Short notices

Roger Bergman, Preventing Unjust War: A Catholic Argument for Selective Conscientious Objection (Eugene, OR: Cascade Books, 2020); 199 pp.: 9781532686665, $46 (hbk); 9781532686658, $26 (pbk)

This impassioned book by Roger Bergman, Professor Emeritus of Cultural and Social Studies at Creighton University, nicely complements The Business of War: theological and ethical reflections on the military–industrial complex, edited by James McCarty, Matthew Tapie and Justin Bronson Barringer and also published in 2020 by Cascade (reviewed in Short Notices in the previous issue of Theology). Bergman defends that most difficult of just-war positions: namely, that of individuals who are not pacifists but are prepared to fight only when they are convinced by their consciences that it is morally justified to do so – i.e. the ‘selective conscientious objection’ of this new book’s subtitle. In the course of the twentieth century, Western military authorities gradually came to accept that convinced pacifists could be exempted from military service, but, understandably from their perspective, they largely remained reluctant to accept that those enlisted could exercise their consciences about which particular military actions to support. In contrast, Bergman uses the example of the Catholic Austrian farmer Franz Jägerstätter to support his argument. In 1943, the non-pacifist Jägerstätter – against the strong counsel of his local bishop – defied induction into the German military, was imprisoned and then executed. In 2007, Pope Benedict XVI beatified him as a martyr of the Catholic faith. Bergman regards him as ‘the only officially recognized [i.e. by the Vatican] martyr of the just-war tradition’ (p. 5) and maintains that his brave and solitary stance, based on individual conscience, represents a crucial but much neglected part of that tradition, starting with Aquinas. This book is written as a challenge to Bergman’s own Catholic Church – in the belief that being ordered to fight in an unjust war, without legal recourse to refuse, constitutes what some military ethicists now term ‘moral injury’ as distinct from physical injury – but it is deeply relevant to all Churches. His central argument is that ‘the problem is not the just-war tradition but the unjust-war tradition, specifically the conventional view that warriors have no responsibility to judge the justice of the wars they are asked to fight’ (p. 171). His argument should, in my view, be taken very seriously indeed.

Catherine Pepinster, Martyrdom: Why Martyrs Still Matter (London: SPCK, 2020); 315 pp.: 9780281081653, £25 (hbk)

In contrast to Bergman, Catherine Pepinster is a journalist not a theologian, a broadcaster and former editor of The Tablet. This highly accessible book – intended for a wider audience than Bergman – gives historical and thematic accounts of Christian martyrs from Stephen to the present day, starting and finishing with a discussion about changing perceptions of what ‘a martyr’ is – a concept largely absent from Judaism, but present especially within Catholic Christianity and now, notoriously, within radical Islam. Three eras receive particular attention: the Early Church facing persecution within the Roman Empire; the Tudor Church, with both Catholic and Reformed martyrs; and twentieth-century Soviet religious persecution and the Nazis’ execution of Christian dissenters such as Franz Jägerstätter and (not, as she admits, without controversy) Maximilian Kolbe, together with more recent martyrs, inevitably including Óscar Romero and Martin Luther King, as well as Christians still being persecuted in Egypt, Iraq and elsewhere in the Middle East. Baroness Caroline Cox writes a glowing commendation: ‘Harrowing, challenging, inspiring: this book is a formidable tour de force on the phenomenon of martyrdom.’ A committed and passionate book.

