Abstract
Power in Weakness: Paul’s Transformed Vision for Ministry
by Timothy G. Gombis; foreword by Michael J. Gorman
Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2021. 184 pp. $25.00. ISBN 978-0-8028-7125-1.
After Paul’s encounter with the risen Christ on the road to Damascus, he turned from coercion and violence to a ministry centered on the hope of Christ’s resurrection. In earthly terms, he traded power for weakness—but a “weakness” essential for the flourishing of communities able to experience God’s transformation, restoration, and healing. What would it mean for pastors to take seriously Paul’s exhortation to “imitate me as I imitate Christ” (1 Cor 11:1) and lead congregations in this way? Instead of drawing leadership principles and practices from the worlds of business, education, and politics, Timothy Gombis follows Paul by making cruciformity the operating principle of the church. He explores practices and patterns that can move congregations beyond a focus on individual salvation so that they can become sites of resurrection power on earth.
A Cross in the Heart of God: Reflections on the Death of Jesus
by Samuel Wells
London: Canterbury Press Norwich, 2020. 144 pp. $20.99. ISBN 978-1-78622-293-0.
This Lenten study focuses on the significance of the story at the very center of Christianity: the crucifixion. Samuel Wells writes as a theologian and pastor to explore the cross in the purposes of God and how this act brings about salvation. Three sections, each with six short chapters, explore the cross in the Old Testament (Covenant, Test, Passover, Atonement, Servant, Sacrifice); the Epistles (Forgiveness, Obedience, Foolishness, Example, Reconciliation, Boast); and the Gospels (Finished, Judged, Betrayed, Pierced, Forsaken, Mocked). The volume provides a comprehensive understanding of the story at the heart of Scripture, the central event in history, and a core tenet of the Christian faith. It includes a study guide with questions and prayers.
Atonement and the Death of Christ: An Exegetical, Historical, and Philosophical Exploration
by William Lane Craig
Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2020. 328 pp. $24.99 (cloth). ISBN 978-1-4813-1204-2.
Through his death on the cross, Christ atoned for sin and reconciled people to God. While this serves as a central tenet of Christian faith, the mechanism of atonement—exactly how Christ effects our salvation—remains controversial. William Lane Craig conducts an interdisciplinary investigation of this crucial Christian doctrine, drawing upon Old and New Testament studies, historical theology, and analytic philosophy. He explores the biblical basis of atonement and unfolds the wide variety of motifs used to characterize this doctrine, highlights alternative theories of the atonement offered by great Christian thinkers of the premodern era, and delves into constructive and innovative engagement with philosophy of law, which allows an understanding of atonement that moves beyond mystery and into the coherent mechanism of penal substitution. Along the way, he enters into conversation with contemporary theories of atonement. The result is a multifaceted perspective that upholds the suffering of Christ as a substitutionary, representational, and redemptive act that satisfies divine justice.
In Him Was Life: The Person and Work of Christ
by Trevor Hart
Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2019. 427 pp. $59.99 (cloth). ISBN 978-1-4813-1015-4.
The consideration of the person of Christ is often disentangled from his work. This volume explores core questions that arise when Christology and soteriology are deliberately brought together. How should we imagine and speak of what the intrinsically negative image of “salvation” means in positive terms if in Jesus God has effected a marvelous exchange in which God has become what we are so that we in turn might share in God’s own life? What does this mean for our understanding of who God is, of our own creaturely nature and capacities, and of God’s ways of relating to us and realizing God’s own creative purposes? And what might Christology itself have to say about the nature, possibilities, and constraints of theology itself? Hart addresses these questions through incisive engagement with a range of Christian theologians, including Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria, Athanasius, Anselm, John Calvin, P. T. Forsyth, Karl Barth, J. A. T. Robinson, and T. F. Torrance.
Atonement and Ethics in 1 John: A Peacemaking Hermeneutic
by Christopher Armitage
The Library of New Testament Studies, 654. London: T&T Clark. 240 pp. $115.00 (cloth). ISBN 978-0-5677-0074-2.
Christopher Armitage considers previous theological perception of 1 John as a text that conveys God’s abhorrence of violence, in contrast with biblical scholarly analysis focused upon the text’s emergence from intense theological conflict between “insiders” and “outsiders” and its hostile rhetoric directed towards “antichrists” and secessionists. He argues that a peace-oriented reading of 1 John is still viable but questions whether the Johannine love commandment includes opponents in its purview, advocating non-violence and love of neighbor. Armitage examines the background and use of five key themes in 1 John (hilasmos, sphazō, anthrōpoktonos, agapē, and adelphos) and what they presuppose about God’s engagement with the world, concluding that a peacemaking hermeneutic is not only viable, but integral to a reading of the epistle.
