In this volume, Mordechai Z. Cohen explores the interpretive methods of Rashi of Troyes (1040-1105), the most influential Jewish Bible commentator of all time. By elucidating the 'plain sense' (peshat) of Scripture, together with critically selected midrashic interpretations, Rashi created an approach that was revolutionary in the talmudically-oriented Ashkenazic milieu. Cohen contextualizes Rashi's commentaries by examining influences from other centers of Jewish learning in Muslim Spain and Byzantine lands. He also opens new scholarly paths by comparing Rashi's methods with trends in Latin learning reflected in the Psalms commentary of his older contemporary, Saint Bruno the Carthusian (1030-1101). Drawing upon the Latin tradition of enarratio poetarum ('interpreting the poets'), Bruno applied a grammatical interpretive method and incorporated patristic commentary selectively, a parallel that Cohen uses to illuminate Rashi's exegetical values. Cohen thereby brings to light the novel literary conceptions manifested by Rashi and his key students, Josef Qara and Rashbam.

In a society fascinated by spirituality but committed to religious pluralism, the Christian worldview faces sophisticated and aggressive opposition. A prior commitment to diversity, with its requisite openness and relativistic outlook, has meant for skeptics, critics and even many Christians that whatever Christianity is, it cannot be exclusively true or salvific. What is needed in this syncretistic era is an authoritative, comprehensive Christian response. Point by point, argument by argument, the Christian faith must be effectively presented and defended. To Everyone an Answer: A Case for the Christian Worldview offers such a response. Editors Francis J. Beckwith, William Lane Craig and J. P. Moreland have gathered together in this book essays covering all major aspects of apologetics, including: faith and reason arguments for God's existence the case for Jesus the problem of evil postmodernism religious pluralism and Christian exclusivism Preeminent in their respective fields, the contributors to this volume offer a solid case for the Christian worldview and a coherent defense of the Christian faith.

The sky forms fifty percent of our visual world and has a voice across cultures. This complex sky-voice contains great diversity and is informed by human images, dreams, and aspirations. The inherent nature of this sky-voice is transmitted from one generation to another through text, image, oral tradition, physical mapping, and painted description. This volume is written by some of the most noted scholars in their fields of British history, history of art, social anthropology, Greek horoscopes and narratology, globe cartography, comets and Irish mythology, western astronomy, Australian aboriginal sky astronomy and mythology, and cultural astronomy and astrology. These scholars acknowledge the presence of such a voice, in the sky's movement mirrored in the archoeastronomy of British prehistory, the apocalyptic myths of comets and meteors, the sky cartography reflected in European globes and frescoes, the Australian aboriginal sky myths, the issue of disappearing dark skies, and in contemporary reflections on the sky. It recognises that sky imagery has persisted in similar forms since its potential roots in the Palaeolithic period.These eleven essays offer critical engagement in understanding the sky in human imagination and culture and contribute to the new fields of cultural astronomy and skyscapes, the role and importance of the sky in the interpretation of cultures, emerging within the academy.

Fourth Maccabees is a superbly craft ed oration that presents a case for the Jewish way of life couched almost entirely in terms of Greek ethical ideals. Using an expansion upon previous scriptural narratives as an opportunity for philosophical exposition, its author delights in the Torah, the Law of Moses, as the divinely given path to becoming our best selves now. Moreover, drawing upon Greek logic tradition, he develops an elaborate rationalisation of that law based upon the promise of eternal life with God. In this collection of essays spanning two decades of study, David deSilva examines the formative training that produced such an author, the rhetorical craft present in his work, and the author's creative use of both Jewish and Greek literary resources. Finally, he demonstrates the book's enduring message and legacy in the Christian church, from theological influence on Origen to textual relations within Codex Sinaiticus.

In this study, Paul S. Chung charts the history of social scientific study of religion from the axial age to the present day, and thereby lays a foundation for a new model of constructive theology in the comparative study of religion, culture and society. Analysing the thought of Max Weber, Alfred Schutz, Pierre Bourdieu, Michel Foucault, Edmund Husserl, Max Horkheimer and others, Chung deals effectively with material interests, power relations and the history of race, gender and sexuality. The result is a synthesis that is at once innovative, critical, and applicable to current methodology in theology and the social sciences.

