Böcker utgivna av William B Eerdmans Publishing Co

The Nicene Creed's powerful summary of Christian faith has stood the test of time, embodying core truths and distinguishing essential Christian teachings from those of lesser importance. As respected thinker and educator David Willis explores the Nicene Creed in this new book, he provides clues for meaningfully interpreting this most ecumenical of church creeds in the twenty-first century.Writing especially for educated laypeople, advanced students, and theological educators, Willis eloquently links the ancient creed to life today. As he points out, faith is constantly taking different shapes within broad boundaries like the creed's perennial truths, and even these truths need to be reinterpreted in each age to keep them intelligible and compelling. Willis admirably achieves this task for our day by elucidating the creed's statement of faith with analogies drawn from such diverse areas as architecture, graphic art, poetry, sculpture, and psychological theory.Those seeking to delve into the creed or to deepen a lifelong encounter with it will be enriched by Willis's reflections.

Abraham's Promise presents a selection of important writings by noted Jewish philosopher-theologian Michael Wyschogrod, who is widely admired for his singular contributions to Jewish-Christian relations. Including several pieces never published before, this reader aptly captures the broad scope of Wyschogrod's work on Judaism and the Jewish-Christian encounter, collecting seminal essays, articles, and reviews that address such topics as the God of Abraham and the God of philosophy, sin and atonement, Judaism and the land, the Six Day War, Paul on Jews and Gentiles, and the theology of Karl Barth. An introductory essay by editor R. Kendall Soulen sets Wyschogrod's career and writings in context.

Completed shortly before Manning's recent death, this book lays out a month of honest prayers to God -- whom Manning affectionately calls "Abba" -- in a devotional format designed to guide and inspire the reader's own prayers. The morning and evening entries each present a Scripture passage, a select excerpt from Manning's contemporary spiritual classics, and a concluding "Dear Abba" prayer.

This is the second of three volumes in Oliver O'Donovan's masterful "Ethics as Theology" project. In his first volume -- Self, World, and Time -- O'Donovan discusses Christian ethics as an intellectual discipline in relation to the humanities, especially philosophy, theology, and behavioral studies, and in relation to the Christian gospel.In Finding and Seeking O'Donovan traces the logic of moral thought from self-awareness to decision through the virtues of faith, hope, and love. Blending biblical, historico-theological, and contemporary ideas in its comprehensive survey, this second volume continues O'Donovan's splendid study in ethics as theology and adds significantly to his previous theoretical reflection on Christian ethics.

A discerning study of a slice of modern Indian Christianity and Christian-Hindu encounter This book revisits South Indian Christian communities that were studied in 1959 and written about in Village Christians and Hindu Culture (1968). In 1959 the future of these village congregations was uncertain. Would they grow through conversions or slowly dissolve into the larger Hindu society around them? John Carman and Chilkuri Vasantha Rao's carefully gathered research fifty years later reveals both the decline of many older congregations and the surprising emergence of new Pentecostal and Baptist churches that emphasize the healing power of Christ. Significantly, the new congregations largely cut across caste lines, including both high castes and outcastes (Dalits). Carman and Vasantha Rao pay particular attention to the social, political, and religious environment of these Indian village Christians, including their adaptation of indigenous Hindu practices into their Christian faith and observances.

A longtime friend and student of the late Pope John Paul II, Stanislaw Grygiel in this book reflects on the life and thought of this extraordinary pope, giving new insight into his character and his vision of beauty as the path that leads us to God.More than simply biographical information about John Paul II -- who was Bishop Karol Wojtyla before he became pope -- or a dry academic analysis of his teaching, Discovering the Human Person derives from Grygiel's extensive firsthand interaction with Wojtyla. Grygiel reflects on the importance of Christian personalism, or communion, as the ground of John Paul II's life, particularly in response to the communist environment that surrounded him in Poland. Grygiel also addresses the pope's call for a new evangelization, his understanding of marriage and family, and the relationship of those to a genuine, healthy understanding of nation and state.

