Books published by Augsburg Fortress Publishers

Discovering reliable information about women in early Christianity is a challenging enterprise. Most people have never heard of Bitalia, Veneranda, Crispina, Petronella, Leta, Sofia the Deacon, and many others even though their catacomb and tomb art suggests their authority was influential and valued by early Christian communities. This book explores visual imagery found on burial artifacts of prominent early Christian women. It carefully situates the tomb art within the cultural context of customary Roman commemorations of the dead. Recent scholarship about Roman portrait sarcophagi and the interpretation of early Christian art is also given significant attention. An in-depth review of women's history in the first four centuries of Christianity provides important context. A fascinating picture emerges of women's authority in the early church, a picture either not available or sadly distorted in the written history. It is often said "a picture is worth a thousand words." The portrait tombs of fourth-century Christian women suggest that they viewed themselves and/or their loved ones viewed them as persons of authority with religious influence.

Martin Luther‘s effort to put God at the very center of human life hinged on five principles: sola gratia, sola fide, sola Scriptura, solus Christus, and ecclesia semper reformanda. They formed the basis for a much-needed reformation of the Christian church projected by Luther and others. Besides inspiring an important renewal of Christian life, however, the Reformation also occasioned the breakup of Western Christianity, which in turn justified religious wars, provided an anti-witness to Christian revelation, privatized the faith, and facilitated the secularization of society as a whole. On the occasion of the five hundredth anniversary of the Reformation, this book attempts to appropriate, situate, and to some degree reinterpret Luther‘s most precious and enduring insights on the basis of the above five principles, which come to mean that God‘s being and action must always come first. On the basis of Luther‘s writings, the book also attempts to consider how grace reaches out to freedom, faith to reason, Scripture to church tradition, Christ to ministry, church to mediation. God‘s being and action always come first, yet God‘s first gift, creation, and the mediations that derive from it are not undone or rendered irrelevant.

The Protestant Reformation emphasized the centrality of scripture to Christian life; the twentieth-century liturgical movement emphasized the Bible's place at the heart of liturgy. But we have not yet explored the place of the Bible as the subject of critical exegesis in contemporary liturgy, argues Gordon W. Lathrop. He seeks to remedy that lack because it is critical historical scholarship that has shown us the grounding of the text in the life of the assembly and the role of intertextuality in its creation. "Saving" and revitalizing images of the past are at the heart of scripture and are the work of the gathered community. Lathrop finds patterns in biblical narratives that suggest revising our models of the "shape" of liturgy (Dix and Schmemann) and our understanding of baptism, preaching, Eucharist, and congregational prayer. He lifts up the visual imagery at the Dura Europos house church and elsewhere as a corrective to the supersessionist impulse in much Christian typology. He identifies the liturgical imperative as seriousness about the present rather than an effort to dwell in an imagined past. Saving Images is a call for a new, reconceived biblical-liturgical movement that takes seriously both biblical scholarship and the mystery at the heart of worship.

Athanasius was a fiery and controversial bishop from Egypt, driven from his See no less than five times. Yet, his work served as a keystone to the settlement of the central disputes of the fourth century, from the Trinitarian and christological debates at Nicaea to the formulation of the divinity of the Holy Spirit. In this volume, Thomas G. Weinandy, OFM, Cap., and Daniel A. Keating introduce readers to this key thinker and carefully illuminate Athanasius's crucial text Against the Arians, unfolding the Trinitarian and incarnational framework of Athanasius's paramount concern: soteriology. The authors provide, in the second part, a robust map of the reception and influence of Athanasius's thought-from its immediate impact on the late fourth and fifth centuries (in the Cappadocians and Cyril) to its significance for the Eastern and Western Christian traditions and its reception in contemporary thought. Herein, Athanasius is presented for today's readers as one of the chief architects of Christian doctrine and one of the most significant thinkers for the reclamation of the Trinitarian and christological theological tradition.

The Gospel and Epistles of John are often overlooked in discussions of New Testament ethics; indeed, it has been asserted that the Fourth Gospel is of only limited value to such discussions--even that John is practically devoid of ethical material. Representing a range of viewpoints, the essays collected here by prominent scholars reveal the surprising relevance and importance of the Johannine literature by examining the explicit imperatives and the values implicit in the Gospel narrative and epistles. The introduction sets out four major approaches to Johannine ethics today. Essays in subsequent sections evaluate the directives of the Johannine Jesus (believe, love, follow), tease out the implicit ethics of the Gospel's narrative (including its fraught and apparently sectarian representation of hoi Ioudaioi as Jesus's opponents), and propose different approaches for advancing the discussion of Johannine ethics beyond the categories now dominant in critical scholarship. In a concluding essay, the editors take stock of the book's wide-ranging discussion and suggest prospects for future study. The sum is a valuable resource for the student as well as the scholar interested in the question of Johannine ethics.

