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My guest today is Dr. Andrew Perriman of London who will discuss his recent book In the Form of a God, which is part of the Studies in Early Christology series. (Read Perriman’s helpful summary of the book here.) The focus for our conversation is looking at the subject of pre-existence in Paul’s epistles. The question before us is whether Paul taught or assumed that Christ had a literal prehuman career prior to his birth. In this interview we’ll cover five of the six major texts, including Galatians 4.4, 1 Corinthians 8.6, 1 Corinthians 10.4, 2 Corinthians 8.9, and Colossians 1.15-16. Next week we’ll tackle Philippians 2.
Andrew Perriman has a degree in English Language and Literature from Oxford and an MPhil and PhD from the London School of Theology where he currently works as an Associate Research Fellow. He teaches New Testament works with graduate students on biblical interpretation.
—— Links ——
- Follow Andrew Perriman at his postost blog
- Get In the Form of a God from Wipf & Stock or from Amazon
- Check out these previous episodes about pre-existence
- Get the transcript of this episode
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- Who is Sean Finnegan? Read his bio here
A couple of interesting points but if this is supposed to support a pre-existent Jesus, then I’ve definitely missed it. Some academic waffle to wade through. My conclusion: The Bible is simpler than academia – only confirming what Paul wrote at 1 Corinthians 1:18-31.
Nice episode with very a reasonable approach by Andrew to some of the allegedly awkward verses/proof-texts. I was wondering why he left out the most obvious element in the ‘creation of all things’ verse of Col 1:16 – in him all things were created: things IN heaven and ON earth. God made the heavens and the earth – not just the stuff in and on. people quote this as some kind of Ace, but conveniently overlook the actual words regarding what was made.