How can one escape God's wrath and gain eternal life? On this crucial theological question, Paul differs from other members of the second-Temple Jewish community. Their soteriology is synergistic: for them, though eschatological salvation is due to God's merciful removal of human guilt, obedience to the Law is also indispensable. The divine and the human co-operate. Paul however believes that under such a scheme anything less than perfect obedience to the Law is futile. In consequence, if there is to be salvation for sinful humans, it must be a salvation independent of all human effort and achievement, and thus solely through faith. Contrary to the recent consensus, Paul's concern was not primarily the inclusion of gentiles into the church. This non-synergistic soteriology of Paul's may seem undermined by some of his own statements, that believers must submit to eschatological judgment and that the person without good works will be disqualified from eschatological salvation. But this conclusion is incorrect. For what he holds is that the good works indispensable for salvation are necessarily performed by the believer as manifestations of the indwelling Spirit present in those who have faith in Christ.

Recent research on Jesus' teaching about the Kingdom of God has in common the assumption that it remains the same throughout the time of his proclamation of it. The data that cannot be harmonized are usually judged to be inauthentic, originating from Christian prophets in the early church. Smith shows in closely argued detail how essential it is to differentiate two historical contexts for Jesus' teaching about the Kingdom of God. The nature of the Kingdom of God is conditional upon its acceptance and the acceptance of its messenger-which is to say, Jesus' teaching about the Kingdom of God is hypothetical. This is the non-rejection context of Jesus' teaching about the Kingdom of God. But some of Jesus' teaching about the Kingdom of God presupposes a context of the rejection of his message by the majority of Jews and especially the Jewish authorities. In this new context, Jesus teaches that the Kingdom will still come but not in the way first delineated, in the non-rejection context. This can be called the rejection context of Jesus' teaching about the Kingdom of God. No attempt should be made to assimilate all the data into one historical context. Distinguishing two contexts for Jesus' teaching about the Kingdom of God allows us to appreciate how Jesus modifies his teaching in the light of the rejection of the Kingdom. Without this differentiation of two historical contexts, it is impossible to make sense of Jesus' teaching about the Kingdom of God.

In recent years, the scholarly consensus has emerged that early Judaism should no longer be classified as a religion of legalistic works on righteousness, but rather defined primarily by God's covenant with Israel. In this work, it is argued, instead, that there is actually a tension in early Judaism between God as righteous judge and as merciful. As E. Sjoberg maintained in his Gott und Sunder im palastinischen Judentum, in the sources used for a reconstruction of early Judaism, there are two mutually exclusive ways in which God is said to relate to human beings. First, God as righteous judge deals with human beings as they deserve. They are assumed to be morally free and responsible, and God judges and recompenses them in history and eschatologically. Not only are the wicked punished for their sins, but the righteous are also rewarded for their obedience. And second, God as merciful does not deal with human beings as they deserve. Rather, he removes the guilt resulting from disobedience to the Law, sometimes on the simple condition of repentance. This means that a person can escape the consequences of disobedience. The understanding of God in the sources vacillates between God as righteous judge and God as merciful, without coming down definitively on one side to the exclusion of the other."

The virtually universal popularity of caffeine, together with concerns about its potential pathogenic effects, have made it one of the most extensively studied drugs in history. However, despite the massive scientific literature on this important substance, most reviews have either focused on limited areas of study or been produced in popular form by individuals with surprisingly little relevant scientific background. Caffeine and Activation Theory: Effects on Health and Behavior brings together the leading experts from seven different countries to provide researchers and clinicians with the most comprehensive and balanced review of the scientific literature on the effects of caffeine found anywhere. It devotes unprecedented coverage to the impact of caffeine on cardiovascular functioning and pathology, details the pharmacological properties and neurophysiological effects of the drug, and thoroughly reviews literature concerned with the role of this powerful stimulant in mood, task performance, and psychopathology. This important new book is also the first source to provide an integrative scientific treatment of the effects of caffeine consumption on menstrual endocrinology and pathology, as well as on reproduction. Rounding out the coverage is a thorough review of emerging research on the possible benefits of caffeine and catechins in green and black teas. The highly integrative final chapter provides a clear understanding of what is known about the effects of caffeine, identifies specific areas in which further research is needed, and provides important methodological guidelines that promise to optimize future research endeavors. Filling the need for a current comprehensive resource, this volume provides extensive reviews of the major bodies of literature on caffeine, stimulates and guides future research, and provides clinicians with the information they need to understand, diagnose, and treat the effects of caffeine consumption in their pati

Barry D. Smith studies the salvation-historical meaning of Jesus' death (commonly known as the atonement) in the New Testament. Smith works his way through the four theories of the doctrine of the atonement that have emerged in the history of Christian theology: moral influence, governmental, satisfaction and Christus victor theories. Smith works from the premise that, for a theory of the atonement to be successful, no biblical data may be omitted or distorted, and the generalized concepts used to comprehend the biblical data must be easily seen as implicit in the data. From this vantage point, Smith advances a formulation of the atonement that is best supported by the biblical text itself. The conclusion Smith reaches is that the biblical data supports both the penal-substitutionary version of the satisfaction theory and the Christus victor theory of the atonement, each of which should be viewed as two parts of a more inclusive theory of atonement present in the New Testament.

