Most readers first encounter Augustine's love for Scripture's words in the many biblical allusions of his masterwork, the Confessions. Augustine does not merely quote texts, but in many ways makes Scripture itself tell the story. In his journey from darkness to light, Augustine becomes Adam in the Garden of Eden, the Prodigal Son of Jesus' parable, the Pauline double personality at once devoted to and rebellious against God's law. Throughout he speaks the words of the Psalms as if he had written them. Crucial to Augustine's self-portrayal is his skill at transposing himself into the texts. He sees their properties and dynamics as his own, and by extension, every believing reader's own. In Christ Meets Me Everywhere, Michael Cameron argues that Augustine wanted to train readers of Scripture to transpose themselves into the texts in the same way he did, by the same process of figuration that he found at its core. Tracking Augustine's developing practice of self-transposition into the figures of the biblical texts over the course of his entire career, Cameron shows that this practice is the key to Augustine's hermeneutics.

Willie Esterhuyse is 'n produk en kind van Suid-Afrika; wereldbekend as denker, spreker en raadgewer vir staatsleiers. Sy passie vir reis bring hom uit by oerbeskawings waar hy godsdiens se geboorte sien. Tydens besoeke aan Malta raak hy vertroud met die eilandjie se onstuimige voorgeskiedenis en erfenisterreine. Hy ontdek veral die arena vir die konflik tussen Christene en Moslems, 'n kwessie wat vandag die wereld aan die praat en vrees het. In opvolg van, God en die gode van Egipte, en Die God van Genesis, sluit hy die trilogie af met Geagte Jahwe. Meesterlik besluit hy om direk 11 briewe te rig aan God op sy Bybelse noemnaam, Jahwe. Hierin kan Willie vlymskerp die kernsake van ons tyd oopsny en basiese lewensvrae oopboor, soos die stryd tussen gelowe, ineenstorting van samelewings. Hy bied ook rigting vir soekende denkers oor 'n ander kyk op God vir ons tyd. Willie daag ons uit om verder te dink: met die "gees van omgee" wat verby die stukkkend en seer kyk - na 'n wereld wat menslik en leefbaar vir almal is.

This study introduces its readers to the differing positions and methods developed by contemporary scholars in Pauline studies. By setting out these views, and the evidence on which they are based, it equips the reader to approach the study of Paul with an awareness of the range of current debate and a knowledge of the evidence and arguments they will encounter. After considering Paul's importance and influence, and the important sources for the study of Paul, the book examines: the earliest period of Christianity - from Jesus to Paul; Paul's life before and after his 'conversion'; his individual letters; the major elements of his theology; his attitude to Israel and the Jewish law; new approaches to the study of Paul, including social-scientific and feminist approaches; and Paul's legacy in the New Testament and beyond. Newly added for the third edition are sections on the interest in Paul's thought from philosophers such as Agamnen and Badiou, and Paul and sexuality. More generally the volume has been fully updated with respect to bibliography, and to presenting the latest debates surrounding Paul's thought in a manageable format - including those around Pauline anthropology, Paul and politics and the concept of righteousness. The helpful study questions at the end of each chapter have been revised, as have the reading lists.

The book provides an original and important narrative on the significance of canon in the Christian tradition. Standard accounts of canon reduce canon to scripture and treat scripture as a criterion of truth. Scripture is then related in positive or negative ways to tradition, reason, and experience. Such projects involve a misreading of the meaning and content of canon -- they locate the canonical heritage of the church within epistemology -- and Abraham charts the fatal consquences of this move, from the Fathers to modern feminist theology. In the process he shows that the central epistemological concerns of the Enlightenment have Christian origins and echoes. He also shows that the crucial developments of theology from the Reformation onwards involve extraordinary efforts to fix the foundations of faith. This trajectory is now exhausted theologically and spiritually. Hence, the door is opened for a recovery of the full canonical heritage of the early church and for fresh work on the epistemology of theology.

"World and Church" deals with the conflict between religiosity and life in the world. Deliberately, Schillebeeckx turns around the order of the words in the idiom 'church and world', thereby stressing the embedding of faith and church life in particular contexts. In the first three chapters he reflects on this tension as he experienced it in burgeoning existentialism and debates between Catholics and Marxists in those turbulent years in Paris, where he was living immediately after World War II. It includes thoughts on pastoral work among the working class and the then popular pretres-ouvriers movement. He looks at some social problems and the mutual interrogation of believers and non-believers, also in light of the ideological compartmentalisation ('pillarization') evident in diverse spheres of European society: education, social work and health care. Schillebeeckx concludes by considering the responsibility of Catholic intellectuals and academics for the future of the world and the church, including the possible significance of a Catholic university

Naturalistic ethics is the reigning paradigm among contemporary ethicists; in God and Cosmos, Baggett and Walls argue that this approach is seriously flawed. This book canvasses a broad array of secular and naturalistic ethical theories in an effort to test their adequacy in accounting for moral duties, intrinsic human value, prospects for radical moral transformation, and the rationality of morality. In each case, the authors argue, although various secular accounts provide real insights and indeed share common ground with theistic ethics, the resources of classical theism and orthodox Christianity provide the better explanation of the moral realities under consideration. Among such realities is the fundamental insight behind the problem of evil, namely, that the world is not as it should be. Baggett and Walls argue that God and the world, taken together, exhibit superior explanatory scope and power for morality classically construed, without the need to water down the categories of morality, the import of human value, the prescriptive strength of moral obligations, or the deliverances of the logic, language, and phenomenology of moral experience. This book thus provides a cogent moral argument for God's existence, one that is abductive, teleological, and cumulative.

