Social memory research has complicated the relationship between past and present because it is a relationship which finds expression in memorial acts such as storytelling and text-production. This relationship has emerged as a dialectic in which "past" and "present" are mutually constitutive and implicating. The resultant complication directly affects the procedures and products of "historical Jesus" research, which depends particularly on the assumption that we can cleanly separate "authentic" from "inauthentic" traditions. In Structuring Early Christian Memory Rafael Rodriguez analyzes the problems that arise from this assumption and proposes a "historical Jesus" program that is more sensitive to the entanglement of past and present.

Unlike literature in the modern western world, ancient documents were typically crafted for the ear rather than the eye. This new investigation of the structure of 1 John's Prologue analyzes the oral patterning and resulting soundscape reflected in this key New Testament passage. After discussing contemporary techniques of sound analysis and establishing the study's methodological approach, Brickle examines the Prologue's aural profile. Here we begin to explore, describe, and depict graphically the patterns of sound that emerge as the text is read aloud. Brickle uses the approaches to Greek pronunciation and orality advocated in the recent New Testament research to determine the impact on the Prologue's soundscape, followed by an analysis employing the principles for beautiful and effective composition elucidated by the ancient teacher of rhetoric, Dionysius of Halicarnassus, in his treatise, On Literary Composition. A final section draws together the results and implications of the study before suggesting further ways to apply research in orality, performance, and memory to the Prologue and other ancient texts.

Charts a new methodological course in Dead Sea Scrolls scholarship by employing memory theory to inform historical research. This is an instructive resource for scholars who are seeking an alternative to currently constructed approaches to the subject, and will be of appeal to those interested in the Dead Sea Scrolls more generally.

Volume 15 2019 This is the fifteenth volume of the hard-copy edition of a journal that has been published online (www.jgrchj.net) since 2000. As they appear, the hard-copy editions replace the online materials. The scope of JGRChJ is the texts, language and cultures of the Greco-Roman world of early Christianity and Judaism. The papers published in JGRChJ are designed to pay special attention to the larger picture of politics, culture, religion and language, engaging as well with modern theoretical approaches.

As the first century came to a close, the church struggled with its identity due to its memories of a disconnected past. As the church reflected on recent history, it remembered the origins of Christianity as full of gaps and discontinuities, leaving it to question the validity of this new Jesus movement. How did Jesus’ ministry relate to ancient Judaism? What was the relationship between John the Baptist and Jesus? What kind of transition occurred between Jesus and his followers? How did the Holy Spirit relate to Jesus? How could the controversial figure Paul have such an integral role in nascent Christianity? How could a heavily Gentile church preach about the Messiah of Israel? Using a musical metaphor, this book demonstrates how Luke replies to these staccato narratives of the first-century church with his own legato version of history. Luke accomplishes this bridging of past events primarily through the ancient practice of rhetorical transitions, and in the process reassures his audiences of the continuity of salvation history throughout the various stages of early Christianity.

New Testament scholars often talk about “oral tradition” as a means by which material about Jesus reached the Gospels’ writers. Despite the recent interest in oral tradition, scholarly advances have not penetrated the mainstream of academic Gospels scholarship, let alone the wider public. Behind the Gospels fills this gap, offering a general theoretical discussion of oral tradition and the formation of ancient texts and providing a critical survey of the field.