News from Tübingen

by Beth Langstaff

One of the guests here at the Institute in October was Yuriy Mark. Yuriy graduated from TCMI in 1997, the first ever graduate from Ukraine. One of his professors at Haus Edelweiss was former Institute director Ronald Heine, who travelled to Heiligenkreuz to teach History of Doctrine.

 

After graduation, Yuriy together with a number of colleagues started a bible college (Tavriski Christian Institute) back in Ukraine. In 2011, he began to sense the need for further education; after praying and searching, he entered the Doctor of Ministry programme at Acadia University in Nova Scotia, Canada. He is researching the topic of reconciliation between Christian communities in the Middle East, exploring how remembering and commemorating the victims of violence on all sides of a conflict might create the space for understanding and forgiveness between Christians. He spent a week here at the Institute, making use of various University libraries to collect material for his research project.

We were also very pleased to see an old friend, Beth Jarvis, who now lives in Valparaiso, Indiana, and to meet two of her fellow travellers, Donnah Wilson, from Atlanta, and Kip Lines, from Indianapolis, who is the new Executive Director of CMF International. Beth, Donnah and Kip were on their way to Freiburg, where Globalscope recently launched a new campus ministry.

News from Tübingen

Foto: Friedhelm Albrecht/Universität Tübingen

By Beth Langstaff

During the semester break, we have been busy planning the next International Symposium, which will be held here in Tübingen at the beginning of October 2018.  We are excited to announce the topic:  "The Lord's Prayer:  Origins, Significance, and Reception" / "Das Vaterunser:  Ursprünge, Bedeutung und Wirkungsgeschichte."  Fourteen scholars from around the world will be discussing the Lord's Prayer, asking and addressing questions such as:  How should we read the Lord's Prayer as the centre of the Sermon on the Mount?  What is the relationship between prayer and faith in the New Testament?  What did early Christians such as Origen teach about the Lord's Prayer?  Does God tempt anyone?  We'll be introducing the speakers in the following issues of The Word and The World.

The Lord's Prayer is found in two of the four gospels, in Matthew 6:9-13, in the middle of the Sermon on the Mount, and a shorter form with slightly different wording in Luke 11:2-4.  Another version is found in the early Christian summary of teaching and church order known as the Didache:  

"Our Father in heaven,

hallowed be your name,

your kingdom come,

your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

Give us today our daily bread,

and forgive us our debt, as we also forgive our debtors;

and do not lead us into temptation,

but deliver us from the evil one; for yours is the power and the glory forever." 

(translation by Michael W. Holmes, The Apostolic Fathers, 3rd. ed.)

The Didache urges its readers to pray like this three times a day — not a bad habit!

SBL in Berlin

NEWS FROM TÜBINGEN: SBL in Berlin

This year, the International Meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature was held at the Humboldt University in Berlin, in the second week of August. I was able to attend and to take part in the Catholic Epistles section of the meeting, which focused on the reception history of the Epistle of James in the Reformation. I was able to read a paper I had written during my research semester last year, on "The Second Battle of James," exploring debates concerning James in the middle of the sixteenth century. These Reformation debates help explain why the Epistle of James has often been dismissed or disregarded in Protestant circles (you have no doubt heard Luther's notorious description of James as a "strawy epistle"/“stråwin Epistel”!); and sixteenth-century exegetes raised questions which still occupy commentators on James: who was James? Was he an apostle--and, if so, why doesn't he identify himself as such? Which audience did James have in view? At the same time, Protestant exegetes (Luther included) cited and valued the Epistle of James; Calvin, for example, encouraged Christians to read and cherish this letter, holding it to be of benefit to all areas of the Christian life.

Scott Caulley, former director of the Institute, now Associate Professor at Kentucky Christian University, also read a paper (on the priesthood of all believers) in I Peter in the same Catholic Epistles session; it was great to see him again.

SARAH AND DANIEL SMITH HERE IN TÜBINGEN

By Beth Langstaff

At the end of May, we were very pleased to be able to welcome Daniel and Sarah Smith here on their first visit to Tübingen. Daniel is Assistant Professor of New Testament at Saint Louis University; at present, he is a Humboldt Fellow at the Ludwig-Maximilians University in Munich. He read a paper at the New Testament Colloquium, "On Appeals to an Imperfect Past in a Present Future: Reflections on the Israelite Wilderness in the Late Second Temple Period,” exploring the intriguing ways in which biblical traditions about the Israelites in the wilderness were read and interpreted by authors such as Josephus and Paul and in texts such as I Maccabees and the Dead Sea Scrolls.                              

Sarah and Daniel Smith at the Institute July 2017

THE RADICALS OF THE REFORMATION

Sattler Memorial

Here in Germany, the Reformation is front-page news throughout this "Luther Year" (the 500th anniversary of Luther's 95 Theses), but the Reformation is all too often considered only within the categories of "Protestants" and "Catholics." (Those of you who have lived here in Germany are probably familiar with the typical choice of "Konfession" provided on German forms: you are expected to be either "evangelisch" or "katholisch.") In the second half of the semester, the Theological German class is reading and discussing the "Radicals" of the Reformation, such as Michael Sattler, one of the so-called "Anabaptists" who rejected infant baptism and began to practice believer's baptism – and who were, as a result, persecuted and executed by Protestants and Catholics alike. In 1527, Michael Sattler and his wife Margarethe were arrested in the town of Horb and put on trial by the Catholic authorities in Rottenburg (ten minutes away from Tübingen); both of them were executed. Here is their memorial in Rottenburg; the last line reads (translated into English), "They died for their faith."

The Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople visits Tübingen

The Dean of the Protestant Faculty, Prof. Michael Tilly (right), awards Bartholomew I, the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople, the honorary doctorate of the Tübingen Eberhard Karls University. Picture:Metz

One of the most interesting aspects of working here in Tübingen is coming into contact with diverse Christian traditions...not only the two standard denominational labels here in Germany ("evangelisch" or "katholisch"), but other Christian families and traditions as well. Students in Theological German & English are not only Lutheran, but also Orthodox, Methodist, Baptist and Reformed--and that diversity makes for intense and challenging discussions. Early this morning, black-clad Orthodox priests were streaming into the Tübingen Old City from all directions, heading for the main church (Stiftskirche), where the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople (leader of the Orthodox Churches) was to receive an honorary doctorate from the Protestant Faculty of the University...I ended up walking with a group of priests who had lost their way and discovered that they came from all over the world. Security was tight: no handbags or coats, and each guest was expected to produce photo ID. Prof Tilly, in his role as Dean, introduced the Patriarch and awarded the doctorate. Patriarch Bartholomew then gave a short lecture--in German, no less! He urged Protestant Christians here in Germany, where they are celebrating the 500th anniversary of the start of the Reformation (the "Lutherjahr", as it is called), not just to trace their roots back to Luther--but to trace their roots all the way back to the "Urchristentum", to the early church...that reminded me of the vision of this Institute: the study of Christian origins / Erforschung des Urchristentums.

HEAVEN IS A FEAST

Last week, Dr Claudia Bergmann from the University of Erfurt read a paper for the colloquium on "The Messiah and the Meal." She examined how in both Judaism and in Christianity, there are descriptions of a meal or feast in the world to come. She made fascinating observations about commensality--the act of eating / sharing a meal together (you can't hold a feast all alone!), and what sharing a meal means both in social and in theological terms.  She also discussed various passages in the NT in which Christ the Messiah not only takes part in the feast(Matt 26:29) but invites and even serves the guests (Luke 12:37). Striking to consider that the Lord's Supper is a dress rehearsal for the heavenly feast.

Tübingen 01.June 2017