Biblical Anthropology

Biblical scholars have long debated the identity of the suffering servant of Isaiah 53. Most Christians identify the servant as Jesus and interpret Isaiah 53 as a description of Jesus’ unique, substitutionary death. However, Isaiah 40–55 repeatedly identifies God's servant as Israel. Was Isaiah 53 about the unique experience of a future individual, or was the passage about what all of God’s people would experience? The aim of this paper is to determine how best to understand the suffering servant of Isaiah 53 from an exegetical (rather than a modern theological) standpoint. The thesis is that the suffering servant was to be both the forerunner to and the paradigmatic exemplar of the ideal people of God—a paradigm the people of God were called to conform to. Thus, in light of the ancient conception of corporate solidarity, the answer to the question of whether the servant was to be an individual or a group is: “both.”

There are three elements of religion, especially Christianity, that are very important; namely, belief, practice, and proclamation. While the first two of these have received great attention in the various forms of the enunciations of orthodoxy and orthopraxy, the third is yet to receive a coherent and systematic articulation. In this paper, I hope to call attention to the need for the formulation of an ortho-kerygma for our gospel witness in our globalizing and urbanizing world.

N.T. Wright has offered a proposal to Christian philosophers where it is apparently possible to hold the belief in the intermediate state-resurrection of the body and an ontological holism in the same sense at the same time. I argue that this not only creates a basic contradiction in Wright's ontological paradigm, but also it is not a coherent and tenable proposal despite the fact one might eventually find a potential solution to such a quandary.

El Salmo 8 brilla en el universo de la Escritura como uno de los textos fundamentales donde se aborda la pregunta por el ser humano y su lugar en el mundo. A partir de una nueva mirada a la estructura del poema, nos preguntamos por el alcance y sentido de su antropología, entendida como reflexión orante.

"Traditionally the central trope in Christian theological
anthropology, “the image of God” tends to function more as a noun than a verb. While that has grounded significant interplay between specific Christian formulations and the concepts of nontheological disciplines and cultural constructs, it facilitates the withdrawal of the image and of theological anthropology more broadly from the context of active relation with God. Rather than a static rendering of the image a more interactionist, dynamic, and relational view of “imaging God” is commended as a key anthropological term. Engaging with Psalm 8 suggests that, biblically, asking the anthropological question “What is humanity?” is tied to the answer to the theological question:
who is God? This locates theological anthropology securely within
the interactive context of being related to by God and suggests that theological anthropology might be a matter of performance rather than definition: actively imaging God."

_____________________________________________________________________________ The decision to use the Greek term εἰκών as the essential word to render the concept of the image of God in the Septuagint conveys meaning in two senses: 1) the word itself, read in its Hellenistic setting, has a semantic domain with more metaphysical possibility than its referent, ‫.צלם‬ 2). Secondly, the choice of εἰκών over other Greek terms available—such as εἶδος or ἰδέα in particular—further underscores a shift toward a more spiritual understanding of the image. Analyzing these particular terminological dynamics more closely will show how the Septuagint helped facilitate an overly metaphysical reading of the image of God. _____________________________________________________________________________

God had congratulated himself for creating the universe and humankind (Gen 1,31), a "very good" creation brought to nought by human sin. However, human nature still sighs and longs for the goodness and image of God within. God's creation yearns to be created anew. Paul's understanding of "new creation" and "new man" looks to the wise plan of God negated by sin. For Paul, the new era, in which the new creation reaches its aim in perfection, is the time of the parousia, the new and future coming of Jesus Christ. The Apostle of the Gentiles understood "kainē ktisis" in a soterio-cosmological sense, as the event consequent upon the redemption brought about by Christ Jesus that will be fulfilled in the parousia. New creation, new mankind in a new covenant takes place in communion with the death and resurrection of Christ Jesus in Baptism. The fundamental condition by which the revelation of the mystery of God takes place is the new covenant fulfilled in the blood of Christ and its effects: the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, upon those who believe, as even the prophets had foretold. One can observe the development of the Pauline thought in his Letters: from a theological perspective and its legitimacy in the Major Letters, to the practical consequences in the daily life of the Christian assemblies in the Deutero-Pauline Letters, that emerge from the application of these theological arguments.

