NT Final Study Guide

BIBL106 New Testament Literature and Interpretation

Final Exam Review

Description

The final exam consists of 42 multiple-choice questions (2 points each) and 4 short answer questions (4 points each) designed to test students’ knowledge of the material covered in weeks 8–13.

5 Step Process

  • Historical analysis
    • Overviewing the context, date, author, social political context
  • Literary analysis
    • Analyzing symbols, metaphors, kind of writing, genre subgenre, form, location of the document, what surrounds it
  • Detailed analysis
    • Close analysis of the language of the passage, language structure grammar discourse
  • Synthesize (+ canonical analysis)
    • Your translation of what the main idea of the passage is.
  • Embodiment
    • To live out the text / scripture, what you think the text is saying to you today

Language Matters

  • Language of the New Testament (what does this mean??)
    • Greek
  • What do we mean by semantic range?
    • Capturing the range in which a word is used in a period of time
    • Ex: translation of the Greek word translated or explained with several different english words

The sum of all potential meanings of a word or phrase based on language

  • What do we mean by cultural encyclopedia?
    • The overall framework you have within a culture that allows you to communicate (your culture)

codes of manners, dress, language, religion, rituals, norms of behavior such as law and morality, and systems of belief.

  • What factors do we consider when assessing the meaning of a word?
    • Immediate Context the author is using about this word
    • Surrounding context
    • Surrounding culture
  • What are some of the main linguistic fallacies?

Etymological fallacy: the mistake notion that etymology is the key to meaning

    • Drawing on the Root of word using incorrect associations without context

Dump truck fallacy: unloading all the possible meaning of a word at once

Picking and choosing: selecting the meaning that is most appealing to the interpreter

  • Grammatical analysis and discourse analysis
    • Grammar: study of words, their forms, and their relationships to one another in the formation of phrases, clauses, and whole sentences.
      • Two independent clauses or a single independent clause
    • Discourse: study of the formation of phrases, clauses, and whole sentences to distinguish semantic meaning from pragmatic effect.
      • Setting, habitual events, character type, opponents, purpose
      • Basically how it is being said
  • Various discourse functions: temporal, causal, result, etc.
    • Connective: “and,” “also,” “in addition,” “moreover,” etc. What is being connected, and how?
    • Contrastive: “but,” “rather,” “however,” etc. What is being contrasted, and how?
    • Correlative: “both … and,” “neither … nor,” “as … so,” “not only … but also,” etc. What is the relationship of the elements being correlated?
    • Comparative: “in the same manner,” “just as,” etc. What is being compared, and how?
    • Causal: “because,” “since,” “for.” What is the statement supporting, and why/how?
    • Purpose: “that,” “so that,” “in order that.” What is the action that brings about the intended goal?
    • Result: “so that,” “with the result that.” What is the action that brings about a certain result?
    • Conditional: “if … then.” What are the terms of the condition?
    • Inferential: “thus,” “therefore,” “then.” What is the basis for the inference?
    • Temporal: “when,” “at that time,” “never.,” etc. How does the adverb inform the verbal action?
    • Important nouns: How are the primary actors? Are they accompanied by anyone? Who/what is being acted upon?
    • Important verbs: What is the primary action of the clause/sentence?
    • Prepositional phrases: typically adverbial; e.g., “in those days;” “by his blood;” “throughout the city.”

Conversation Matters

  • New Testament use of the Old Testament: explicit vs. implicit use of Scripture
    • Explicit: marked citations (“[just] as it is written”); unmarked citations (no source or citation formula)
    • Implicit: Allusions (evoking a particular text); motifs and patterns (distinct to a certain strand of tradition)
      • Uniqueness: the element is unique to an antecedent tradition
      • Distinctiveness: The element is particularly associated with (though not necessarily unique to) an antecedent tradition
      • Multiplicity: Several elements of an antecedent source appear in close proximity
      • Thematic correspondence: Second temple authors show a remarkable penchant for drawing on texts that share a similar subject, theme, or argument with the text they are composing. (Tooman, 27-30)
  • Jesus’s appeal to Deut 6:4-5 and Lev 19:18
    • 4 “Hear, O Israel: dThe Lord our God, the Lord is one. 5 You eshall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.
    • 18 sYou shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against the sons of your own people, but tyou shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the Lord.
    • These are the two verses are how Jesus responds to what is the center of the Law
  • New Testament use of the New Testament
    • Cross referencing like in how acts is pt 2 of luke
  • Key suppositions of early Christian hermeneutics (slide with 3 of the answers)
    • Christocentric
    • Chromatic insight (Double Check)
    • Communal
  • What do we mean by canonical context?
    • Books of the bible that have been recognized by the church
    • NT canon includes 4 gospels, acts, letters of the apostles, and revelation

