To understand the Apostle Paul's attitude to his own people, it is necessary to place it in the perspective of his interpretation of the Gospel as a whole. Two main approaches to this have been taken. There are those who see Paul's point of departure in his conviction that Jesus of Nazareth was the Messiah and in the transformation of the understanding of the messianic condition which this demanded. Others point out that in his epistles Paul seems to be most concerned, not with the messiahship of Jesus, but with the criticism of the Law, that Paul's call (misnamed a ‘conversion’) arose from a new insight into the meaning, function and weakness of the Law (and with this, the insight into the nature of the self), not from a new concept of messiahship. They claim that Judaism, always tolerant of diversity of belief even in messianic claimants, could absorb Paul's paradoxical doctrine of a crucified Messiah but could not overlook Paul's acceptance of Gentiles, sinners who did not observe the Law, as members of the people of God. This passed the limits of Jewish tolerance and brought down upon the Apostle the wrath of his own people. The two positions indicated are too polarized. The immediate cause of the Jewish opposition to Paul centred in the Law. But his understanding of the Law was inextricably bound up with the significance which he had come to ascribe to Jesus of Nazareth as the Messiah and with the challenge that this issued to all the fundamental symbols of Jewish life. To isolate the criticism of the Law from the total messianic situation as Paul conceived it is both to exaggerate and to trivialize it. That criticism was a derivative of the place which Paul ascribed to Jesus as the Messiah.

Pauvreté des moyens d'expression, richesse des effets: parmi tous les écrits du Nouveau Testament, c'est dans le quatrième évangile que cette réussite est la plus visible. Comment en rendre compte? Par le génie de l'évangéliste qui, ne disposant que d'un instrument linguistique sommaire, s'en est servi habilement. Discernement des temps, emploi du verbe au début de la phrase, casus pendens, répétitions adversatives, chiasmes: ces particularités ont été signalées, en fonction du problème relatif à la langue originaire du livre, grecque ou araméenne, et conséquemment du milieu culturel (Mutterboden) où il vit le jour.

Es muß in der griechischen Kirche und einigen ihrer Nachbarn vom 15. Jh. an ein lebendiges, paränetisch gerichtetes Interesse an Joseph und Aseneth gegeben haben.l 11 der 16 bekannten altgriechischen Handschriften stammen aus dem 15.–17. Jh., dazu eine von 1802 (die übrigen vier aus dem 10.–12. Jh.). Zwei davon, Bukarest, Bibl. Acad. Rom., Gr. 966, 17. Jh. (Sigel F oder 171) und Sinai, Gr. 1976, 17. Jh. (Woder 174)2 vertreten eine paränetisch interpolierte Form, zu der auch die rumänische Übersetzung gehört. Aus dem 15. Jh. stammen die beiden Handschriften der serbisch-kirchenslawischen Übersetzung, aus dem 15.–18. die Hauptmasse der armenischen Textzeugen. Das genannte Interesse bezeugen nun auch die Spuren von JA im Neugriechischen:3 der sekundäre Schluß der altgriechischen Gruppe c (III), Einschläge in der altgriechischen Handschrift McKell, 16. Jh. (G oder 162) (II) und vor allem eine Übertragung (Ngr) des ganzen Textes (I).

The Old Testament citations have offered a fertile field for study and investigation because of their interesting text forms. In particular, the surprising fact that over half of the Old Testament citations attributed to Jesus completely conform to the LXX text has led investigators to seek an explanation for this phenomenon. Some have tried to show that the original citations in Hebrew or Aramaic have been assimilated to the LXX in the course of tradition, while others have attributed this phenomenon to the Gospel writers who used the LXX text familiar to them.

Despite the relative neglect shown the First Epistle of Peter, few NT books are more relevant for a study of the use of the OT in the NT. Like the Epistle to the Hebrews, I Peter quotes frequently from various sections of the OT, and like the Book of Revelation its thought is frequently framed with OT expressions. Especially because of the unique collection of stone testimonia and the use of other OT quotations, I Peter ii. 1–10 is one of the most intriguing passages in the NT. As is well known, I Peter provides a message of consolation and exhortation to Christians who were being or were about to be persecuted, and this message is conveyed by a series of imperatives based on indicatives. Particularly in i. 13 through ii. 10 the imperative is couched between a preceding assumption (expressed either by a conditional sentence as in i. 17 or a participle as in i. 22) and a following supporting indicative.