Bücher veröffentlicht von William B Eerdmans Publishing Co

For four decades, from 1951 to 1990, The Reformed Journal set the standard for top-notch, venturesome theological reflection on a broad range of issues. With a lively mix of editorial comment, articles, and reviews, it addressed topics as diverse as the civil rights movement, feminism, the Vietnam War, South African apartheid, the plight of Palestinian Christians, and the rise of the Christian Right, all from a Reformed perspective. In this anthology James Bratt and Ronald Wells have assembled select pieces that exemplify the Journal 's position at the cutting edge of thoughtful Christian engagement with culture.

A renowned ethicist who himself faced death during a recent life-threatening illness, Allen Verhey in The Christian Art of Dying sets out to recapture dying from the medical world. Seeking to counter the medicalization of death that is so prevalent today, Verhey revisits the fifteenth-century Ars Moriendi, an illustrated spiritual self-help manual on -the art of dying.- Finding much wisdom in that little book but rejecting its Stoic and Platonic worldview, Verhey uncovers in the biblical accounts of Jesus' death a truly helpful paradigm for dying well and faithfully.

Philo, Josephus, and the Testaments on Sexuality is the fourth of five volumes by William Loader exploring attitudes toward sexuality in Judaism and Christianity during the Greco-Roman era. In this volume Loader examines three substantial and historically important sets of documents the writings of Philo of Alexandria, the histories of Josephus, and the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs. For each set of writings, he provides an in-depth introduction, detailed analysis highlighting each writer's position on a broad range of matters pertaining to sexuality, and a summary conclusion."

Traditional Christian theology has generally treated desire as a dark and negative force intimately related to sin something to be restricted and repressed, closeted and controlled. But, according to LeRon Shults and Jan-Olav Henriksen?'s Saving Desire, we see only part of the picture if we do not also perceive that desire can be a powerful force for great good. Grounding their work firmly in the experiential realm of human life, the eight eminent theologians contributing to this volume celebrate together the positivity, the sociality, and the physicality of saving desire that is, humankind?'s innate desire not only for the good life but also, more vitally, for the life-transforming goodness of God.

Is a pentecostal-charismatic worldview defensible in light of contemporary science? In The Spirit of Creation Amos Yong demonstrates that pentecostal thought does indeed have merit in scientific contexts. What's more, he argues that pentecostal-charismatic views regarding the dynamic presence and activity of the Spirit of God and the pluralistic cosmology of many spirits have something important to add to the broad discussion now taking place at the crossroads of science and religion. Interacting with many scientific fields of study -- including psychology, sociology, evolutionary science, cosmology, and more -- Yong's Spirit of Creation demonstrates the significance of pentecostal ideas to the ongoing dialogue between theology and science.

How might a church infused with missional theology change the way it approaches Christian practices? Interacting both with the missional theology of George Hunsberger and Darrell Guder and with the theology of Christian practices laid out by Craig Dykstra and Dorothy Bass, Benjamin T. Conner argues that allowing these two disciplines to inform one another can enhance the nature of the church's witness, its congregational discipleship, and its theological education. Framing his work with real-world narratives and applications inspired by his work as a minister to adolescents with special needs, Conner shows how a practical missional mindset can redefine and reinvigorate the spirit and purpose of a congregation.

Contemporary society is in crisis, its structures broken and fragmented, and its people overstimulated, overstressed, and thirsty for true communion with the sacred and with one another. Yet although more than eighty-five percent of congregations in the United States conduct small-group ministry, too many of these groups begin with no clear sense of purpose, structure, or spiritual focus and end by veering away from Christian tradition and unknowingly settling for shallow versions of popular Christianity. In The Church and the Crisis of Community Theresa Latini lays out both a theoretical groundwork and a practical guideline for successful small-group ministry. Examining the latest sociological research and the real-life practices of small groups in six congregations, she shows how well-developed groups -- those with mission statements, leadership training, and solid organizational structure -- can be a truly effective tool in the church's work of transforming broken and shallow forms of community into life-giving, life-sustaining relationships with God and others.

