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Books > Christianity > Protestantism & Protestant Churches > Calvinist, Reformed & Presbyterian Churches
This readable, accessible introduction provides a solid grounding
in the history of the Protestant Reformation. In honor of the 500th
anniversary of the Reformation, Glenn Sunshine examines the key
people and ideas of this movement. Questions for discussion and
suggestions for further reading provided for each chapter make this
book ideal for the classroom or group study.
As profound as Martin Luther's ideas are, this giant of church
history was concerned above all with practical instruction for
daily Christian living. Harvesting Martin Luther's Reflections
highlights this concern of Luther, mining his thought in key areas
of doctrine, ethics, and church practice. Gathering noteworthy
contributions by well-known Luther scholars from Europe and the
Americas, this book ranges broadly over theological questions about
baptism and righteousness, ethical issues like poverty and greed,
and pastoral concerns like worship and spirituality. There are even
rare discussions of Luther's perspective on marriage and on Islam.
As a result, Harvesting Martin Luther's Reflections is both a
state-of-the-art discussion of Lutheran themes and an excellent
introduction for newcomers to Luther's work.
Honoring the 500th anniversary of the Reformation, Christopher
Elwood offers an insightful and accessible overview of John
Calvin's theological ideas within their historical context. A Brief
Introduction to John Calvin discusses the trials and tribulations
Calvin encountered as he ministered and taught in Geneva, paying
special attention to the theological controversies associated with
the Trinity and predestination. In this concise introduction,
Elwood explores the development of Calvinism and its influence in
today's world.
Recent decades have witnessed much scholarly reassessment of
late-sixteenth through eighteenth-century Reformed theology. It was
common to view the theology of this period-typically labelled
'orthodoxy'-as sterile, speculative, and rationalistic, and to
represent it as significantly discontinuous with the more
humanistic, practical, and biblical thought of the early reformers.
Recent scholars have taken a more balanced approach, examining
orthodoxy on its own terms and subsequently highlighting points of
continuity between orthodoxy and both Reformation and
pre-Reformation theologies, in terms of form as well as content.
Until now Scottish theology and theologians have figured relatively
minimally in works reassessing orthodoxy, and thus many of the
older stereotypes concerning post-Reformation Reformed theology in
a Scottish context persist. This collection of essays aims to
redress that failure by purposely examining post-Reformation
Scottish theology/theologians through a lens provided by the gains
made in recent scholarly evaluations of Reformed orthodoxy, and by
highlighting, in that process, the significant contribution which
Scottish divines of the orthodox era made to Reformed theology as
an international intellectual phenomenon.
The so-called extra Calvinisticum-the doctrine that the incarnate
Son of God continued to exist beyond the flesh-was not invented by
John Calvin or Reformed theologians. If this is true, as is almost
universally acknowledged today, then why do scholars continue to
fixate almost exclusively on Calvin when they discuss this
doctrine? The answer to the "why" of this scholarly trend, however,
is not as important as correcting the trend. This volume expands
our vision of the historical functions and christological
significance of this doctrine by expounding its uses in Cyril of
Alexandria, Thomas Aquinas, Zacharias Ursinus, and in theologians
from the Reformation to the present. Despite its relative
obscurity, the doctrine that came to be known as the "Calvinist
extra" is a possession of the church catholic and a feature of
Christology that ought to be carefully appropriated in contemporary
reflection on the Incarnation.
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