Violent Rituals of the Hebrew Bible
by Saul M. Olyan
Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019. 180 pp. $74.00 (cloth). ISBN 978-0-1906-8190-6.
Although seldom studied by biblical scholars as a discrete phenomenon, ritual violence is mentioned frequently in biblical texts, and includes ritual actions such as disfigurement of corpses, destruction or scattering of bones removed from a tomb, stoning and other forms of public execution, cursing, forced depilation, the legally sanctioned imposition of physical defects on living persons, coerced potion-drinking, sacrificial burning of animals and humans, forced stripping and exposure of the genitalia, and mass eradication of populations. This book investigates these and other violent rites, the ritual settings in which they occur (e.g., the temple, the royal court, the battlefield), their various literary contexts (e.g., legal texts, narrative, visions, dreams, and oracles), and the identity and aims of their agents in order to speak in an informed way about the contours and social aspects of ritual violence as it is represented in the Hebrew Bible.
The Gospels as Stories: A Narrative Approach to Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John
by Jeannine K. Brown
Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2020. 224 pp. $21.99. ISBN 978-0-8010-4984-2.
Jeannine Brown shows how a narrative approach illuminates each of the Gospels, helping readers see the overarching stories. The volume offers a corrective to tendencies to read the Gospels piecemeal, one story at a time. It takes four key areas of narrative analysis (plot, characters, intertextuality, and narrative theology) and applies them to the four Gospels. It is filled with numerous examples and visual aids that show how narrative criticism brings the text to life, making it an ideal supplementary textbook for courses on the Gospels. Readers will gain hands-on tools and perspectives to interpret the Gospels as whole stories.
Prophecy and Gender in the Hebrew Bible
edited by Juliana Claassens and Irmtraud Fischer
The Bible and Women: An Encyclopedia of Exegesis and Cultural History, 1.2. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2021. 408 pp. $56.00. ISBN 978-0-88414-473-1.
Both prophets and prophetesses shared God’s divine will with the people of Israel, yet the voices of the latter group were often forgotten due to later prohibitions against women teaching in public. To rediscover and recapture these biblical traditions, this volume is dedicated to the female prophetic voices in the Former Prophets (Joshua to 2 Kings) as well as in the Latter Prophets of the Hebrew Bible. Essays examine how women appear in the iconography of the ancient world, the historical background of the phenomenon of prophecy, political and religious resistance by women in the biblical text, and gender symbolism and constructions in prophetic material, as well as the metaphorical discourse of God. Seventeen international contributors explore texts from a range of innovative gender-oriented approaches.
Scripture, Texts, and Tracings in Romans
edited by Linda L. Belleville and A. Andrew Das; afterword by Craig S. Keener
Scripture, Texts, and Tracings in Paul’s Letters. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books/Fortress Academic, 2021. 280 pp. $95.00 (cloth). ISBN 978-1-9787-0471-8.
The Apostle Paul employs the Jewish Scriptures more in Romans than in any of his other letters. The twelve essays in this volume advance the interpretation of Romans by exploring how Paul quoted, alluded to, or “echoed” the Jewish Scriptures. Identification of allusions is at the forefront, as are questions of methodology, the texture of Paul’s theology, his understanding of Scripture, and implications for other areas of Pauline studies, such as empire-criticism.
Latino/a Theology and the Bible: Ethnic-Racial Reflections on Interpretation
edited by Francisco Lozada Jr. and Fernando F. Segovia
Lanham, MD: Lexington Books/Fortress Academic, 2021. 312 pp. $120.00 (cloth). ISBN 978-1-9787-0549-4.
This book explores the use of the Bible among Latino/a theologians today. Latino/a theology emerged in the 1980s, alongside a broad variety of contextual theological movements and discourses following the Latino/a movement and the formation of Latino/a studies in the 1960s and 1970s. While much work has been done on biblical interpretation in Latino/a biblical criticism, little can be found regarding interpretation in Latino/a theological reflection. To address this gap in the literature, eleven contributors, from various ecclesial affiliations and religious traditions, examine the status and role of the Bible in Latino/a theology.