Omiliile la Hexaemeron ale Sfântului Vasile cel Mare –o lucrare de mare actualitate, de înaltă ţinută teologică şi ştiinţifică

Author(s): Vasile Borca / Language(s): Romanian Issue: 2/2012

The author of homilies at Hexaemeron conveys divine authority to the biblical text, highlighting the roundlessness of profane philosophers. Saint Basil rejects the materialist monism and dualism as being irrational and in discordance with the Holy Bible.Existence can’t be the product of chaos but it bears the fingerprint of a powerful Rational Being. One of the essential characteristics of divine creation is the beauty. Beauty and divine greatness are ineffable. There is order and harmony in the entire creation. The great hierarch proves both the vast scientific knowledge of his time and the theological ones. The big merit of Saint Basil is that he knew to make a clear distinction between human conceptions and the godly truth revealed.

Şekina(h) –Slava Domnului

Author(s): Ginel Ivan / Language(s): Romanian Issue: 2/2012

The main idea that the mosaic message sends/reveals us when the God’s glory is discovered, is similar with that when the Lord sends Moses to mission, assuring him of his permanent presence, becoming in this way a sort of “Immanuel” which means “God is with us”.Moises’ spiritual ascent is tortuous; he leads the Jewish people through wildness in order to help them climbing the Mountain of Knowledge of God (Horeb) even though they are tended to make useless things. He spends a long time in the heights of understandings in a sort of holly dreaming, after abandoning/leaving the sensitive relationship with the mind, he gets/receives the power to perceive through understanding the fire and the God’s message. Trying to find out the mistery of God’s glory we can only sigh her longing.

Originea suferinței în lumina referatului biblic al Genezei

Author(s): Emanuel Chezan / Language(s): Romanian Issue: 2/2012

Suffering is the most difficult reality of the human being, it is the fundamental human truth, it overwhelms the man and not only through natural pressure, but also through its metaphysical difficulty of finding a sense to it. In addition to religion (especially the christian one) or faith, suffering has no explanation, it is absurd and makes the very existence absurd; only religion can explain the suffering, proving that suffering has no being in itself, but it is an accident and proving that sin explains the human degradation as a responsibility, in other words the free spirit. Suffering, in the Holy Scripture, is considered an undesirable occurrence in the created world, by the free act of fall sin entered the world, suffering came with it, as a conflict and pain, decomposition, hard labor and death.

Relaţia dintre Israel şi neamuri din perspectivă paulină

Author(s): Marius-Ioan Sabou / Language(s): Romanian Issue: 2/2012

To say that justification is the result of acts means to state that God belongs only to Hebrews and nations need to take the practices of the Hebrew people at a personal level. Saint Paul the Apostle shows that the Gospel is for all who believe (Rom. 1,16) and that God’s Justice is for all who believe (Rom. 3,22). The text from Rom. 9-11 answers to the tension created by the statement of Saint Paul regarding the idea that the special status of Israel before God is no longer valid; statement that raises a question mark regarding the faith of God towards His chosen people, towards God’s Justice, which implies that the adoption and glory and the covenants and law and worship and the promises (Rom. 9,4-5) are owned by the Hebrew people. The identity of Israel is determined by the calling of God, Israel being defined by promise (Rom. 9,8) and choice (Rom. 9,11) and not through a physical descending. The ethnic identity, loyalty and dedication to the covenant does not bring anything which constitutes the base for this identity, they are not essential to this identity. The Gospel of Christ brought justice to all those who believe (Rom. 10,4). The search for justice by following the Law did not fail because the Law would have been a wrong purpose; instead, the way it was followed was wrong (Rom. 9,37). The finality of the Law looks at its role to keep the special status of Israel. The faith Saint Paul’s speaks about is the devotion to Jesus as a Lord raised from the dead.

