Saturday, July 09, 2005
What’s New? Evangelizomai
In the current issue of New Testament Studies, John Dickson argues that the Greek root evangel- refers only to the announcement of new information (“good news”), and not also, as some have argued, to general teaching and exhortatory activity (particularly in Romans 1:15).
Dickson makes a background observation about the connection between the Hebrew basar and the Greek evangelizomai:
There is widespread agreement amongst scholars that the Hebrew root [bsr] as found in biblical tradition was highly significant for the rise of the Christian use of at least the verb evangelizomai. The usage of the evangel- root in Greek descriptions of the announcement of (grand) news is mirrored perfectly by the consistent employment of [bsr] with respect to such announcements in biblical tradition. In 2 Sam 18.19–31, for
instance, messengers ... are sent from the field of battle to proclaim [bsr] to the king the news [bsrh] of victory and the death of the king’s son. Similar uses of the root [bsr], connoting the announcement of hitherto unknown news, are found throughout the scriptures of Israel. Of special interest here is the use of the terminology in the Psalms. ...
JOHN P. DICKSON
New Testament Studies, Volume 51, Number 2 (April 2005)
Page Numbers: 212 - 230
Citation: JOHN P. DICKSON. Gospel as News: e?a??e?- from Aristophanes to the Apostle Paul