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This translation of the Gospel of Thomas represents a departure from the usual literal English of previous publications. It aims at providing a reader-friendly translation of the original Coptic language in contemporary idiomatic English, while remaining true to the complexities of the Coptic. The commentary seeks to clarify each saying as it likely would have been understood in the historical context of the Coptic language during the period of Thomas''s popularity in Egypt. The sayings in Thomas in this period are no longer sayings of the Jewish man Jesus of Nazareth, but they have become sayings of a revelation bearer, the living Jesus, who announces a radical faith for a new age of the church. The historical matrix that best serves to inform the text is found in a continuation, albeit in a radical direction, of the traditional faiths represented in the earliest Christian literature.""Hedrick, himself an expert in non-canonical (""apocryphal"") Gospels, has here presented for a popular audience a free-flowing non-literal (but accurate) translation of The Gospel of Thomas, with a commentary on each saying, followed by an extensive glossary to explain the more technical terms . . . [T]his impressive volume initiates in a readable way the beginner into the scholarly discussion as far as one may wish to go.""--James Robinson, Claremont Graduate University""Professor Hedrick''s clear modern-English translation and commentary will make this important early source for the teachings of Jesus understandable to anyone who is interested in the foundations of Christianity. His commentaries are particularly valuable because they show the many ways that Jesus'' sayings in the Gospel of Thomas relate to Jesus'' sayings in the Bible, as well as how those sayings are similar to other passages in ancient religious literature.""--Stevan Davies, Misericordia University ""A text like the Gospel of Thomas poses special difficulties to a translator: should its apparent obscurity be retained or clarified? Like all best translators, Charles Hedrick has first decided what the text means and then translates accordingly. The result is a fresh, often bold and unexpected, and yet always dependable translation of this important text.""--Ismo Dunderberg, University of Helsinki""Unlocking the Secrets of the Gospel according to Thomas offers a reader-friendly introduction to the Gospel of Thomas that is, at the same time, the product of a career of detailed study of this early gospel. Hedrick''s introduction is both balanced and readable, his new translation of the Coptic text is fresh and idiomatic, and his brief comments on each saying filled with learning. This is ideal for undergraduate teaching and for the general reader.""--John S. Kloppenborg, University of Toronto""While clarifying its numerous relations to antique literature both within and outside the Bible, Hedrick presents Thomas'' Gospel as a collection of sayings that speak for themselves by inviting each reader''s individual response to the transforming wisdom of Jesus as seen by its users from the second century onwards, rather than as a mere historical artifact or aid for determining the character of Jesus'' original message.""--John Turner, University of NebraskaCharles W. Hedrick is Distinguished Emeritus Professor at Missouri State University, Springfield, Missouri. He is author of numerous books and articles on subjects relating to New Testament studies. His most recent book is: House of Faith or Enchanted Forest? American Popular Belief in an Age of Reason (Cascade Books, 2009).

From the very beginning there have been Christians who wanted to go all the way--who, rather than asking, ""What must I do to be a Christian?"" asked instead, ""What can I do to be more Christian?"" These highly intentional Christians have had an impact on the development of both Christianity and western civilization that has been completely out of proportion to their numbers. The greatest impact of these Christian has come through the communities of like-minded believers--some of lay evangelicals and others of celibate monastics--formed based upon their common desire to live more intentional Christian lives. Throughout the past twenty centuries, hundreds of groups of both kinds have formed.This probing work tells the story of these communities, both monastic and lay. It is a story that, though often overlooked, is both inspiring and instructive. Above all it is a story that opens the way for greater understanding between two groups of Christians who have long been estranged--Protestant evangelicals and Catholic monastics.""Evangelicals are often accused of being ahistorical because we jump from Paul to Martin Luther without a pause to consider what the Spirit did in between. But every Christian tradition finds some way to draw the line from Jesus to the present. How we tell that story shapes who we are. ''Follow Me'' tells the Christian story in a way that sparks my imagination and gets me excited about who the church is becoming in our post-Christian era. I hope every community of disciples will read it and ask, ''How is God calling us to live the next chapter?''"" --Jonathan Wilson-Hartgroveauthor of To Baghdad and Beyond: How I Got Born Again in Babylon""Kauffman offers us a first installment on the kind of scholarship becoming possible thanks to the stereoscopic perspective of those who are learning to live on both sides of a great river that has long divided Christianity. . . . Unexpected though the news may be, it is the very burden of Kauffman''s book to show us why we should not have been surprised, and would not be surprised, if we read the history of Christianity looking for its broadest unifying patterns rather than for the basis of our separate identities. . . . He has done a service to historian, ecumenist, and renewal-minded Christian alike by looking for the forest not just the trees, surveying the lay of the land, and marking the river that gives it life.""--Gerald W. Schlabachauthor of Just Policing, Not War: An Alternative Response to World ViolenceIvan J. Kauffman grew up in one of the oldest surviving lay evangelical communities, the Amish Mennonites. Educated as both a Mennonite and a Catholic he has been active in Mennonite Catholic dialogues from their beginnings in the 1980s, and was a founder of the North American grassroots Mennonite Catholic dialogue, Bridgefolk, which meets regularly at Saint John''s Abbey, Collegeville, Minnesota. He identifies himself as a Mennonite Catholic.