This paper examines worship from the perspective of humanity’s creation in the image of God. It synthesizes several historical interpretations of the doctrine of the imago Dei and proposes a vocational understanding. This approach views humanity’s created purpose as a calling to display and embody the glory of God. As believers understand their vocation as a life of worship, this transforms individual spiritual disciplines and corporate worship. The Holy Spirit works to spiritually form believers into the image of Christ, who is the glory and supreme image of the Father. Therefore, all corporate and private worship is at its core, Christ-centered. The paper concludes with several suggestions to transform public worship, including prayer, congregational song, Scripture reading, and the proclamation of the Word of God.

According to Ps 139:8 Yahweh is present also in the netherworld. Thus the distance between
humans and Yahweh after death is not greater than it has been during their lifetime (and before
their birth). This paper proposes to understand the view of death in Ps 139 not as a precursor of
later hopes for a life after death, but rather as a critical answer to such hopes in the spirit of
Qoheleth and Ben Sira (following Gen 3).

The essay responds to the question, Why generate?, from a Biblical perspective. The study explores the double meaning-diachronic and synchronic-of the term "generation" in the Bible, and particularly through Genesis and Exodus. The God of Israel is the "God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob": he is, from the beginning, woven into human generations. To be a son of Israel is to be born of a people, who are born in crossing the sea. In this context, the filiation of Jesus gives meaning to all human filiations, right up to the "generation that is to come", and so to the Lord who comes (again).

Este artigo visa construir uma proposta de conceptualização da palavra hebraica nefesh no Antigo Testamento, indicando se tratar de uma palavra que, além de ter os significados de respiração, garganta, desejo e vida, pode ainda ser pensada enquanto “alma”, desde que se compreenda por tal expressão o próprio ser humano, em sua situação de necessidade, relacionado ao seu corpo, sua vida, e mesmo o risco de morte.

This article aims to build a propose of conceptualization of the word nefesh in the Old
Testament, indicating that it is a word that, besides meaning breath, throat, desire and life, it can also be understood as a “soul”, if this mean the human being itself, in its situation of necessity, related to his body, his life, and even the risk of death.

The relationship between Achan and Israel in Josh 7 has puzzled commentators for thousands of years. Achan sinned, yet the anger, judgment, and punishment of the Lord came upon the Israelites at large, and the result was the death of dozens of Israelite soldiers. Why would God’s judgment come upon the whole nation in response to the sin of one individual? Various explanations of the Achan-Israel relationship have been proposed over the past century, including “corporate personality,” the concept of “taboo,” and “corporate solidarity.” The question is: which, if any, of these proposals are correct? The goal of this paper is to determine the actual relationship between Achan and Israel in Josh 7.
          After an introduction to the problem, the paper proceeds in three sections. In the first section, four current proposals are examined. All four are found to be inadequate, establishing the need for a new proposal—one which better matches the actual text of Josh 7. As a first step toward this new proposal, the second section provides an exegetical examination of the relevant passages (Josh 7:1–5, 10–15). In the third section, a new explanation is proposed which better accounts for the exegetical data. The new proposal is that the Achan-Israel relationship in Josh 7 is best explained in terms of Israel’s covenantal commitment to be a properly functioning community before God—a commitment Israel was failing to uphold at the time of the divine punishment. Thus, Israel was not punished for Achan’s sin but for their failure to uphold their covenantal obligation. The term corporate responsibility is ultimately found to be a fitting description of Israel’s relationship with Achan.

Work is central to the human vocation from the beginning of creation.  This essay explores the unity of work and worship in the Garden of Eden, the profanation of work through covenant-breaking in the Garden, and the efforts to recover the sanctification of work in the rest of the biblical narrative.

The godlikeness of human beings remains a theologoumenon of primary importance from the first page of the Bible, especially now in our post-human age with its strong tendency to embrace promising technologies (artificial intelligence and robotics) even at the expense of our own humanity. This state of affairs calls for a clearer understanding of human identity and a sound ethical response through the retelling of the normative biblical concept of the 'image of God'. The thesis of this article consists in a consideration of the entire phrase 'God created man in his image' in Genesis 1:26-28 as a metaphorical and theocentric phrase with demonstratively meaningful content. It employs the relational concept of an extended human reality. In light of recent exegesis, the 'image of God' in Gen 1:26-27 should be seen as a signifier of human life under God, rather than a single determining characteristic or essential attribute. After exegetical and contextual readings of Gen 1:27 I will evaluate three major interpretative approaches to the 'image of God in human-ity'. In this evaluation we will see that theologians have preferred substantialist (e.g., image as soul or mind) or relational interpretations (e.g., image as relational personhood) and Old Testament scholars have preferred functional interpretations (e.g., image as kingly dominion). I outline their respective (in)consistencies in light of the meaning of the ancient text and its extended biblical context. At the end, I offer some suggestions for applying a more complete conceptualization of the 'image of God' to ethical practice.

