Dr Eric Eve
Biography:
Eric is Fellow and Tutor in Theology, Tutor for Graduates and Secretary to the Governing Body. He teaches New Testament and is also responsible for supervising the tuition of theology students at Harris Manchester. His doctoral thesis was on The Jewish Context of Jesus’ Miracles, an expanded version of which was published by Sheffield Academic Press (in July 2002).
Eric originally graduated from Brasenose College, Oxford with a degree in Engineering Science. He eventually returned to Oxford to study Theology at Harris Manchester College, where he gained a second BA, an MSt and a DPhil. Immediately after completing his own Theology Finals in 1995 Eric wrote A Guide for Perplexed Students. It is aimed particularly at mature students studying at Harris Manchester, but may be of wider interest too.
For a somewhat different take on New Testament Scholarship, you might light to try out his work of Interactive Fiction in which the protagonist escapes a dire lecture by experiencing a near-brush with death, in what could be described as an NT scholar's vision of hell. The work is called All Hope Abandon and you can try out a demo version of it online, or read his article about it in Digital Humanities Quarterly.
Eric served as University Assessor for the Proctorial Year March 2010 — March 2011.
Research Area:
New Testament Studies
Research Interests:
Media and memory studies in relation to the composition of the Gospels and the traditions behind them; the Synoptic Problem (in particular scepticism about Q); Miracle in Second Temple Jewish Literature and the Gospels (and the relation between them);
Links:
Select Publications
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The Growth of the Nature Miracles
Eve, EEdited by:Twelftree, GSeptember 2017|Chapter|The Nature Miracles of Jesus Problems, Perspectives, and ProspectsThis is the first book to tackle this problem head on. Do the stories reflect events in the life of the historical Jesus, or are they myths or legends?Religion -
Writing the Gospels
Eve, EJanuary 2016|Book -
Signs and Syncriseis in John and the Wisdom of Solomon
Eve, EEdited by:Barton, J, Groves, PDecember 2015|Chapter|The New Testament and the ChurchThe focus of the volume is thus not only upon the New Testament itself, but upon how reading the New Testament is important for dialogue within the Church and within Christian denominations.Religion -
Orality is No Dead-End
Eve, EOctober 2015|Journal article|Journal for the Study of the Historical Jesus<jats:p>Paul Foster has recently argued that ‘orality’ (along with memory and the Fourth Gospel) is one of three ‘dead-ends’ in historical Jesus scholarship, and that it is more appropriate to continue to use traditional methods such as form criticism. While some of Foster’s criticisms are valid, he does justice neither to the particular scholars he addresses nor to the wider implications of orality studies for New Testament and Historical Jesus scholarship. It is in any case inconsistent to advocate form criticism while denying the usefulness of orality studies. <jats:sc>nt</jats:sc> scholarship needs to embrace newer approaches to ancient media studies, not spurn them as ‘dead-ends’.</jats:p> -
The Miracles of an Eschatological Prophet
Eve, EMay 2015|Journal article|Journal for the Study of the Historical Jesus<jats:p>While it has not been a central aspect of his work on the historical Jesus, E.P. Sanders has contributed to the understanding of Jesus’ miracles. In <jats:italic>Jesus and Judaism</jats:italic>, Sanders argued that Jesus was an eschatological prophet and maintains that he certainly healed people in ways that his contemporaries regarded as miraculous, but that his miracles were not signs of the end, and cannot be used to determine what type of figure he was. The fuller treatment of miracles in the later <jats:italic>The Historical Figure of Jesus</jats:italic> emphasizes the exorcisms and dismisses the nature miracles as having made minimal impact, leading Sanders to conclude that Jesus’ miracles were not as spectacular as the Gospels suggest, and that they probably led his contemporaries to view Jesus as a holy man like Honi the Circle-Drawer, although Jesus himself probably understood his miracles as signs of the imminent arrival of the new age, and his disciples may have come to see them as a defeat of evil powers and as a legitimation of Jesus’ claims. After summarizing Sanders’s arguments this article goes on to suggest how some of their foundations may be secured while also suggesting that the case for associating Jesus’ miracles with his role as an eschatological prophet may be stronger than Sanders allowed. It then concludes by indicating how Sanders’s account of the role of Jesus’ miracles might be further rounded out first by exploring their possible symbolism (as Sanders does with the Temple incident) and second through various social-scientific approaches.</jats:p> -
Book Review: Beyond Oral and Written: Werner H. Kelber, Imprints, Voiceprints & Footprints of Memory
Eve, EMay 2015|Journal article|The Expository Times -
The Devil in the Detail: Exorcising Q from the Beelzebul Controversy
Eve, EEdited by:Poirier, JC, Peterson, JApril 2015|Chapter|Marcan Priority Without Q: Explorations in the Farrer HypothesisA collection original essays from leading scholars reflecting the newest thinking on the Farrer solution to the synoptic problemReligion -
Memory, Orality and the Synoptic Problem
Eve, EJanuary 2015|Journal article|Early ChristianityMemory, Oral Tradition, Synoptic Problem -
Studies in Matthew and Early Christianity. By GRAHAM STANTON. Edited by MARKUS BOCKMUEHL and DAVID LINCICUM.
Eve, EOctober 2014|Journal article|The Journal of Theological Studies -
Jesus' Miracles in their Historical and Cultural Context
Eve, EEdited by:Kollmann, B, Zimmermann, RJanuary 2014|Chapter|Hermeneutik der frühchristlichen Wundererzählungen: Geschichtliche, literarische und rezeptionsorientierte PerspektivenReligion