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The Contribution Of Archaeology To The Interpretation Of The New Testament, Raymond F. Surburg

Concordia Theological Monthly

Archaeology is, furthermore, of great value because it relates exegesis to historical facts. Christianity is a historical religion, based upon events and experiences which transpired in history. Allegorical and symbolical interpretations often ignore the historical background of the Christian religion and lead to aberrations in religious thought. While the New Testament as a supernatural revelation harbors many elements transcending historical verification, it does nevertheless contain much material which can be determined by historical study. Thus Dana asserts: "There is no feature of the process of interpretation more important than the reconstruction of the historical situation out of which a given …

The Historical Development Of The World Council Of Churches With Special Reference To American Lutheran Participation, Ralph Underwager

Bachelor of Divinity

This is a quest into the historical development of the World Council of Churches as an expression of the faith, life, and witness of the churches of our time. The historical perspective includes the nineteenth and twentieth centuries as a whole, but particular emphasis will fall on the years since 1910, the date of the World Missionary Conference in Edinburgh, Scotland. Major movements, the men that guided them, and significant historical realities, with special attention given to the extent of American Lutheran participation, will form the major part of this inquiry.

Preaching On The Holy Spirit: A Study Of Luther's Sermons On The Evangelical Pericopcs, Martin E. Marty

Concordia Theological Monthly

"In our day the Holy Spirit suffers great ignominy," sighed Luther, in reference to current doctrinal misunderstanding. "In our day the Holy Spirit suffers great ignominy," might be a contemporary comment on neglect of the worship of, and witness to, the Holy Spirit. It has become almost a rubric to bemoan this neglect on Whitsunday, the third great feast of the church year, but this complaint is often followed by a tendency to contribute to the neglect and the ignominy through silence from the pulpit, as far as a living concern for the work of the Holy Spirit is concerned, …

A Historical Study Of The Early Missouri Synod Missionary Work In Kansas, Williard E. Mueller

Bachelor of Divinity

It is the purpose of this thesis to present the chief facts of the history of the Missouri Synod's mission work in the state of Kansas in the context of its time.

That The Scriptures Might Be Fullfilled, Roy Schroeder

Master of Sacred Theology Thesis

In this thesis we want to study the concept of .fulfilment as found in the New Testament. John Marsh points out the importance of this concept when he says: “To an age which has inherited the new and refined instruments of historical study which were developed in the nineteenth century., it has become very difficult to give any intellectual, as distinct from devotional or religious, context to the concept of ‘fulfilment’ as the Bible understands it.

Book Review. - Literatur, William F. Arndt

Concordia Theological Monthly

Book Review. - Literatur

The Relationship Of The Church To The National Culture In America, Ernest B. Koenker

Concordia Theological Monthly

As one considers the cultural complex of America today, there are a number of questions which might present themselves to the Christian living under the Word. What are the values which underlie our national culture, and is there any sense in which these are being absolutized today in some kind of Messianism? Can one say that the Christian churches in America, or the Lutheran Church, have profoundly shaped our culture, or have the churches themselves been thoroughly shaped by the culture? In view of the loss or muffling of a dynamic Christian witness in many of the American denominations, what …

Theological Observer. - Kirchlich-Zeitgeschichtliches, F. E. Mayer

Concordia Theological Monthly

Theological Observer. – Klrchllch Zeitgeschichtliches (Theological Observer. – Of course contemporary history)

Book Review. - Literatur, William F. Arndt

Concordia Theological Monthly

Book Review. - Literatur

The Faculty At Bethel On The "Demythologizing" Championed By Professor Dr. Bultmann, A. Adam

Concordia Theological Monthly

The intention is not to pass judgment on the theology of R. Bultmann in general. To do that, a far more detailed discussion would be required, for which we do not have the space here. In concerning ourselves specifically with demythologizing as understood by Bultmann, we had to curtail to some extent the study of the problem and thus simplify some of the implications.

In Memoriam Joh. Albrecht Bengel, Jaroslav Pelikan

Concordia Theological Monthly

November 2, 1952, is the two-hundredth anniversary of the death of Johann Albrecht Bengel, a leading figure in the history of Lutheran theology. He has exerted an influence over subsequent Biblical scholarship comparable to that of Luther and Flacius in the sixteenth century, the Buxtorfs in the seventeenth, von Hofmann in the nineteenth, and Schlatter in the twentieth. Until a generation or two ago his Gnomon Novi Testamenti was a commonplace in the libraries of the evangelical clergy; and some of the works which have come to replace it, like Dean Alford's commentary and the Expositors Greek Testament, are expansions …

Book Review. - Literatur, J. T. Mueller

Concordia Theological Monthly

Book Review. - Literatur

The Historical Method In Biblical Interpretation, Raymond P. Surburg

Concordia Theological Monthly

The failure of exegetes to agree on hermeneutical principles is said to be one of the major causes for the divisions in Christendom, and, as Avey pointed out more than 25 years ago, American denominationalism will not disappear unless all bodies agree on basic principles of Biblical interpretation. Biblical scholars of the liberal tradition claim that the greatest obstacle to any agreement among exegetes lies in the continued use of the so-called dogmatic method inherited from the Reformers. Its advocates are charged that on the assumption that the Bible is divinely inspired and inerrant they employ the prooftext method in …

An Evaluation Of Adult Confirmation Materials, Frederick Koehler

Bachelor of Divinity

Working with adults has proved to me an enjoyable and rewarding experience. This thesis is written with a desire to help give adults that which has proved to be a blessing to me and to fulfill in their lives this same joy which they may have never known.