This chapter investigates Tom Wright’s portrayal of Paul’s ethics. As the ethical quality of faithfulness is such a central theme in PFG, I raise the question whether Wright also attributes a central role to divine faithfulness in shaping and enabling human faithfulness (i.e. ethical life). In the first part (“What Wright Thinks is Wrong”), I maintain that Wright’s thinking on what is wrong with this world is not wrong, but that the emphasis is in the wrong place. Paul’s personal focus is on the solution, not on the plight. And with regard to the plight, his emphasis is on human enslavement to the external powers of Sin, Flesh, etc., and less so on internal incapacities. In the second part (“From Wrong to [W]Right: How Change is Possible”), I argue that Wright’s model of cognitive change through the “renewal of the mind” presents only one of several aspects of moral transformation in Paul, and that it puts too little trust in the empowering dynamics of Spirit-shaped intimate relationships. In the third part, I largely agree with Wright’s presentation of Paul’s ethical aims and aspirations (focusing on reconciliation, virtues, and fulfilment of the Torah), but I criticize that when it comes to questions of practical morality, Wright’s highflying study fails to touch ground. I finally conclude that faithfulness plays a central role in Wright’s soteriology but only a marginal role in his ethics. I draw attention to the transforming experience of love as the link between divine and human faithfulness that any exposition of Paul’s theology-and-ethics that wants to be faithful to the apostle needs to appreciate.

In the book of Ecclesiastes, the motif of “fear of God” can be designated as the supreme song and quintessence of biblical piety (Delitzsch, Ecclesiastes, 183). This motif that appears seven times in the book (3,14; 5,7; 7,18; 8,12, twice, 13; 12,13), finds in its epilogue its theological synthesis. However, the passage in Ecclesiastes 12,13.14 has been commonly evaluated by book scholars as a later textual addition by a second author or simply the intervention of a wise commentator. In this article the text of Ecclesiastes 12,13-14 will be approached (with special emphasis on verse 13), through an exegetical analysis according to its own textual design within the book, examining its vocabulary both in its two final verses as well as throughout chapter 12. Also will be analyzed the linguistic connections with the rest of the book and how this passage turns out to be an elaborate conclusion of the wise writer. In this study, some intertextual relations with sapiential, poetic, and prophetic literature will be examined, with the purpose of demonstrating how this text offers us a rich theology for the entire Hebrew Bible focused especially on the important relationship between the moral character of the human being, the Decalogue as their fundamental life norm, and the eschatological orientation of the last verses of Ecclesiastes. The Qohelet’s epilogue can be considered a veritable master theological work and the present article will seek to investigate in this passage and its truths for our time.

Introduced by Aldo Magris, full professor of Theoretical Philosophy at the University of Trieste, the book is divided into three sections. It aims to illustrate the development and semantic links of terms related to the phenomenology of spiration in ancient times, especially Late Antiquity.
The first part focuses on the three main cultural contexts of the Hellenistic era: Greek, Jewish and Christian;  the second part outlines the chaotic and fascinating sapiential galaxy of the High Empire: Gnosticism, esoteric syncretism and philosophical speculation; the third part, finally, investigates the semantic reworking of the terms pneuma/spiritus in Christian thought of the first centuries, both Greek and Latin.
The conclusion - which tries to be a more theoretical reflection - offers a plausible reading key on what emerged during the study and highlighting the benefits and advantages that a discipline such as pneumatology could offer to current theological thought.

