Buswell Bulletin: Book Highlights – April 2022
Each month we highlight recently acquired books that are of particular interest or importance. (Inclusion on this list is not an endorsement.)
African American Readings of Paul: Reception, Resistance, and Transformation
Lisa M. Bowens
Eerdmans, 2020
Publisher description:
The letters of Paul—especially the verse in Ephesians directing slaves to obey their masters—played an enormous role in promoting slavery and justifying it as a Christian practice. Yet despite this reality African Americans throughout history still utilized Paul extensively in their own work to protest and resist oppression, responding to his theology and teachings in numerous—often starkly divergent and liberative—ways.
In the first book of its kind, Lisa Bowens takes a historical, theological, and biblical approach to explore interpretations of Paul within African American communities over the past few centuries. She surveys a wealth of primary sources from the early 1700s to the mid-twentieth century, including sermons, conversion stories, slave petitions, and autobiographies of ex-slaves, many of which introduce readers to previously unknown names in the history of New Testament interpretation. Along with their hermeneutical value, these texts also provide fresh documentation of Black religious life through wide swaths of American history. African American Readings of Paul promises to change the landscape of Pauline studies and fill an important gap in the rising field of reception history.
Joshua W. Jipp, writing in The Christian Century 137, no. 22 (p. 34–35):
Bowens engages in a remarkable analysis of Black Christian writings, from slave petitions to abolish slavery (1774) to Martin Luther King Jr.’s essay “Paul’s Letter to American Christians” (1968). She shows how these interpreters used Paul to resist White supremacy and fight against oppressive interpretations of the epistles.
Romans: A Theological and Pastoral Commentary
Michael Gorman
Eerdmans, 2022
Publisher description:
This commentary engages the letter to the Romans as Christian scripture and highlights the Pauline themes for which Michael Gorman is best known—participation and transformation, cruciformity and new life, peace and justice, community and mission. With extensive introductions both to the apostle Paul and to the letter itself, Gorman offers background information on Paul’s first-century context before proceeding into the rich theological landscape of the biblical text.
In line with Paul’s focus on Christian living, Gorman interprets Romans at a consistently practical level, highlighting the letter’s significance for Christian theology, daily life, and pastoral ministry. Questions for reflection and sidebars on important concepts make this especially useful for those preparing to preach or teach from Romans—the “epistle of life,” as Gorman calls it, for its extraordinary promise that, through faith, we might walk in newness of life with Christ.
Pelagius: Commentaries on the Thirteen Epistles of Paul with the Libellus Fidei
Introduction and translation by Thomas Scheck
Paulist Press, 2022
Publisher description:
The British monk Pelagius (360?–420) is best known for his claim that human beings could perform good works on their own strength, without need of divine assistance, a teaching condemned by the Council of Carthage (417-418).
Yet, before this, Pelagius also penned a collection of commentaries on all the Pauline epistles This new volume will include new English translations of all of Pelagius’s Pauline Commentaries, including the commentary on Romans, thought to be thus far the only commentary to have been previously translated into English.
The commentaries are not only of interest in demonstrating an orthodox side of someone condemned as a heretic but, perhaps even more importantly, they are of extreme importance for the history of Pauline exegesis.
Voices From the Ruins: Theodicy and the Fall of Jerusalem in the Hebrew Bible
Dalit Rom-Shiloni
Eerdmans, 2021
Publisher description:
Where was God in the sixth-century destruction of Jerusalem?
The Hebrew Bible compositions written during and around the sixth century BCE provide an illuminating glimpse into how ancient Judeans reconciled the major qualities of God—as Lord, fierce warrior, and often harsh rather than compassionate judge—with the suffering they were experiencing at the hands of the Neo-Babylonian empire, which had brutally destroyed Judah and deported its people. Voices from the Ruins examines the biblical texts “explicitly and directly contextualized by those catastrophic events”—Kings, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Lamentations, and selected Psalms—to trace the rich, diverse, and often-polemicized discourse over theodicy unfolding therein. Dalit Rom-Shiloni shows how the “voices from the ruins” in these texts variously justified God in the face of the rampant destruction, expressed doubt, and protested God’s action (and inaction).
Rather than trying to paper over the stark theological differences between the writings of these sixth-century historiographers, prophets, and poets, Rom-Shiloni emphasizes the dynamic of theological pluralism as a genuine characteristic of the Hebrew Bible. Through these avenues, and with her careful, discerning textual analysis, she provides readers with insight into how the sufferers of an ancient national catastrophe wrestled with the difficult question that has accompanied tragedies throughout history: Where was God?
Jonathan Edwards and Deification: Reconciling Theosis and the Reformed Tradition
James R. Salladin
IVP Academic, 2022
Publisher description:
The doctrine of deification or theosis is typically associated with the Eastern Orthodox tradition. Indeed, the language of participation in the divine nature as a way to understand salvation often sounds like strange music in the ears of Western Christians despite passages like 2 Peter 1:4 where it appears. However, recent scholarship has argued that the theologies of some of the most prominent figures in the history of the Western church, including Martin Luther, John Calvin, and John Wesley, share more in common with deification than has been acknowledged.
