This thesis is an investigation into the discrepancies that exist in textual interpretations within Pentacostalism, in view of the ongoing search for a viable hermeneutic model unique to Pentecostalism. Since its birth, the modern Pentecostal movement has been influenced by many other theological traditions, especially Covenant theology and Dispensationalism. Nevertheless, from this research it becomes clear that Pentecostalists themselves have contributed to the discrepancies by failing to distinguish between biblical passages related to national Israel and those related to the church. It is factual that cultural differences and theological backgrounds influence the interpretations ascribed to Scripture. Yet, this research found that scriptural interpretive discrepancies exist amongst Pentecostalists belonging to the same cultural group and same denomination. This study presents a new perspective on biblical interpretation for Pentecostalism, namely the Mediatorial View, which when consistently applied to all tectual interpretations, most certainly will reduce the number of discrepancies that exist. / Philosophy, Practical and Systematic Theology / M. Th. (Systematic Theology)

Made available in DSpace on 2014-07-29T16:17:42Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertacao SAmuel N dos SAntos.pdf: 1063779 bytes, checksum: 95147b60c8e271abf2cf57c25320fd96 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2012-05-31 / The intention of this study is to analyze the proposal of the making of Christian identity from the work entitled First Apology, by Justin Martyr. We believe that in the formation of Christianity, some authors such as Justin, promoted the project of creating a Christian identity, from the rules and practices that should equalize / standardize the fact of being a Christian in the first and second centuries A.D. Justin, in his First Apology, indicates what should be done and what should be avoided to be considered Christian, and such discourse allows the production of identity characteristics. To achieve this goal, we investigated the relationships of interculturality in the first and second centuries A.D, we researched and presented specific aspects of author and his work, such as: its dating, the extant manuscripts, the genre, the historical context, etc. Finally, in the last chapter, we presented closely at particular aspects of the First Apology: its internal structure, his idea about Jesus, the Jewish prophecies, the Christians as a race, those who were not Christians and the groups considered heretical, the relationship of the author with the stoicism and the Platonism, the author s intention in drawing up his speech and, finally, about the Christian identity proposed by him seen from the data above. / A intenção do presente trabalho é analisar a proposta de construção de uma identidade cristã a partir da obra intitulada I Apologia, de Justino Mártir. Acreditamos que na formação do cristianismo, alguns autores como Justino, promoveram o projeto de criação de uma identidade cristã, a partir de preceitos e práticas que deveriam igualar/homogeneizar o fato de se ser cristão nos séculos I e II d.C. Justino indica na I Apologia o que se deveria fazer e o que se deveria evitar para se ser considerado cristão e tal discurso possibilita a produção de características identitárias. A partir dessa ideia, investigamos as relações de interculturalidade nos séculos I e II d.C., pesquisamos e apresentamos o autor e aspectos específicos de sua produção, tais como: datação, manuscritos existentes, gênero, o contexto histórico, etc. Por fim, no último capítulo, apresentamos detidamente aspectos particulares da I Apologia: sua estrutura interna, sua ideia de Jesus, das profecias judaicas, dos cristãos enquanto uma raça, que os diferenciavam dos que não eram cristãos e dos grupos considerados heréticos, a relação do autor com o estoicismo e o platonismo, a intenção do autor na elaboração do discurso e, por último, a identidade cristã por ele proposta a vista disto tudo.