If the church is more than just a building, what could it mean to live in it--to inhabit it as a way of life? From their location in new monastic communities, Otto, Stock, and Wilson-Hartgrove ask what the church can learn from St. Benedict''s vows of conversion, obedience, and stability about how to live as the people of God in the world. In storytelling and serious engagement with Scripture, old wisdom breathes life into a new monasticism. But, like all monastic wisdom, these reflections are not just for monks. They speak directly to the challenge of being the church in America today and the good news Christ offers for the whole world.Conversations between contemporary Christian communities and Benedictine monasticism are among the most surprising and promising in the church today. Given that the roots of monasticism and of contemporary Protestantism lie in different parts of the Christian tradition, mutual engagement between contemporary Christians and monastics has been rare. Recently, however, the scene has shifted, and Inhabiting the Church represents the new eagerness to learn the art of living together faithfully from experienced and ancient practitioners.--Christine D. Pohl from the foreword""Protestants looking for a richer, thicker, more robust and enchanted way of living into the Christian story should not ignore this invitation into the rhythms and cadences of Benedictine spirituality. Indeed, only one kind of person should avoid this book: the reader who does not wish to be changed.""--Lauren F. Winner author of Girl Meets God and Real Sex ""This book is a timely intersection of the new and ancient, breathing fresh life into an aging body. An older generation will find this book a long-awaited reassurance that the Spirit is still stirring radical nonconformity on the margins of empires. And the contemporary renewal of new monastics and prophetic tricksters will find a cure for the pretension and sloppiness that can so often taint our vision or tempt us to pretend that there is ''something new under the sun.'' With both courage and humility, we will all find ourselves invited to inhabit the incarnational body that makes God visible to the world . . . May it inspire all of us to become the church that God longs for."" --Shane Claiborne author of The Irresistible Revolution, founding member of The Simple Way, and recovering sinner""These folks are bringing things both old and new out of the great Christianstorehouse! The New Monasticism is discovering what is alwaysrediscovered--and always bears great life for the Gospel.""--Fr. Richard Rohr, O.F.M.Center for Action and ContemplationAlbuquerque, New MexicoJon Stock is a member of Church of the Servant King, publisher of Wipf and Stock, and proprietor of Windows Booksellers in Eugene, Oregon.Tim Otto serves as an Associate Pastor of the Church of the Sojourners in San Francisco. He is also a part-time nurse at the San Francisco county hospital, working with AIDS and cancer patients.Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove is a member of Rutba House in Durham, North Carolina. He is the author of To Baghdad and Beyond.

