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This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. What does the Didache contain?

2. What did the temple at Jerusalem serve as, in terms of a symbol?

3. What does Mack claim the author of the Acts of the Apostles set out to show?

4. When do scholars place the writing of the Gospel of John?

5. What collection of early Christian texts does the Didache now belong to?

Short Essay Questions

1. What is Mack's argument about why John wrote Revelations?

2. Describe the situation in the empire since the reign of Caligula, in terms of the political mood of the Jews.

3. What were the two key arguments that the centrists tried to use against the non-centrist positions of Valentinus and Marcion?

4. What was Marcion of Sinope's logic, in terms of his views of two Gods, and what to do about the Jewish contamination in the gospels?

5. What are the standard writing conventions used in the Acts of the Apostles?

6. What were the four ways of reading the scripture that supported the Christian inclusion of Jewish scripture in their religion?

7. What did the Jewish scripture available to early Christians consist of?

8. What evidence does Mack put forth that the attempts to move into mainstream Christianity worked?

9. Explain the observations Mack claims are important about Mark's use of the pronouncement stories.

10. Describe Matthew's depiction of Jesus.

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Explain the Didache, in detail. What is it? Where was it located? What is it a part of, and why? What does it contain? What features does Mack note are of particular interest? How does the Didache relate to Judaism? Why is this important to understanding the state of Christianity in the early second century?

Essay Topic 2

Compare and contrast the ideas of Marcion of Sinope to the ideas of Valentinus. Who were these individuals? What were their arguments against the centrist concept of Christianity? How do their arguments differ? How are they similar? Combined, how did their ideas influence the rest of the world? How did their ideas lead to the concept that the Jewish scriptures were "really" about Christians?

Essay Topic 3

Compare and contrast two of the following Gospels. Be sure to include the time of the writing, the location, the portrayal of Jesus, the use of other documents to form a basis, and the individual additions of each author to the main story line. How are the two similar, and how are they different?

• The Gospel of Mark

• The Gospel of Matthew

• The Gospel of Luke

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