This thesis focussed on the matter of Judean ethnic identity in the first century CE. At first we pointed out that New Testament scholarship lacks an overall interpretive framework to understand Judean identity. There is not an appreciation of what informed the entire process of Judean ethnic identity formation in the first century, or at any period for that matter. This lack of interpretive framework is acute in scholarship on the historical Jesus, where the issue of Judeanness is most strongly debated. We investigated the reconstructions of John P Meier and John D Crossan, and attempted to identify what content, be it explicitly or implicitly, or by omission, do they assign to Jesus’ Judean identity. But as yet, we were not in a position to say just what kind of Judean Jesus was. We then proceeded by developing a Socio-Cultural Model of Judean Ethnicity. At first Sanders’ notion of covenantal nomism was explored and redefined to function primarily as an ethnic descriptor. We combined the notion of covenantal nomism with Berger and Luckmann’s theories on the sociology of knowledge, and saw that covenantal nomism could function as the Judean construction of reality. It is a convenient way to define the Judean “symbolic universe”. Dunn’s “four pillars of Second Temple Judeanism” was then reviewed, which looked at the importance of the Temple, God, Election and the Torah. The “new perspective” on Paul as developed by Dunn also proved useful, as he brought attention to the importance of traditional customs (e g circumcision and food laws), and how it served as “badges” for Judean identity. The approaches of Sanders and Dunn, however, lacked the insights of ethnicity theory. Ethnicity theory has identified two primary alternatives when it comes to ethnicity formation: constructionism and primordialism. We looked at the attempt of Jones to integrate the various approaches by her incorporation of the concept of the habitus. An overview of Duling’s Socio-Cultural Model of Ethnicity followed, which lists all the relevant cultural features and which emphasises the predominant constructionist approach. We integrated all of the above into our own proposed model, which we termed covenantal nomism. It is a pictorial representation of the Judean symbolic universe, which as an ethnic identity, was proposed to be essentiall primordialist. The model was then given appropriate content, by investigating what would have been typical of first century Judean ethnic identity. It was also demonstrated that their existed a fundamental continuity between Judea and Galilee, as Galileans were ethnic Judeans themselves and they lived on the ancestral land of Israel. Attention was then focussed on the matter of ethnic identity in Q. We investigated the stratification of Kloppenborg and suggested that the third stratum which refers to the Torah properly belongs to the polemical and apologetic strategy of the main redaction. After analysing the two stratums it was concluded that Q points to a community whose Judean ethnic identity was in (re)construction. Apart from the cultural features of name and land, all cultural features demonstrated strong elements of discontinuity with traditional covenantal nomism. The Q people were given an eschatological Judean identity based on their commitment to Jesus and the requirements of the kingdom/reign of God. / Thesis (PhD (New Testament Studies))--University of Pretoria, 2007. / New Testament Studies / unrestricted

Patrick Edward Connor was a military officer who was given the duty of guarding the overland mail route in the West during the civil war. In addition to this he was to watch the Mormons in Utah and determine their loyalty to the government of the United States. He was the commander of the Military District of Utah and he established his headquarters at Camp Douglas which was near Salt Lake City, Utah.While stationed in Utah, Connor saw action against hostile Indians on the Bear River in Idaho and other places; had some problems with the Mormons; and became interested in the mining possibilities of the Utah territory.

In this dissertation, I explore to address the problem of the identity of Paul’s interlocutor(s) in Rom 1–3 and the subsequent issue of whether Paul only includes non-Jewish Gentiles as recipients of his gospel teaching. In order to deal with the research question in a linguistically informed manner, I draw from Systemic Functional Linguistics and use two related notions of cohesive chains and grammatical metaphor (nominalization). By applying both methods to the text, I identify twenty-three active cohesive chains and five most important instances of nominalization in the text. Based on the linguistic data elicited solely by examining the interaction patterns among the chains and by explicating the various textual effects that nominalization brings about, I conclude that the linguistic evidence points to the possibility that the interlocutor is an ethnically Jewish man and Paul thus does not exclude his fellow Jews from his presentation of the gospel in Rom 1–3.

Despite the fact that the majority of scholars agree that Paul’s letter to the Romans was written to address the Judean-Gentile ethnic divide in Rome, there is still a continued failure to follow through with the avenues that this position opens up for the study of Romans. Traditionally, Paul’s letter to the Romans has been read as a theological tractate, a reading that assumes an ideational or theological interpretation of the letter to the exclusion of Paul’s ethnic rhetoric present in the letter and how it might have related and even addressed the tangible relations between real-world Judeans and Gentiles in first century antiquity. This study investigates just that: how might Paul’s ethnic rhetoric have addressed the Judean- Gentile ethnic divide in Rome. After the introduction, the study reviews the current state of scholarship with regard to Paul and ethnicity in Romans. This then is followed by an elaborate socio-historical exploration of Judean-Gentile ethnicities and relations in ancient antiquity and the specific Roman context into which Paul’s letter was addressed. The impact of those relations to the origins of the early Christian movement in Rome and significant points of coherence between the socio-historical context and Paul’s letter are also established. Having established the socio-historical context, Paul’s ethnic rhetoric in Romans 1-4 is probed for how it might have addressed the Judean-Gentile ethnic divide and realised unity among them. / MA (New Testament), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2014