The author does not pretend to be an authority on this subject matter, but is writing on adult confirmation materials merely because of his love in this field. Neither does he intend to exhaust all the material related to this paper, but merely to present an overview in order to evaluate some …

The Principium Cognoscendi Of Roman Catholic Theology, F. E. Mayer

Concordia Theological Monthly

For a time it seemed that Rome made honest attempts to bring about a rapprochement to Protestantism and to remove as far as possible all obstacles in the way of a reunion of all Christian denominations. In the encyclical Provida Matris of May, 1895, the Pope suggested prayers for the reconciliation with the separated brethren (italics our own). In the encyclical Mystici Corporis Christi of 1943 and again in the Christmas message of 1949 the Roman pontiff seemingly welcomed discussions between Catholic and Protestant theologians. In the Christmas message the Pope did not seem to be averse in principle to …

The Eschatological Tension Of The Kingdom Of God And Interpretations By American Protestant Theology, Vernon Schreiber

Master of Sacred Theology Thesis

The purpose of this paper· is to examine the New Testament teaching of the Kingdom of God and analyze, with limitations the development of' the concept of the Kingdom in American Protestant theology. In our quest for an understanding of the problems raised by an investigation of American theological utterances concerning the Kingdom of God, we have turned first of all, to the New Testament presentation of the Kingdom of God.

Luther's Endorsement Of The "Confessio Bohemica.", Jaroslav Pelikan Jr.

Concordia Theological Monthly

As a result of the research that has been carried on in the past half century on the theology of the Reformation. we are now in an advantageous position for a historical and theological evaluation of the faith of the Reformers. What began as purely historical investigation has become instead a recovery of Reformation insights that had been lost in the intervening centuries. For this reason contemporary theological scholarship has been compelled to buttress its systematic presentations with historical material and to make its historical study relevant by drawing theological conclusions from it.

Johann Lorenz Mosheim's Philosophy Of History, Lewis Spitz Jr.

Concordia Theological Monthly

History as record and interpretation, just as history as past actuality, has been in constant change. Tempora mutantur, et nos mutamur in. illis is the inexorable law of life and of living academic disciplines as well. The history of historiography powerfully demonstrates the truism that each generation writes its own history. As the world view of humanity changes, the new criteria of evaluating the human story necessitates a reworking of the history of the past.

Book Review. - Literatur, L. W. Spitz

Concordia Theological Monthly

Book Review. - Literatur

History As A Weapon In Controversy, W. Spitz

Concordia Theological Monthly

Eduard Fueter, ascribing the development of modern historiography to the Lutheran Reformation and more particularly to the purposes of polemics, declares that Protestant church history was created solely for the needs of confessional polemics. Ancient church history was to furnish the proof that Protestantism, in contrast to Catholicism, had preserved the original purity of Christianity. Medieval church history was to expose the terrible darkness to which the rule of the Antichrist had led.

Book Review. - Literatur, John Theodore Mueller

Concordia Theological Monthly

Book Review. - Literatur

The Interpretation Of Difficult Bible Passages, W. Arndt

Concordia Theological Monthly

What a grand book we have in the Bible! While we are said to live in a new age since scientists 'have learned how to split the atom and there is preached to us the philosophy of collective action in national and international affairs in the · labor world and politics - a philosophy which is definitely in the saddle and riding fast and furiously-we Lutherans cling to the old Book. We say it comes from God and it leads to God.

Shinto The Principle Of Japan, George Shibata

Bachelor of Divinity

Our thesis is: Shinto is the principle of the Japanese nation. It is manifested in the love of the people for the nation. As for the individual in his relationship to God, Shinto leaves the matter to each soul. But the two factors are so closely related that they militate against the successful introduction of Christianity.

Our study of Shinto will be, first of all, the consideration of the historical circumstances and influences in which Shinto developed. Then the traditional myths will be analyzed. Finally, the resulting State Shinto and the sectarian Shinto will be described.

Celtic Chrisitinaity A Survey Of Its History And Influence, Gerald Schaus

Bachelor of Divinity

In the light of thorough research in this field by outstanding historians, it would be a rather serious admission of a lack of completeness of historical study to hold with the old view, namely, that nothing factual is known about Celtic Christianity! Now this paper makes no, pretensions of being a comp1ete coverage of the history of Celtic Christianity, for that is impossible to do in a work of this length. The purpose, rather, is to present an overall picture of the labors of the Celtic Christians and to compare the Celtic Church with the Church of Rome.

The Herods In The Opinion Of Comtemparay Writers, Clarence Bopp

Master of Sacred Theology Thesis

Because the Herods were in power in Palestine at the time of Christ and His apostles, there are many references to them in the New Testament historical books. Most of these references record events which emphasize the character of a particular Herod. For this reason a study of the character of the various Herods is of as much importance to an understanding of the New Testament as is the study of events during their reigns. In this paper we have accordingly attempted not only to study the chief events which occurred under each Herod, but also to analyze the character …

Why Should A Pastor Continue To Study Church History?, W. G. Polack

Concordia Theological Monthly

The history of the Church, the account of the progress of the Gospel of Jesus Christ in the world, with all the many ramifications it presents, the great characters it introduces, and the stirring and dramatic events it portrays, strangely enough does not interest every pastor, as it does not interest every theological student at our Seminary. Some pastors sagely declare that they do not care about the study of church history, what they are interested in is making church history. The latter may be a most laudable ambition, but one wonders whether real, worth-while history can be made by …

The No And The Yes Of Scripture On Atheism, W. H. Dau

Concordia Theological Monthly

The question to be investigated now is whether Scripture regards atheism as possible; whether atheism is viewed by the Biblical writers as a reality or merely a state of mind and a matter of imagination.