Your collective wisdom
A question: what do you consider are the best books/articles on the subject of New Testament ecclesiology? I would love to hear your thoughts. I will be exploring this subject in more depth in the coming weeks.
I note here the relatively new Hendrickson monograph, Stewards, Prophets, Keepers of the Word: Leadership in the Early Church, by Ritva H. Williams.
"Steward, prophet, keeper of the word—these three roles reflect the hierarchical social structures, religious experience, and faithfulness to tradition found in ancient Mediterranean cultures, and, as Ritva Williams argues, influenced the development of early Christianity. The linear progression of leadership (apostles to bishops or apostles to presbyters or charismatics to office holders, etc.) commonly held to have emerged in the early church does not appear in early Christian texts from the mid-first to early second centuries. Instead, what these texts reveal is a variety, diversity, and plurality of ways that Christ-followers adopted and adapted these dynamic roles from antiquity as they struggled to organize and live in their local situations"
Here is the table of contents, a sample chapter and the entire introduction.
8 Comments:
Hey Chris, this is an exciting area of study that has kept me busy over the past few weeks.
Must read's include:
* House Church and Mission by Gehring
* Paul's Idea of Community by Banks
* From Synagogue to Church by Burtchaell
* Serve the Community of the Church by Clarke
* The First Urban Christians by Meeks
* Johnson's chapter in The Cambridge Companion to Paul
* At the Origins of Christian Worship by Hurtado
There are loads more, but these I've found helpful.
Chris,
I would also have said Banks' book; consider also Paul Minear's IMAGES OF THE CHURCH IN THE NT; Also, a collection of essays entitled A VISION FOR THE CHURCH (eds. M. Bockmuehl and M. Thompson), which includes essays by W. Horbury, M. Hooker, Bockmuehl, Bauckham, Beale, C. Rowland, and JMG Barclay.
Also, R. McKelvey, THE NEW TEMPLE: THE CHURCH IN THE NT (1969).
As a series of good article about what the NT church was not, Ben Witherington had a series of posts in response to the god awful book Pagan Christianity. http://benwitherington.blogspot.com/2008/06/pagan-christianty-by-george-barna-and.html
Also, I haven't read it, but his book New Testament Story, might also be worth a look.
Huge thanks, guys, very helpful.
I have heard recomended several times a book by Howard Snyder called The Problem with Wineskins.
That quote sounds got better and better as it went on. I wonder if Cardinal Spin is going to like this one?
Looking forward to more of your thoughts on the book(s)...
on the popular level...
biblical foundations for baptist churches, hammett
9 marks of a healthy church, deliberate church, dever
Here is what I read for Richard Hays last spring in a guided study at his direction.
NEWTEST 399: CHURCH AND MINISTRY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
READINGS
Robert Banks, Going to Church in the First Century (2d ed.; Jacksonville, FL: Seedsowers Christian Books Publishing, 1990).
C. K. Barrett, Church, Ministry, and Sacraments in the New Testament (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1985).
Markus Bockmuehl and Michael B. Thompson, eds. A Vision for the Church: Studies in Early Christian Ecclesiology in Honour of J.P.M. Sweet (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1997).
Raymond E. Brown, The Churches the Apostles Left Behind (New York: Paulist Press, 1984).
Daniel Boyarin, “Judaism as a Free Church: Footnotes to John Howard Yoder's The Jewish-Christian Schism Revisited,” Cross Currents 56 (2007): 6-21.
Richard B. Hays, “Embodying the Gospel in Community” Mennonite Quarterly Review, 74 (2000): 577-585.
Ernst Käsemann, “The Cry for Liberty in the Worship of the Church,” in Perspectives on Paul (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1971), 122-137.
Ernst Käsemann, “Ministry and Community in the New Testament,” in Essays on New Testament Themes (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1982), 63-94.
Ernst Käsemann, “United and Multiplicity in the New Testament Doctrine of the Church,” in New Testament Questions of Today (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1969), 252-259.