Throughout the two-thousand-year span of Christian history, believers in Jesus have sought to articulate their faith and their understanding of how God works in the world. How do we, as we examine the vast and varied output of those who came before us, understand the unity and the diversity of their thinking? How do we make sense of our own thought in light of theirs? The Christian Understandings series is an exciting new series that seeks to illuminate precisely these questions. Short, concise, orienting-volumes in the Christian Understandings series "fill in the gaps" for readers as they dive into the exciting and stimulating story of Christian thought.

Helmut Gollwitzer was a direct heir of the theological legacy of the great Protestant theologian Karl Barth. Yet, Gollwitzeræs work is perhaps least appreciated and studied, especially in English, of all of Barthæs immediate "descendants." A Protestant theologian and member of the Confessing Church movement in World War II-era Germany, Gollwitzer studied under Karl Barth at the Universities of Bonn and Basle and was professor of Protestant theology at the University of Berlin. Deeply influenced by his mentor, Gollwitzer appropriated the methodological principles of Barthæs theology and developed in new and particularly contextual directions one of Barthæs most penetrating constructive insights in the doctrine of God. At the same time, Gollwitzer, more than any of Barthæs other interpreters, embraced and extended the sociopolitical impulses and implications within Barthæs theology. In this, Gollwitzer embodies a salient alternative for theological and political discourse, one especially needed in the American context of increasingly intertwined theological and political discourses. This volume, the first book-length study of Gollwitzer available in English, provides a helpful introduction to the life, theology, and political thought of this crucial theologian and public intellectual and makes clear Gollwitzeræs importance to the North American context.

Wolfhart Pannenberg is one of the most important theologians of the second half of the twentieth century. This volume offers the first full historical and thematic survey of Pannenberg's corpus, from his early work on the theology of revelation and Christology, to his writings on anthropology, theology and the university, and the pivotal achievement of his systematic theology. In the process of this survey, it identifies the broad, consistent development in his work across his career, as well as several significant revisions to his positions. As such, the project makes a significant contribution to the theological assessment of his career and will be a useful text for students and scholars in modern and contemporary theology.

Imagine pulling up a chair to the Luther family table after a fine dinner.Imagine being invited to ask Martin Luther questions about . . . almost anything. Imagine Luther talking about his early life, his education, his decision to become a monk, his rediscovery of the gospel, his attacks on scholasticism and the papacy, his journey to the Diet of Worms where he was ordered tobut refused torecant his teaching, his marriage to Katherine von Bora, and much more.Because Luthers friends took notes of many private conversations around the Luther family table, you dont have to imagine Luthers answers. This newly abridged edition of Martin Luthers Table Talk serves up a rich sampling of Luthers wide ranging thoughts on biblical exposition, doctrinal teaching, ministry, the church and the sacraments, pastoral counsel, and life as a Christian. You will also learn much about the political, economic and social world that Luther lived ina world unlike our own.The theological convictions of Luther and other early reformers that shaped the Reformation are often referred to as The Five Pillars of the ReformationWord alone, Faith alone, Grace alone, Christ alone, and Glory to God alone. In the table talks in this volume, you will find these themes woven over and over again into the mealtime conversations around Luthers table. Pull up a chair and spend some time with the great reformer. This volume provides access to selections from Martin Luthers Table Talk, Volume 54 of Luthers Works.Editor Henry F. French has carefully chosen some of the best of Luthers conversations with many guests who frequented the dinner table in the home of Martin and Katie Luther.

As various events have focused attention on Islam, the often-misunderstood faith of one billion people, westerners have shown a new curiosity about it and other religions. This is perhaps in part because religion is such an important factor in geopolitics. Islam needs to be understood on its own terms, apart from extreme expressions, John Kaltner argues. This edition offers information about Islam in an accessible presentation and presents Islam as first and foremost a religion of practices. Showing the deep humanism of Islam and its commitments, Kaltner presents Islam through assertions that counter frequent misconceptions of the faith.

