Raymond Edward Brown
Personal Information
Description
Raymond Edward Brown SS was an American Catholic priest, a member of the Sulpician Fathers and a prominent biblical scholar. He was regarded as a specialist concerning the hypothetical "Johannine community", which he speculated contributed to the authorship of the Gospel of John, and he also wrote influential studies on the birth and death of Jesus. Brown was professor emeritus at Union Theological Seminary (UTS) in New York where he taught for 29 years. He was the first Catholic professor to gain tenure there, where he earned a reputation as a superior lecturer. Brown was one of the first Catholic scholars to apply historical-critical analysis to the Bible. As biblical criticism developed in the 19th century, the Catholic Church opposed this scholarship and essentially forbade it in 1893. In 1943, however, the Church issued the papal encyclical Divino Afflante Spiritu, which authorised Catholic scholars to investigate the Bible historically. Brown called this encyclical the "Magna Carta of biblical progress." The Second Vatican Council (Vatican II) further supported the method of higher criticism, which, Brown felt, vindicated his approach. Brown remains controversial among traditionalist Catholics because of their claim that he denied the inerrancy of the whole of scripture and cast doubt on the historical accuracy of numerous articles of the Catholic faith. Some conservatives were angered at his questioning of whether the virginal conception of Jesus could be proven historically. He was regarded as occupying the center ground in the field of biblical studies, opposing the literalism found among many fundamentalist Christians while not carrying his conclusions as far as many other scholars.
Books
The death of the Messiah
Since its original publication in 1994 as a two-volume hardcover boxed set, "The Death of the Messiah" has lived up to early expectations and become the benchmark by which any future study of the Passion narratives will be measured. Raymond E. Brown's masterful study examines every detail of the four Gospel stories of the final agonizing days of Jesus' life. Where others simply describe the accounts of the death of the Messiah as if they were one seamless whole, Father Brown reads and explains each Gospel on its own terms and elucidates the themes that make each one unique. "The Death of the Messiah" is the ideal complement to Brown's Birth of the Messiah, as thorough and expert in its handling of the Passion narratives as his book on the infancy narratives of the Gospels.
The Semitic background of the term "mystery" in the New Testament
Examining the concept of mystery in the Old Testament, the Pseudepigrapha, and the New Testament, the author concludes that the meaning of mystery can be explained on the basis of Semitic backgrounds. In the course of his investigations he sheds light not only on the meaning of mystery but also on the whole understanding of God's redemptive purpose that lies behind Paul's use of the word. -- Book Cover.
The critical meaning of the Bible
The Word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul, discerning the thoughts of the heart. So proclaims te Epistle to the Hebrews. Yet for many persons the biblical Word of God is less a sharp sword than a crutch, supporting rather than piercing them. Interpreted as they have "always" heard it, scripture tells them exactly what they want to hear. Modern critical investigation of the Bible can change that radically, for now Christians and the churches are being told that the biblical authors did not always mean what they were thought to have meant when read through the spectacles of later interests. Because of its approach, some Protestants and Catholics believe the new biblical criticism is impious. Raymond Brown, a Catholic priest who is Auburn Professor of Biblical Studies at Union Theological Seminary in New York City, argues strongly to the contrary. Critically interpreted, the Bible is all the more critical to Christians and the Church. The challenge of the scriptures is unleashed, "piercing to the division of soul, discerning the thoughts of the heart." - Back cover.
The community of the beloved disciple
"This study in Johannine ecclesiology reconstructs the history of one Christian community in the first century -- a community whose life from its inception to its last hour is reflected in the Gospel and Epistles of John. It was a community that struggled with the world, with the Jews, and with other Christians. Eventually the struggle spread even to its own ranks. It was, in short, a community not unlike the Church of today. This book offers a different view of the traditional Johannine eagle. In the Gospel the eagle soars above the earth, but with talons bared for the fray. In the Epistles we discover the eaglets tearing at each other for possession of the nest" -- Back cover.