Here is a selection of titles added to the collection in the past week
A semiotic approach to the theology of inculturation /Cyril Orji ; foreword by Dennis M. Doyle. This book argues that though it is a difficult and delicate task, inculturation is still a requisite demand of a World Church and that without it the church is unrecognizable and unsustainable. The book also suggests that the past failures of inculturation experiments in Africa can be overcome only by critically applying the science of semiotics, which can serve as an antidote to the nature of human knowing and reductionism that characterized earlier attempts to make Christianity African to the African. Drawing from the semiotic works of C. S. Peirce, Clifford Geertz, and Bernard Lonergan, the book shows why semiotics is best suited to an African theology of inculturation and offers ten pinpointed precepts, identified as’Habits,’which underline the attentiveness, reasonableness, and responsibility required in a semiotic approach to a theology of inculturation.
C.S. Lewis: anti-Darwinist : a careful examination of the development of his views on Darwinism /Jerry Bergman ; foreword by Ellen Myers ; preface by Karl Priest. It is commonly believed that C.S. Lewis was a theistic evolutionist, a conclusion based on a few statements that he made in The Problem of Pain and Mere Christianity. A careful study of his writings reveals, not only that for most of his life he was not a theistic evolutionist, but strongly opposed Darwinism, especially towards the end of his life.
Christianity and the culture machine: media and theology in the age of late secularism /Vincent F. Rocchio. In this intensive examination of Christianity’s role in the cultural marketplace, the author argues that Christianity’s inability to effectively contest the ideology of secular humanism is not a theological shortcoming, but rather a communications problem: the institutional church is too wedded to an outmoded aesthetic of Christianity to communicate effectively.
Corinthian democracy: democratic discourse in 1 Corinthians /Anna C. Miller. In this innovative study, Miller challenges prevailing New testament scholarship that has largely dismissed the democratic civic assembly–the ekklēsia–as an institution that retained real authority in the first century CE. She demonstrates that Paul’s persuasive rhetoric is itself shaped and constrained by the democratic discourse he shares with his Corinthian audience. Miller argues that these first-century Corinthians understood their community as an authoritative democratic assembly in which leadership and citizenship cohered with the public speech and discernment open to each. Ultimately, Miller’s study offers new insights into the tensions that inform Paul’s letter.
Digital humanities and Christianity: an introduction /edited by Tim Hutchings and Claire Clivaz. This volume provides the first comprehensive introduction to the intersections between Christianity and the digital humanities This volume introduces key debates, shares exciting initiatives, and aims to encourage new innovations in analysis and communication. It is ideally suited as a starting point for students and researchers interested in this vast and complex field.
Digital humanities and research methods in religious studies: an introduction /edited by Christopher D. Cantwell and Kristian Petersen. This volume provides practical, but provocative, case studies of exemplary projects that apply digital technology or methods to the study of religion. An introduction and 16 essays are organized by the kinds of sources digital humanities scholars use – texts, images, and places – with a final section on the professional and pedagogical issues digital scholarship raises for the study of religion.
Endangered Gospel: how fixing the world is killing the Church /John C. Nugent. Endangered Gospel stresses the core gospel truth that, rather than ushering in a new world through social activism, God’s people already are the new world in Christ. Endangered Gospel explores how we might enthusiastically embrace the social dimensions of the gospel without divorcing them from the church or forcing them on the world.
Four kingdom motifs before and beyond the book of Daniel /edited by Andrew Perrin, Loren T. Stuckenbruck ; with the assistance of Shelby Bennett, Matthew Hama. TWU AUTHORS. Four Kingdom Motifs Before and Beyond the Book of Daniel includes thirteen essays that explore the reach and redeployment of the motif in classical and ancient Near Eastern writings, Jewish and Christian scriptures, texts among the Dead Sea Scrolls, Apocrypha and pseudepigrapha, depictions in European architecture and cartography, as well as patristic, rabbinic, Islamic, and African writings from antiquity through the Mediaeval eras.
Gift and promise: an Evangelical theology of the Lord’s Supper /Peter Schmiechen. An evangelical Lord’s Supper – this is a high-risk operation, given the reliance by many on transactional sacrifice and the tendency to reduce the Supper to a sacrament of penance for individuals. Here is a clear and consistent evangelical perspective, based on the theology and biblical considerations that have formed our faith and practice.