After offering a brief overview of the role of faith within Judaism, Christianity and Islam, an interdisciplinary analysis of faith, belief, belief systems and the act of believing is undertaken. The debate over the nature of doctrine between George Lindbeck and Alister McGrath brings into focus four ways in which beliefs can be employed: expressive, interpretative, formative and referential/relational. An analysis of monotheistic belief ensues which demonstrates how it can function meaningfully in each of these modes, including the last, where insights from phenomenology and relational ontology, as well as philosophical theology, favour a participatory approach in which God is encountered not as an object of investigation, but as that transcendent Other whose worship is the fulfilment of human being. The study concludes by highlighting convergences between the nature of faith presented in the initial scriptural overview and that developed throughout the rest of the study.

Few religious currents have been as influential as the Theosophical. Yet few currents have been so under-researched, and the Brill Handbook of the Theosophical Current thus represents pioneering research. A first section surveys the main people and events involved in the Theosophical Society from its inception to today, and outlines the Theosophical worldview. A second, substantial section covers most significant religions to emerge in the wake of the Theosophical Society - Anthroposophy, the Point Loma community, the I AM religious activity, the Summit Lighthouse Movement, the New Age, theosophical UFO religions, and numerous others. Finally, the interaction of the Theosophical current with contemporary culture - including gender relations, art, popular fiction, historiography, and science - are discussed at length.

This very readable brief guide examines a wide range of spiritual writing that can be read for enjoyment or inspiration, including some books that come from beyond any religious tradition. While written from within the Christian tradition, and offering introductions to the writings of medieval mystics, Quakers and modern evangelists, both Protestant and Catholic, it also looks at classics of secular spirituality and writings from different religious traditions. Each book is explained to convey a brief idea of what each one has to offer the interested reader, while a 'Speed Read' for each book delivers a quick sense of what each writer is like to read and a highly compressed summary of the main points of the book in question. This is an excellent reference to dip into, but within sections such as Early Christian Classics, Secular Texts, Lives of Inspiration and Alternative Approaches, the books are arranged chronologically, revealing some interesting juxtapositions and connections between them.

Chinese practices related to ancestors have long been the subject of conflicting interpretations. These practices are rooted in the lived experience of practitioners, and therefore need to be considered as embodied expressions of the quest for existential meaning. For practitioners, the achievement of existential meaning requires the inclusion, implication, and mediation of the ancestors. When gestures in ancestor rites are analyzed from this perspective it is possible to appreciate their essence as constitutive of "ancestor religion." This book uses an inquisitive method that investigates the discrepancies between foreign and local explanations, and proposes another hermeneutic framework for ancestor related praxes.

For Jews, Christians and Muslims, as for all human beings, military conflicts and war remain part of the reality of the world. The authoritative writings of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, namely the Hebrew Bible, the New Testament and the Koran, as well as the theological and philosophical traditions based on them, bear witness to this fact. Showing the influence of different historical political situations, various views - sometimes quite similar, sometimes more divergent -- have developed in the three religions to justify the waging of war under certain circumstances. Such views have also been integrated in different ways into legal systems while, in certain cases, theologies have provide legitimation for military expansion and atrocities. The aim of the volume The Concept of Just War in Judaism, Christianity and Islam is to explore the respective understanding of "just war" in each one of these three religions and to make their commonalities and differences discursively visible. In addition, it highlights and explains the significance of the topic to the present time. Can the concepts developed in the Jewish, Christian and Islamic traditions in order to justify war, serve as a foundation for contemporary peace ethics? Or do religious arguments always add fuel to the fire in armed conflict? The contributions in this volume will help provide answers to these and other socially and politically relevant questions.

This textbook offers a comprehensive introduction to the world's religions, including history, beliefs, worship practices, and contemporary expressions. Charles Farhadian, a seasoned teacher and recognized expert on world religions, provides an empathetic account that both affirms Christian uniqueness and encourages openness to various religious traditions. His nuanced, ecumenical perspective enables readers to appreciate both Christianity and the world's religions in new ways. The book highlights similarities, dissimilarities, and challenging issues for Christians and includes significant selections from sacred texts to enhance learning. Pedagogical features include sidebars, charts, key terms, an extensive glossary, illustrations, and about a dozen maps. This book is supplemented with helpful web materials for both students and professors through Baker Academic's Textbook eSources. Resources include self quizzes, discussion questions, additional further readings, a sample syllabus, and a test bank.