All historical work on Paul presupposes a story concerning the composition of his letters -- which ones he actually wrote, how many pieces they might originally have consisted of, when he wrote them, where from, and why. But the answers given to these questions are often derived in dubious ways.In Framing Paul Douglas Campbell reappraises all these issues in rigorous fashion, appealing only to Paul's own epistolary data in order to derive a basic "frame" for the letters on which all subsequent interpretation can be built. Though figuring out the authorship and order of Paul's letters has been thought to be impossible, Campbell's Framing Paul presents a cogent solution to the puzzle. 

The Christian tradition provides a wealth of insight into perennial human questions about the shape of the good life, human happiness, virtue, justice, wealth and poverty, spiritual growth, and much else besides -- and Christian scholars can do great good by bringing that rich tradition into conversation with the broader culture. But what is the nature and purpose of distinctively Christian scholarship, and what does that imply for the life and calling of the Christian scholar? What is it about Christian scholarship that makes it Christian? Ten eminent scholars grapple with such questions in this volume. They offer deep and thought-provoking discussions of the habits and commitments of the Christian scholar, the methodology and pedagogy of Christian scholarship, the role of the Holy Spirit in education, Christian approaches to art and literature, and more. CONTRIBUTORS Jonathan A. Anderson Dariusz M. Brycko Natasha Duquette M. Elizabeth Lewis Hall George Hunsinger Paul K. Moser Alvin Plantinga Craig J. Slane Nicholas Wolterstorff Amos Yong

Radical, comprehensive vision of the kingdom of God in light of the new creationTwentieth-century Dutch missiologist and prolific author J. H. Bavinck was committed to confronting the world with the saving message of Christ. In this first English translation of the Dutch work published in 1946, Bavinck presents a cosmic kingdom vision and champions the coming of the kingdom of Christ as the basic message of the gospel.Bavinck eloquently challenges believers to live as kingdom people as he expresses a uniquely Reformed perspective on the eternal significance of our temporal world. His eschatological vision, which permeates the book, is now more relevant than ever as climate change, resource depletion, financial turmoil, and other issues increasingly threaten our world.With Bert Hielema's skillful translation capturing the beauty and power of Bavinck's original text, Between the Beginning and the End calls all Christians to consider anew the entire scope of the church and Christ's kingdom.

Julia Roberts on the red carpet at the Oscars. Lady Gaga singing "Applause" to worshipful fans at one of her sold-out concerts. And you and me in our Sunday best in the front row at church. What do we have in common?Chances are, says Rebecca Konyndyk DeYoung, that we all suffer from vainglory -- a keen desire for attention and approval. Although contemporary culture has largely forgotten about vainglory, it was on the original list of seven capital vices and is perhaps more dangerous than ever today.In Vainglory: The Forgotten Vice DeYoung tells the story of this vice, moving from its ancient origins to its modern expressions. She defines vainglory, gives examples from popular culture, explores motivational sources, and discusses other vices associated with it such as hypocrisy and boasting. After exposing the many ways in which vainglory can rear its ugly head, she explores personal spiritual practices that can help us resist it and community practices that can help us handle glory well.

This book explores the ways that Christians, from the period of late antiquity through the Protestant Reformation, interpreted the Bible according to its several levels of meaning. Using the five bodily senses as an organizing principle, Karlfried Froehlich probes key theological developments, traditions, and approaches across this broad period, culminating in a consideration of the implications of this historical development for the contemporary church. Distinguishing between principles and rules of interpretation, Froehlich offers a clear and useful way of discerning the fundamental difference between interpretive methods (rules) and the overarching spiritual goals (principles) that must guide biblical interpretation. As a study of roots and reasons as well as the role of imagination in the development of biblical interpretation, Sensing the Scriptures reminds us how intellectually and spiritually relevant the pursuit of a historical perspective is for Christian faith and life today.

According to the pre-modern Christian tradition, knowledge of God is mainly testimonial: we know certain important truths about God and divine things because God himself has told them to us. In academic theology of late this view is often summarily dismissed. But to do so is a mistake, claims Mats Wahlberg, who argues that the testimonial understanding of revelation is indispensable to Christian theology.Criticizing the currently common idea that revelation should be construed exclusively in terms of God's self manifestation in history or through inner experience, Wahlberg discusses the concept of divine testimony in the context of the debate about how any knowledge of God is possible. He draws on resources from contemporary analytic philosophy -- especially John McDowell and Nicholas Wolterstorff -- to argue for the intellectual viability of revelation as divine testimony.

