Early Christian Outlook and its Jewish Matrix: Narratives of Gospels and Acts

After completing the Early Christian Outlook and its Jewish Matrix programme, you will learn about:

• Recognising the importance of early Christianity in late Second Temple Judaism
• Describing the variegated settings and circumstances of the birth of Christianity 
• Strategies employed to describe messiahship by the Synoptic tradition and the Second Temple Judaism 
• Roots and metamorphosis of Messiah’s pre-existence in Second Temple Jewish literature in rabbinic sources
• Early Christianity's main genres and process that led to the New Testament canonisation
• The transition of Jesus-centred traditions from oral Semitic stage to Greek compositions 
• Recognising the references to ‘the Jews’ in the Fourth Gospel and understanding different explanations regarding the Gospel’s harsh and critical stance in research
• Recognising the conflicts within the Jesus movement, including the Gentiles and their obligations to Torah as a difference of opinion in broader Second Temple Judaism
• Using the story of Exodus as a reference to understand John’s reworking of Jesus’ miracles using Synoptic traditions into the narrative of signs and wonders