Renowned biblical scholar Stanley Porter offers an accessible introduction to hermeneutics to help students and pastors better interpret and understand God's Word. Interpretation for Preaching and Teaching focuses on various levels of interpretation and proclamation, which are arranged in a necessary hierarchy: language and linguistics, the biblical text, biblical theology, systematic theology, and homiletics. Stanley Porter grounds the discussion within a conversation of biblical authority and offers a fresh examination of the key issues. The result is a workable method that introduces each of the major topics of interpretation and addresses some of the complexities of their use. This book provides the basics for a Bible interpreter to move from fundamental questions about the task of biblical interpretation to understanding a text and its theology to creating and delivering a sermon. It offers valuable guidance for professors and students of hermeneutics and equips pastors and Bible teachers to deliver a relevant message to those who rely on them to be faithful interpreters.

Request instructor resources Get the workbook "We know that this book works and will take students to a level not often achieved through other beginning textbooks." So say Stanley Porter and his coauthors in the preface to their Fundamentals of New Testament Greek -- an ambitious, comprehensive introduction to the grammar and vocabulary of the Greek New Testament. This first-year Greek textbook discusses all the forms and basic syntax of Koine Greek, complete with extensive paradigms, examples, and explanations. Porter, Reed, and O'Donnell's Fundamentals of New Testament Greek features pedagogically sound and linguistically informed techniques of language instruction. The volume introduces the individual words and grammatical details of Greek, sensitive to their frequency of use in the New Testament, reinforcing for students the elements that they will most often encounter. Grammatical forms, including the less common ones, are analyzed and explained in detail, often with illustrative examples from the Greek New Testament. The authors include complete paradigms and give numerous examples; the vocabulary list includes nearly one thousand words, which are introduced throughout the book's thirty chapters. Students who complete this text will be able to move directly into Greek exegesis courses and more advanced Greek-language courses. Fundamentals of New Testament Greek will prove invaluable for gaining a thorough foundational understanding of New Testament Greek, including full exposure to the formation, accenting, and semantics of its complex verbal system. Read more about the book in a blog post by its editor, Craig Noll, on EerdWord.

In this volume, a leading expert brings readers up to date on the latest advances in New Testament Greek linguistics. Stanley Porter brings together a number of different studies of the Greek of the New Testament under three headings: texts and tools for analysis, approaching analysis, and doing analysis. He deals with a variety of New Testament texts, including the Synoptic Gospels, John, and Paul. This volume distills a senior scholar's expansive writings on various subjects, making it an essential book for scholars of New Testament Greek and a valuable supplemental textbook for New Testament Greek exegesis courses.

Leading New Testament scholar Stanley Porter offers a comprehensive commentary on the Pastoral Epistles that features rigorous biblical scholarship and emphasizes Greek language and linguistics. This book breaks new ground in its interpretation of these controversial letters by focusing on the Greek text and utilizing a linguistically informed exegetical method that draws on various elements in contemporary language study. Porter pays attention to the overall argument of the Pastoral Epistles while also analyzing word meanings and grammatical structures to tease out the textual meaning. Porter addresses major exegetical issues that arise in numerous highly disputed passages and--while attentive to the history of scholarship on First Timothy, Second Timothy, and Titus--often takes untraditional or innovative positions to blaze a new path forward rather than adopt settled answers. This commentary will appeal to professors, students, and scholars of the New Testament.

Leading biblical scholar Stanley Porter critiques the state of research regarding the New Testament's use of the Old Testament and sacred traditions. He provides needed orientation for readers interested in New Testament references to themes such as "son of man" and "suffering servant" as well as the faith of Abraham and the Passover. Porter explains that examining scriptural traditions is fundamental to understanding central ideas in the New Testament regarding Jesus. He sheds light on major themes in New Testament Christology and soteriology, offering fresh, constructive proposals.

Rabbi or Messiah? Prophet or the Son of God? People have debated the identity of Jesus of Nazareth since the first century. But what if there was no Jesus? What if there was no Mary or Joseph, no twelve apostles? What if the story of Jesus was no more than a myth to convey spiritual truth? These claims have been around for hundreds of years and have become more prominent with well-known religion columnist Tom Harpur's recent book, The Pagan Christ. Harpur claims that Jesus was not a historical figure, but was one version of an ancient myth that can be traced from ancient Egyptian religion to the Roman mystery cults. Stanley Porter and Stephen Bedard tackle this radical claim by looking at the roots of the "pagan Christ idea," examining the supposed pagan parallels and presenting the evidence for the historical Jesus. The authors demonstrate that the suggestion of pagan origins for the Gospel story is not based on historical or textual evidence, but rather on a desire to create a universalistic spirituality revolving around a "Cosmic Christ" within each person. A fair examination of both the mythological and biblical texts reveal that the traditional understanding of an actual historical figure known as Jesus of Nazareth appearing two thousand years ago is indeed the only logical conclusion. Stanley E. Porter is President and Dean, and Professor of New Testament at McMaster Divinity College, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. Porter has M.A. degrees from Claremont Graduate School and Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, and the Ph.D. from the University of Sheffield. He has written widely on issues of concern in study of the New Testament, such as Jesus, Paul, the book of Acts, and John. He has a passion for education in the church, and preaches and teaches regularly. Stephen J. Bedard is the pastor of Woodford Baptist Church and First Baptist Church, Meaford, Ontario, Canada. He holds the M.Div. and M.Th. degrees from McMaster Divinity College, and is actively engaged in further graduate study. Bedard is an advocate of informed preaching and teaching, and is devoted to the ministry of the local church.

Captures John's unique perspective and voice in the wider field of Jesus studies In this volume Stanley Porter tackles a variety of important and often highly contentious topics within the Gospel of John as a means of defining and capturing the distinctive Johannine voice. Subjects discussed include John in relation to competing Gospels, the public proclamation of Jesus in John, the sources of John's Gospel, John's prologue, the "I Am" sayings, the notion of truth, the Passover theme, and the ending of the book. Each chapter, besides surveying representative research, puts forward new and insightful proposals regarding the topics concerned. Porter does not shy away from matters that have often perplexed Johannine scholars, and he confronts some of the viewpoints that have led to confusion in the field. In exploring John's unique perspective and voice, Porter makes a significant contribution to the wider fields of Jesus studies and New Testament investigation.

Notes and complete bibliographic information helps researchers find 850 leading references to the New Testament, non-canonical literature, and church fathers.

Revision of the author's thesis (doctoral--University of Sheffield).

This detailed work in Greek linguistics argues that the semantic category of synthetic verbal aspect provides a suggestive and workable linguistic model for explaining the range of uses of the tense-forms in Greek. The author addresses in particular those studying the hellenistic Greek of the New Testament, although those interested in Greek language from other periods, and in systemic linguistics and more general questions related to the study of ancient languages will benefit as well. This book will serve both as a textbook for advanced language classes, and as a reference tool for Greek language research.