Bruce Longenecker

The material evidence of early Christian devotion

by

Dr Tim Murray offers this review of Bruce Longenecker’s latest book, The Materiality of Early Christ Devotion Our historical imagination matters Most of what we know about early Christianity we know from texts. Indeed, the degree to which these Jesus-communities engaged in textual activities (reading, writing, memorising, teaching, copying) and the variety of their literary … Continue Reading

What were the early Christian communities like?

by

Dr Tim Murray offers this review article of Group Survival in the Ancient Mediterranean: Rethinking Material Conditions in the Landscape of Jews and Christians by Richard Last and Philip Harland: Imagining the Early Church Both academics and pastors are frequently required to reconstruct ‘what it was like’ in the early church to make sense of the New … Continue Reading

Were Joseph and Mary ‘poor’?

by

One of the repeated themes of short Christmas expositions is that, in the nativity story, we see God coming to the ‘poor’, and as a result the main message of Christmas is that we should pay particular attention to the ‘poor’. I put the term in inverted commas, because in both these contexts the term … Continue Reading

What was ordinary life like in the first century?

by

Bruce Longenecker is Professor of Christian Origins and W. W. Melton Chair of Religion at Baylor University, Waco, Texas. He has a long-standing interest in the cultural context of the early Christian movement, and has just published In Stone and Story, an exploration of the Roman world of the first century, and how Christian faith engaged with, … Continue Reading