Bibliotheca Ephemeridum Theologicarum Lovaniensium – serie

Besides their insistence on praxis and the application of the Word of God to a given situation, Liberation Theologies make ample use of tools of analysis to uncover root causes of oppression. Now, it is precisely with respect to these tools that Liberation Theologies today find themselves on shifting grounds. In intra-ecclesiastical circles cultural concerns have come to replace socio-economic analysis, whereas after the implosion of the East Bloc the liberationists proper also pay more attention to the issues of gender, ecology, and indigenous movements. The contributions to this volume, originating from various continents, discuss to what extent this shift in emphasis is desirable, and acceptable, and conclude that the cultural focus cannot possibly invalidate but only enrich and complete the socio-economic analysis. They, moreover, try to assess the developments in light of globalization (economics, informatics), on the one hand, and postmodernity on the other. Given the impact of western culture politics, the question arises as to whether the native cultures will succeed in keeping up their religious core values and structures of solidarity - two elements so indispensable for liberative commitments.

This volume includes about thirty contributions to the 49th Colloquium Biblicum Lovaniense, held in July 2000 in Leuven. The authors represent the contemporary state of the scholarly discussion in Europe and North America on the sayings source Q, in connection to actual problems of the quest of the historical Jesus. The contributions show different positions on the historical and exegetical problems though almost all of them are accepting the Q-hypothesis. Some of the articles are devoted to the text and theology of the Q-source (or Q-gospel) as a whole, others deal with more special questions of the language, or the historical background or context, or the situation of the Q-community. Some of the contributions give interpretations of important particular text-passages, including parables and miracle-stories. The volume gives a good overview of the progress of the discussion and research on Q since the Leuven colloquium in 1981.

This volume brings the revised version of the full collection of 38 essays covering James Robinson's studies on Q, from his 1964 break-through article on the genre of Q to the corpus of hotly debated contributions on Q 12,27 which he published between 1998 and 2002 and his detailed presentation of the 'Critical Edition of Q' (2002). Edited by C. Heil and J. Verheyden.

The question of the extent to which the Septuagint reflects an evolution in messianic belief in comparison with the Masoretic Text has come into prominence in recent years, and in view of the role played by messianism in Jewish belief of the late Second Temple period and in early Christianity it seemed very appropriate that "The Septuagint and Messianism" should be chosen as the theme of the 2004 Colloquium Biblicum Lovaniense. This volume contains the papers given at the Colloquium, which are concerned both with methodological issues and with the interpretation of specific texts (in practice the majority of the texts in the Septuagint for which a messianic interpretation has been claimed). The papers are very far from all reflecting the same approach, and it has frequently happened that the same texts have been treated by different contributors from very different viewpoints. But the fact such different viewpoints are expressed is a proper reflection of the complexity of the issues involved in the question of the extent of messianic belief in the Septuagint, and of the fact that the question requires a nuanced answer. It is in any case hoped that the varied approaches reflected in the papers will serve to make clear the underlying reasons for the differences between those who take a "minimalist" and those who take a "maximalist" view on the subject of the Septuagint and Messianism.

Ce livre présente un recueil des principaux articles de l'auteur, qui est Dominicain depuis 1959 et Professeur à la Faculté de Théologie de Louvain-la-Neuve depuis 1976.Les articles sont regroupés selon 4 thèmes qui représentent les domaines de recherches de l'auteur:1. Les miracles évangéliques comparés aux miracles grecs et rabbiniques ;2. L'eucharistie avec un essai de reconstitution du texte primitif de la Cène ; 3. L'origine du monothéisme biblique ;4. L'arrière-fond judaïque du Nouveau Testament.

Old Testament Pseudepigrapha and the Scriptures contains the papers of the Colloquium Biblicum Lovaniense 2012, which focused on a series of contemporary questions in Pseudepigrapha research. The papers discuss the relationship of Old Testament Pseudepigrapha to scriptures, both in a technical sense (how did authors rewrite or interpret Scripture) and in a literary sense (how and why did authors expand or extend earlier scriptures). Many papers cover the phenomenon of pseudepigraphy, giving explanations ranging from pious forgery through various kinds of literary devices to authorial self-effacement. Some contributions discuss the historically fluid boundaries between canonical and pseudepigraphic texts, and the production and use of Old Testament pseudepigrapha in early Christianity. The volume contains papers on texts like Jubilees, the Genesis Apocryphon, other Dead Sea Scrolls texts, the Sibylline Oracles, Baruch, the Testament of Abraham, 4 Ezra, Jannes and Jambres, the Latin Vision of Ezra, the Life of Adam and Eve, the Story of Melchizedek, and the Story of Zosimus, as well as detailed studies on aspects of other texts like, e.g., 2 Baruch and the Liber Antiquitatum Biblicarum.

