David W. Brown
Arts & Literature
“Some of Annie Dillard’s best-known works have challenged conventional accounts of the divine’s relation to the world by setting vivid descriptions of its horrors alongside lyrical descriptions of its beauty. Inevitably, readers are puzzled at how this might fit with Dillard’s acknowledged sympathy for religious belief. In this brilliant, insightful study Lori Kanitz identifies the mystical Judaism of Kabbalah and Hasidism as the deepest influence on her. The result is not only a penetrating analysis of where Dillard stands (her shema or credo) but also a profound exploration of how encounters with negations of the good might best be understood.”
Theology
Foreword
“Readers are offered a carefully nuanced account of how angels have functioned symbolically at various key points in their development, not, however, with the intention of dismissing them as 'mere symbolism,' but rather as a way of working through their meaning to a more profound grasp of why their existence might after all be deemed important to religious belief.”
Arts & Literature
“In this rich and rewarding volume, Christopher Brewer brings together reports on research projects funded by the Templeton Religion Trust on the theme of ‘Art Seeking Understanding.’ In an echo of Anselm’s ‘faith seeking understanding,’ the participants explore how works of art are themselves able to deepen our understanding of relations between different aspects of our experience. The research projects bring together historians of art, philosophers, theologians, and representatives of the empirical sciences, especially psychology and neuroscience. Not only do the participants explore visual art (including conceptual art, Indian miniature painting, and paratexts in manuscripts), but they also examine architecture, dance, film, music, the novel, and ritual. While much of the volume focuses on issues of morality and character, attention is also given to spiritual values and the way in which aesthetic cognition might open up consideration of transcendent realities. So there is something here for everyone. Careful analysis of aesthetic judgements can indeed provide an alternative access to true knowledge. Brewer’s researchers have opened up a plausible path for others to follow.”
Contemporary Art and the Church
Arts & Literature
“This volume stems from the 2015 biennial conference of CIVA (Christians in the Visual Arts), an organisation founded in the late 1970s to encourage dialogue between the church and visual arts. How different the situation is between now and then is well illustrated by this remarkably fine collection of essays. Those present at the society's inception provide a short section that surveys the dire situation then and the transformation since. Without abandoning evangelical and biblical roots, anew confidence and maturity has been achieved among both the practicing artists and art theorists represented, demonstrated, among other ways, in creative engagement with a wide range of contemporary art, including perhaps unexpected figures such as Emin, Klein, Hamilton, and Warhol. Whatever their theological perspective, readers will gain much from these at times profound reflections of how and where the Spirit's address to Christians can sometimes be found.”
Divine Disorder and the Rescue of God
Theology
“Although Mark Corner follows a common modern strategy in finding the roots of kenosis in the life of the Trinity rather than narrowly in the incarnation itself, this makes the work far from dull or unoriginal. Indeed, his own particular version (inspired by Donald MacKinnon), enables him to critique leading, contemporary writers on the subject, including Bruce McCormack. Not all will agree with where he takes us, but he does so with admirable clarity in what proves to be a fascinating discussion.”
Imagination in an Age of Crisis
Arts & Literature
“This impressive collection ranges widely in its offering of imaginative responses to threat and suffering. Some deeply affecting presentations of poetry and visual art are set alongside more conventional theological reflection on figures as diverse as Samuel Beckett and Ai Weiwei, or Aboriginal art and African American folk religion. Best digested gradually, it provides a rich feast of insights along the way.”
Philosophy
“In shaping understanding of the nature of religious language, two of the most important figures in the twentieth century were Ludwig Wittgenstein (d. 1951) and George Lindbeck (d. 2018), the former with his notion of language games, the latter with his idea of a cultural-linguistic approach to doctrine. For some, though, their insights are seen as unnecessarily restrictive, a threat to the objectivity of religious belief. In a book which is a model of clarity in both argument and exposition, Dr. Lim brilliantly advances the claim that the exact opposite is the case. A wide range of potential contexts and allusiveness in metaphor and symbol entail a richness of meaning even for centuries-old imagery, while an inevitable lack of precision means only that God is never fully contained by our words, not that truth fails to emerge. This is a work of relevance to conservative and liberal Christian alike.”