Sacrificiul levitic al Holocaustului şi aspectul său tipic în concepţia lui Origen

Author(s): Eusebiu Borca / Language(s): Romanian Issue: 2/2012

The sacrifices of Leviticus and his ritual were commanded not from humans but from God Himself. From those sacrifices, the burnt offering (the sacrifice of holocaust) is a salutary offering. Origen thought that this one should be offered only from “man” (entire humanity). The Law of sacrifice command to offer animals (Lev. 1,2.10.14), but just for practicing, and in anticipation of the true and perfect sacrifice of Jesus Christ. The Son of God would offer Himself for the reconciliation of the whole world (Heb. 9.14). Origen claims that animal sacrifices from Leviticus acquired a typical signification. They set forth in shadow that reconciliation which God had determined to effect by giving His Son to death, as a sacrifice for the sin of the whole world was established by His blood. It was not the blood of the animal which took the place of the man, but true sacrifice of Christ (only a human life could atone for a human life). Christ was the ultimate fulfillment, the antitype of the burnt offering, “the Lamb of God” (John 1.29).

Măsturisirea lui Hristos prin calitatea vieţii creştine –paradigmă misionară prin excelenţă a Bisericii preniceene

Author(s): Claudiu Pop / Language(s): Romanian Issue: 2/2012

Christ sent his apostles to all nations to preach „repentance and forgiveness of sins” (Lk 24, 47). They were to baptize everyone who believed (Mt 28,19). Therefore, this mission to baptize (sacramental ministry) is implied in the mission to evangelize. The preaching of the Word is required for sacramental ministry because the sacraments are sacraments of faith, drawing their origin and nourishment from the Word. Therefore, we have highlighted in this paper a close relation between evangelization and Sacraments and faith. Besides sanctifying the faithful and giving praise to God, the sacraments instruct. They are „sacraments of faith” because they presuppose faith and nourish it.The Christians’ faith had to be testified more than ever in the early times of the Church. The institution of martyrdom represents to us a very important moment of Church’s history. During the early Christian centuries, the martyr term acquired the extended meaning of a believer who is called to witness for his religious belief, and on account of this witness, endures suffering and/or death. The death of a martyr or the value attributed to it is called martyrdom. Some of the early theologians (Saint Justin, for instance) do not see martyrdom as a sacrifice nor do they give special glory to the martyr as a hero of the faith. At all points a martyr is one who witnesses to the truth of the word which is Jesus.

Misiunea Bisericii Ortodoxe prin Sfânta Liturghie

Author(s): Cassian Filip / Language(s): Romanian Issue: 2/2012

The mission of the Orthodox Church through the Saint Liturgy is concretized on explaining to and acquiring by Christians of the three sacraments that it has held and transmitted unaltered since the apostolic era until today: untouched learning on Saint Trinity, on the Body of Christ Son of God but also on His presence with its dead, resurrected and holly body and on the Euristic teaching, as way of His Son’s real and personal presence, made for us and for our salvation.

Das Danielbuch und die Danielfigur in jüdischer, christlicher und islamischer Tradition

Author(s): Konrad Kremser / Language(s): German Issue: 1/2022

A book and a character named „Daniel“ are known in Jewish, Christian and Islamic traditions. The book of Daniel is partly viewed as a prophetic book and Daniel accordingly as a prophet, partly it is explicitly denied that the book and the character „Daniel“ are prophetic. A comparison of the different traditions helps to identify lines of development.

