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Project

The History of Exegesis and Marginal Books of the New Testament: The Patristic Reception History of 1 Peter

This project is an enquiry into the nature of the authority assigned by the Early Church to 1 Peter, a letter that seems to have had a rather marginal status in the corpus of New Testament writings. Andreas Merkt (Regensburg) has studied the reception history of 1 Peter 1:1-2:10 for the international project Novum Testamentum Patristicum (currently in press). This present proposal should result in a follow-up volume on 1 Peter 2:11-5:14. Only a small number of Patristic commentaries devoted to the Catholic epistles has come down to us. A large part of the evidence for the reception of 1 Peter is to be traced all through Patristic literature. The letter contains a couple of famous cases that have produced a rich and diversified reception history. One such case is 1 Peter 3:19, about Jesus preaching salvation to those in prison. Greek Patristic authors (Clement of Alexandria, Origen, Cyril of Alexandria, Maximus the Confessor) have taken this to refer to Christs descent in hell between his death and resurrection to create an opportunity for a post-mortem conversion of the saints of the Old Testament who had passed away without having known the gospel. Augustine (followed by Beda Venerabilis), however, did not favour this descensus theory, proposing instead that the OT saints had been instructed while still alive by (the pre-incarnated) Christ. The project will offer an exhaustive commentary on the reception history of the second half of the letter in the Greek and Latin tradition and will thereby illustrate the richness of the interpretative traditions and the complex relationships between these, as well as the interplay of exegesis and theology in the ancient Church. In connection with the project a blog will be started (January 2016) where issues regarding the reception history of 1 Peter and related questions will be discussed and information will be posted that may be relevant for a wider readership: Patristicexegesis.comThe Novum Testamentum Patristicum project is coordinated by A. Merkt, T. Nicklas and J. Verheyden; further information is available at http://www.uni-regensburg.de/theology/novum-testamentum-patristicum/index.html
Date:1 Oct 2015 →  31 Dec 2016
Keywords:Exegesis, New Testament, Patristic Reception History, Marginal Books, 1 Peter
Disciplines:Theology and religious studies