Il volume, suddiviso in tre sezioni e prefato dal prof. Aldo Magris, ordinario di Filosofia Teoretica presso l'Università di Trieste, si propone di delineare lo sviluppo ed i nessi semantici dei termini relativi alla fenomenologia della spirazione in età antica, soprattutto tarda. Ad una prima parte attenta ai tre principali contesti culturali dell’epoca ellenistica – greco, ebraico e cristiano – segue una seconda parte dedicata alla caotica e affascinante galassia sapienziale dell’Alto Impero - gnosticismo, sincretismo esoterico e speculazione filosofica; la terza parte, infine, indaga l’elaborazione o, per meglio dire, l’‘elevazione’ teologica di cui la dinamica dello spirare ha beneficiato in seno al pensiero cristiano dei primi secoli, sia greco sia latino. Le conclusioni, infine, operano una riflessione critica a carattere più squisitamente teoretico, cercando di offrire una plausibile chiave di lettura su quanto emerso lungo lo studio e, soprattutto, evidenziando i benefici ed i vantaggi che una disciplina come la pneumatologia potrebbe offrire al pensiero teologico odierno. Correda il volume un ricco apparato di riferimenti - relativi ai passi scritturisti, alle citazioni extratestuali, ai luoghi, ai personaggi letterari o mitologici, ai nomi antichi e a quelli nomi moderni - completato da un accurato indice analitico, recante termini sia greci sia latini.

For biblical anthropology, the concept of aphtharsia (incorruptibility) plays an important role in the construction of a holistic vision about man, in accordance with the Hebrew tradition of the Old Testament. This vision is continued in the New Testament, especially in the Pauline texts. Entering the biblical literature of the New Testament by means of the sapiential books of the Old Testament, aphtharsia is a term used in the biblical text designating both God and man. This double stance of the term allows for the shaping of a biblical anthropological vision about man's eternal destiny expressed in the patristic theology by means of the concept of theosis. The analysis of the occurrences of aphtharsia in the Pauline texts represents an important aspect of the research with regard to the place and role of this concept in the biblical thought about man, as well as the manner enabling the development of new contributions to the biblical anthropology.

The paper describes, analyzes, and responds to Norman Gulley's presentation and argument for the Adventist understanding of the nature of personhood and the state of deceased believers and his opposition to the immortality of the soul. Twenty arguments are identified and critiqued, and their weaknesses are demonstrated. In response, a biblical argument is made for the traditional understanding of the intermediate state of believers.

The Bible portrays circumcision as having an important role in Israelite culture. Consequently, circumcision has received a great deal of scholarly attention. Some have viewed it as having an " internal " role, for example, for rites of fertility and marriage, whereas others have highlighted its " external " role as an ethnic marker, differentiating the Israelites from " other " groups. Circumcision, however, was practiced by many groups in the ancient Near East, and it is commonly accepted that if circumcision was an ethnic marker, it functioned mainly against the " foreign " Philistines, who did not practice it. Interestingly, all the biblical texts that depict the Philistines as ‫ערלים‬ (uncircumcised) project this reality into the pre-monarchic period (Iron I), regardless of their date, source, or genre. Not a single text, regardless of genre, uses this pejorative to describe the Philistines in the monarchic period (Iron II). This clear-cut dichotomy is supported by additional historical and archaeological lines of evidence (direct and indirect) and is in line with other changes in Philistine culture. All this seems to suggest that the Philis-tines started to circumcise in Iron II, the time when they ceased to manufacture their Aegean-inspired decorated pottery, adopted the local script, changed their foodways, and so on. This, in turn, gives us a better understanding of the significance of circumcision for the Israelites, and it appears that the " internal " and " external " explanations are not mutually exclusive. Rather, they reflect different perspectives on the practice over time, as well as different views by different social fractions.

Although translating חָכְמָה into English as “wisdom” seems straightforward enough, the underlying concepts of wisdom differ considerably. English “wisdom” is typically limited to “emotional intelligence” (EQ), whereas חָכְמָה also includes IQ, and is not inherently positive. The fact that other wisdom terms, such as מַחֲשָׁבָה, often have negative overtones, and that others, such as עָרְמָה and מְזִמָּה, border on pejoratives, is explored from a cultural viewpoint (high-context culture). The root שׂכל is linked to the cultural value of honour (as opposed to shame).
The English words “foolish(ness)” and “folly” often serve to render a wide array of Hebrew terms, which blinds English speakers and translators working from an English source text to the difference between them. Some terms are usually rendered OK in English (פֶּתִי “simpleton, naive [person],” בער “to be stupid,” סָכָל “fool [generic]”), whereas other renderings often seem to lack nuance. I will suggest other renderings, e.g. נָבָל “boor,” כְּסִיל “complacent fool,” אֱוִיל “morally perverse fool, idiot,” לֵץ “insolent person.”
Insight into Hebrew terms in their own cultural context can help bypass the English or Western language grid that influences Bible translators all over the world, and can give hints for more culturally appropriate renderings in high-context cultures in, e.g., Asia and Africa.

