Mark’s Gospel slides

I’m in the midst of doing some study half-days for clergy and lay ministers in the Anglican diocese of Exeter, and give below links to two sets of slides from the first half-day, which covers Introducing Mark—an overview of Mark’s shape and key themes, and a look at the death and resurrection of Jesus in Mark. [The second half-day’s slides are now available here.] It’s been very interesting revisiting Mark for this purpose, after recently revising the material on Mark in Exploring the New Testament Continue reading →

A new book on healing and exorcism in second temple Judaism and the New Testament

Mikael Tellbe & Tommy Wasserman, eds.Healing and Exorcism in Second Temple Judaism and Early ChristianityWUNT 2/511; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2019; ISBN 978-3-16-158936-2 Another month, another new book! Just out from Mohr Siebeck is this collection of essays from an excellent conference hosted by Tommy Wasserman and Mikael Tellbe at the theological college in Örebro, Sweden. I hugely enjoyed participating in the conference (see my report here), and am now delighted to see the revised papers published—with one or two additions, including a very helpful essay Continue reading →

A new book on Luke-Acts and ancient historiography

Butticaz, Simon, Luc Devillers, James M. Morgan & Steve Walton, eds.Le corpus lucanien (Luc-Actes) et l’historiographie ancienne: Quels rapports?Berlin: LIT Verlag, 2019. ISBN 978-3-643-90954-1. €39.90. I’m delighted to announce the publication of a valuable book which I’ve co-edited on Luke-Acts and historiography. Here’s the brief description: In biblical research, consensus is rare. Formulated by Dibelius at the beginning of the 20th century, the thesis that Luke is “the first Christian historian” is one such. Among the authors of the New Testament, Luke is alone in tracing Continue reading →

Get our book, Poverty in the Early Church and Today: A Conversation, in pdf for free!

I’m very pleased to announce that the wonderful people at Bloomsbury T&T Clark have agreed with the website Knowledge Unlatched to make Poverty in the Early Church and Today: A Conversation, the book which Hannah Swithinbank and I edited available online for free. We’re delighted, as we were keen to make the book freely accessible to people in the developing world—but our publishers have gone one better in making it freely available to anyone. For more about the book, see here and here. The download Continue reading →

Sharing possessions in Acts

I recently gave a paper to a joint meeting of the Book of Acts and Use and Influence of the New Testament seminars at the British New Testament Society meeting in Liverpool. My full paper, offering an exegetical discussion of the sharing of possessions in Acts, especially in the early chapters, continues to be available for download for a short time here. It’s strictly work in progress, so please don’t cite it as a published maidthis work. I’d welcome feedback and comments. I’m also now Continue reading →