Face of New Testament Studies, The: A Survey of Recent Research

by Scot McKnight (Editor), Grant Osborne (Series Editor)

In The Face of New Testament Studies, editors Scot McKnight and Grant R. Osborne bring together New Testament experts who track developments in their specialized fields of research-and why those developments are important. It provides scholars and students with a useful survey of the "state-of-the-question" in New Testament Studies.

Genres: New Testament

544 pages, Paperback

First published January 28, 2004

About the author

Scot McKnight is a recognized authority on the New Testament, early Christianity, and the historical Jesus. McKnight, author or editor of forty books, is the Professor of New Testament at Northern Seminary in Lombard, IL. Dr. McKnight has given interviews on radios across the nation, has appeared on television, and is regularly speaks at local churches, conferences, colleges, and seminaries in the USA and abroad. Dr. McKnight obtained his Ph.D. at the University of Nottingham (1986).

Reviews

[Phil · Rating 3 out of 5]

Overall, this resource was moderately helpful in providing a birds-eye perspective of recent issues in New Testament studies. The broad-ranging nature of the work gave a peek behind the curtain in research on the General Epistles, Revelation, and Gospels, areas of NT study where my degree of familiarity is not as deep. The diversity of contributors was also helpful, the majority of whom are fluent in research happening both inside and outside of evangelical circles. But for all its value, the work has not aged well. Written in 2004, many aspects of the work do not reflect the current status of research. For example, Eckhard Schnabel references the use of a “searchable CD-ROM” in order to find scanned images of NT MSS. More pertinent to my own research, Fisk’s echo of Brown’s assessment of the belief that Colossians was not written by Paul (at 60% of scholars) seems to reflect the lay of the land in the from the early-1970s to the mid-1990s, particularly with little reference to evangelical scholarship. Even at the time Fisk was writing, but certainly by the present time, this number should be drastically “revised downward” (Joel White).
In many ways, I was disheartened that the most salient aspect of the work that touched on my area of study was focused almost exclusively on matters of authorship and reliant on largely out-of-date research. But in the broader scheme of the whole book, I felt that my perspective of NT studies was broadened, and I became aware of at least a dozen areas of new research in various branches of NT study. I believe that an updated version is forthcoming by McKnight and Gupta that will correct these issues.

[Shane Williamson · Rating 3 out of 5]

2022 reads: 17

Rating: 3.5 stars

Some good surveys of research. Obviously a little dated now (published in 2004). Hagner, Bolt, and Dunn were the most invigorating.

[Lu Tsun · Rating 3 out of 5]

McKnight, Scot and Grant R. Osborne, eds. The Face of New Testament Studies: A Survey of Recent Research. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic; Leicester: Apollos, 2004.
The Face of New Testament Studies edited by Scot McKnight and Grant R. Osborne gives the collection of essays with respect to currently debating or examining issues in the world of NT scholarship in four parts: NT background, hermeneutic, Jesus studies, and the studies of NT books.

Comparing to William Baird’s History of New Testament Research, Scot McKnight and Grant R. Osborne are more interested in holding different aspects of “the face of the NT studies” together in peaceful tension.

What has interested me personally includes the “General Hermeneutics” by Greg Clark, “The Old Testament in the New” by Craig A. Evans, “The History of Miracles in the History of Jesus” by Graham H. Twelftree, “Paul’s Theology” by James D. G. Dunn, “Hebrews in Its First-century Contexts: Recent Research” by George H. Guthrie, and “The Johannine Gospel in Recent Research” by Klaus Scholtissek.

In “Jesus of Nazareth,” Scot McKnight notes the growing awareness of the twentieth-century’s tendency to “modernize” the historical Jesus, and now the compendium has swayed to the tendency to anchor Jesus in Judaism in the contemporary scholarship.

One unusual comment made by Graham H. Twelftree in his “The History of Miracles in the History of Jesus” is that he implies N.T.Wright to be insincere in his high claim of the foundational character of resurrection but as a matter of fact he marginalizes miracle category in his hermeneutic model (201-202):

"In Jesus and the Victory of God (1996), N.T.Wright agrees that there has been "a quiet revolution in relation to the 'mighty works' or 'works of power' that Jesus is said to have performed." Sanders said, "There is nothing about miracles which would trigger, in the first-century Jewish world, the expectation that the end was at hand." Over against this, Wright says that the mighty works "were signs which were intended as, and would have been perceived as, the physical inauguration of the kingdom of Israel's god, the putting into action of the welcome and the warning which were the central message of the kingdom and its redefinition." But Wright gives only a slight discussion to the miracles (eleven of the 662 pages). Along with not integrating the miracles into his picture of the historical Jesus. Wright in this brief treatment allows the miracles to be overshadowed by his attention to the other aspects of Jesus' life. Thus, Wright is another scholar who marginalizes the miracles."

He footnoted also Wright's tendency of “methodological naturalism” noted by C. S. Evans in 1999.

Although Scot McKnight and Grant R. Osborne do not provide an introduction to their methodology, it is interesting to note that Scot McKnight comments in his own conclusion of “Jesus of Nazareth”: “If critics and conservatives alike can listen to the discordant voices and historians can work themselves into a comfortable peace agreement, and if eschatologians can hear what the linguists are saying about prophetic language, then there will be sufficient ground for scholarship to proceed together for a century of multidisciplinary and collaborative efforts (176).”