David Jasper and Ou Guang-an, Literature and Religion: A Dialogue between China and the West (Eugene, OR: Pickwick, 2020); 176 pp.: 9781532652196, $44 (hbk); 9781532652189, $24 (pbk)

This is an ambitious and intriguing book. The Anglican David Jasper, Emeritus Professor of Literature and Theology at Glasgow and, part-time, at Renmin University in Beijing, has contributed often to Theology (most recently in the previous issue). Ou Guang-an, who is new to me, has a background in Confucian and Taoist culture and is Professor of English at Shihezi University, Xinjiang. With a joint interest in literature and religion (broadly understood), they have had a personal dialogue for some time, comparing differences and similarities in their approaches given their contrasting contexts and world views. In the first half of this book, Ou Guang-an, a fluent English-speaker, gives his distinctively Chinese take on the Book of Job, then on Thomas Hardy’s Tess of the d’Urbervilles and finally on the poetry of W. B. Yeats. On each topic David Jasper gives a brief but nuanced Western response. In the second half they reverse this process, with David Jasper giving his perspective on a variety of Chinese writers and novelists whose works have been translated into English (he speaks little Chinese himself), while Ou Guang-an responds. There is much to learn from this dialogue about how a Western theistic perspective differs from – but, at times, also resonates with – a non-theistic Chinese perspective.

Jonathan Chaplin and Andrew Bradstock (eds), The Future of Brexit Britain: Anglican Reflections on National Identity and European Solidarity (London: SPCK, 2020); 278 pp.: 9780281084296, £12.99 (pbk)

There are quite a number of big names contributing to this collection, including Professor Kenneth Medhurst, Lord Brian Griffiths, Professor John Milbank, Lord Stephen Green, Professor Charlotte Methuen and Alison Rose, as well as the former politicians Dominic Grieve and John Denham. Griffiths is an ardent supporter of Brexit and puts the economic case strongly for this; Milbank is as ever highly suspicious of what he terms ‘neoliberalism’ in the EU; Green, with his considerable banking experience, offers a global, and not especially optimistic, perspective on Britain’s trading relationships after Brexit; and many of the church officials and bishops simply express regret about the Brexit decision (as do I). Unfortunately, all were writing at least six months before Boris Johnson’s ‘deal’ with the EU. The whole political context is changing just too fast for any book like this to cope.

Alison Woolley, Women Choosing Silence: Relationality and Transformation in Spiritual Practice (London: Routledge, 2020); 300 pp.: 9780367732011, £36.99 (pbk)

This book, commended by Heather Walton and Nicola Slee and first published in 2019 as a hardback priced at £120, is now available as a more affordable paperback.

Alec Ryrie (ed.), Christianity: A Historical Atlas (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2020); 223 pp.: 9780674242357, $35/£28.95 (hbk)

This is another dip-into book, albeit for general interest rather than spiritual edification. It is coffee-table size, nicely illustrated, printed on glossy paper and good value. Professor Alec Ryrie is a respected historian of the Reformation, but this book is remarkably short of scholarly references to sources for a university publication, either for its many maps or for its statistical projections. Even the authorship of the text is not attributed specifically to Ryrie since he is denoted simply as ‘editor’ (along with two named contributors, with no academic profile given to either of them). Yet it does succeed well visually, giving a vivid series of illustrations and maps depicting the spread of Christianity around the world at significant points in history over the last two millennia.

Mary Ann Beavis, The First Christian Slave: Onesimus in Context (Eugene, OR: Cascade Books, 2021); 123 pp.: 9781725270145, $34 (hbk); 9781725270183, $19 (pbk)

This intriguing book looks at Paul’s short, personal letter to Philemon, using a mixture of scholarship and imagination. As previous exegetes have done, Mary Ann Beavis cites contemporary parallels such as Pliny the Elder writing to Sabianus on behalf of a repentant freedman, but she also uses nineteenth-century American slave-related letters. She acknowledges that obviously there is a huge historical and contextual gap between the latter and the letter to Philemon. Yet she shows at length that some nineteenth-century letters appealing for help from former slave-owners are as ‘obsequious and assertive’ as Paul’s letter to Philemon (in verses 14 and 8–9 respectively) and similarly invoke ‘loyalties and debts’ (verses 17–19). In addition: ‘Despite the slaves’ stated confidence in the good will of the slaveholders, like Philemon, they held all the cards: they could choose to grant these requests, or ignore them’ (p. 65). This nineteenth-century evidence, she argues, shows that, perhaps like Onesimus, ‘enslaved persons could use letters (among other tactics), with the assistance of sympathetic “masters,” to convey their ardent wishes in terms designed to stroke slaveholders’ egos and thereby gain their cooperation’ (p. 66). She even concludes her study with an imaginary letter from Onesimus – thought by later tradition to have become a bishop – recalling Paul’s actions and its (entirely conjectural) effect on Philemon himself. Fascinating.

