C.K. Barrett and the Quote of the Day

I ran across this interesting quote in Barrett's classic commentary, The Gospel According to John, on John's style:

John can hardly be said to create a new vocabulary, yet his choice of words is undoubtedly distinctive. His Greek moves slowly and within narrow limits, which clearly distinguish it from the other gospels; but it must be acknowledged to be an adequate instrument for the author's purpose. In spite of the small vocabulary the reader never receives the impression of an ill-equipped writer at a loss for the right word; rather that of a teacher who is confident that his message can be summed up in  a few fundamental propositions which he has learnt to express with studied economy of diction (7; Second Edition).

Raymond Brown Video Clip

Speaking of Raymond Brown, here is a video intro for his Passion and Death of Jesus.

Enjoy!

Raymond Brown on John 1:14a

Reading a bit of Raymond Brown's classic commentary on John's Gospel, The Gospel According to John, I-XII, I ran into this neat quote on John 1.14a: "The Word became flesh."

Raymond E. Brown

The title, "the Word," was appropriate in vs.1 because the divine being described there was destined to speak to men. When the title is used for the second time in vs.14, this divine being has taken on the human form and has thus found the most effective way in which to express himself to men. Thus, in becoming flesh the word does not cease to be the Word, but exercises his function as Word to the full (32, italics mine).

Lexham Bible Dictionary Entries

Hello, again folks. Just wanted to alert readers of this blog to a great resource that Logos Bible Software has released recently, called the Lexham Bible Dictionary. I had the great opportunity of writing the entries for "Shepherd" (seen above) and "Theophany". Once this dictionary is fully completed it will boast of more than 2,500 entries, making it the most comprehensive Bible dictionary on the market. What makes this resource great is the fact that it is being launched in conjunction with the FaithLife Study Bible, and both can be accessed for free here!

I hope that my small contributions will be of help to anyone preparing a sermon, lecture, or writing a paper for class. At least I kept that in the forefront of my mind when writing my entries.

Enjoy!

My SBL Abstract

Hello, folks. Just wanted to include a shameless plug here. I just checked the SBL website and they have now posted their online program. I have the honor of participating in the Markan Literary Sources group with the theme of the session entitled, Literary Sources for Mark 3-6. My paper is entitled, "Of Kings and Mark: A Case of Mimesis in the Second Gospel." You can read the abstract here.

Gospel of John Resources

I am excited to have an opportunity to teach the Gospel of John at my church in the fall. It will be an adult Sunday school class, and when I taught Romans a few years ago, I had between 20-25 folks per week. I'm figuring this class will attract at least that many.

Meanwhile, I have been charged with creating a syllabus and to come up with a text to use for the course. I was wondering if any of my blogging friends had any suggestions? I have talked to some of you privately already, but I am wondering what others may think. Thus far, I might be requiring Craig Koester's The Word of Life: A Theology of John's Gospel as I have ordered it in order to read it and then consider it for class.

Also, for my own individual preparation, what monographs, articles, essays, commentaries and the like should I be reading? I have a fairly extensive list thus far, but again, I am curious as to what you all think.