God after Christendom? /Bryan Haymes and Kyle Gingerich Hiebert. By revisiting the story of speech about God in scripture and in the living tradition of the church, the authors argue that we are thereby enabled to confront the contemporary temptations that too often unwittingly remake God in our own image. In this way the authors provocatively suggest that at least part of what Christian discipleship involves today is bound up with the task of unlearning some of the ways of speaking of God that have become so familiar to us. By learning to reread the texts of the Christian tradition, particularly in its most vital and creative moments, the authors suggest that we might become better equipped to faithfully read the signs of our own times.
God’s focus on the fatherless: a lens to inform spiritual impact in the local church /Dwight David Croy. This study concentrates on God’s focus on and vision for the fatherless as an informal lens from which local churches may measure and implement ministry impact and outreach principles.
Holiness and the Missio Dei /Andy Johnson. Johnson takes the reader on a biblical journey that explores the question of what holiness or sanctification has to do with God’s mission in the world. Using a missional lens to guide the reader into a theological engagement with Scripture, Johnson argues that God’s primary means of making us holy is through our participation in his saving, reconciling mission to bring creation to its intended destiny. This book is written primarily for church leaders, for students, and for academics who are interested in missional readings of Scripture
How not to kill a Muslim: a manifesto of hope for Christianity and Islam in North America /Joshua Graves. Graves provides a practical subversive theological framework for a strategic posture of peaceful engagement between Christians and Muslims. Based upon both academic and personal experience (Josh grew up in Metro Detroit), this book will provide progressive Christians with a clear understanding of Jesus’radical message of inclusivity and love.
Invest your humanity: celebrating Marvin Meyer /edited by Julye Bidmead and Gail J. Stearns. This volume is dedicated to Marvin C. Meyer, a person of passionate spirit and personality, known to many as the preeminent scholar who brought to life the Gnostic Gospels. Friends, students, and scholars here pay tribute to Meyer with reflections, new pedagogies, and explorations in biblical texts, ancient magic, and archaeological discoveries.
Jesus v. abortion: they know not what they do /Charles K. Bellinger. Jesus v. Abortion critiques the pro-choice and muddled middle positions, employing several unusual angles. Many important thinkers are brought into this conversation.
Laying down arms to heal the creation-evolution divide /Gary N. Fugle. Laying Down Arms to Heal the Creation-Evolution Divide presents a comprehensive, uplifting alternative that brings together an orthodox, biblical view of a sovereign Creator-God and the meaningful discoveries of modern evolutionary biology. Fugle offers unique insights into this debate from his dual perspective as both an award-winning biology professor and a committed leader in conservative evangelical churches. He explains conservative readings of early Genesis that respect both the inerrant words of Scripture and the evolutionary revelations in God’s natural creation. This book is for individuals who sense that biblical Christian faith and evolution are compatible without compromising core convictions.
Love, loss, and abjection: the journey of new birth in the Gospel of John /Melanie Baffes. This study explores the premise that the experience of being ‘born from above’ in John’s Gospel can be seen as mirroring the development of human subjectivity, particularly as understood through the psychoanalytic work of Julia Kristeva. Examining the story of Mary of Bethany (as narrated in John 11-12) through this lens, this analysis seeks to better understand the concept of new birth and how it relates to being fully human.
Old Testament theology and the rest of God /Nicholas Haydock. Haydock explores the ways in which God’s rest interacts with the direction of the narrative, noting also its role in shaping both Israel’s worship and their messianic expectation. In this fascinating study, Haydock considers the importance and place of rest in the ancient Mesopotamian worldview.
One thing I know: how the blind man of John 9 leads an audience toward belief /Britt Leslie. This work employs multiple methodologies to analyze the story of the man born blind (John 9) in order to discern how this episode serves the greater purpose of the Gospel. The analysis of linguistic patterns; narrative structure; cultural anthropology; and an analysis of irony, humor, and wit are each employed. These are all synthesized in the final chapter, which makes an attempt to discern how an ancient performance of John 9 might look, and how such a performance might sway an ancient audience toward trust in Jesus as Messiah.
Parabolic figures or narrative fictions?: seminal essays on the stories of Jesus /Charles W. Hedrick. Hedrick contends that parables do not teach moral and religious lessons; they are not, in whole or part, theological figures for the church. Rather, parables are realistic narrative fictions that like all effective fiction literature are designed to draw readers into story worlds where they make discoveries about themselves by finding their ideas challenged and subverted–or affirmed. The parables have endings but not final resolutions, because the endings raise new complications for careful readers, which require further resolution.