Yair Zakovitch, The Song of Songs: Riddle of Riddles (London: T&T Clark, 2020); 125 pp.: 9780567693969, £28.99 (pbk)

This delightful study by the veteran Israeli scholar Yair Zakovitch, first published in 2019, is now out in paperback in the Library of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies. It has eight essays (some previously published in journals) seeking to unravel this elusive biblical book that never mentions God (only Esther does the same), has a surprisingly equal depiction of female and male love, and remains ambiguous about whether its eroticism is physical or spiritual (or both). Zakovitch diplomatically concludes: ‘The poems in the Song of Songs were erotic love poems, pure and simple. But if I am correct, the book – from the moment it took shape and was given a ticket into the Holy Scriptures of Israel – invited and expected the [spiritual] allegorical interpretation of its poems’ (p. 112).

Chloe T. Sun, Conspicuous in His Absence: Studies in the Song of Songs and Esther (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2021); 326 pp.: 9780830854882, $34 (pbk)

Written from a scholarly evangelical and theological perspective, this book provides a useful contrast to Zakovitch (even though his work is never mentioned, despite her extensive citation of other Jewish and Christian scholars). Chloe Sun’s scope is wider, because she considers the Song of Songs and Esther together, and argues as follows:

Song of Songs and Esther serve as two countertexts in Old Testament theology, particularly regarding the theology of divine presence and absence. Underlining the countertexts is wisdom which complements and supplements Israel’s salvation history. In doing so these two scrolls complement and supplement what is lacking in Old Testament theology in regard to the transcendent and mysterious nature of God … challenging, or even protesting the loud voices of divine presence in human history … Song of Songs presents an applied wisdom in the area of love and sexuality, whereas Esther exemplifies an applied wisdom in times of evil. (pp. 77–8)

The book unpacks this claim over the final four chapters, examining Time, Temple, Feasts and Canon. And, interestingly, she concludes that the Song of Songs ‘portrays a love restored’ in contrast to ‘a love gone wrong’ in Ezekiel 16 and Hosea (p. 257).

Greg Garrett and Rowan Williams, Rowan Williams in Conversation with Greg Garrett (London: SPCK, 2020); 128 pp.: 9780281083718, £9.99 (pbk)

Mary Zournazi and Rowan Williams, Justice and Love: A Philosophical Dialogue (London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2020); 205 pp.: 9781350090378, £55 (hbk); 9781350090361, £17.99 (pbk)

Two books each with seven transcribed conversations held at intervals with Rowan Williams, speaking in tranquillity and eloquently after his turbulent time as Archbishop of Canterbury. Given his interest in Shakespeare and nineteenth-century Russian novels, as well as present-day novels such as Marilynne Robinson’s influential Gilead, it is perhaps not surprising that they feature strongly in both books – the first in conversation with the American Episcopalian novelist and broadcaster Greg Garrett and the second with the Australian academic, atheist philosopher and filmmaker Mary Zournazi. Their conversations are always interesting, albeit somewhat gushing and deferential on Garrett’s part and philosophical and political more than theological on Zournazi’s part. Rowan Williams does what he always does so well – impress religious and non-religious intellectuals across different disciplines. His critique of ‘scientific’ materialists, who reduce human beings to ‘mechanisms’ without feelings or imagination, comes through clearly, as does his championing of faith and justice in the modern world. I can see these as bedside books to be dipped into rather than read consecutively.