Ethics, Culture & Social Issues
“As police chief of the City of Dallas, the challenges I face reducing crime and public disorder have, in many cases, the lack of personal responsibility at their root . . . Biblical justice, as described in this fascinating book clearly is the prescription for many societal ills that play themselves out in numerous communities in the country and the world.”
History & Biography
“Still Letting My People Go is a most welcome and much-needed analysis of nineteenth-century North Carolinian Presbyterian minister Eli Caruthers and his important manuscript American Slavery and the Immediate Duty of Southern Slaveholders. Jack R. Davidson’s astute interpretation of Caruthers’s life and text will be of major interest to historians and religious scholars, casting new light on the southern biblical defense of American slavery in the era of the Civil War.”
The Making of a Tory Evangelical
History & Biography
“This is an important and welcome book offering a valuable reassessment of one of the nineteenth century’s leading social reformers. David Furse-Roberts provides a subtle and nuanced study of Shaftesbury’s evolving intellectual make-up. Placing Shaftesbury at the intersections of Tory political thought, paternalism, and Evangelicalism, this book advances not only our understanding of Shaftesbury himself but important elements of a wider Victorian mindset.”
The Theological Education of the Ministry
History & Biography
“Most current discussions of doctrine and theology show little regard for the historical context in which specific positions were developed. The work of Alan Sell is an outstanding exception to this, and of particular value as he engages with great skill in explicating the complexities of non-Anglican and non-Catholic history. In this volume we are provided with a number of insightful vignettes ranging across the centuries but with a particular focus on the twentieth century.”
Understanding Natural Theology
Theology
“Praise for Understanding Natural Theology Christopher Brewer’s new book can rightly be described as magisterial, and professional academics are as likely to derive benefit from reading it as are students relatively new to the field. The field is “nature” or “creation” and what kind of knowledge of God may be so derived without benefit of scriptural revelation. Teachers are commonly so convinced of their own approach (for example, “theology of creation” or analytic “proofs”) that students often emerge from their classes totally unaware of alternatives. Brewer dispels such confusions by presenting five quite different approaches, with “natural religion” at one extreme and Karl Barth at the other, with equal attention given to background setting, critique, and defense. The presentation is admirably clear and in a lively, engaged style. Readers will not feel forced to endorse one particular view. Instead, they are given the tools to see clearly what is at stake through this impressive survey.”
Preaching & Worship
“In this remarkable book, Joshua D. Genig brings together the fields of Mariology, spirituality, and homiletics. He examines how Mary’s reception of God’s word at the annunciation (Luke 1:26–36) provides a ‘sacramental’ model for how the faithful should receive God’s word from dynamic preaching. Drawing upon sound biblical exegesis, the church fathers, and Christian theologians—Catholic, Lutheran, and Reformed—the author shows how the word of God must be living, breathing, and active in the lives of the faithful, just as the Word was in Mary.” —Robert L. Fastiggi Sacred Heart Major Seminary “At a time when moral and instructional sermons dominate our churches, the contents of this book are likely to provide a profound challenge to Protestant and Catholic preachers alike. On Genig’s view, both expect far too little of what God can achieve through them: Catholics still largely confine God’s action to material symbols such as bread and wine, while Protestants think of words as divine address rather than mediated, real, personal engagement. Here instead we are invited to take the angel’s words to Mary at the annunciation as our model, where the address affected real change in Mary, with God now dwelling within her. So likewise, Genig argues, as Christians we too should expect a real sacramental transformation of ourselves as much through preaching as through those symbols traditionally so labeled. That way, as this learned and well-argued book so amply demonstrates, we will recover a wider vision of the role of the sermon, which Luther shared with the earlier patristic tradition.”
NOTE: Only includes books currently in our catalog; not necessarily a complete list.
Theology
Theology
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