Inside BAR

The God-fearers—referred to several times in the New Testament—may have been a large group of people living in the Mediterranean world during the early centuries of Christianity. Thought to be half-converts to Judaism, God-fearers, according to some scholars, were a fertile source for converts to Christianity. Three feature articles in this issue of BAR present a lively God-fearers debate.

Speaking out against the existence of a large population of God-fearers (“The God-Fearers: A Literary and Theological Invention”) are A. Thomas Kraabel and Robert S. MacLennan. Kraabel has published widely on religious studies and archaeology. Many of his articles are connected with his excavation of an ancient synagogue at Khirbet Shema in Israel, where he served as the expedition’s associate director from 1969 to 1973.

Senior Pastor of the Hitchcock Presbyterian Church in Scarsdale, New York, MacLennan is also a Ph.D. candidate in Ancient Studies at the University of Minnesota. He spent the summer of 1979 with Yigal Shiloh’s City of David excavation team in Jerusalem.