In this volume of IVP Academic's New Explorations in Theology series, theologian James Salladin considers the role of deification in the theology of another well-known Western theologian: Jonathan Edwards. In addition, he reflects upon the question of how Edwards's soteriology compares with the rest of the broader Reformed tradition.
Here, we discover how Edwards's theology affirms what it means for sinners to be brought into the hands of a loving God.
Alister McGrath, endorsement:
An outstanding study of Edwards's theology of deification, which highlights the coherence of his theological vision.
The Resurrection of Jesus: Apologetics, Criticism, History
Dale C. Allison, Jr
T&T Clark, 2021
Publisher description:
The earliest traditions around the narrative of Jesus' resurrection are considered in this landmark work by Dale C. Allison, Jr, drawing together the fruits of his decades of research into this issue at the very core of Christian identity.
Allison returns to the ancient sources and earliest traditions, charting them alongside the development of faith in the resurrection in the early church and throughout Christian history. Beginning with historical-critical methodology that examines the empty tomb narratives and early confessions, Allison moves on to consider the resurrection in parallel with other traditions and stories, including Tibetan accounts of saintly figures being assumed into the light, in the chapter “Rainbow Body”.
Finally, Allison considers what might be said by way of results or conclusions on the topic of resurrection, offering perspectives from both apologetic and sceptical viewpoints. In his final section of “modest results” he considers scholarly approaches to the resurrection in light of human experience, adding fresh nuance to a debate that has often been characterised in overly simplistic terms of “it happened” or “it didn't”.
Michael Licona, endorsement:
This book is the product of the deep and wide reflections of a preeminent scholar. Allison is refreshingly transparent and honest. Some will accuse him of being too pessimistic. Others will charge him with not being skeptical enough. If he is guilty of either, he cannot be faulted for accepting easy answers or of neglecting any arguments. Although I remain persuaded that historical inquiry can yield greater confidence pertaining to what happened to Jesus after his death than Allison allows, this volume is a fair-minded assessment of the data and is scholarship at the highest level.
Risen Indeed: A Historical Investigation into the Resurrection of Jesus
Gary R. Habermas
Lexham Press, 2021
Publisher description:
A pivotal contribution to the history of apologetics.
Gary Habermas has spent a career defending the historicity and truthfulness of the resurrection of Jesus. But his earliest writing on Jesus’ resurrection has been unavailable to the broader public, until now.
In Risen Indeed: A Historical Investigation Into the Resurrection of Jesus, readers will encounter Gary Habermas’ foundational research into the historicity of the resurrection. With a new, extensive, introductory essay on contemporary scholarship regarding the resurrection, Habermas shows how the questions surrounding the historicity of the resurrection and arguments raised by critics are perennially important for Christian faith.
Michael Licona, endorsement:
Gary Habermas is the preeminent scholar on the matter of the historicity of the resurrection of Jesus, having researched it for six decades! Now, for the first time, his doctoral dissertation is available for all to read and presents in detail what has come to be known as the “minimal facts approach.” Without a doubt, this is one of the strongest and most compelling approaches to contending for the historicity of Jesus’ resurrection. Until his magnum opus is published, this book is the best source to learn Habermas’ famous approach.
On Christian Teaching: Practicing Faith in the Classroom
David Smith
Eerdmans, 2018
Publisher description:
Christian teachers have long been thinking about what content to teach, but little scholarship has been devoted to how faith forms the actual process of teaching. Is there a way to go beyond Christian perspectives on the subject matter and think about the teaching itself as Christian? In this book David I. Smith shows how faith can and should play a critical role in shaping pedagogy and the learning experience.
Believing Philosophy: A Guide to Becoming a Christian Philosopher
Dolores G. Morris
Zondervan Academic, 2021
From the publisher description:
Believing Philosophy introduces Christians to philosophy and the tools it provides believers, helping them understand, articulate, and defend their faith in an age of unbelief. …
In Part 1, author Dolores G. Morris explains why Christians should read and study philosophy. She begins with a historical overview of Christian philosophy from the church fathers to contemporary philosophers and then introduces the basic resources of philosophical reasoning: the role and aim of reason, distinctions between truth and reason and provability, and learning to read like a philosopher. …
In Part 2, Morris introduces students to philosophical arguments and questions relevant to Christians. She presents arguments by three key branches of philosophy: metaphysics, epistemology, and practical philosophy. Building on concepts introduced in Part 1, she explains what philosophical arguments are and how they ought to be evaluated from a philosophical and Christian perspective. …
The author discusses her book on episode 57, “Jesus Philosopher”, of John Dickson’s podcast Undeceptions.