The significance of Holy Saturday, the day between Good Friday and Easter Sunday, is often ignored in Christian life. The most influential modern theologian who has taken its importance seriously is the Swiss Catholic theologian, Hans Urs von Balthasar. He has presented a very innovative but also controversial interpretation that on Holy Saturday Jesus Christ suffered in utter solidarity with the dead in Hell and took to himself our self-damnation. However, this interpretation and several other aspects of his theology related to it seem to depart from the traditional teaching in an idiosyncratic way and have invited various critiques. What this thesis aims to do is to critically examine Balthasar’s theology of Holy Saturday and present its implications for Christian suffering and discipleship, while doing full justice to the genre within which he is working (a combination of theology and spirituality) and at the same time taking into consideration the main critiques made against him. First of all, we will argue that Balthasar does not try to present a radical reinterpretation of the doctrine of the Descent into Hell in contrast to the traditional teachings but rather tries to fully appreciate the in-betweenness of Holy Saturday as the day of transition from the Cross to the Resurrection, in other words, from the old aeon to the new. Balthasar says that Christ Himself descended into Hell as victor over sin and death objectively, but He still had to wait for the victory to arrive subjectively. Further, we will claim that this silent waiting on Holy Saturday, which marks the transition from the Cross to the Resurrection, helps us to deepen our understanding of the meaning of suffering in Christian discipleship. The waiting on Holy Saturday represents the fundamentally ‘tragic’ state of the Christian (understood as “tragedy under grace”) torn between the law of this world and the truth of Christ. As a paradoxical being in transition, the Christian believes that their victory is both already there and not there yet. In this sense, the Christian still lives in Holy Saturday. This notion deepens our understanding of suffering in the Christian life, because now we could translate the meaning of suffering into ‘tragic waiting,’ while fully facing the subjective reality of suffering and at the same time maintaining the hope of finding its salvific meaning by relating it to the paschal mystery. Our conclusion will be that this ‘tragic waiting,’ which itself is our lives, now can be seen in a Christological light. In short, we can patiently endure our Holy Saturday because of Christ’s Holy Saturday in Hell.

This thesis purpose is to analyse the purpose and use of religious motifs, with a focus on Lutheran faith and elements of the ideal of the passive woman in Sweden during the 17th century, in three novels written by Selma Lagerlöf. The three novels are “Tösen från Stormyrtorpet”, ”Legenden om Julrosorna” and “Gudsfreden”. Neither of them have a lot written about them therefore other sources has been used. The first part consists of an introduction to Lutheran faith and values, based on Vägen mellan himmel och jord: underströmmar av luthersk livsförståelse i Selma Lagerlöfs författarskap by Margareta Brandby-Cöster. As well as a short summary of the religious landscape of Sweden during the 17th century, the female emancipation movements relation and its negative view on passive female ideal. The first part will also contain a brief summary of how Christianity and the industrialisation has affected the male image. The second part is the analysis of the three novels where the first one is “Tösen från Stormyrtorpet”. The focus will be to explore how Lutheran values are expressed in the story as well as how the female protagonist Helga is used to reveal problems in society and its view on women related to religious values. In “Legenden om Julrosorna” I look at the how Lutheran values are expressed especially the thought of love for the other and the belief that you need to be part of society to live in the world created by God for humans. In the third novel “Gudsfreden” I will examine what male identities are constructed and expressed as well as the consequences of a “Christian hero” putting himself above God. In the third and final part I will connect my thesis to the subject of Swedish with a focus on upper secondary school. I will compare it to the curriculum and discuss the importance of exploring themes in literature.

The principal aim of this study is to discern what has shaped the author of 1 Peter to regard Christian suffering as a necessary (1.6) and to-be-expected (4.12) component of faithful allegiance to Jesus Christ. Most research regarding suffering in 1 Peter has limited the scope of inquiry to two particular aspects—its cause and nature, and the strategies that the author of 1 Peter employs in order to enable his addressees to respond in faithfulness. There remains, however, the need for a comprehensive explanation for the source that has generated 1 Peter’s theology of Christian suffering. If Jesus truly is the Christ, God’s chosen redemptive agent who has come to restore God’s people, then how can it be that Christian suffering is a necessary part of discipleship after his coming, death and resurrection? What led the author of 1 Peter to such a startling conclusion, which seems to runs against the grain of the eschatological hopes and expectations of Jewish restoration ideology? This thesis analyzes the appropriation of shepherd and fiery trials imagery, and argues that the author of 1 Peter is dependent upon Zechariah 9-14 for his theology of Christian suffering. Said in another way, the eschatological program of Zechariah 9-14, read through the lens of the Gospel, functions as the substructure for 1 Peter’s eschatology and thus its theology of Christian suffering. In support of this hypothesis, this study highlights the fact that Zechariah 9- 14 was available and appropriated in early Christianity, in particular in the Passion Narrative tradition; that the shepherd imagery of 1 Pet 2.25 is best understood within the milieu of the Passion Narrative tradition, and that it alludes to the eschatological program of Zechariah 9-14; that the fiery trials imagery found in 1 Peter 1.6-7 and 1 Pet 4.12 is distinct from that which we find in Greco-Roman and OT wisdom sources, and that it shares exclusive parallels with some unique features of the eschatological program of Zechariah 9-14; that Zechariah 9-14 offers a more satisfying explanation for the modification of Isa 11.2 in 1 Pet 4.14, the transition from 4.12-19 to 5.1-4, why Peter has oriented his letter with the term διασπορά, and why he has described his addresses as οἶκος τοῦ θεοῦ; and finally that 1 Peter contains an implicit foundational narrative that shares distinct parallels with the eschatological program of Zechariah 9-14. We can conclude that 1 Peter offers a unique vista into the way in which at least one early Christian witness came to understand and to communicate the fact that Christian suffering was a necessary feature of faithful allegiance to Jesus Christ.