In this episode, we’re joined by Dr. Jason Staples, who is Asst Teaching Professor in the Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies at North Carolina State University, and the author of The Idea of Israel (CUP) as well as the more recent book that we’re discussing in this episode, Paul and the Resurrection of Israel (also with CUP). Over the course of our conversation, we talk about the imprecision in how we often use the...
In this episode we debrief a recent conference on socio-scientific approaches to religious enmity that Dr. Chris Porter organized at Trinity College, Melbourne. For this conversation we are joined by two keynote speakers from the conference: Dr. Sam Perry, who is Associate Professor in the Department of Sociology at the University of Oklahoma, and Dr. Elizabeth Shively, who is Senior Lecturer in New Testament at St Mary’s College at the University of St Andrews (in...
This past Sunday I had the privilege of preaching at my local church here in Minneapolis—Mill City Church. We’ve been reading through and preaching through the New Testament this year as a church, which in hindsight feels really appropriate in 2020. In this sermon I tried to provide a concise overview of the main issue in Galatians (Should the Gentile males in Galatia be circumcised?) and how Paul addresses it (Nope!). Summarizing a single text...
There are many ongoing debates about “Black Lives Matter” v. “All Lives Matter,” though it does seem that, broadly-speaking, people have been coming around to recognizing what the slogan “Black Lives Matter” truly means, and why it’s crucial that we all affirm it without qualification. Yet, some disputes obviously persist. As a possible way forward, we discuss the topic of Transcultural Identity. Transcultural Identity is about the ways in which our identities are sometimes not...
My new article in Journal of Biblical & Theological Studies is now officially out. The paper is entitled, “Eschatological Emphases in 1 Thessalonians and Galatians: Distinct Argumentative Strategies Related to External Conflict and Audience Response.” In this article I am addressing a couple of different issues at once. To begin, there is the issue of the chronological ordering of Paul’s letters. Most scholars tend to think that 1 Thessalonians is the earliest and most primitive example of...
Death and Life is the published PhD Thesis of Andrew K. Boakye (PhD, University of Manchester), who is currently Lecturer in Religions and Theology at the University of Manchester. I was first introduced to Dr. Boakye’s research at the 2012 Galatians & Theology Conference held at my alma mater (University of St Andrews), where he gave a paper just before I gave mine, entitled, “If the Law Could Make Alive: Justification as Resurrection in Galatians.” Ever since...
It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery (Galatians 5:1). This past weekend, I went on a church retreat with Bethel English Church at Oak Glen Christian Conference Center. While I really enjoyed being away from the city, and out in nature, the messages during this retreat were also quite impactful to me. Our speaker talked about...
I am currently in the midst of that delightfully anti-climatic state of liminality that comes with submitting a PhD thesis. Of course, once you’re done with the thesis, you’re not actually done at all because you still have to defend it. And so, that means that I basically still need to be working on my thesis in a sense—at least in terms of preparing for the viva. Thus, with Galatians on my mind, I’ve decided...
This week I am putting the final touches on the first draft of my PhD thesis on suffering and eschatology in Galatians. I’m quite excited to be at this stage, but I know there’s still a lot of work to be done. Since my thesis is on Galatians I’m often thinking about the best way to translate it. I love reading new translations and thinking through their interpretive decisions. For this week I thought I’d...
I’m excited that my article, “Suffering and Covenantal Hope in Galatians: A Critique of the ‘Apocalyptic Reading’ and Its Proponents,” is finally in print, appearing in the newest issue of the Scottish Journal of Theology (68.1 [2015]: 1–15). The paper was originally presented in the Paul Group at the 32nd Annual Meeting of the British New Testament Conference which took place at King’s College, London in September 2012. Below is the abstract: This article addresses...
Recent Comments