This study attempts an investigation of Psalms 35–41 in the Masoretic tradition from two viewpoints and in the wake of current research on the Psalter. Firstly, the common opinion that they form a sub-unit of their own within the structure of the first ‘book’ of the Psalter (Psalms 3–41) is verified on the basis of their concatenation and pragmatics. The deepened insight leads to the conclusion that the bundle consists of two clusters, Psalms 35–37 and Psalms 38–41, each of which deals with the question of how to understand God’s tolerance towards the wicked, and how readers, following in the psalmist’s footsteps, might live on with that knowledge. The two clusters also provide evidence of an advancing argument in two parallel moves that are covered by the book’s main title: ‘From Servant of YHWH to Being Considerate of the Wretched’. Secondly, the Davidisation of the psalmist throughout the whole bundle is examined, not insofar as it is limited to explicit references to the historical David (especially in psalm headings), but also by feasible, lexical (Hebrew) analogies with the vita David in 1-2 Samuel (with 1 Kings 2). In this way, intertextuality is envisaged as a literary process that is initiated by the author and can be continued by well-informed readers. The monograph’s subtitle renders this as ‘The Figure David in the Reading Perspective of Psalms 35–41 MT’.

«Fatigues et peine, veilles souvent; faim et soif, jeûne souvent; froid et dénuement; sans compter tout le reste, ma préoccupation quotidienne, le souci de toutes les Églises» (2 Co 11,27-28). L’apôtre Paul a montré avec quelle obstination il convenait de poursuivre le bien de l’Église – de toutes les Églises, qui font vibrer par leur diversité la gloire du Dieu unique, à l’instar des variantes de la cathédrale de Rouen où Monet saisit l’infinie variété des couleurs que distille sur les pierres chatoyantes le soleil de Normandie. «Le souci de toutes les Églises» constitue le fil rouge des contributions présentées dans ce volume d’hommage offert au professeur Joseph Famerée à l’occasion de son éméritat. Une première partie traite de l’œcuménisme sous l’angle d’un regard rétrospectif et d’une vision prospective. La communion espérée entre les Églises ne relève pas d’une volonté d’uniformité entre les cultures et les traditions qui ont su accueillir l’Évangile. Elle se recommande du témoignage dû au Dieu Un – le Dieu d’amour, impatient de rassembler dans l’unité ses enfants dispersés. Cheminant dans l’opacité des mémoires, par-delà la pesanteur des institutions, le désir de faire prévaloir la communion sur l’acrimonie des divisions ne peut se dispenser d’un long travail d’histoire et de théologie. Une deuxième partie aborde les questions ecclésiologiques les plus actuelles: la requête de synodalité et de conciliarité, qui se fait jour tant dans l’Église catholique que dans l’Église orthodoxe; la réforme du ministère pétrinien, que recommande le bien suprême de la communion; la conception du ministère dans l’Église, où «il n’y a plus ni Juif, ni Grec; il n’y a plus ni esclave, ni homme libre; il n’y a plus l’homme et la femme; car tous, vous n’êtes qu’un en Jésus-Christ» (Ga 3,28). La troisième partie envisage la trajectoire et l’influence d’un théologien de l’unité qui a puissamment contribué au ralliement tardif de l’Église catholique à la tâche œcuménique: Yves Congar (1904-1995) – il convenait, en effet, d’évoquer l’œuvre majeure du dominicain français, auteur de prédilection du professeur Joseph Famerée. En guise d’ouverture, après une réflexion sur le poids de la culture dans le développement des sociétés africaines, l’ultime contribution invite la théologie à tourner son regard vers les vastes cieux que l’astronomie offre à sa contemplation émerveillée, non sans lui assigner de nouvelles tâches.