Born in 1844 in Persia (Iran), 'Abdu'l-Baha is best known as the eldest son of Mirza Ḥusayn-Ali Nuri, Baha'u'llah (1817-1892), the founder of the Baha'i Faith. Negar Mottahedeh's edited volume of specially commissioned essays marking the centenary of 'Abdu'l-Baha's journey to the West documents the uniqueness of 'Abdu'l-Baha's vision of human solidarity and peace in the context of twentieth century modernity and shows the moral impact of his principled positions on the emergent Civil Rights movement in America.

Few studies focus on the modes of knowledge transmission (or concealment), or the trends of continuity or change from the Ancient to the Late Antique worlds. In Antiquity, knowledge was cherished as a scarce good, cultivated through the close teacher-student relationship and often preserved in the closed circle of the initated. From Assyrian and Babylonian cuneiform texts to a Shi'ite Islamic tradition, this volume explores how and why knowledge was shared or concealed by diverse communities in a range of Ancient and Late Antique cultural contexts. From caves by the Dead Sea to Alexandria, both normative and heterodox approaches to knowledge in Jewish, Christian and Muslim communities are explored. Biblical and qur'anic passages, as well as gnostic, rabbinic and esoteric Islamic approaches are discussed. In this volume, a range of scholars from Assyrian studies to Jewish, Christian and Islamic studies examine diverse approaches to, and modes of, knowledge transmission and concealment, shedding new light on both the interconnectedness, as well as the unique aspects, of the monotheistic faiths, and their relationship to the ancient civilisations of the Fertile Crescent.

The author of this unique volume, Dr. Ronald W. Pies is a psychiatrist with a long-standing inerest in Jewish thought. Readers will surely note Dr. Pies's efforts to connect the teachings found within Pirkei Avot with the larger fabric of psychology, philosophy, and literature. While Pirkei Avot is a unique and specific expression of Judaic values, it is nevertheless true that the world's great religions often resonate with the values found within them. In some instances, this may reflect a direct historical/cultural interaction; in other cases, it reflects what may be called "convergent evolution." In any case, as the author writes, "Many values articulated in the world's major faiths are seen to mirror those embraced in Pirkei Avot.

The relationship between Islam and feminism is complex. There are many Muslim scholars who fervently promote women's equality. At the same time, there is ambivalence regarding the general norms, terminology, and approaches of feminism and feminist theology. This ambivalence is in large part a product of various hegemonic, androcentric, and patriarchal discourses that seek to dictate legitimate and authoritative interpretations. These discourses not only fuel ambivalence, they also effectively obscure valuable possibilities related to interreligious feminist engagement. Divine Words, Female Voices is the follow-up to Jerusha Lamptey's 2014 book, Never Wholly Other, in which she introduced the idea of "Muslima" theology and applied it to the topic of religious diversity. In this new book, she extends her earlier arguments to contend that interreligious feminist engagement is both a theologically valid endeavor and a vital resource for Muslim women scholars. She introduces comparative feminist theology as a method for overcoming challenges associated with interreligious feminist engagement, reorients comparative discussions to focus on the two "Divine Words" (the Qur'an and Jesus) and feminist theology, and uses this reorientation to examine intersections, discontinuities, and insights related to diverse theological topics. This book is distinctive in its responsiveness to calls for new approaches in Islamic feminist theology, its use of the method of comparative theology, its focus on Muslim and Christian feminist theology in comparative analysis, and its constructive articulation of Muslima theological perspectives.

"An invaluable guide from a trusted expert."--Lee Strobel
Written in a compelling, accessible style, this book answers the most common questions about Jewish people and culture, drawn from the steady stream of queries Michael L. Brown's ministry receives every month.
As a Messianic believer, Brown provides clear answers to questions like "Are there Jewish denominations?" and "Do the Jewish people expect a literal Messiah?" The book also addresses Christians' questions about their own relationship to the Old Testament law, such as "Should Christians observe the Sabbath on Saturday?" and "Are Gentile Christians spiritual Jews?"