George Lindbeck, “The Story-Shaped Church: Critical Exegesis and Theological Interpretation,” in The Theological Interpretation of Scripture (ed. Stephen E. Fowl; Cambridge: Blackwell Publishers, 1997), 39-52.
Wayne A. Meeks, The First Urban Christians: The Social World of the Apostle Paul (2d ed.; New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003).
Miroslav Volf, “Soft Difference: Theological Reflections on the Relation Between Church and Culture in 1 Peter,” Ex Auditu 10 (1994): 15-30.
Geoffrey Wainwright, “Church,” in Dictionary of the Ecumenical Movement (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1991), 159-167.
John Howard Yoder, “The Hermeneutics of Peoplehood: A Protestant Perspective,” in The Priestly Kingdom: Social Ethics as Gospel (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1984), 15-45.
John Howard Yoder, The Royal Priesthood: Essays Ecclesiological and Ecumenical (Scottdale, PA: Herald Press, 1998).
Seven chapters:
- “The Otherness of the Church”
- “A People in the World”
- “Why Ecclesiology Is Social Ethics: Gospel Ethics versus the Wider Wisdom”
- “To Serve Our God and to Rule the World”
- “Another ‘Free Church’ Perspective on Baptism, Eucharist and Ministry”
- “Sacrament as Social Process: Christ the Transformer of Culture”
I also note at this post Working bibliography of biblical studies books on ecclesiology
a number of others:
Andrew D. Clarke: A Pauline Theology of Church Leadership (The Library of New Testament Studies)
Andrew D. Clarke: Serve the Community of the Church: Christians as Leaders and Ministers (First-Century Christians in the Graeco-Roman World)
Arthur G. Patzia: The Emergence of the Church: Context, Growth, Leadership & Worship
C. K. Barrett: Church, Ministry, & Sacraments in the New Testament
Ernst Käsemann: New Testament Questions of Today. “Unity and Multiplicity in the New Testament Doctrine of the Church,” 252-259.
Ernst Käsemann: Essays on New Testament Themes. “Ministry and Community in the New Testament,” 63-94.
Ernst Käsemann: Perspectives on Paul. “The Cry for Liberty in the Worship of the Church,” 122-137.
Gerhard Lohfink: Jesus and Community
Gordon D. Fee: Listening to the Spirit in the Text
Guy Laurie: Introducing Early Christianity: A Topical Survey of Its Life, Beliefs and Practices
James D. G. Dunn: Unity and Diversity in the New Testament: An Inquiry into the Character of Earliest Christianity
John Howard Yoder: The Fullness of Christ: Paul's Revolutionary Vision of Universal Ministry
Markus Bockmuehl and Michael B. Thompson: A Vision for the Church: Studies in Early Christian Ecclesiology in Honour of J. P. M. Sweet
Miroslav Volf: After Our Likeness: The Church As the Image of the Trinity
Paul S. Minear: Images of the Church in the New Testament
Raymond E. Brown: The Churches The Apostles Left Behind
Richard N. Longenecker: New Wine into Fresh Wineskins: Contextualizing the Early Christian Confessions
Richard N. Longenecker, ed.: Community Formation: In the Early Church and in the Church Today
Richard S. Ascough: What Are They Saying About the Formation of Pauline Churches?
Ritva H. Williams: Stewards, Prophets, Keepers of the Word: Leadership in the Early Church
Robert J. Banks: Paul's Idea of Community: The Early House Churches in Their Cultural Setting, Revised Edition
Robert J. Banks: Going to Church in the First Century
Steven Croft, ed.: Mission-Shaped Church: Church Planting and Fresh Expressions of Church in a Changing Context
T. F. Torrance: Royal Priesthood: A Theology of Ordained Ministry
Wayne A. Meeks: The First Urban Christians: The Social World of the Apostle Paul
Hi Andy,
HUGELY helpful, many thanks!
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