Transforming Fire
Imagining Christian Teaching
- Discipleship & Christian Education
- Publisher: Eerdmans
- Published: 2021
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Publisher's Description
“We don’t need books about teaching so much as books that teach.” Considering Jesus himself taught in a variety of ways—parable, discussion, miracle performance, ritual observance—it seems that there can be no single, definitive, Christian method of teaching. How then should Christian teaching happen, especially in this time of significant change to theological education as an institution? Mark Jordan addresses this question by first allowing various depictions and instances of Christian teaching from literature to speak for themselves before meditating on what these illustrative examples might mean for Christian pedagogy. Each textual scene he shares is juxtaposed with a contrasting scene to capture the pluralistic possibilities in the art of teaching a faith that is so often rooted in paradox. He exemplifies forms of teaching that operate beyond the boundaries of scholarly books and discursive lectures to disrupt the normative Western academic approach of treating theology as a body of knowledge to be transmitted merely through language. Transforming Fire consults writers ranging from Gregory of Nyssa to C. S. Lewis, and from John Bunyan to Octavia Butler, cutting across historical distance and boundaries of identity. Rather than offering solutions or systems, Jordan seeks in these texts new shelters for theological education where powerful teaching can happen and—even as traditional institutions shrink or vanish—the hearts of students can catch fire once again.
Endorsements (4)
“It may be hard to imagine a beautiful book about pedagogy. But Mark Jordan has given us one. More than a primer on great books or their consoling lessons in this age of existential panic about higher education, he shows how they teach. Evocative, disruptive, and learned, Transforming Fire is recommended not only for those interested in theological education, but all those who care about genuine learning.”
“Teaching takes center stage in these wonderfully compelling recommendations for reinvigorating theological education today. Breaking through the narrow confines of academic norms, Jordan demonstrates in his own beautifully crafted and deeply affecting prose how theological instruction might regain the persuasive power to transform embodied lives.”
“Mark Jordan’s enactment of texts as ‘scenes of instruction’ is a thoroughly welcome, indeed crucial, intervention in the vexed world of curricula for ministry. Via the juxtaposition of texts at once staunchly ‘traditional’ and willfully ‘extra-canonical,’ his book enacts a series of reflective engagements—both of specific texts and of their comparison—that model generosity of spirit and an unmistakable, carefully calibrated critical sensibility. The book is a brief for the vitality of tradition and—what Jordan shows to be the same thing—the simple, perduring fact that all teachers are students, and all students teachers. To read closely is nothing less than to make the word flesh.”
“Anyone who worries that reforming theological education means leaving books behind will have their suspicions disabused by this volume. Through a deft review of a range of classic texts, Mark Jordan defends the importance of books for Christian teaching by reminding us that the value of words lies not simply—or even primarily—in conveying information, but in their power to shape bodies, imaginations, and desires for life in the world. In so doing he provides a sterling example of what he himself calls for: not so much a book about teaching, but a book that teaches.”
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