Power and the powers: the use and abuse of power in its missional context /Andrew Hardy, Richard Whitehouse, and Dan Yarnell. This book sets out to address the issue of the use and misuse of power from biblical, theological, and practical perspectives. The authors bring their theological, pastoral, missionary, and personal experience to their task in order to inform, challenge, and invite readers into a responsible use of the powers that God has put into the hands of each one of us to achieve his purposes in the world.
Presence in the modern world /Jacques Ellul ; a new translation by Lisa Richmond ; foreword by Ted Lewis ; introduction to Jacques Ellul’s life and thought by David W. Gill. Presence in the Modern World is Ellul’s most foundational book, combining his social analysis with his theological orientation. Ellul responds by describing how a Christian’s unique presence in the world can make a difference.
Reason and mystery in the Pentateuch /Aaron Streiter. Reason and Mystery in the Pentateuch is grounded in the faith that: God revealed to Moses two works, known together as the Torah. The Torah has never been corrupted; the text read today is identical to the text God revealed to Moses.
Redeeming flesh: the way of the cross with zombie Jesus /Matthew John Paul Tan. This book–part social analysis, part theological critique, and part devotional–considers how the zombie can be a way to critically situate our culture, awash with consumer products. Tan considers how zombies are the endpoint of social theory’s exploration of consumer culture and its postsecular turn towards an earthly immortality, enacted on the flesh of consumers. The book also shows how zombies aid our appreciation of Christ’s saving work. Through the lens of theology and the prayer of the Stations of the Cross, Tan incorporates social theory’s insights on the zombie concerning postmodern culture’s yearning for things beyond the flesh and also reveals some of social theory’s blind spots. Turning to the Eucharist flesh of Christ, Tan challenges the zombie’s secularized narrative of salvation of the flesh, one where flesh is saved by being consumed and made to die.
Taking hold of the real: Dietrich Bonhoeffer and the profound worldliness of Christianity /Barry Harvey. Harvey engages in constructive conversation with Bonhoeffer, contending that the ‘shallow and banal this-worldliness’ of modern society is ordered to a significant degree around the social technologies of religion, culture, and race. Christians are called to participate in the profound this-worldliness that breaks into the world in the apocalyptic action of Jesus Christ, a form of life that requires discipline and an understanding of death and resurrection. Unable to find a faithful form of this-worldliness in wartime Germany, Bonhoeffer joined the conspiracy against Hitler, a decision aptly contrasted with a small French church that, prepared by its life together over many generations, saved thousands of Jewish lives.
Tapestry of grace: untangling the cultural complexities in Asian American life and ministry /Benjamin C. Shin, Sheryl Takagi Silzer ; foreword by John C. Kim. In Tapestry of Grace, Shin and Takagi Silzer apply their years of study and teaching to explain how the cultural complexities that occur between the different generations of the Asian American church can be untangled. Taking lessons from their own spiritual journeys, they show how each generation can experience the amazing grace of the Gospel.
The Didache: a commentary /Shawn J. Wilhite ; foreword by Clayton N. Jefford. Wilhite’s commentary on the Didache includes a brief introduction to the Didache, the use of Scripture by the Didachist, and the theology of the Didache. The commentary proceeds section by section with a close ear to the text of the Didache, relevant early Christian literature, and current scholarship.
The Gospel according to Paul: a reappraisal /Graham H. Twelftree. Paul’s gospel is seen as his message, perhaps an empowered message; he saw it differently. In the gospel’s coming or establishment, it is clear that, at heart, the gospel is God’s salvation–the presence of God himself–in Christ, experienced in the symbiotic relationship between Paul’s message about God’s Son, Jesus Christ, and the activity of God in the miraculous. Not surprisingly, then, Paul rarely talks of preaching the gospel. He sees himself as gospelling.
The humanity of Christ: the significance of the anhypostasis and enhypostasis in Karl Barth’s Christology /James P. Haley. This work is a critical analysis of Karl Barth’s unique adoption of the concepts anhypostasis and enhypostasis to explain Christ’s human nature in union with the Logos, which becomes the ontological foundation that Barth uses to explain Jesus Christ as very God and very man. Barth’s unique coupling together of anhypostasis and enhypostasis provides the ontological grounding, flexibility, and precision that so uniquely characterizes his Christology.