Messages to the Seven Churches in „Johannes Offenbarung” Bby Johann Gottfried Herder

Author(s): Marek Karczewski / Language(s): English Issue: 19/2018

The Article Messages to the Seven Churches in “Johannes Offenbarung” by Johann Gottfried Herder refers to the publication in Polish "Siedem bram. Komentarz do Apokalipsy2–3 według “Johannes Offenbarung” Johanna Gottfrieda Herdera", in: Veritatem revelare. Księga Pamiątkowa dedykowana ks. dr. hab. S. Ewertowskiemu, prof. UWM. W 40-lecie święceń kapłańskich i 65-lecie urodzin, ed. M. Karczewski, S. Mikołajczak, J. Ruciński, Faculty of Theology University of Warmia and Mazury, Olsztyn 2017, p. 107–118. However in the English-language article significantly expanded the number of quotes from the originalsource, the scientific bibliography has been supplemented, the theological conclusion were refined, the content of the publication has been extended. The article is a contribution too further research on the biblical hermeneutic of Johann Gottfried Herder. Scientific discussion on this subject is not free from simplifications and opinions not entirely legitimate. The article contains an introduction, two main parts and conclusion. The main parts contain: 1) a short description of the scientific and ecclesiastical career of J.G. Herder; discussion of his theological works; characteristics of J.G. Herder as a biblist and 2) analysis of theMessages to the Seven Churches contained in his commentary on the Revelation. The basic source is Maran atha. Das Buch von der Zukunft des Herrn. Des Neuen Testaments Siegel. 1779 issued originally in Riga and in the edition of J.G. Müller in Stuttgart and Tübingen in the Johann Gottfried von Herder’s Sämtliche Werke. Zur Religion und Theologie. Zwölfter Theilseries, 1829, pp. 8–291 along with additional texts on the Revelation of St. John from 1773–1778. A biblical commentary to Rev. 2–3, along with its unusual scientific style and preaching, is a valuable source of knowledge about Herder’s biblical interpretation. This allows you to get acquainted with Herder’s original theology, which, flowing from the Word of God, is based on three pillars: Christology, pneumatology and ecclesiology. Theological message of J.G. Herder contained in the discussed part of the commentary on the Revelation has, over many points, the value above the confessional and timeless.

Nakaz miłości bliźniego w świetle Biblii. Zarys problematyki

Author(s): Roman Krawczyk / Language(s): Polish Issue: 19/2018

Man as a social being was not born to live only for himself. He cannot do without another man at the material, spiritual, cultural and religious level; he cannot attain the stage of full spiritual development without belonging to a community of people. Therefore, the biblical imperative to love one’s neighbour is a fundamental law governing each human being’s life. In this paper, the author discusses the exact meaning of the imperative of love in the light of the Bible.

Łukasz G a r b a c k i, Reinterpretacja Księgi Jeremiasza w Apokalipsie św. Jana, Bernardinum, Pelplin 2018, ss. 250

Author(s): Marek Karczewski / Language(s): Polish Issue: 19/2018

The Prayer of the Holy Apostles in the Iconography of the Palatine Chapel (Sicily)

Author(s): Ilie Melniciuc-Puică / Language(s): English Issue: 3/2022

The canonical text of Acts describes the spiritual confrontation between Simon Magus and the Apostles Peter and John in Samaria. The biblical episode was developed by apocryphal literature, the conflict becoming a paradigm of the struggle between truth and false, under the eyes of the citizens of Rome. The ecclesiastical selection did not forbid iconographic representations of this event, which is proved by the mosaic of the Palatine Chapel in Palermo-Sicily. Simon Magus, the self-named “great power of God”, failed to imitate the ascension to heaven, being defeated by the prayers of the apostles Peter and Paul, who invoke the power of the name of Jesus Christ.

1 Cor 11:2-16: A Theology of Beauty

Author(s): Hrisostom Ciuciu / Language(s): English Issue: 3/2022

This paper is an attempt to answer the question of the supremacy of men over women, as understood by some readers of the Apostle Paul, who relied on one specific fragment from the first epistle to the Corinthians. The pericope which this paper now addresses – 1 Cor 11:2 16 – is one of the stumbling blocks in this matter. We will argue that St. Paul, although urging the Corinthians to maintain the tradition, does so not to underline the natural differences between men and women, but to subdue them to the new order in Christ. Far from being a discourse about something so trivial as male supremacy, we think that this fragment is better understood as a grace-based point of view, not something social, but a real theology of beauty.

