The suggestion that the New Testament contains citations of early Christological hymns has long been a controversial issue in New Testament scholarship. As a way of advancing this facet of New Testament research, Matthew E. Gordley examines the Colossian hymn (Col 1:15-20) in light of its cultural and epistolary contexts. As a result of a broad comparative analysis, he claims that Col 1:15-20 is a citation of a prose-hymn which represents a fusion of Jewish and Greco-Roman conventions for praising an exalted figure. A review of hymns in the literature of Second Temple Judaism demonstrates that the Colossian hymn owes a number of features to Jewish modes of praise. Likewise, a review of hymns in the broader Greco-Roman world demonstrates that the Colossian hymn is equally indebted to conventions used for praising the divine in the Greco-Roman tradition. In light of these hymnic traditions of antiquity, the analysis of the form and content of the Colossian hymn shows how the passage fits well into a Greco-Roman context, and indicates that it is best understood as a quasi-philosophical prose-hymn cited in the context of a paraenetic letter. Finally, in view of ancient epistolary and rhetorical theory and practice, an analysis of the role of the hymn in Colossians suggests that the hymn serves a number of significant rhetorical functions throughout the remainder of the letter.

We know that the earliest Christians sang hymns. But are some of these early Christian hymns preserved for us in the New Testament? Matthew Gordley takes a new look at didactic hymns in the Greco-Roman and Jewish world of the early church, considering how they might function in the New Testament and what they could tell us about early Christian worship.

The letter to the Colossians contains a series of moral instructions in Colossians 3:12-17 and includes the admonition to "sing" among them. This study considers how music-making (specifically singing) supports moral formation according to the letter to the Colossians. Studies in ethnomusicology, anthropology of the voice, and music psychology offer useful frameworks for conceptualizing how a social practice like music-making forms participants into a community and shapes how they know themselves, their community, and the world. With the aid of these frameworks, we find that the singing in Colossians 3:16, as a corporate, vocal practice of music-making, enables the members of the church community to inhabit the story of reconciliation found in the Christ Hymn (Col 1:15-20).

A new reading strategy for the Thanksgiving Hymns Hasselbalch asserts that current theories about the social background of Thanksgiving Hymns are unable to explain its heterogeneous character. Instead the author suggests a reading strategy that leaves presumptions about the underlying social contexts aside to instead consider the collection’s hybridity as a clue to understanding the collection as a whole. Features: Systemic Functional Linguistics applied to four Hodayot Analysis that highlights the role of a mediator in the agency of God An approach that highlights the unity of the collection

While scholars of antiquity have long spoken of didactic hymns, no single volume has defined or explored this phenomenon across cultural boundaries in antiquity. In this monograph Matthew E. Gordley provides a broad definition of didactic hymnody and examines how didactic hymns functioned at the intersection of historical circumstances and the needs of a given community to perceive itself and its place in the cosmos and to respond accordingly. Comparing the use of didactic hymnody in a variety of traditions, this study illuminates the multifaceted ways that ancient hymns and psalms contributed to processes of communal formation among the human audiences that participated in the praise either as hearers or active participants. The author finds that in Greek, Roman, Jewish, and Christian contexts, many hymns and prayers served a didactic role fostering the ongoing development of a sense of identity within particular communities.

Concentrate on the biblical author's message as it unfolds. Designed to assist the pastor and Bible teacher in conveying the significance of God's Word, the Zondervan Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament series treats the literary context and structure of every passage of the New Testament book in the original Greek. With a unique layout designed to help you comprehend the form and flow of each passage, the ZECNT unpacks: The key message. The author's original translation. An exegetical outline. Verse-by-verse commentary. Theology in application. While primarily designed for those with a basic knowledge of biblical Greek, all who strive to understand and teach the New Testament will benefit from the depth, format, and scholarship of these volumes.

Given the dearth of non-messianic interpretations of Psalm 110:1 in non-Christian Second Temple Jewish texts, why did it become such a widely used messianic prooftext in the New Testament and early Christianity? Previous attempts to answer this question have focused on why the earliest Christians first began to use Ps 110:1. The result is that these proposals do not provide an adequate explanation for why first century Christians living in the Greek East employed the verse and also applied it to Jesus’s exaltation. I contend that two Greco-Roman politico-religious practices, royal and imperial temple and throne sharing—which were cross-cultural rewards that Greco-Roman communities bestowed on beneficent, pious, and divinely approved rulers—contributed to the widespread use of Ps 110:1 in earliest Christianity. This means that the earliest Christians interpreted Jesus’s heavenly session as messianic and thus political, as well as religious, in nature.