Supersessionism’s assumption of national Israel’s promises by the Church, a non-nationed entity, denies a soteriological significance to theocracy. This essay will pursue a biblical-theological and anthropological study of the role of national identity in human life and why redemption of this dimension in a restored nation-state of Israel is necessary for a fully formed biblical soteriology.  The essay will follow the biblical plotline starting with the Garden of Eden and humankind created according to God’s image in which the image includes the commission to subject hostile forces in an ever-expanding advance of Eden’s culture.  This divinely commissioned trajectory necessarily includes human political and social institutions, as these parts of human life are never separated from the spiritual/religious, as the “gods of the nations” concept in the OT demonstrates.  This means human political life is included in the fabric of Eden’s mandate and is first displayed to the world in Israel’s theocracy.  Adam and Israel’s failure in the Bible’s Story calls for the restoration of humanity and the human commission.  According to Israel’s prophets this restoration must and will touch all dimensions of human life in a domination of sin that extends to the conversion/subjugation of nations before God’s King and his people.  The NT presents the fulfillment of this prophetic vision in the person and work of Jesus Christ as not taking place in this Age as Supersession attempts in the Church, but when the Messianic King returns.  The world needs a theocracy that rules over sin and evil not just as vindication from national evil of the present, but as fulfillment of the human calling to produce a culture that dominates evil at every level, including the political/national.  This dimension of human salvation Supersessionism cannot deliver in its understanding of the NT Church as the fulfillment of the visions of Israel’s prophets.

As the ancient saying stays „The heart of the human problem is the problem of the human heart”. Biblical authors seem to be aware of true of this proverb and there are several texts in the Bible that deal with it. Human beings in the Bible very often strive in vain trying to improve the condition of their sinful heart. Even God seems to be hopeless when dealing with the iniquity of human heart. However, “God is greater than our hearts” (1Jo 3,20). In this paper we focus on three biblical texts (Gen 6,5; 8,21; Ezek 36,26) in order to show certain evolution in God’s confrontation with the mystery of human heart.

The normal entrance to the ancient cities of the Near East was through the city gate. While there are many city gate types, collectively they were constructed to provide defensive capabilities against enemies of the city. However, these gates were also used to reflect individual cities’ civic pride and thus were constructed with the best possible techniques and design (Barton 1925: 145). While city gates are of importance militarily, the gate was also the visitor’s initial view of the city proper, and thus a visitor’s first impression would have come from the city gate. Remember, first impressions mean a lot, and for these ancient city dwellers, having a city gate “worth talking about” was important.

Catherine McDowell's revised Harvard dissertation (2009) offers the first full-length monograph on the creation of humankind according to the non-Priestly account in Gen 2:5–3:24 in relation to the Mesopotamian mīs pî/pīt pî and the Egyptian wpt-r rituals. The Mesopotamian materials especially have attracted much scholarly attention since their first comprehensive edition by Christopher Walker and Michael B. Dick in 2001. There are obvious reasons why Old Testament scholars should take an interest in these rituals. While the notion of divine images plays a significant role in the prophetic and pentateuchal traditions, there are hardly any texts from the ancient Near Eastern world that would afford a deeper understanding of the theological significance of such images. This situation has changed, however, with the mīs pî/pīt pî ritual instructions, at least with regard to one particular type of divine images: cultic statues as key items of ancient temple worship. Therefore, McDowell's volume offers a much-needed addition to the ongoing debate about the " image of God " both in the Old Testament and in the literary transmission from the ancient Near East. Chapter 1 provides an overview of pertinent scholarship, as well as the rationale for McDowell's research. As she correctly observes, the initial interest of biblical scholars in the mīs pî/pīt pî ritual came from a comparison with Second Isaiah's polemic against idols (especially in Isa 44–45), which apparently presupposes a certain level of familiarity with

The theme of ritual sacrifice among ancient Israelites has always been a complex and fertile field of studies, which many disciplines have thoroughly examined. Among these, some sociological and anthropological general theories on sacrifice could represent an interesting key of interpretation of the phenomenon. This paper aims to compare some of them to biblical immolation procedures, in order to form a conceptual substratum, so as to foster and ease the comprehension of these customs. Thus, it has been possible to track down some essential elements of these rituals, proving the validity of this approach. These results, supported by other contributions – such as historical, theological, or philological ones – could help to unravel the “inexpressible” of the biblical code.