Want to find meaning in Biblical narratives? Want to discover practical guidance for everyday life? Then turn to Texas Torah: the Interface of the Weekly Torah Portion with Everyday Life. Originally written by Rabbi Herb Cohen as a regular column in the Texas Jewish Post, the weekly discussions of the Torah portion provide fertile ground for serious-minded people of all faiths to find eternal wisdom in the Biblical text. Inside you will discover... why God consulted with the angels before creating man what the Torah can teach us about iconic movie stars Paul Newman, Richard Burton, and Marlon Brando the Bible's first "drum circle" the origins of My Space what a visit to Graceland can teach the spiritual seeker why it's never a good idea to retire what special lessons converts can teach born Jews what the Bible says about what kind of clothes to wear

The series Religion and Society (RS) contributes to the exploration of religions as social systems- both in Western and non-Western societies; in particular, it examines religions in their differentiation from, and intersection with, other cultural systems, such as art, economy, law and politics. Due attention is given to paradigmatic case or comparative studies that exhibit a clear theoretical orientation with the empirical and historical data of religion and such aspects of religion as ritual, the religious imagination, constructions of tradition, iconography, or media. In addition, the formation of religious communities, their construction of identity, and their relation to society and the wider public are key issues of this series.

This book features an exploration of the interaction between Darwinian ideas and Catholic doctrine. This coherent collection of original papers marks the 150 year anniversary since the publication of Charles Darwin's "Origin of Species" (1859). Although the area of evolution-related publications is vast, the area of interaction between Darwinian ideas and specifically Catholic doctrine has received limited attention. This interaction is quite distinct from the one between Darwinism and the Christian tradition in general. Interest in Darwin from the Catholic viewpoint has recently been rekindled. The major causes of this include: John Paul II's "Message to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences on Evolution" in 1996; (2) the document "Communion and Stewardship: Human Persons Created in the Image of God" issued in 2002; by the International Theological Commission under the supervision of Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, the present Pope Benedict XVI; Cardinal Christoph Schonborn apparent endorsement of Intelligent Design in his "New York Times" article "Finding Design in Nature" of July 7, 2005; and, Pope Benedict XVI's contributions in the recent collection of papers "Schopfung und Evolution" ("Creation and Evolution"), published in Germany in April, 2007. Responding to this heightened interest, the book offers a valuable collection of work from outstanding Catholic scholars in various fields.

B. W. Young describes and analyses the intellectual culture of the eighteenth-century Church of England, in particular relation to those developments traditionally described as constituting the Enlightenment. It challenges conventional perceptions of an intellectually moribund institution by contextualising the polemical and scholarly debates in which churchmen engaged. In particular, it delineates the vigorous clerical culture in which much eighteenth-century thought evolved. The book traces the creation of a self-consciously enlightened tradition within Anglicanism, which drew on Erasmianism, seventeenth-century eirenicism and the legacy of Locke. By emphasizing the variety of its intellectual life, the book challenges those notions of Enlightenment which advance predominantly political interpretations of this period. Thus, eighteenth-century critics of the Enlightenment, notably those who contributed to a burgeoning interest in mysticism, are equally integral to this study.

This book offers an investigation into the Christological ideas of three contemporary thinkers: Slavoj Zizek, Gianni Vattimo and Rene Girard.In the wake of Heidegger's announcement of the end of onto-theology and inspired by both Levinas and Derrida, many contemporary continental philosophers of religion search for a post-metaphysical God, a God who is often characterized as tout autre, wholly other.The Slovenian philosopher Slavoj Zizek is an exception to this rule. First, he clearly has another source of inspiration: neither Heidegger, Levinas or Derrida, but Lacan and the great thinkers of German Idealism (Kant, Schelling, and Hegel). Moreover, he does not aim at tracing a post-metaphysical God. His 'turn' to Christianity is the result of his concern to 'save' the achievements of modernity from fundamentalism, post-modern relativism and religious obscurantism.The Italian philosopher Gianni Vattimo is an intermediary. His sources (mainly Nietzsche and Heidegger) seem to indicate that he aligns with those philosophers whose works are inspired by Heidegger, Levinas and Derrida. Indeed, Vattimo is also searching for the God who comes after metaphysics, but he explicitly rejects the wholly-other God. With Zizek, Vattimo shares a Christological interest, an attention for the event of the Incarnation and the conviction that the Incarnation amounts to the end of God's transcendence. Both thinkers also defend the uniqueness of Christianity vis-a-vis natural religiosity. In this way, they seem to share at least some affinity with the views of the French-American literary critic and fundamental anthropologist Rene Girard, who has also defended the uniqueness of Christianity and claims that the latter broke away from the violent transcendence of the natural religions.The book will investigate the Christological ideas of these three contemporary thinkers, focussing on the topics of the relation between transcendence and the event of the Incarnation on the one hand, and the topic of the uniqueness of Christianity on the other.

FEW BRITISH EXPLORERS IN ARABIA have produced books whose importance as travelogues is trans-cended by their literary quality. One such is The Holy Cities of Arabia, published to critical acclaim in 1928, with its author hailed as a worthy successor to Burckhardt, Burton and Doughty. Unrivalled among works by Western travellers to Islam's holy cities, this account of a pilgrimage to Makkah in 1925-26 is made all the more remark-able by its author's timing. In 1925 `Abd al-`Aziz Ibn Saud brought to an end centuries of rule over the Hijaz by the Hashimite sharifs and their Ottoman overlords. Rutter, living as a learned Muslim Arab in a Makkan household, had a ringside seat as Riyadh imposed its writ on Islam's holy cities. As striking as his account of life in Makkah before modernization are his interviews with Ibn Saud, and his journeys to al-Ta'if and to the City of the Prophet, al-Madinah. The Holy Cities of Arabia proved to be its author's only full-length work. After a brief career as a Middle East traveller, Rutter lapsed into obscurity. This new edition aims to revive a neglected masterpiece and to establish Rutter's reputation. Little was known about him until now and the introduction tells the story of his life for the first time, assessing his talents as a travel writer and analysing his significance as a British convert.

