ABSTRACT
This chapter provides brief explanations of sixty terms, names, and concepts frequently encountered in the New Testament and in the secondary literature devoted to it. Apocalypse is a literary genre that takes its name from the first word of the Book of Revelation, apokalypsis. The Christian canon consists of those books the church regards as authoritative. Eschatological teachings found in the Bible focus on "last" things. Traditional Christian doctrine identifies four "last things": death, judgment, hell, and heaven. New Testament form critics focus their attention on the individual literary units of which the gospels are composed. The gospels contain many of the same stories, which have been compared to pearls on a string as they are often arranged in different orders. In the New Testament, God's spirit or presence that dwells in Jesus and, later, in the Christian community is referred to as the Holy Spirit.
