Give God the Glory: Ancient Prayer and Worship in Cultural Perspective

The New Testament, worship, prayer - the list of books and articles on these topics is not a short one. Amid the cacophony of interpretive voices, Jerome Neyrey offers an intriguing descant as he aims to bring readers into an understanding and appreciation of the otherness of the culture in which the Christian scriptures and early church worship came to be.In Give God the Glory, Neyrey reads select biblical texts in terms of social science models and the theory of communication. He examines New Testament passages in the context of both the Hebraic ethos and the Greco-Hellenistic culture in which these scriptures were conceived and written. Neyrey also looks at New Testament prayer and worship in relation to other ancient literature, particularly the writings of Philo, the Didache, and Justin's First Apology. Illuminating the New Testament texts in their original light, this book focuses on interpretation rather than history, supplementing and enhancing the existing wealth of scholarship.