How does the mind experience the sacred? What biological mechanisms are involved in mystical states and trances? Is there a neurological basis for patterns in comparative religions? Does religion have an evolutionary function? This pathbreaking work by two leading medical researchers explores the neurophysiology of religious experience. Building on an explanation of the basic structure of the brain, the authors focus on parts most relevant to human experience, emotion, and cognition. On this basis, they plot how the brain is involved in mystical experiences. Successive chapters apply this scheme to mythmaking, ritual and liturgy, meditation, near-death experiences, and theology itself. Anchored in such research, the authors also sketch the implications of their work for philosophy, science, theology, and the future of religion.

Exploring the relations between the concepts of peace and violence with aesthetics, nature, the body, and environmental issues, The Poesis of Peace applies a multidisciplinary approach to case studies in both Western and non-Western contexts including Islam, Chinese philosophy, Buddhist and Hindu traditions. Established and renowned theologians and philosophers, such as Kevin Hart, Eduardo Mendieta, and Clemens Sedmak, as well as upcoming and talented young academics look at peace and non-violence through the lens of recent scholarly advances on the subject achieved in the fields of theology, philosophy, political theory, and environmentalism.

How did a Jewish teacher, healer, sage and mystic become the vehicle for so much hatred and harm directed against his own people? "Dialogue is demanding and difficult. It is often painful. It entails deep listening, letting others define themselves and being willing to confront and transform deep-rooted prejudices in ourselves. It requires the courage to re-envision absolutely everything we tend to cherish and protect, and to relinquish our entrenched vainglorious ego attachments, our inflated sense of 'I, me and mine.' This challenge to grow beyond tribalism, to approach others in a fair and reasonable way, is an essential step in our human evolution." —from the Invitation to the Reader Judaism and Christianity have had a volatile relationship in their two-thousand-year history. Anger, rivalry, insensitivity, bloodshed and murder have marred the special connection these two Abrahamic faiths share. In the last several decades, scholars, activists, laypeople and clergy have attempted to expose and eliminate the struggles between Jews and Christians. This collaborative effort brings together the voices of Christian scholar Ron Miller and Jewish scholar Laura Bernstein to further explore the roots of anti-Semitism in Christian faith and scripture. In a probing interfaith dialogue, Miller and Bernstein trace the Jewish-Christian schism to its very source in the first book of the New Testament, the Gospel of Matthew. Illuminating the often misunderstood context of Matthew’s gospel—a persecuted Christian minority writing some sixty years after Jesus’s death—this examination of a foundational Christian text discerns the ways in which the Jewishness of Jesus was forgotten and Jews and Judaism became Christianity’s foil. More important, it takes a renewed look at Matthew with contemporary retellings that present a new and better future of conciliation and compassion between the two faith traditions.

The wisdom from these stories can become a companion on your own spiritual journey. Native American Stories of the Sacred are intended for more than entertainment: they are teaching tales containing elegantly simple illustrations of time-honored truths. From tales of Creation to "Why?" stories that help explain the natural world around us, these stories highlight the sacredness of all life and affirm that we are each an integral part of all that is holy. Drawn from tribes across North America, these are careful retellings of traditional stories such as Son of Light's quest to win back his captured wife from the monstrous Man-Eagle; humble Muskrat’s noble self-sacrifice to establish solid land so other beings might live; Water Spider’s creative solution for retrieving fire for all the animals; and White Buffalo Calf Woman’s profound gift of the sacred pipe to the people. Each of the compelling stories in this collection illustrates principles that can guide you on your own spiritual quest. Now you can experience the wisdom of these teaching tales even if you have no previous knowledge of Native American traditions. SkyLight Illuminations provides insightful yet unobtrusive commentary that explains the cultural and spiritual significance of the seemingly mundane objects found in these stories—tobacco, gambling, even the exploits of mischievous tricksters such as Coyote and Weasel—while gracefully drawing comparisons to Christian, Jewish, Buddhist and Hindu religious traditions, among others. Whatever your spiritual heritage, these Native American stories of the sacred are sure to delight and inspire you with the sacredness of all Creation, and remind you that the earth does not belong to us—we belong to the earth.