This unique theological biography traces the emergence of William Stringfellow''s theology and the place of biblical politics within it. It highlights the centrality of life and work to his theology, and the inseparability of one from another. It tells the story of an ordinary life made less ordinary, radicalized through becoming a biblical person. Amidst periods in America of threat and prosperity (1950s), and later dissent and protest (1960s), Dancer examines not only how Stringfellow held America to account, but the way in which he offered a hopeful alternative in which the place of the Bible and the world were both central. It explores the way Stringfellow learned that the Bible makes sense of us and not us of it. This is biblical politics--a radicalizing, organizing engagement with the person and the world of which the church seems to sadly have lost both sight and interest.The advocacy of Karl Barth, his love of the circus, his scholarship to LSE, the National Conference on Religion and Race, his love for his parable of hope, Anthony Towne, and his prophetic confrontation with Johnson''s ""Great Society,"" all offer clues and insights into this radicalizing force at work in his life. Yet it was a life-threatening illness and personal confrontation with death in many ways became the final point of radicalization that lead to the production of Ethic for Christians and Other Aliens in a Strange Land-ethics as pertinent to today as they are to any age.""For me and many others, the life and work of William Stringfellow were seminal in developing a biblical public theology. In what Anthony Dancer calls ''biographical theology,'' this book lays out the social and political context that influenced and informed Stringfellow''s theology of public discipleship. I commend it to anyone seeking for an authentic way of living faithfully, and enacting what Stringfellow called ''biblical politics.''""--Jim Wallisauthor of Rediscovering Values: On Wall Street, Main Street and Your Street""Few American Christians have borne such powerful witness to the word of God and the life of the Christian as did William Stringfellow. While superbly situating him in his own turbulent historical moment, Anthony Dancer also makes clear how powerfully we need to listen to the voice of Stringfellow today.""--William O''BrienCoordinator of The Alternative Seminary""This book is a gift. In the absence of a definitive biography, for which we may yet hope, Dancer provides us the most thorough reflection to date on William Stringfellow''s life. In the process he establishes himself, not only as a biographic theologian, but a voice in the Stringfellonian tradition. May his own summon a new generation to ''Listen to this Man.''""--Bill Wylie-Kellermanneditor of Keeper of the Word: Selected Writings of William StringfellowAnthony Dancer works as the Social Justice Commissioner for the Anglican Church in Aotearoa, New Zealand and Polynesia. He is editor of William Stringfellow in Anglo-American Perspective (2005).

This book initiates a new conversation about how theological education might be re-envisioned for the twenty-first century church. The prevailing curricular structure in today''s seminaries and divinity schools was fashioned in a very different era, one that assumed the continued cultural dominance of Christianity and the continued academic dominance of the canons of Enlightenment reason. Neither assumption is viable in today''s post-Christian world; hence, our new circumstances demand a new vision for theological education.The authors of this volume offer an important resource for this project through their creative appropriation of the classical rhetorical tradition, particularly as it has been rehabilitated in the contemporary context. Like St. Augustine, they believe that the chief goals of Christian theology are similar to those of classical rhetoric: ""to teach, to delight, and to move."" And the authors are united in their conviction that these must also be the goals of theological education in a post-Christian era.This volume arises out of a passionate commitment to the cause of theological education. The authors hail from a wide range of denominational traditions and have taught in numerous seminaries and divinity schools. They have also studied the classical and postmodern rhetorical traditions in both theory and practice. They met as a group on numerous occasions to read one another''s contributions to the volume and to offer guidance for the process of rewriting. As a result, this book is much more than a mere collection of essays; it is a jointly-authored work, and one which presents an integrated vision for the future of theological education.""Questioned by the larger church, marginalized within the Academy, divided internally about its mission, mainline theological education is not well, and most of us in the enterprise know it. In the last twenty years we''ve seen trenchant, insightful diagnoses, but unfortunately few engaging, feasible remedies. This volume may be an exception. While no sure cure is offered, these essays point in a healthy direction opened up by a rhetorical approach to the tasks and topics of theological education. Ranging from the modest but compelling to the comprehensive but controversial, these essays challenge faculty to rethink the enterprise in ways suited to the 21st century. Timely and telling.""Mark U. Edwards, Jr., Associate Dean for Academic Affairs, Harvard Divinity School""''To Teach, to Delight, and to Move'' brilliantly accomplishes the imperatives of its title as it makes bold proposals for reconceiving theological education according to the insights of ancient and contemporary rhetoric. The rich dialogue of its authors over several years has yielded a surprisingly persuasive book. It will be among the handful of books whose reading is required for all those with a passion for better teaching and learning in theological education. It is, however, by no means simply for teachers and administrators of theological schools. All rhetors, pastors and lay persons alike, with responsibility for the gospel''s persuasion in the public, postmodern world will readily join this promising symposium."" M. Douglas Meeks, Cal Turner Chancellor Professor of Theology and Wesleyan Studies, The Divinity School, Vanderbilt UniversityDavid S. Cunningham is Professor of Religion and Director of the CrossRoads Project at Hope College in Holland, Michigan. He holds degrees in Communication Studies from Northwestern University, and in Theology and Religious Studies from the University of Cambridge (England) and Duke University. He has published widely in the areas of Christian theology and ethics, including ''Faithful Persuasion: In Aid of a Rhetoric of Christian Theology'' (Notre Dame, 1992) and ''These Three Are One: The Practice of Trinitarian Theology'' (Blackwell, 1998). His most recent book, ''Reading is Believing: The Christian Faith Through Literature and Film'' (Brazos, 2002) explores the cen

