Sean the Baptist (in the UCA)

New Testament Position at International Christian College in Glasgow

Received from the British New Testament Society Mailing List:

Lecturer in New Testament (Closing date 7th December)

International Christian College

Salary: £22,090 - £25,740 pa

The Lecturer in New Testament will teach courses on our BA(Hons) and
MTh degree programmes and will supervise research dissertations at a
variety of levels including PhD, MPhil, MTh and BA Honours.

The post also involves the pastoral care of students as well as
participating in the spiritual life of the College, including worship
and prayer, and fostering the integration of theology and lifestyle
amongst students.

The postholder will also play an active role in promoting the college
at events and conferences.

The College: International Christian College was created by the
merging of Glasgow Bible College and Northumbria Bible College in
September 1998. The College is evangelical and interdenominational,
training for cross-cultural, youth, children's, urban and pastoral /
preaching ministries in the context of contemporary culture. The
College is the main theological training college in Scotland and the
North of England, offering a range of high quality training
opportunities for Christian workers. The College has over 150 students
on its programmes all of which are validated by the University of
Aberdeen.

To apply for this post, please click the APPLY button below. Full
details of this post and the application procedure are in the
attachment: http://www.jobs.ac.uk/enhanced/fp/afk023.pdf

The closing date is midday UK time on Friday 7th December 2012.

Paul and the Restoration of Humanity: New Book

First in a new series entitled 'Books I might have bought at SBL had the discounts been more favourable'

This from Brill:

Paul and The Restoration of Humanity in Light of Ancient Jewish Traditions

Aaron Sherwood

In Paul and The Restoration of Humanity in Light of Ancient Jewish Traditions, Aaron Sherwood questions the assumption of universalism in Pauline thought, and finds instead that relevant Pauline traditions depict a partly restricted and particularly Israelite restoration of humanity. This important Jewish component of Paul’s thought remains largely unrecognized, but Pauline and other ancient Jewish traditions consistently present Israel and non-Israelites' uniting in their worship of Yhwh as the restoration of both Israel and humanity.

Aaron Sherwood demonstrates in Pauline traditions the same deployment of Israel-nations unification as in biblical and post-biblical traditions. This suggests that rather than secondarily finding space for Gentile justification, the restoration of humanity plays a generative role in Paul’s theology, mission, and apostolic self-identity.

 

Postgraduate Opportunities in Theological Ethics at the University of Aberdeen

Michael Mawson at Aberdeen has been in touch and asked me to publicize new developments in their Department for postgraduate students interested in theological ethics:

We are pleased to announce a new one-year Master's in Theological Ethics degree at the University of Aberdeen.  Aberdeen's department of Divinity is currently one of the top-ranked theology programs in the UK, and recent appointments in the areas of Systematic Theology and Theological Ethics have strengthened the department still further. The Theological Ethics area emphasizes fundamental texts and thinkers in the Christian tradition for engaging contemporary issues and debates.  For more information: http://www.abdn.ac.uk/divinity/pgrad/MThTheologicalEthics.shtml

If you have questions or are interested in applying to the MTh degree feel free to contact Professor Bernd Wannenwetsch, Dr Brian Brock or Dr Michael Mawson.  We will also be happy to meet with prospective students at the ... Society of Christian Ethics meeting (in Chicago in January 2013).

In addition, we would be happy to discuss funding options for both prospective Master's and doctoral students.  Among other things, there will be doctoral funding in the two following two interdisciplinary collaborations: 'Normativity - Nature, Narrative and Nihilism' and 'Transitional Justice, Peace and Reconciliation.'  We would be interested in supporting Welcome Trust applications for students hoping to work in the area of bioethics. Finally, we are willing to support external funding applications for especially strong proposals.  For additional information on funding: http://www.abdn.ac.uk/divinity/pgrad/awards.shtml

Review of the Pope on the Baby Jesus

Anyone who wants to save time in the run up to Christmas can read John Crace's review of Pope Benedict XVI's Jesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives here.

The spoof on Benedict's appeal to the work of other scholars is great. My favourite line being:

"Marcus Reiser has suggested there is some confusion about the naming of Jesus, arguing that Emmanuel was his real name. This need not detain us long. Emmanuel was a very common second name in Israel at the time. More surprising is that his nickname, according to the great Marian scholar Martin Dibelius, was Jay-Z."

SBL: Good and Bad

I had no real inclination to post detailed reflections on this year's SBL Annual meeting in Chicago. Mark Goodacre pointed out that the use of Twitter was an important part of proceedings this year, and even I had a go at it. Not sure what I think.

Instead, I thought I would list 5 good and 5 less good aspects of the Conference for me, in no particular order.

Good

1. People: always the main event, getting to spend time with so many people who (a) share a professional interest and some of whom (b) you also count as personal friends. It was especially good to connect with members of the Chester TRS Department, my dear, dear friends Alan and Ellie Kreider and Brad Braxton, and many other US and UK friends.

2. Papers: the usual mix, but the highlights were a session on Gender, Sexuality and the Bible, Dale Allison's whirlwind presentation in the John, Jesus and History unit (also mentioned by Mark Goodacre) and Thomas Schmeller's elegant negotiation of the bridge between 2 Corinthians 1–9 and 10–13. I also very much enjoyed the session honoring Chris Rowland and discussing the recent Festschrift in his honour.

3. Meetings: On Saturday morning I met Clifford Green, who is Executive Director of the Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works in English project (one more volume to come in 2013) to discuss wider dissemination of the articles gathered together in Pacifica 25.2 (July 2012) which I edited. Green's book on Bonhoeffer's Theology of Sociality was what reconnected me Bonhoeffer's importance, so it was a pleasure to meet with him before going to hear David Congdon talk about Bonhoeffer's understanding of mission.

4. Receptions: Friday and Saturday nights were quiet. Monday was Chester, Oxford, Kings and Scottish, with T & T Clark/Bloomsbury and Sheffield on Monday. T & T Clark's was the best of these.

5. Books: Only 6 purchases of which the most important are NA28 and Konrad Hamann's biography of Bultmann, which I plan to read slowly alongside a re-reading of Bultmann himself over the summer break.

6. Chicago: sorry this makes 6, I wrote the others first, but this also needs to be mentioned. Its a great city.

Bad

1. The McCormick Conference Centre: The epitome of dystopian architecture. Everyone hated it, and not just because of the distances.

2. Bars: reception bars were lightening fast to dismantle at the appointed time, and hotel bars almost all shut up shop by 1am. This left little incentive to stick it out for those 3.30 a.m. discussions about life, the universe and the state of the discipline.

3. Sessions: we need less of them, with fewer papers in each session, to ensure better discussion and interaction by a greater number of qualified and knowledgeable people in the room.

4. Travel: 24 hours door to door: enough said.

5. Books: too many at only 20% discount which meant that they remained unaffordable.

Anyone else have a top 5, or 3, or a list of groans?

Oh, and watch this space for a new reception to be introduced into the Programme Book next year in Baltimore