This collection explores the controversial and perhaps even abject idea that evils, large and small, human and natural, may have a central positive function to play in our lives. For centuries a concern of religious thinkers from the Christian tradition, very little systematic work has been done to explore this idea from the secular point of view.

Volume XXIV of the distinguished annual Studies in Contemporary Jewry explores the question of relations between Jews and Protestants in modern times. One of the four major branches of Christianity, Protestantism is perhaps the most difficult to write about; it has innumerable sects and churches within it, from the loosely organized Religious Society of Friends to the conservative Evangelicals of the Bible Belt. Different strands of Protestantism hold vastly different views on theology, social problems, and politics. These views play out in differing attitudes and relationships between mainstream Protestant churches and Jews, Judaism, and the State of Israel. In this volume, established scholars from multiple disciplines and various countries delve into these essential questions of the "Protestant-Jewish conundrum." The discussion begins with a trenchant analysis of the historical framework in which Protestant ideas towards Jews and Judaism were formed. Contributors delve into diverse topics including the attitudes of the Evangelical movement toward Jews and Israel; Protestant reactions to Mel Gibson's blockbuster "The Passion of the Christ."; German-Protestant behavior during and after Nazi era; and mainstream Protestant attitudes towards Israel and the Israeli-Arab conflict.. Taken as a whole, this compendium presents discussions and questions central to the ongoing development of Jewish-Protestant relations. Studies in Contemporary Jewry seeks to provide its readers with up-to-date and accessible scholarship on questions of interest in the general field of modern Jewish studies. Studies in Contemporary Jewry presents new approaches to the scholarly work of the latest generation of researchers working on Jewish history, sociology, demography, political science, and culture.

This book introduces Reformed theology by surveying the doctrinal concerns that have shaped its historical development. The book sketches the diversity of the Reformed tradition through the past five centuries even as it highlights the continuity with regard to certain theological emphases. In so doing, it accentuates that Reformed theology is marked by both formal ('the always reforming church') and material ('the Reformed church') interests. Furthermore, it attends to both revisionary and conservative trends within the Reformed tradition. The book covers eight major theological themes: Word of God, covenant, God and Christ, sin and grace, faith, worship, confessions and authority, and culture and eschatology. It engages a variety of Reformed confessional writings, as well as a number of individual theologians (including Zwingli, Calvin, Bullinger, Bucer, Beza, Owen, Turretin, Edwards, Schleiermacher, Hodge, Shedd, Heppe, Bavinck, Barth, and Niebuhr). "Doing Theology" introduces the major Christian traditions and their way of theological reflection. The volumes focus on the origins of a particular theological tradition, its foundations, key concepts, eminent thinkers and historical development. The series is aimed readers who want to learn more about their own theological heritage and identity: theology undergraduates, students in ministerial training and church study groups.

More than two hundred years ago, Dr. William Paley wrote a series of books that marshaled evidence for the Christian faith. His books were often required reading at major institutions of learning. Believers and unbelievers alike wrestled with Paley's arguments and his compelling presentation of them. Paley's Natural Theology was one of those books. In it, he showed from biology and human anatomy that the argument for design was a clear and self-evident inference from the facts, and from that point of departure proposed that only a designer God could adequately account for those facts. His famous analogy from an intricate watch to the required deduction that there exists a watchmaker persists to this day. When evolutionary theory rose to dominance, it was thought that Paley's views on 'intelligent design' had been fully put to rest. However, each new generation discovers anew that evolutionary theory requires them to accept as true what appears, on its face, to be patently absurd: that immense complexity, surpassing in its apparent genius what 1,000 human geniuses cannot create was nonetheless the product of unguided, intrinsically dumb, natural forces. Unsatisfied, they consider the alternatives. The argument is sure to rage for another two hundred years and Dr. Paley's Natural Theology will prove to be relevant then as it is relevant today, advances in our understanding of biology notwithstanding, and, actually, because of those very same advances. "I do not think I hardly ever admired a book more than Paley's Natural Theology: I could almost formerly have said it by heart." Charles Darwin, 1859.

This volume is based upon the seventh series of lectures delivered at Yale University on the Foundation established by the late Dwight H. Terry of Plymouth, Connecticut, through his gift of an endowment fund for the delivery and subsequent publication of "Lectures on Religion in the Light of Science and Philosophy." The deed of gift declares that "the object of this Foundation is not the promotion of scientific investigation and discovery, but rather the assimilation and interpretation of that which has been or shall be hereafter discovered, and its application to human welfare, especially by the building of the truths of science and philosophy into the structure of a broadened and purified religion. The beliefs of men in the past, the author makes clear, were inevitably inspired by their fears of an incomprehensible universe and were derived from their ideas of the supernatural. Science has gradually created a new set of sanctions; and the religion of today, freed from the dread of the unknown, must be formed on this new foundation. Professor Montague proceeds to outline the basis of a philosophy of life reconceived from this point of view, applying to it the term Promethean Religion. It is a volume which will stimulate new thought and discussion, a distinguished addition to the important volumes already published on the Dwight Harrington Terry Foundation.