David L. Schindler is the foremost American participant in the Communio movement in Catholic theology. Over the last thirty-five years, his profound theological and ontological vision has led him to probe our most urgent cultural problems to their deepest metaphysical roots, comprehensively evaluating them in the light of Trinitarian faith. The first book-length study of Schindler's thought, Being Holy in the World explores Schindler's Trinitarian theology, ecclesiology, anthropology, and metaphysics in the context of the encounter between Christianity and contemporary culture.

It is true -- and troubling -- that we humans are able to control and manipulate nature in many ways, and this ability seems to be growing exponentially. In this book Allen Verhey addresses this reality and seeks to show the importance of bringing a Christian voice into the debate. Verhey identifies the various narratives under which people view the term "nature" and then questions these narratives or "myths" at work in our culture. He presents the biblical narrative as an alternative story capable of providing a different understanding of nature and altering it. Finally Verhey shows the relevance of the Christian story to many forms of discourse in our society, including contemporary ecological wisdom and analytical and political discourse. Nature and Altering It is Verhey's effort to nurture minds formed and informed by the Christian story that are capable of challenging the minds that shape our culture's attitudes toward nature and our use of it.

Explores whether human minds can truly discover God without ChristDoes all knowledge of God come through Christ alone, or can human beings discover truths about God philosophically? The Analogy of Being assembles essays by expert Catholic, Protestant and Orthodox theologians to examine the relationship between divine revelation in the person of Jesus Christ and the philosophical capacities of natural reason.These essays were inspired by the lively, decades-long debate between Karl Barth and Erich Przywara, which was first sparked in 1932 when Barth wrote that the use of natural theology in Roman Catholic thinking was the -invention of the anti-Christ.- The contributors to The Analogy of Being analyze and reflect on both sides of Barth and Przywara's spirited discourse, offering diverse responses to a controversy reaching to the very core of Christian faith and theology.Contributors: John R. Betz Martin Bieler Peter Casarella J. Augustine Di Noia Michael Hanby David Bentley Hart Reinhard Hutter Bruce D. Marshall Bruce L. McCormack Kenneth Oakes Richard Schenk John Webster Thomas Joseph White

For more than thirty years, Douglas Laycock has been studying, defending, and writing about religious liberty. In this second volume of the comprehensive collection of his writings on the subject, he has compiled articles, amicus briefs, and actual court documents relating to regulatory exemptions under the Constitution, the right to church autonomy, and the rights of non-mainstream religions. This collection -- which deals with religious schools and colleges, sex abuse cases, the rights of Hare Krishnas and Scientologists, the landmark decision Employment Division v. Smith, and more -- will be a valuable reference for churches, schools, and other religious organizations as they exercise their Constitutionally protected freedom of religion.

The definitive reference work on Augustine that scholars, from all fields of theological study, describe as "superb" and "indispensable" for students, scholars, libraries, and anyone interested in studying Augustine. While the work provides exhaustive resources on Augustine's own life and his theological and pastoral work, it also provides an exceptional wealth of information about scholarship, past and present on the great theologian. Moreover, it documents the influence of Augustine on the Catholic Church, the Reformation and on great thinkers and theologians such as Kierkegaard, Luther, Erasmus, and Calvin. Topics range from archeology to martyrdom, from imagination to Augustine's personal friends.

The Church at Worship is a series of documentary case studies of specific worshiping communities from around the world and throughout Christian history. This inaugural volume, Walking Where Jesus Walked, uses vivid descriptions of Jerusalem, its history, its people, and its worship practices to set the stage for a rich selection of primary church documents, presenting readers with a vibrant snapshot of the church at Jerusalem in the fourth century.Some of the primary materials included here: Select art, artifacts, and architectural drawings Egeria's Diary: A Pilgrim's Observations of Jerusalem at Worship The lectionary and communion prayer likely used in Jerusalem The Liturgy of St. James, historically associated with Jerusalem Excerpts from the sermons of Cyril, bishop of Jerusalem