Embodiment Matters

  • Distinguishable features of premodern, modern, and postmodern interpretation
    • premodern:
    • Modern: heightened awareness / enlightenment against tradition (interest in history and origins and not indebted to religion/tradition)
    • Postmodern: attention to identity of the interpreter,
  • What are the benefits of reading the New Testament with diverse communities of interpreters?
    • Different perspectives and interests
    • Understanding the historical differences and similarities
    • Also, shows us to the differences between cultures
  • Premodern: allegory, typology, and fourfold approach
    • Allegory: locates a deeper, “spiritual” meaning behind the characters and events in the biblical text
    • Typology: Drawing points of connection within biblical history
    • Fourfold: Literal, Moral, Allegorical (teaches a lesson), Anagogical (prophecies and deeper meaning)
  • Interpretive location
    • Where you are located in understanding / interpretation of the Bible
    • Understanding and finding your predisposition
  • Embodiment is both communal and individual
    • Text commands and inspires a community and within the community there are individuals
  • Feminist interpretation
    • Feminist criticism: seeks to expose how the Bible and/or its interpreters inculcate attitudes and practices that are oppressive to women
  • Interpretive disagreements are an opportunity for growth
  • Augustine’s test for faithful interpretation (ON PAST STUDY GUIDE)
    • Love of God and love of neighbor
    • Love is the end goal above everything else

Independent New Testament Readings

  • Prison Epistles
    • Importance of unity in the church and following Jesus, example Philippians
    • Philemon, Phillipians, Ephesians, Colosians
  • Key themes of Hebrews
    • Faith, endurance, bearing witness
    • Sacrifice and priesthood
  • Key themes of James
    • Acting on faith
    • Wisdom and justice of the community
  • Key themes of 1 Peter
    • Endurance through difficult trials
    • Christian identity suffering as a Christian
  • What are the Catholic Epistles?
    • James, 1+2 Peter, 1+2+3 John, Jude, Revelation
  • Primary source of Revelation’s imagery
    • Daniel, Isaiah,
    • St John

Miscellaneous

  • Why is peer-reviewed scholarship of the Bible important? What does it ensure?
    • Other schols-ars are reviewing and analyze an argument or piece of work
    • It does not ensure that everything someone has written is correct but rather it shows how well argued a piece of writing is
  • What is a scholarly (historical-critical) commentary?
    • Commentary that focuses on the historical context, the language etc…
    • Helpful tool in understanding the text with Historical context (tool to consult)

Short Answers

  • Be able to describe why it is a good practice to compare different English translations of the New Testament.
    • Lost in Translation information
    • The translation may not share the same sentiment
    • Every translation is an interpretation of the original language
  • Be able to describe a “hermeneutics of suspicion” (pros and cons).
    • Post modern
    • Coming to the bible expecting the Bible to be instrument for power to remove us from oppressive ideology
    • Lack of trust within the text and the need to be liberated from the bible (Biblical interpretive traditions)
    • Not best for a Chrsitian
    • Weaponization of the Bible
    • Can alert readers to central core moral /ethical issues from the bible (allows us to grow in the understanding of the Bible)
  • Be able to describe embodiment as movement.
    • We understand works through our own frame of reference
    • Start with hypothesis: how the text might speak to us
    • Return back to text to check our understanding (like a review)
    • Exegetical and contextualization are a back and forth between the text and the reader
    • Movement is essentially the reader's preliminary or provisional ideas to confirm or revise those interpretations. (this is not a linear process)

Be able to describe embodiment as participation.

    • The participation of reader and author with contextualization being a mediator
      • Participation emphasizes that we are invited to hear Scripture if we are familiar with scripture or not