De–Introducing the New Testament: Texts, Worlds, Methods, Stories

De–Introducing the New Testament offers an exciting and provocative look at how we conduct critical New Testament scholarship in our present historical moment and socio–economic landscape. Challenging some of the methodologies and trajectories central to the area, the authors use the term “de–introducing” to denote a practice of unmasking the most basic categories and frameworks in the field so that we might better understand and appraise what discourses are at work therein. The authors acknowledge the interplay of ancient texts and modern disciplinary formation as important sites for the expression of identity and power relationships, and raise questions about the connections we seek to cultivate with the past. Engaging with several dominant rhetorical paths in the field, the authors raise critical questions about the stories we tell in the field of New Testament studies: about who we are as New Testament scholars, what it is we think we do in the discipline, on what terms, and to what ends. Ultimately, the authors argue for a renewed commitment to the defamiliarizing power of New Testament studies and a reclaiming of the discipline as one that exemplifies the best practices of the humanities and the radical potential of liberative ethics.

Davina C. Lopez is the author of Apostle to the Conquered: Reimagining Paul′s Mission (2008). Todd Penner is the author of Contextualizing Gender in Early Christian Discourse (with Caroline Vander Stichele, 2009) and In Praise of Christian Origins: Stephen and the Hellenists in Lukan Apologetic Historiography (2004). Both Lopez and Penner conducted research for this book as scholars–in–residence at the Burke Library of Union Theological Seminary/Columbia University between 2010 and 2011. In addition, they are both Senior Editors for the Oxford Encyclopedia of the Bible and Gender Studies (2014) and have co–authored numerous essays together related to method and its consequence for interpretation in the study of the New Testament.