Књижевни портрети Аода, Деворе, Варака и Самсона у Књизи о судијама

Author(s): Vladimir Pekić / Language(s): Serbian Issue: 20/2021

This paper shows portraits of selected Judges from the Old Testament Book of Judges. The aim is to interpret the characters of Ehud, Deborah, as well as Barak, and Samson in accordance with typical characteristics of epic heroes, which exist in all cultures. Besides, these heroes show the characteristics of synecdochic heroes that, in this case, represent features belonging to entire Israel as the God’s chosen people. Firstly, the author introduces the readers to the Book of Judges, and then, using narrative approach to text, describes the characters and gives the conclusion regarding theological and political implications of these portraits and the Book of Judges in its entirety. The narrative of Deborah and Barak contains surprising and unexpected choice of person who was supposed to fulfill the will of God. That is one important piece of puzzle that should connect the images of protagonists and express theological idea present in the Book of Judges. The story of Samson ends with his regain of strength, demolition of Dagon’s temple, and his death. An important question that permeates the entire narrative of Samson is whether he is aware of the fact that he brings salvation to Israel in God’s name. His deeds cannot be compared to any of other judges. All of them act in the name of certain tribe (or a group of tribes), while Samson acts individually, without even a slightest sign of support from either his tribe or family. Portraits of analyzed judges show that the writer of these narratives managed to show complex and dynamic characters. These characters do not only have positive features; some were mostly depicted in negative tones, but it does not prevent them from fulfilling their missions and saving Israel from danger. Through their deeds, hesitations and failures, the writer managed to present Book’s primary idea – struggle for preservation of Moses’ alliance with God and striving for a leader, i.e. king who will actually, and not merely symbolically, unite Israel as God’s people.

"Крв његова на нас и нашу дјецу" (Мт 27, 25) - могућност једне филојудејске егзегезе

Author(s): Vladislav Topalovic / Language(s): Serbian Issue: 19/2020

Matt 27:25 is one of the most controversial texts in the dialogue between Judaism and Christianity. The author’s goal is to emphasize incorrectness and danger of anti-Judaic and anti-Semitic interpretation of Matt 27:25. That is why the author observes these words in the historical context of the Church in which Matthew’s Gospel was written, while analyzing certain terms used in the text and comparing them to parallel synoptic texts and the rest of the New Testament. The author also reviews the history of the interpretation of Matt. 27:25 and those commentaries considered to be anti-Judaic. The conclusion is that the anti-Judaic reading of Matt. 27:25 is unjustified, as well as certain readings of patristic commentaries of this text that supposedly have anti-Judaic tone. Matt. 27:25 is a text can very well be interpreted as an expression of opportunity for Judaism, and not as the anti-Judaic expression.

“Il cuore spezzato”. La figura di Davide nell’analisi narrativa di 2Sam 18:19-19:9

Author(s): Damian Stachera / Language(s): Italian Issue: 4/2022

In the story of King David’s kingdom, the author of the Second Book of Samuel describes not only historical facts, but by means of various narrative and stylistic devices, allows the reader to enter the world of the personalities, interrelationships and inner experiences of the various characters.The narrative of 2Sam 18:19-19:9 is distinguished by dynamic shifts in perspective and action, long moments of complication, the use of different characters and irony to make the characteristics of the protagonist visible. Consequently, the story of David, who learns of the death of his son Absalom, is the story of a man facing an internal conflict concerning the roles assigned to him by life – father and king.This conflict breaks the heart of the legendary King David, which at the same time makes his character,caught up in conflicting emotions, closer to the ordinary reader.