Expert guidance on how to grow up in Christ This book is a follow-up to Thomas Bergler''s acclaimed work The Juvenilization of American Christianity, which documents how church youth ministries over the past several decades have contributed to a process of adolescent spiritual traits becoming accepted and even celebrated by Christians of all ages. This "juvenilization" in the church is a real problem that must be addressed, says Bergler, and in his new book he addresses it head-on. Bergler''s From Here to Maturity is an accessible guide for helping both individuals and whole faith communities to grow spiritually. Bergler claims that spiritual maturity -- defined as "basic competence in the Christian life" -- is both desirable and attainable, and he effectively presents a biblical theology of spiritual maturity, identifying its traits from pertinent New Testament passages. Adapting Dallas Willard''s model of spiritual formation and applying it to congregational life, Bergler offers a wealth of practical, research-based guidance as to how Christian leaders can effectively foster spiritual maturity in their congregations. He also identifies six key faith-sustaining factors and provides a system for evaluating a church''s state of spiritual maturity and steps for improving it. Ecumenically friendly, From Here to Maturity will be useful to individuals and leaders from many different churches and theological traditions.

The best contemporary English-language resource on pursuing a universal ethicsIn this volume twenty-three major scholars comment on and critically evaluate In Search of a Universal Ethic, the 2009 document written by the International Theological Commission (ITC) of the Catholic Church. That historic document represents an official Church contribution both to a more adequate understanding of a universal ethic and to Catholicism's own tradition of reflection on natural law.The essays in this book reflect the ITC document's complementary emphases of dialogue across traditions (universal ethic) and reflection on broadly applicable ethical guidance within the Christian tradition (natural law). Among other things, the document situates the natural law ethical tradition within the larger search for a universal ethic. Along with its insightful essays, Searching for a Universal Ethic offers -- for the first time in published form -- the Vatican's official English translation of In Search of a Universal Ethic.Contributors: John Berkman Serge-Thomas Bonino, O.P. David Burrell, C.S.C. Lisa Sowle Cahill Joseph E. Capizzi David Cloutier Anver M. Emon Robert P. George Sherif Girgis Jennifer A. Herdt Russell Hittinger M. Cathleen Kaveny Anthony J. Kelly, C.Ss.R. Fergus Kerr, O.P. Steven A. Long William C. Mattison III Gilbert Meilaender Livio Melina Michael S. Northcott David Novak Jean Porter Martin Rhonheimer Tracey Rowland

In this book renowned philosopher Merold Westphal unpacks the writings of nineteenth-century thinker S├╕ren Kierkegaard on biblical, Christian faith and its relation to reason. Across five books -- Fear and Trembling, Philosophical Fragments, Concluding Unscientific Postscript, Sickness Unto Death, and Practice in Christianity -- and three pseudonyms, Kierkegaard sought to articulate a biblical concept of faith by approaching it from a variety of perspectives in relation to one another. Westphal offers a careful textual reading of these major discussions to present an overarching analysis of Kierkegaard''s conception of the true meaning of biblical faith. Though Kierkegaard presents a complex picture of faith through his pseudonyms, Westphal argues that his perspective is a faithful and illuminating one, making claims that are important for philosophy of religion, for theology, and most of all for Christian life as it might be lived by faithful people.

"I wasn''t supposed to spend my life in the world of scholarship," Richard Mouw acknowledges at the beginning of Called to the Life of the Mind. Yet he has indeed spent his career in the academy -- and has become one of the most widely respected evangelical Christian scholars of our time. In this wise little book Mouw defends Christian scholarship as an important and legitimate endeavor, responding in particular to those traditions that continue to be suspicious of intellectual pursuits. Writing in an inviting, conversational style, Mouw reflects candidly on the faithful Christian cultivation of the life of the mind and offers gentle advice on how Christians, especially evangelicals, might fruitfully navigate the world of the academy as followers of Jesus.