A new project on the writings of the New Testament and their early Jewish contexts / Speaker: PD Dr. theol. Felix John (Faculty of Theology)

Nothing is created in a vacuum. The writings of the New Testament, the second part of the Christian Bible, did not fall from the sky. Rather, they breathe the spirit of the culture in which they were written: in the world of early Judaism - which in turn interacted in many ways with Hellenistic-Roman culture. For far too long, early Judaism was used by Christian theology as a negative foil from which Jesus and his movement supposedly stood out. This view was revised, not least in connection with the emergence of the Jewish-Christian conversation.

The task of the "Corpus Judaeo-Hellenisticum Novi Testamenti digital" project is to scientifically map this paradigm shift at the level of individual source texts. Digital humanities tools have been used since 2024. With their help, the texts of early Judaism - including those of the early believers in Christ - will become easily accessible.

Since 2004, academics from the University of Greifswald have been presenting their research projects in the lecture series "University in the Town Hall" in the Bürgerschaftssaal of the Town Hall. The aim of the lecture series is to give the general public an insight into the diverse research carried out at the University's five faculties. Admission is free.