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This thesis is about the application of modern literary criticism to the epistle of Jude. One of the major questions it asks is "What happens to a text (Jude) when a reader reads it using one of these literary theories?" Or to put it a different way, "What does this way of reading emphasise which may have been neglected, ignored, or treated as irrelevant by other forms of reading?" The answers to these questions have been constructed around three loci: the reader, the text, and the author. Within the chapters constructed around those foci, the issues of power and desire, knowledge and language are brought to the forefront by the methods used for reading Jude. These methods include ideas drawn from reader response criticism, feminism, psychoanalysis, intertextuality, the study of tropes, structuralism, and post-structuralism. These methods and the ideas which they highlight are drawn together to comment on the relationship between the reader, the text, and the author and to accent their access (or lack of it) to desire, power, knowledge, and language. The epistle of Jude becomes an epistle that is about power and desire just as much as it is an epistle about "false teachers" and about a community of people known by the name Beloved.

ABSTRACT CHRISTIAN LOVE AND THE IMITATION OF CHRIST IN THE EPISTLE TO DIOGNETUS: A SECOND-CENTURY EXAMPLE OF CHRISTIAN DISCIPLESHIP Charles Theodore Mielke IV, Ed.D. The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, 2017 Chair: Dr. Timothy Paul Jones The Epistle to Diognetus is an early church writing that offers an excellent picture of the Christian life, as well as deficiencies of other religions. In the text, the author illustrates the nature of God’s love. As he comes to the climactic point in the text, he also offers a call for action on the recipient of the letter. This call is to imitate God; but not just a generalized concept of God, specifically God’s love. This invitation to imitate God, along with the detailed expression of his love offers a clear image of a true committed disciple in the middle second century. Along with expounding upon the nature of God’s love and how to imitate this characteristic, strong connections are drawn between the text of Diognetus and the writings of the New Testament. These connections provide support for continuity of thought between the unknown author of Diognetus, and the New Testament writers.

The convergence of the Church, its Gospel and the World has become a critical area of New Testament Biblical Studies. This significance revolves around the ‘relevance and impact ‘ of the Church and her kerygmatic message in an increasingly secular and sceptic world. The secularization and scepticism is mainly driven by the dawning of a ‘post-modern’ twenty first century which has also ushered in an era of unprecedented technological and scientific advancement. This new-world, which is being advanced through the ‘global village’ phenomenon, and the broadening democratization and entrenchment of individual human rights in developing countries, seems to have discarded all ‘absolutes’, and only values that which can be verified empirically. All this has left many individuals questioning the relevance of the Church and her message. Many seem to have designated the Church and her message as ‘past the expiry date’. It is thus no longer uncommon for previously Christian societies to be described as Post-Christian societies. The convergence of Church, Gospel and World has thus become very significant. The critical question is whether the Church is to close the door on the world and adopt an isolationist stance, or whether the Church is to fulfill her missiological and prophetic role by engaging and penetrating our twenty first century world with the message of the Gospel. This short dissertation will consider selected aspects of Pauline Ecclesiological and Soteriological perspectives in a social context, and the Social conditions of the Pauline World. We will then consider how the three components – Church; Gospel and World – ought to converge in the missiological task of the Church. / Prof. J.A. du Rand

<p> The topics of suffering and death appear throughout the Epistle to the Hebrews but have rarely been examined in New Testament scholarship. This study offers a thorough investigation of each reference to these topics in the epistle using semantic domain analysis. Incorporating the work of linguist M.A.K. Halliday, it then attempts to connect these topics to the social situation addressed by the author of Hebrews. It is determined that the author is responding to the reality of suffering in the lives of his audience. This is closely connected to a perceived threat or fear of death on the part of the probable recipients. With this social context in place, this study examines how the author responds to this situation by creating models of endurance in suffering and death. The author establishes these exemplars in order to motivate his audience toward similar endurance within their own social context.</p> / Thesis / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

This study is an attempt to read 1 John, a document which was conceptualised almost two thousand years ago in a particularly different context from that of Zulu people into which this venture is undertaken. A number of hermeneutical problems are raised by this kind of reading. Chapter eight of this thesis addresses itself to these problems. The present dissertation utilises the sociology of knowledge especially Berger and Luckmann's theory of the symbolic universe to investigate the possible social scenario of 1 John into which the conceptualisation and crystallisation of the text of 1 John first took place. The investigation has led the researcher into discovering the abundance of family language and common social conventions relating to family, which the author of 1 John found to be useful vehicles for conveying his understanding of the new situation that had come about as a result of the fellowship eventuating from the acceptance of the gospel. The same theory of Berger and Luckmann was used to investigate the African (Zulu) scenario with the view to ascertaining whether some form of congruency could be established between the social symbols identified in 1 John and those obtaining in the Zulu context. To ensure that the results of this investigation applied to Zulu people of this day and age, the researcher conducted field research. In doing this, a qualitative approach was followed as it was deemed appropriate for this kind of study. Within the qualitative framework, the focus group interview method was employed. The results were therefore subjected to a process of comparison and synthesis with the views obtaining in 1 John and the Zulu world. This investigation confirmed our hypothesis that there exists a major of congruency between both universes, that is, 1 John and that of Zulu people, which if properly identified, investigated and exploited, could enhance a smooth construction of a hermeneutical bridge of understanding between the two worlds and enhance a heightened relevance and significance of 1 John's message within the Zulu context. The investigation also revealed some difficulties regarding certain symbols especially those that that seek to express the divine reality. The bankruptcy of language to capture and express the divine reality as people perceive it was noted. Our conclusion therefore, was this: inadequate though these symbols might be to express divine reality, at the moments they are a given. For instance, within the Zulu context, a number of symbols could be used to express the reality of the Christ-event. For instance, to mention just a few, the First born son, as well as the Ancestor symbols, both convey something of the reality of Christ but they do not go far enough to express the fullness embodied in the person of Christ. For that reason it is suggested that we do not shy away from these symbols because of attendant difficulties, but that an informed and critical discussion seeking to reach consensus among all stake-holders be conducted. / Dissertation (DD)--University of Pretoria, 2004. / New Testament Studies / unrestricted

This graduation thesis contains analysis of various aspects of the Epistle of James as Judeo- Christian halakhah addressed to the Diaspora Jews.according to an author's opinion, the author of the Epistle (traditionally, the bishop of Jerusalem church James the Just) wrote his encyclical to those readers who already knew the teachings of other Judaic and Christian missionaries. A Jew-rigorist from Palestine presented to co-brothers (who a priori were considered to be less religious) his understanding of holiness through temptations and deliberate poverty. In this paper, theological, social, and ethical aspects of the Epistle are researched through historical context of the author, i. e. his Sitz im Leben.

Please read the abstract in the thesis. / Thesis (PhD)--University of Pretoria, 2013. / gm2013 / New Testament Studies / unrestricted