes updated text and notes throughout, taking advantage of recent studies of sexual ethics and, where appropriate, criticizing them. A new chapter evaluates recent proposals for a normative "ethic of creation," and in a concluding chapter, Countryman offers his own positive statement of a New Testament ethic. The result is an invaluable resource for anyone who seeks to understand what the New Testament says about sex.

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BAR Highlights: 1/10/07

More recent archaeological news from Biblical Archaeology Review:

Tunnel Roadblock?
A group in Israel has asked that country’s Attorney General to order a halt in construction of a tunnel from the Western Wall to an ancient synagogue.

A Bang and a Whimper
A tsunami specialist uses a theoretical model and his own observations of the devastating results of the 2004 tsunami to piece together a theory regarding the end of Minoan society, the Bronze Age civilization crucial to the development of Western culture.

Mr. Mummy
A noted Egyptologist undertakes an actual mummification in order to learn about the ancient process and discusses, among other subjects, why it’s difficult to study Alzheimer’s disease in mummies.

Pass the Ketchup
Researchers investigating a cave near Haifa have been learning how its prehistoric inhabitants hunted, slaughtered and prepared animals 200,000 years ago.

Giza in Peril
Contaminated groundwater is rising and threatening the ancient monuments in the Giza plateau.

New: Mark (Hermeneia)

Another recent announcement from Fortress, this time featuring the one and only Prof. Adela Collins. The bookstore received its copies just before the SBL Annual Meeting... magisterial in both size and scope. This will undoubtedly remain the standard commentary on the Gospel of Mark for years to come.

Fortress Press Releases Hermeneia Volume on Mark

"Adela Collins' long-awaited commentary on the Gospel of Mark fulfills and even surpasses the highest expectations. It demonstrates the scholarly expertise and sound critical judgment we have come to expect from this expert on Jewish apocalyptic and Greco-Roman literary culture. This book will now be the definitive resource for historical-critical reading of the Gospel of Mark."
—Karen L. King, Harvard Divinity School

In the newly released Hermeneia Volume Mark: A Commentary, Professor Adela Yarbro Collins brings to bear on the text of the first Gospel the latest historical-critical perspectives, providing a full treatment of such controversial issues as the relationship of canonical Mark to the "Secret Gospel of Mark" and the text of the Gospel, including its longer endings.

She situates the Gospel, with its enigmatic portrait of the misunderstood Messiah, in the context of Jewish and Greco-Roman literature of the first century. Her comments draw on her profound knowledge of apocalyptic literature as well as on the traditions of popular biography in the Greco-Roman world to illuminate the overall literary form of the Gospel.

The commentary also introduces an impressive store of data on the language and style of Mark, illustrated from papyrological and epigraphical sources. Collins is in constructive dialogue with the wide range of scholarship on Mark that has been produced in the twentieth century. Her work will be foundational for Markan scholarship in the first half of the twenty-first century.

Adela Yarbro Collins is Buckingham Professor of New Testament Criticism and Interpretation at Yale Divinity School in New Haven, Connecticut. She has written numerous books on ancient Judaism and Christianity.

Order your copy today!

New: Justin Martyr

A recent announcement from Fortress:

New Volume Reintroduces Justin Martyr

Justin—philosopher and Christian martyr, Samaritan, exegete, apologist, and witness to so many of the intellectual and cultural worlds of the later Roman Empire—surprises every generation of scholars anew with the riches he has to offer them. One of the most gifted leaders in the early church, Justin and his writings are one of our richest sources for understanding the developing beliefs, worship, and public perception of Christians in the second century.

The newly released volume Justin Martyr and His Worlds presents a well-rounded portrait of one of the second-century church's most remarkable figures.

Here are studies of Justin's relationship to Judaism, Hellenism, and the Roman state, to philosophers, emperors, and heretics, and to the scriptures and other writings of second-century Judaism and Christianity. A map and timeline of Justin's world, a list of his writings, and a full-color gallery of images complement the work of many leading scholars.

Contents
Introduction: By Sara Parvis and Paul Foster, Editors

Part One: Justin's Worlds
Justin and Judaism — Judith Lieu, King's College, London
Justin and Gnosticism — Christoph Markschies, Humboldt Universität, Berlin
Justin and the Apologetic Tradition — Sara Parvis, University of Edinburgh

Part Two: Justin's Writings and Thought
Jesus as the Name of God in the "Dialogue with Trypho" — Larry W. Hurtado, University of Edinburgh
The "Apologies": A Textual History — Paul Parvis, University of Edinburgh
A New Text of Justin's "Apologies" — Denis Minns, University of Oxford
Justin's Use of the Old Testament — Oskar Skarsaune, Norwegian Lutheran School of Theology in Oslo
The Gospel of Peter and the Writings of Justin — Paul Foster, University of Edinburgh
Justin, Suicide and Martyrdom — Graham Stanton, University of Cambridge
Part Three: Reading Justin Today
Justin Scholarship: Trends and Trajectories — Michael Slusser, Duquesne University
Justin and the Postcolonial Tradition — J. Rebecca Lyman, University of California at Berkeley

Editors
Paul Foster is Senior Lecture in New Testament Literature, Language, and Theology, and Sara Parvis is Lecturer in Patristics, at the University of Edinburgh School of Divinity.

Order your copy today!

RBL Highlights: 1/8/07

A few highlights from this week's Review of Literature, including a review of Walter Brueggemann by our own Carolyn Sharp:

Russell C. D. Arnold
The Social Role of Liturgy in the Religion of the Qumran Community
Reviewed by Carol A. Newsom

John Sietze Bergsma
The Jubilee from Leviticus to Qumran: A History of Interpretation
Reviewed by Erhard Gerstenberger

Walter Brueggemann
The Theology of the Book of Jeremiah
Reviewed by Carolyn J. Sharp

Catharine Edwards and Greg Woolf, eds.
Rome the Cosmopolis
Reviewed by Jonathan L. Reed

Ulrich Luz; Helmut Koester, ed.; James Crouch, trans.
Matthew 1-7: A Commentary
Reviewed by David Sim
Reviewed by Charles L. Quarles

Ziadé, Raphaëlle
Les martyrs Maccabées: de l'histoire juive au culte chrétien: Les homélies de Grégoire de Nazianze et de Jean Chrysostome
Reviewed by Jan Willem van Henten