While concentrated on the famous Passio Perpetuae et Felicitatis, this book focuses on an area that has so far been somewhat marginalized or even overlooked by modern interpreters: the recontextualizing of the Passio Perpetuae in the subsequent reception of this text in the literature of the early Church. Since its composition in the early decades of the 3rd century, the Passio Perpetuae was enjoying an extraordinary authority and popularity. However, it contained a number of revolutionary and innovative features that were in conflict with existing social and theological conventions. This book analyses all relevant texts from the 3rd to 5th centuries in which Perpetua and her comrades are mentioned, and demonstrates the ways in which these texts strive to normalize the innovative aspects of the Passio Perpetuae. These efforts, visible as they are already on careful examination of the passages of the editor of the passio, continue from Tertullian to Augustine and his followers. The normalization of the narrative reaches its peak in the so-called Acta Perpetuae which represent a radical rewriting of the original and an attempt to replace it by a purified text, more compliant with the changed socio-theological hierarchies.

Life in this world is challenging. Brokenness and sin surround us. Controversies and confusion about complicated issues seem endless. It’s easy for Christians to be overwhelmed as they struggle to remain faithful to God’s teaching in a rapidly changing world. Along with the changes have come great problems and difficult questions.

What kind of future does Africa have? What, if anything, can the children of God do for their native lands and peoples?

Problems are not solved until we acknowledge them and face them openly, honestly, and courageously. In Biblical Christianity in Modern Africa, Wilbur O’Donovan addresses the problems facing the church in Africa from a biblical perspective. He wisely and boldly confronts issues that challenge the church in Africa, such as: Urbanization, Pornography, Poverty, False teaching, Broken marriages.

Denominationalism Although modern Africa’s problems are great, they are not intimidating to God. God does not change, and remembering what God did for his people in the past will help us know what he can do today. Biblical Christianity in Modern Africa reminds us that the wisdom of God is the answer to the problems of Africa today, just as they were to the people who lived thousands of years ago.

Religious Minorities and Cultural Diversity in the Dutch Republic explores various aspects of the religious and cultural diversity of the early Dutch Republic and analyses how the different confessional groups established their own identity and how their members interacted with one another in a highly hybrid culture. This volume is to honour Dr. Piet Visser on the occasion of his 65th birthday. Piet Visser has become a leading scholar in the field of the Anabaptist and Mennonite History. Since January 1, 2002, he served as the chair of Anabaptist/Mennonite History and Kindred Spirits at the Doopsgezind Seminarium, VU-University, Amsterdam.

"The Sleeping Giant" is the fastest-growing minority group in the U.S.--the Hispanic community. Hispanics, especially Puerto Ricans, Cubans and Mexicans, are changing society and the church. As a second-generation Puerto Rican, born and reared in El Barrio of New York City, Manuel Ortiz knows first-hand what it is like to be a Hispanic in the U.S. As a sociologist, he recognizes the exciting potential for the future of the church--if leadership development is undertaken. Oritz first explores the unique needs and concerns of Hispanics in the U.S. Then he turns to key missiological issues, including Protestant-Catholic relationships, justice, racial reconcilliation and ecclesiastical structures. Ortiz has interviewed numerous Hispanic leaders working in a variety of contexts and describes their models for ministry. Finally, the book focuses on leadership training and education, with a particular emphasis on developing second-generation leadership. The sleeping giant must not be ignored. This is a book that will awaken awareness of the possibilities of the Hispanic church.

Baptists in America began the eighteenth century a small, scattered, often harassed sect in a vast sea of religious options. By the early nineteenth century, they were a unified, powerful, and rapidly-growing denomination, poised to send missionaries to the other side of the world. One of the most influential yet neglected leaders in that transformation was Oliver Hart, longtime pastor of the Charleston Baptist Church. Oliver Hart and the Rise of Baptist America is the first modern biography of Hart, arguably the most important evangelical leader in the pre-Revolutionary South. During his thirty years in Charleston, Hart emerged as the region's most important Baptist denominational architect. His outspoken patriotism forced him to flee Charleston when the British army invaded Charleston in 1780, but he left behind a southern Baptist people forever changed by his energetic ministry. Hart's accommodating stance toward slavery enabled him and the white Baptists who followed him to reach the center of southern society, but also eventually doomed the national Baptist denomination of Hart's dreams. More than a biography, Oliver Hart and the Rise of Baptist America seamlessly intertwines Hart's story with that of eighteenth-century American Baptists, providing one of the most thorough accounts to date of this important and understudied religious group's development. This book makes a significant contribution to the study of Baptist life and evangelicalism in the pre-Revolutionary South and beyond.

For contemporary Western readers, it can be easy to miss or misread cultural nuances in the New Testament. To hear the text correctly we must be attuned to its original context. As David deSilva demonstrates, keys to interpretation are found in paying attention to four essential cultural themes: honor and shame, patronage and reciprocity, kinship and family, and purity and pollution. Through our understanding of honor and shame in the Mediterranean world, we gain new appreciation for how early Christians sustained commitment to a distinctive Christian identity and practice. By examining the protocols of patronage and reciprocity, we grasp more firmly the connections between God's grace and our response. In exploring kinship and household relations, we grasp more fully the ethos of the early Christian communities as a new family brought together by God. And by investigating the notions of purity and pollution along with their associated practices, we realize how the ancient map of society and the world was revised by the power of the gospel. This new edition is thoroughly revised and expanded with up-to-date scholarship. A milestone work in the study of New Testament cultural backgrounds, Honor, Patronage, Kinship, and Purity offers a deeper appreciation of the New Testament, the gospel, and Christian discipleship.