The Jesus dialogues: Jesus speaks with religious founders and leaders /Brennan R. Hill. In each chapter, Jesus sits down with both women and men religious founders and leaders and talks with them on an equal basis about religious perspectives, past and present. The book is a thorough overview of Christianity, compared and contrasted with eight other religions as well as selected indigenous religions. A final chapter deals with the ‘why’ and ‘how’ of interfaith dialogue, which is so needed in today’s diverse and global society. Listening in on these conversations reveals significant differences among religions. These dialogues help one realize that Gandhi was right when he said that we must listen to all religions in order to obtain just a glimpse of the divine.
The kinship of Jesus: Christology and discipleship in the gospel of Mark /Kathleen Elizabeth Mills ; foreword by Warren Carter. This study provides a commentary on the Gospel of Mark that underlines kinship as the nexus between Christology (Jesus and his kinship with God) and discipleship (Jesus and his kinship with disciples). In a world that finds people increasingly separated from one another, this study demonstrates Jesus’s formation of his own family and its continued impact on Christian identity and community.
The parables of Jesus and the problems of the world: how ancient narratives comprehend modern malaise /Richard Q. Ford. Jesus provides a subtle but rich array of unexpected possibilities hidden within the hierarchies of power so commonplace in his world. By doing so he profoundly addresses the perils inherent in the prerogatives of many of us living in today’s world. In these ancient interpersonal tragedies, readers can discover modern global analogues–where the powerful still control the powerless and where others of us, immersed as we are in privilege, are still willing to side with control.
The protevangelium of James /Lily C. Vuong. The Protevangelium of James tells stories about the life of the Virgin Mary that are absent from the New Testament Gospels: her miraculous birth to Anna and Joachim, her upbringing in the temple, and her marriage at the age of twelve to the aged widower Joseph. The text also adds significant details to the well-known stories of Jesus’ conception, birth, and escape from the slaughter of innocents perpetrated by Herod the Great. This study edition presents a fresh, new translation of the text with cross-references, notes, and commentary. The extensive introduction makes accessible the most recent scholarship in studies on Mary in Christian apocrypha, offers new insights into the text’s provenance and relationship to Judaism, and discusses the text’s contributions to art and literature.
The Trinity hurdle: engaging Christadelphians, Arians, and Unitarians with the gospel of the Triune God. /R. Sutcliffe. The Trinity Hurdle is a scriptural and historical defense of the doctrine of the Triune God and substitutionary atonement for Christadelphians, other non-Trinitarians, and those engaging with them.
Two puzzling baptisms: First Corinthians 10:1-5 and 15:29, studies in their Judaic background /Roger David Aus. How could the Apostle Paul maintain in his first letter to the Christians in Corinth that all their ancestors were baptized into Moses at the Red Sea event, and how could he tolerate some of them having themselves baptized again on behalf of the dead)? Answers to these puzzling questions can be found in early Jewish sources now located both in Greek and Hebrew, all here translated.
We have found the Messiah: how the disciples help us answer the Davidic Messianic question /Michael Vicko Zolondek. In this book, Zolondek challenges a generation of scholarship by arguing that the manner in which it has gone about answering the Davidic messianic question is significantly problematic when considered in the light of Jesus’ cultural context and the messianism of his day. In this book, readers will not only be exposed to more than forty years of research on the Davidic messianic question, but they will come away with a unique understanding of what it means to be a Davidic Messiah and what it would have looked like for Jesus to have taken up that role.
Where the river bends: considering forgiveness in the lives of prisoners /Michael T. McRay ; foreword by Desmond M. Tutu. McRay’s important new book brings the perspectives and stories of fourteen Tennessee prisoners into public awareness. Weaving these narratives into a survey of forgiveness literature, McRay offers a map of the forgiveness topography. At once storytelling, academic, activism, and cartography, McRay’s book is as necessary as it is accessible.
Word and power: is the theology of John Wimber compatible with Presbyterian theology and practice? /Gareth William David Stewart. This work aims at considering the contribution of John Wimber, the late leader of the Vineyard Churches, to contemporary theological reflection within the Reformed tradition. This book asks whether Wimber may be a possible alternative source for the contemporary Reformed Churches as they approach ministry and mission in the twenty-first century. Written from a confessional Presbyterian context in Northern Ireland, Word and Power places Wimber in his theological context and asks whether Wimber’s view of power evangelism, discipleship formation, and ministry training might be a model that Reformed Churches–and Presbyterians in particular–could adopt for their ecclesiology today.