Explore Answers to Life's Most Important Theological Questions. Over 175,000 Copies Sold! How do we know the Bible is God's Word? What is sin and where did it come from? How is Jesus fully God and fully man? What are spiritual gifts? When and how will Christ return? If you've asked questions like these, then systematic theology is no abstract term. It's an approach to finding answers every Christian needs to know. The second edition of Bible Doctrine by respected theologian Wayne Grudem takes a widely used upper-level textbook on systematic theology and makes it accessible. Abridged from the second edition of Wayne Grudem's award-winning Systematic Theology, Bible Doctrine covers the same essentials of the faith, giving you a firm grasp on seven key topics: The Doctrine of the Word of God The Doctrine of God The Doctrine of Man The Doctrine of Christ The Doctrine of the Application of Redemption The Doctrine of the Church The Doctrine of the Future. You don't need to have had several years of Bible college or seminary training to reap the benefits of Bible Doctrine. It's easy to understand and packed with biblical answers to your most pressing theological questions. This new edition now includes: New, thoughtful critiques of open theism, the new perspective on Paul, Molinism (or "middle knowledge"), "Free Grace" theology, and the preterist view of Christ's second coming Completely revised, stronger chapter on the clarity of Scripture Completely revised, stronger chapter on creation and evolution. New discussion of how biblical inerrancy applies to some specific "problem verses" in the Gospels Additional material respectfully explaining evangelical Protestant differences with Roman Catholicism (with extensive interaction with the Catechism of the Roman Catholic Church), Protestant liberalism, and Mormonism Completely updated bibliographies All Scripture quotations updated from RSV to ESV An explanation of why monogenes in John 3:16 and elsewhere should be translated as "only begotten" rather than merely "only" An extensive discussion on the eternal submission of the Son to the Father A discussion of recent criticisms of the penal substitutionary view of the atonement Numerous other updates and corrections that have be prompted by letters and emails from people around the world and by interaction with the students Wayne has taught over the last 26 years both at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School and at Phoenix Seminary

A milestone in the history of popular theology, 'The Screwtape Letters' is an iconic classic on spiritual warfare and the power of the devil. This profound and striking narrative takes the form of a series of letters from Screwtape, a devil high in the Infernal Civil Service, to his nephew Wormwood, a junior colleague engaged in his first mission on earth trying to secure the damnation of a young man who has just become a Christian. Although the young man initially looks to be a willing victim, he changes his ways and is 'lost' to the young devil. Dedicated to Lewis's friend and colleague J.R.R. Tolkien, 'The Screwtape Letters' is a timeless classic on spiritual conflict and the invisible realities which are part of our religious experience.

Rene Girard holds up the gospels as mirrors that reveal our broken humanity, and shows that they also reflect a new reality that can make us whole. Like Simone Weil, Girard looks at the Bible as a map of human behavior, and sees Jesus Christ as the turning point leading to new life.

The title echoes Jesus' words: "I saw Satan falling like lightning from heaven". Girard persuades us that even as our world grows increasingly violent the power of the Christ-event is so great that the evils of scapegoating and sacrifice are being defeated even now. A new community, God's nonviolent kingdom, is being realized -- even now.

What happens when authority is abused?Imagine our nation without police officersImagine our lives without the protection of the badge.Imagine traveling without stop signs, traffic signals, and roadside warnings.Imagine no violations, no punishments--a grade school playground without rules, a government without leaders...You might as well imagine the earth without gravity, because without authority, there would be chaos.But what happens when authority is misused? Or worse, what happens when spiritual abuse is written off as "authority"?As surely as the absence of authority produces chaos, the abuse of authority produces destruction. Countless people have fallen victim to the manipulation of power and authority. Lives have been warped forever, marriages have been destroyed, women and children have been abused, and husbands and fathers undermined within the boundaries of their home. Also, tragically, it's inside the church--where salvation, healing, freedom, and love should abound--that some of the worst authority abuse takes place. God's design for authority has been misunderstood, twisted, and manipulated, leaving innocent people as victims and prisoners of controlling, abusive situations. The wounded and weak have been preyed upon, and the guilty have been frightened into submission by leaders who use people to improve their own self-esteem or advance their careers.Wake up!!! This is not God's design for the church--or authority.In this book, Bishop George Bloomer discusses: Gods true design for authorityWhy people abuse authorityThe effects of authority abuse in the homeHow to recognize an authority abuserGod's restoration plan for the abused and the abuserAndThe key to breaking freefrom the bondage of spiritual abuse.