Week 4. Evangelium

Readings | Weekly Activities

This week we will turn from the Hebrew Bible to some selections from the New Testament gospel, or evangelium. Like many words in Christian Latin, evangelium comes from the Greek: the good, eu-, message, angelium (yes, an angelus is a messenger). Two of the reading selections consist of parables which Jesus preaches to his followers (and you will encounter these same parables in writers that we read later in this semester. The third selection is from the account of the crucifixion found in the gospel according to John. Again, the scene of Jesus' crucifixion is analyzed and interpreted again and again by the writers of the Middle Ages; by familiaring yourselves with the details of the Biblical account, you will be better prepared for the texts that we will then be reading later in the semester.