About the Contributor(s): Barry D. Smith is Professor of Philosophy and Religious Studies at Crandall University in New Brunswick, Canada. He is the author of The Indescribable God: Divine Otherness in Christian Theology (2012) and What Must We Do to Be Saved? Paul Parts Company with His Jewish Heritage (2007).

Synopsis: The God of classical Christian faith is radically transcendent--utterly beyond understanding and words. So if God is to be known it must be in the luminous darkness of unknowing. Drawing on a wide range of primary sources--biblical, patristic, and medieval--Barry D. Smith identifies and explores seven ways of expressing the otherness of God in classical Christian thinking. By allowing historical theologians to speak for themselves, he shows how an aversion to ontotheology long precedes postmodernism. The book first lays out the Old Testament and New Testament foundations for subsequent Christian reflections on divine transcendence. These were the teachings that the early church assumed and, with the assistance of Greek philosophy, further refined with their own set of apophatic conceptual tools. The main focus of the book is a sevenfold exposition of that theological refinement. Smith concludes by looking towards possible future theological developments within this apophatic tradition. Drawing on the theological methodology of historic Christianity, he indicates how a synthesis of the biblical teaching on the otherness of God with philosophical traditions other than those inherited from Greek philosophy is also possible. Endorsements: "The process by which Greek thought forms were used by Christian thinkers was eclectic and nuanced. The great value of The Indescribable God is it pays full attention both to the ideas of God's incomprehensibility in Scripture and to the primary texts of Christian thinkers from the early church fathers to Calvin and beyond, letting both kinds of sources speak for themselves. The result is a first-class tool for the student of Christian doctrine." --Paul Helm, Teaching Fellow, Regent College Author Biography: Barry D. Smith is Professor of Philosophy and Religious Studies at Crandall University in New Brunswick, Canada. He is the author of Jesus' Twofold Teaching about the Kingdom of God (2009) and What Must We Do to Be Saved? Paul Parts Company with His Jewish Heritage (2007).

Barry D. Smith studies the salvation-historical meaning of Jesus' death (commonly known as the atonement) in the New Testament. Smith works his way through the four theories of the doctrine of the atonement that have emerged in the history of Christian theology: moral influence, governmental, satisfaction and Christus victor theories. Smith works from the premise that, for a theory of the atonement to be successful, no biblical data may be omitted or distorted, and the generalized concepts used to comprehend the biblical data must be easily seen as implicit in the data. From this vantage point, Smith advances a formulation of the atonement that is best supported by the biblical text itself. The conclusion Smith reaches is that the biblical data supports both the penal-substitutionary version of the satisfaction theory and the Christus victor theory of the atonement, each of which should be viewed as two parts of a more inclusive theory of atonement present in the New Testament.

The virtually universal popularity of caffeine, together with concerns about its potential pathogenic effects, have made it one of the most extensively studied drugs in history. However, despite the massive scientific literature on this important substance, most reviews have either focused on limited areas of study or been produced in popular form by individuals with surprisingly little relevant scientific background. Caffeine and Activation Theory: Effects on Health and Behavior brings together the leading experts from seven different countries to provide researchers and clinicians with the most comprehensive and balanced review of the scientific literature on the effects of caffeine found anywhere. It devotes unprecedented coverage to the impact of caffeine on cardiovascular functioning and pathology, details the pharmacological properties and neurophysiological effects of the drug, and thoroughly reviews literature concerned with the role of this powerful stimulant in mood, task performance, and psychopathology. This important new book is also the first source to provide an integrative scientific treatment of the effects of caffeine consumption on menstrual endocrinology and pathology, as well as on reproduction. Rounding out the coverage is a thorough review of emerging research on the possible benefits of caffeine and catechins in green and black teas. The highly integrative final chapter provides a clear understanding of what is known about the effects of caffeine, identifies specific areas in which further research is needed, and provides important methodological guidelines that promise to optimize future research endeavors. Filling the need for a current comprehensive resource, this volume provides extensive reviews of the major bodies of literature on caffeine, stimulates and guides future research, and provides clinicians with the information they need to understand, diagnose, and treat the effects of caffeine consumption in their patients.