Despite the fact that the majority of scholars agree that Paul’s letter to the Romans was written to address the Judean-Gentile ethnic divide in Rome, there is still a continued failure to follow through with the avenues that this position opens up for the study of Romans. Traditionally, Paul’s letter to the Romans has been read as a theological tractate, a reading that assumes an ideational or theological interpretation of the letter to the exclusion of Paul’s ethnic rhetoric present in the letter and how it might have related and even addressed the tangible relations between real-world Judeans and Gentiles in first century antiquity. This study investigates just that: how might Paul’s ethnic rhetoric have addressed the Judean- Gentile ethnic divide in Rome. After the introduction, the study reviews the current state of scholarship with regard to Paul and ethnicity in Romans. This then is followed by an elaborate socio-historical exploration of Judean-Gentile ethnicities and relations in ancient antiquity and the specific Roman context into which Paul’s letter was addressed. The impact of those relations to the origins of the early Christian movement in Rome and significant points of coherence between the socio-historical context and Paul’s letter are also established. Having established the socio-historical context, Paul’s ethnic rhetoric in Romans 1-4 is probed for how it might have addressed the Judean-Gentile ethnic divide and realised unity among them. / MA (New Testament), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2014

Die vorliegende Arbeit setzt sich mit der Bedeutung der Nationen aus Offb 21,24.26 auseinander. Wie ist es möglich, dort Nationen als Gegenüber des Gottesvolks zu finden? Die These erhärtet sich, dass das Alte Testament in Bezug auf die Beziehung des Gottesvolks zu den Nationen eine Vorschau auf die zukünftigen, himmlischen Zustände ist und dass die Zeit des Neuen Testaments eine Zeit des Übergangs darstellt, in der das Gottesvolk neu formiert wird. Der gegenseitigen Beziehung kommt eine enorme Bedeutung zu. Das Gottesvolk ist dazu eingesetzt, zusammen mit Gott über die Nationen zu herrschen. Die Nationen ihrerseits sollen durch diese göttliche Herrschaft zur Erkenntnis und zur Anbetung Gottes geführt werden. Es ist ein fester Bestandteil der Identität des Gottesvolks, dass es zwischen Gott und den Nationen steht und vermittelt. Somit begründet sich die Präsenz der himmlischen Nationen in ihrer Notwendigkeit als Gegenüber des Gottesvolks. / The following dissertation examines the meaning of the nations mentioned in Revelation 21:24.26. How is it possible that there will be nations as counterpart to God's people? In the course of the study, the thesis is confirmed that the relationship between God's people and the nations shown in the Old Testament is a preview to the future state in heaven and that the New Testament stands for a time of transition and new formation of God's people. An outstanding meaning is attributed to this mutual relationship. God's people is appointed to rule over the nations along with God. By divine rule the nations are to be led to recognition and adoration of God. It is an inherent part of the identity of God's people to stand and to intercede between God and the nations. Thus the presence of heavenly nations is justified by its necessity as counterpart of God's people. / Systematic Theology & Theological Ethics / M. Th. (Systematic Theology)

Thesis (doctoral) - Freie Universität, Berlin, 2003. / Includes bibliographical references (p. [314]-339) and index.

Die vorliegende Arbeit setzt sich mit der Bedeutung der Nationen aus Offb 21,24.26 auseinander. Wie ist es möglich, dort Nationen als Gegenüber des Gottesvolks zu finden? Die These erhärtet sich, dass das Alte Testament in Bezug auf die Beziehung des Gottesvolks zu den Nationen eine Vorschau auf die zukünftigen, himmlischen Zustände ist und dass die Zeit des Neuen Testaments eine Zeit des Übergangs darstellt, in der das Gottesvolk neu formiert wird. Der gegenseitigen Beziehung kommt eine enorme Bedeutung zu. Das Gottesvolk ist dazu eingesetzt, zusammen mit Gott über die Nationen zu herrschen. Die Nationen ihrerseits sollen durch diese göttliche Herrschaft zur Erkenntnis und zur Anbetung Gottes geführt werden. Es ist ein fester Bestandteil der Identität des Gottesvolks, dass es zwischen Gott und den Nationen steht und vermittelt. Somit begründet sich die Präsenz der himmlischen Nationen in ihrer Notwendigkeit als Gegenüber des Gottesvolks. / The following dissertation examines the meaning of the nations mentioned in Revelation 21:24.26. How is it possible that there will be nations as counterpart to God's people? In the course of the study, the thesis is confirmed that the relationship between God's people and the nations shown in the Old Testament is a preview to the future state in heaven and that the New Testament stands for a time of transition and new formation of God's people. An outstanding meaning is attributed to this mutual relationship. God's people is appointed to rule over the nations along with God. By divine rule the nations are to be led to recognition and adoration of God. It is an inherent part of the identity of God's people to stand and to intercede between God and the nations. Thus the presence of heavenly nations is justified by its necessity as counterpart of God's people. / Philosophy, Practical and Systematic Theology / M. Th. (Systematic Theology)