John Wesley (1703-91) was a unique character in history who left a disproportionately large imprint on the world. That imprint was a contagious passion for what he called real Christianity--the Good News of saving grace and scriptural holiness. This book examines Wesley''s life and faith in order to better understand what it means to be a present-day participant in that legacy. The book begins with the story of Wesley''s search for an authentic Christian experience. His steps are traced from his early days of struggle, through his conversion at Aldersgate, to his long years of remarkable ministry. The second part of the book outlines the basic Wesleyan understandings of sin, grace, redemption, new birth, sanctification, and perfection. A concluding exploration of some practical implications of the Wesleyan doctrine of holiness is found in the third part. This book celebrates the Wesleyan tradition, especially that branch known as the Holiness Movement. It is, however, not entirely uncritical. It seeks to provide an honest and sympathetic consideration of the heritage and faith of Wesley''s lasting imprint.""Dan Burnett''s new book In the Shadow of Aldersgate has captured the person of John Wesley and the theological movement that followed him with clarity and freshness. . . . This doctrinal overview refers to other spiritual traditions with respect and grace but assists the reader to understand Wesleyanism in respect to other faith perspectives. [It] is a gift to those who want to understand historic Wesleyan doctrine."" --Dr. Don BrayGeneral Director, Global Partners, The Wesleyan Church""For anyone interested in a concise biography of John Wesley, and an excellent summary of his doctrine of salvation, one could not go wrong in choosing In the Shadow of Aldersgate. I certainly intend to use it as a text in my course ''The Life and Theology of John Wesley.''""Mark L. Weeter, Professor, Division of Religion and PhilosophyOklahoma Wesleyan University""In the Shadow of Aldersgate . . . moves from John Wesley''s life to the thought and potential of the tradition that flows from that life. . . . Besides aiding the Wesleyan tradition in understanding its inaugural springs of authentic Christianity, this book will be an introductory source to those in the wider Christian community . . . . The evangelical spirit of the writer is evident throughout, but this posture does not diminish the book''s use for an ecumenical audience."" Richard K. EckleyProfessor of TheologyHoughton CollegeDaniel L. Burnett has worked in various capacities of ministry and theological education in both the USA and England. A graduate of Nazarene Theological Seminary (M.Div., D.Min.), he now serves as pastor of Central Wesleyan Church in Anderson, Indiana.

CONTENTSPART 1: METHODS, MODELS, AND COMPARATIVE STUDIESWhat Does Sociology Have to Do with The Bible?The Bible and Economic EthicsSocial Class as an Analytic and Hermeneutical Category in Biblical StudiesSocial Class and Ideology in Isaiah 40-55: An Eagletonian ReadingIdeology and Ideologies in Israelite ProphecyPeriodization, Interactive Power Networks, and Teleogical Constraints in Hebrew Bible StudiesIcelandic and Israelite Beginnings: A Comparative ProbeStructure and Origin of the Early Israelite and Iroquois ""Confederacies""PART 2: TRIBUTES TO COLLEAGUESJames Muilenburg: Superlative TeacherDavid Jobling: Fearless Frontiersman Marvin L. Chaney, Master Social CriticJack Elliott: Breacher of Boundaries

The liturgical season of Lent and Good Friday are very important for Christians as they meditate and reflect upon the dying of Jesus. These are traditions that take us back to the very beginnings of the Christian tradition. From early times, pilgrims have made their way to the Holy Land, especially Jerusalem, to walk where Jesus walked and to remember his death on the cross. Not everyone can go to Jerusalem, and we cannot stand at the foot of the cross of Jesus, but the Stations of the Cross and the Seven Last Words may take us to Jerusalem and to Calvary imaginatively.

The current immigration crisis on our southern borders is usually debated from a safe distance. Politicians create a fear of the migrant to garner votes, while academicians pontificate on the topic from the comfort of cushy armchairs. What would happen if instead the issue were explored with one's feet on the ground--what the author calls an "ethics of place"? As an organic intellectual, De La Torre writes while physically standing in solidarity with migrants who are crossing borders and the humanitarian organizations that accompany them in their journey. He painstakingly captures their stories, testimonies, and actions, which become the foundation for theological and ethical analysis. From this vantage point, the book constructs a liberative ethics based on what those disenfranchised by our current immigration policies are saying and doing in the hopes of not just raising consciousness, but also crafting possibilities for participatory praxis.