Syftet med denna uppsats är att undersöka maktkritiska perspektiv inom samtida missionsteologi. Genom att ha valt ut några teologiska verk analyserar jag hur förståelsen av makt i mission har utvecklats och utmanats. Det framträder ett tydligt behov av att omformulera både missionens motiv, metoder och mål.

Resultatet visar att traditionella missionsmodeller ofta präglades av dominans, kolonialt tänkande och kyrklig överordning. Men nu uppmuntras en ny missionsteologi där Guds makt tolkas som sårbar kärlek och tjänande snarare än kontroll. Denna förståelse får konsekvenser för hur kyrkan ser på sig själv som missionssubjekt och hur evangeliet kommuniceras i världen.

Uppsatsen argumenterar för att maktkritiska perspektiv inte är ett tillägg till missionsteologi utan ett element till dess förnyelse. Genom att omtolka makt i ljuset av Kristi kors öppnas vägen för en mer ömsesidig rättvis och trovärdig mission. 

This study critically evaluates the Universal Basic Education (UBE) Programme in Nigeria, with a focus on its human rights implications on the rights of the child. Recognizing education as a fundamental human right and a key driver of development, the research explores whether the UBE Programme fulfills its mandate of providing free, compulsory, and quality basic education to Nigerian children, its alignment with Human Rights Norms and its impact towards the integral development of children. The study employs a qualitative approach, analyzing policy documents, legal frameworks, and relevant literature. By examining the UBE Programme through the lens of national laws such as the UBE Act (2004) and the Child Rights Act (2003); and international instruments – the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), the research identifies both progress and persistent gaps in the realization of children’s educational rights. The findings reveal significant implementation challenges, including inadequate funding, poor infrastructure, and disparities in access. The study concludes with recommendations for policy reform and the adoption of an integral child-rights-based approach to education in Nigeria. 

This article examines the question of what it means to tell a story in the Old Testament by looking at the meaning of a biblical Hebrew lexeme, sipper, in the light of lexical semantics and three parameters in narrative theory: story, discourse and situation. The relationship between the meanings ‘to count’ and ‘to tell’ is problematised, and it is noted that the relationship is not obvious etymologically. In light of narrative theory, the connection between the two meanings is best understood in terms of plurality. It is further noted that sipper is a broad term for storytelling in both prose and poetry, as well as in narrative entertainment. This somewhat contradicts Robert Kawashima's thesis that the prose form of the Old Testament signals the death of the epic narrator. Finally, sipper is examined in the semantic fields of ‘communication’ and ‘speech’. Here, sipper stands for human storytelling and is never negated. In the semantic fields, sipper seems to indicate an interest in the act of storytelling as such, not just the content of the telling.

The planetary emergency raises urgent questions of guilt, hope, and salvation—questions at the heart of the doctrine of justification. Accordingly, the dissertation examines this doctrine in relation to the challenges of the planetary emergency. In dialogue with the Evangelical Lutheran theologian Eberhard Jüngel, the study explores how grace can be understood as a saving force that exposes the lie that we humans are separated from the creation to which we belong and on which we depend, and re-inserts us into its relational fabric. The dissertation’s central premise is that viewing humanity as fundamentally separate from the more-than-human is both ecologically and theologically problematic. Salvation must therefore be reinterpreted so that it appears not as an escape from the world, but as a hope for all creation. The analysis highlights as fruitful Jüngel’s understanding of the nature of sin as an assault on the web of relationships that creation and Creator together constitute, his interpretation of justification as a transcendent saving address that takes place in and through relationship, and the new-creating potential this address carries. The main limitations concern the one-sided language-centrism of his theology, its limited soteriological scope, and its insufficient integration of the perspectives of creation and of victims. Building on this analysis, the study develops an ecological soteriological contribution in which justification is interpreted as a creation-transforming event of grace that speaks truth, brings liberation, and restores broken relationships. In doing so, it offers a further development of Lutheran justification theology in which humanity is reconciled into the wholeness of creation, filling a gap in previous research by interpreting the Evangelical Lutheran doctrine of justification in light of the existential and ethical questions of the planetary emergency.

This thesis examines the moral and theological concepts of the Apostle Paul, sin, and morality through the lens of comparative analysis of J. Albert Harrill’s twenty-first century perspective and of John Owen’s seventeenth-century approach. Focusing on Paul’s letters, particularly Romans 1:28-31, this study scouts how the depravity of the mind leads to the loss of knowledge of God in both individual and collective contexts or vice versa (if we take a reading of Hosea 4:6). Owen drew emphasis on the spiritual and ethical implications of sin, grace, and atonement through Christ’s death, while Harrill positioned Paul’s writings within the socio-historical and political context of the Greco-Roman world. By comparing these frameworks, this thesis identifies epistemological agreements and differences, highlighting how their methodologies contribute to a balanced understanding of Paul’s teachings. The study bridges theological and historical perspectives, thereby fostering dialogue within diverse Christian communities and addressing contemporary debates in Christian ethics. Through qualitative and comparative methods, it analyses key texts and weaves in knowledge from scholars like Tertullian, N.T. Wright, and Louis Berkhof to enrich the critiques on sin, morality, and divine knowledge.

The purpose of the present paper is to revisit the interface between biblical studies, receptionexegesis, and reception theory. In the first part of the paper, we discuss what we believeto be the most important lessons learned from recent scholarship on the relationshipbetween these fields and highlight what we think is still an underestimated conclusion:if we assume that “meaning” is contextual rather than essential, the full(er) capacity of abiblical text is not discoverable until we have examined how it has appeared in various contexts.Related to this is the question of why and how texts survive and even thrive in newcontexts and in what way later authors utilize the “capacity” of the biblical texts, becauseeven if “meaning” is ultimately brought to texts by their readers, texts are in some sensesagents as well. To exemplify these discussions and the connection between reception exegesisand biblical criticism, two short examples from the reception of Psalms 110 and 137in medieval Christian Arabic and Judeo‑Arabic sources are presented. In the first example,we recapitulate findings on how inner‑biblical reception generates a complex web ofpotential interpretations but also how the ambivalence created in the process may be thegreatest asset of that text. It is also an example of where interpretation may teach us aboutthe life and thought of ancient and medieval communities and how they interacted withone another over the meaning of the biblical text. In contrast, the second example is morecentered on the “capacity” of the text and in what sense communities exploit that potentialfor their larger purposes.