Through the intensely intimate relationship that arises between God and humans in the incarnation of the Word in Christ, God gives us the gift of God's own life. This simple claim provides the basis for Kathryn Tanner's powerful study of the centrality of Jesus Christ for all Christian thought and life: if the divine and the human are united in Christ, then Jesus can be seen as key to the pattern that organizes the whole, even while God's ways remain beyond our grasp. Drawing on the history of Christian thought to develop an innovative Christ-centered theology, this book sheds fresh light on major theological issues such as the imago dei, the relationship between nature and grace, the Trinity's implications for human community, and the Spirit's manner of working in human lives. Originally delivered as Warfield Lectures at Princeton Theological Seminary, it offers a creative and compelling contribution to contemporary theology.

Theologians are increasingly looking to cultural criticism, rather than philosophy, as a dialogue partner for cross-disciplinary studies. This book explores the importance of this shift by bringing together scholars from a variety of theological perspectives to analyze different contemporary theories of cultural movements. The book is divided into two parts. The first examines the theoretical relationship between theology and cultural studies. The second consists of theological analyses of a series of controversial topics (including race, class, resistance movements, and identity politics) that cry out for theological reflection.

The Oxford Handbook of Systematic Theology brings together a set of original and authoritative accounts of all the major areas of current research in Christian systematic theology, offering a thorough survey of the state of the discipline and of its prospects for those undertaking research and teaching in the field. The Handbook engages in a comprehensive examination of themes and approaches, guiding the reader through current debates and literatures in the context of the historical development of systematic theological reflection. Organized thematically, it treats in detail the full array of topics in systematic theology, as well as questions of its sources and norms, its relation to other theological and non-theological fields of enquiry, and some major trends in current work. Each chapter provides an analysis of research and debate on its topic, identifying and interpreting options and laying out the basis for the reader to explore the territory, asking: What are the critical issues? How have these issues developed and been expounded? What are current prospects? The focus is on doctrinal (rather than historical) questions, and on major (rather than ephemeral) debates. The aim is to stimulate readers to reach theological judgements on the basis of consideration of the range of opinion. Drawn from Europe, the UK, and North America, the authors are all leading practitioners of the discipline. Readers will find expert guidance as well as creative suggestions about the future direction of the study of Christian doctrine.

The Oxford Handbook of Systematic Theology brings together a set of original and authoritative accounts of all the major areas of current research in Christian systematic theology, offering a thorough survey of the state of the discipline and of its prospects for those undertaking research and teaching in the field. The Handbook engages in a comprehensive examination of themes and approaches, guiding the reader through current debates and literatures in the context of the historical development of systematic theological reflection. Organized thematically, it treats in detail the full array of topics in systematic theology, as well as questions of its sources and norms, its relation to other theological and non-theological fields of enquiry, and some major trends in current work. Each chapter provides an analysis of research and debate on its topic. The focus is on doctrinal (rather than historical) questions, and on major (rather than ephemeral) debates. The aim is to stimulate readers to reach theological judgements on the basis of consideration of the range of opinion. Drawn from Europe, the UK, and North America, the authors are all leading practitioners of the discipline. Readers will find expert guidance as well as creative suggestions about the future direction of the study of Christian doctrine.

Theologians are increasingly looking to cultural criticism, rather than philosophy, as a dialogue partner for cross-disciplinary studies. This book explores the importance of this shift by bringing together scholars from a variety of theological perspectives to analyze different contemporary theories of cultural movements. The book is divided into two parts. The first examines the theoretical relationship between theology and cultural studies. The second consists of theological analyses of a series of controversial topics (including race, class, resistance movements, and identity politics) that cry out for theological reflection.

One of the world's most celebrated theologians argues for a Protestant anti-work ethic In his classic The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, Max Weber famously showed how Christian beliefs and practices could shape persons in line with capitalism. In this significant reimagining of Weber's work, Kathryn Tanner provocatively reverses this thesis, arguing that Christianity can offer a direct challenge to the largely uncontested growth of capitalism. Exploring the cultural forms typical of the current finance-dominated system of capitalism, Tanner shows how they can be countered by Christian beliefs and practices with a comparable person-shaping capacity. Addressing head-on the issues of economic inequality, structural under- and unemployment, and capitalism's unstable boom/bust cycles, she draws deeply on the theological resources within Christianity to imagine anew a world of human flourishing. This book promises to be one of the most important theological books in recent years.

Since the 1970s exciting new directions in the study of culture have erupted to critique and displace earlier, largely static notions. These more dynamic models stress the indeterminate, fragmented, even conflictual character of cultural processes and completely alter the framework for thinking theologically about them. In fact, Tanner argues, the new orientation in cultural theory and anthropology affords fresh opportunities for religious thought and opens new vistas for theology, especially on how Christians conceive of the theological task, theological diversity and inculturation, and even Christianity's own cultural identity.

Through the intensely intimate relationship that arises between God and humans in the incarnation of the Word in Christ, God gives us the gift of God's own life. This simple claim provides the basis for Kathryn Tanner's powerful study of the centrality of Jesus Christ for all Christian thought and life: if the divine and the human are united in Christ, then Jesus can be seen as key to the pattern that organizes the whole, even while God's ways remain beyond our grasp. Drawing on the history of Christian thought to develop an innovative Christ-centered theology, this book sheds fresh light on major theological issues such as the imago dei, the relationship between nature and grace, the Trinity's implications for human community, and the Spirit's manner of working in human lives. Originally delivered as Warfield Lectures at Princeton Theological Seminary, it offers a creative and compelling contribution to contemporary theology.

Are there any fair and viable alternatives to global capitalism? University of Chicago theologian Kathryn Tanner offers here a serious and creative proposal for evaluating economic theory and behaviour through a theological lens.

In recent decades economic dislocation, immigration, new architecture, and other forces have transformed the physical, social, and even religious landscape of large cities. There gleaming skyscrapers tower over struggling ghettos, abandoned businesses mar upscale shopping areas, and tall-steeple churches sometimes languish where storefront mosques thrive. Exploring the religious significance of this new urban landscape, a group of theologians, members of the Workgroup on Constructive Christian Theology, traveled to select cities and found an exciting, vibrant, and multivoiced religious spirit at work. In these essays five leading American theologians delve deeply into the contemporary spiritual geographies of five cities, capturing, through a mix of personal and historical narrative, political analysis, and theological rumination, a sense of this new sacred space and the spirit aborning there.

With simplicity and elegance, Tanner sketches a historically informed vision of the faith. Chapter 1 recovers strands of early Christian accounts of Jesus and his significance for a very different age. Chapter 2 situates Christology in a religious vision of the whole cosmos, while Chapter 3 lays out the ethical and political implications of the vision. Chapter 4 speculates about the "end" of things in Christ. Tanner's work was developed from the Scottish Journal of Theology lectures in 1999 in Edinburgh.

Delving into the complex aspects of Christian beliefs in their historical, theological, and social diversity, Tanner offers a rigorous and sustained analysis of the relations of belief to attitudes and action. In arguing that Christian beliefs about God and the world can be disengaged from complicity with social forces of reaction and oppression, Tanner discloses the radical potential of Christian beliefs and realigns them with efforts to bring about a just society.