ΕἰΚώΝ BEI PAULUS

Author(s): Viktor Kókai-Nagy / Language(s): German Issue: 2/2022

Εἰκών in Paul. “And God said, Let us make man in our image (ποιήσωμεν ἄνθρωπον κατ ̓ εἰκόνα ἡμετέραν)...” (Gen 1:26). One assumes that this mean-ingful phrase has left many traces in the New Testament. But if one looks at the oc-currence of the word εἰκών, it becomes quite clear that it has a special theological meaning only for Paul. For him, the word expresses the extraordinary dignity of the human being. In my article I would like to explore this theme and compare Paul’s thoughts on εἰκών with Philo’s concept of εἰκών. Εἰκών in Paul. “And God said, Let us make man in our image (ποιήσωμεν ἄνθρωπον κατ ̓ εἰκόνα ἡμετέραν)...” (Gen 1:26). One assumes that this meaningful phrase has left many traces in the New Testament. But if one looks at the occurrence of the word εἰκών, it becomes quite clear that it has a special theological meaning only for Paul. For him, the word expresses the extraordinary dignity of the human being. In my article I would like to explore this theme and compare Paul’s thoughts on εἰκών with Philo’s concept of εἰκών. In my article I would like to discuss the topic in three points. First, we will briefly look at the εἰκών motif in Genesis. Then we will see how Philo understood the image of God. And at the end we will arrive to Paul.

BIBLICAL PERFORMANCE CRITICISM UND DAS MARKUSEVANGELIUM

Author(s): Martin MEISER / Language(s): German Issue: 2/2022

New Testament texts were mostly not read silently but heardaloud. Accordingly, some of them, especially the Gospel of Mark, still bearthe traces of this form of communication and are also calculated to do so. The listeners reacted with emotional statements. The new Biblical Performance Criticism that has emerged in the USA makes these insights the basis of interpretation, in distinction from approaches that are too strongly literary. The present article seeks to raise the profit of this interpretation for textual interpretation and tries to integrate the insights of Biblical Performance Criticism into conventional exegesis of the Gospel of Mark.

“WHEN HE ARRIVED IN ROME, HE EAGERLY SEARCHED FOR ME!” (2 TIM 1,17) FRIENDS, FOES, AND NETWORKS IN 2 TIMOTHY

Author(s): Korinna ZAMFIR / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2022

The antagonistic discourse of 2 Timothy divides the community into two camps: the truthful believers and the heterodox opponents of Paul. Emphasis on cohesion, on the strong links between Paul and friends and delineation from those depicted as dangerous outsiders strengthen group identity. However, perspectives from network theory show that Christ-believers did not belong to impermeable camps. Proximity, multiplex social relations (shared family, neighbourhood, or occupational ties, worship, and commensality) created opportunities for communication and exchange. Weak ties bridged the gap between various clusters, shaping networks akin to small worlds, allowing for interactions across partisan lines and for more inclusive forms of identity.

Huius se visibus Dominus prius obtulit. Komu prvému sa zjavil zmŕtvychvstalý Kristus v Seduliovej Veľkonočnej piesni (Carmen Paschale V, 357-364)?

Author(s): Róbert Horka / Language(s): Slovak Issue: 1/2022

Huius se visibus Dominus prius obtulit. To Whom did Risen Christ first appear in Sedulius‘ Easter Song (Carmen Paschale V, 357-364)? Around the middle of the 5th century poet Sedulius wrote his famous Easter Song. It is a biblical epic in which the author collected, artfully pieced together into a coherent narrative, and exegetically interpreted selected stories from the canonical Gospels, especially the miracles of Jesus. Christ is by him presented as the new Roman national hero who overcomes all the obstacles and dangers to establish the true city that will last forever: the Kingdom of God. Within this story, Sedulius also describes the Lord‘s resurrection. As the first to whom the risen Christ appeared, however, he mentions his mother Mary, which is clearly inconsistent with the Gospel tradition. But Sedulius sticks strictly to the biblical text in his poem. This paper therefore attempts to find a suitable pericope that Sedulius could have interpreted in his time to mean that the Resurrected did indeed first appear to his mother.