Jason Micheli was diagnosed with a bone cancer so rare and deadly that his doctors didn't classify it with one of the normal four stages. But Micheli wasn't going to let the cancer kill his spirit, his faith, or his sense of humor. This is a funny, no-holds-barred, irreverent-yet-faithful take on the disease that has touched every family.

Gary Yamasaki explores how the visual art of filmmaking works to establish perspective and point of view to guide the viewer into a films story. Biblical story is also shaped by perspectives that frame a point of view. The insights gained from studying the art of filmmaking can help students increase their understanding of biblical narratives.

Donald M. MacKinnon has been one of the most important and influential of the post-World War British theologians, significantly impacting the development and subsequent work of the likes of Rowan Williams, Nicholas Lash and John Milbank, among many other notable theologians. A younger generation largely emerging from Cambridge, but with influence elsewhere, has more recently brought MacKinnons eclectic and occasionalist work to a larger audience worldwide. In this collection, MacKinnons central writings on the major themes of ecclesiology, and especially the relationship of the church to theology, are gathered in one source. The volume will feature several of MacKinnons important early texts. These will include two short books published in the Signposts series during World War II, and a collection of later essays entitled The Stripping of the Altars.

Dietrich Bonhoeffers work has persistently challenged Christian consciousness due to both his death at the hands of the Nazis and his provocative prison musings about Christian faithfulness in late modernity. Although understandable given the popularity of both narrative trajectories, such selective focus obscures the depth and fecundity of his overall corpus. Bonhoeffers early work, and particularly his Christocentric anthropology, grounds his later expressed commitments to responsibility and faithfulness in a world come of age. While much debate accompanies claims regarding the continuity of Bonhoeffers thought, there are central motifs which pervade his work from his doctoral dissertation to the prison writings. This book suggests that a concern for otherness permeates all of Bonhoeffers work. Furthermore, Clark Elliston articulates, drawing on Bonhoeffer, a Christian self-defined by its orientation towards otherness. Taking Bonhoeffer as both the origin and point of return, the text engages Emmanuel Levinas and Simone Weil as dialogue partners who likewise stress the role of the other for self-understanding, albeit in diverse ways.

Scholars of early Christianity are awakening to the potential of Pompeiis treasures for casting light on the settings and situations that were commonplace and conventional for the first urban Christians. The essays of this book explore different dimensions of Pompeiis potential to refine our lenses for interpreting the texts and situations of early Christianity. The contributors to this book (including Carolyn Osiek, David Balch, Peter Oakes, Bruce Longenecker, and others) demonstrate that it is an exciting time to explore the interface between the Vesuvian contexts and the early Jesus-movement.

A Generous Symphony offers a balanced appraisal of Balthasars literary achievement and explicates Balthasars literary criticism as a distinctive theology of revelation, which offers possibilities for understanding how divine presence may be manifested outside the canonical boundaries of Christian tradition. The structure of A Generous Symphony is a chronological presentation of the Balthasarian canon of imaginative literature, which allows readers to see how social and historical interests guide Balthasars readings in the pre-Christian, medieval, and modern eras. While other books have examined the systematic theology of Balthasar, this book will examine the important question of how students of literature, like Balthasar, can be transformed into theologians by attending to the implicit presence of Christ in what Gerard Manley Hopkins poem As kingfishers catch fire . . . called the ten thousand places. Balthasars deep investment in the uniqueness of Christian revelation is underlined, while, at the same time, his aesthetic sympathies cause him to invest literature with quasi-sacramental status.

The profound ambivalence of the biblical portrayals of Hagar and Ishmaeldispossessed, yet protected; abandoned, yet given promises that rival those of the covenant with Abrahambelies easy characterizations of the Pentateuch''s writers. In particular, John T. Noble argues, conventional characterizations of the Priestly writers'' view of covenant have failed to take into account the significance of these two "non-chosen" figures.Noble carefully examines their roles and depictions in the P and non-P Genesis traditions, comparing them to other "non-chosen" figures and to patterns found in Exodus traditions and the patriarchal promises to Abraham, showing that Ishmael is clearly favored, though not chosen. Indeed, Noble argues, Ishmael must be seen as a key figure in the Priestly material, highlighting the relationship between Noahic and Abrahamic covenants. His ambiguous status calls for reconsideration of the goals and values of the Priestly work, which Noble sketches around themes of covenant, fertility, life, and the future of nations.

Beneath the commonplace affirmation that Jesus paid for our sins lie depths of implication: Did God demand a blood sacrifice to assuage divine anger? Is sacrifice (consciously or unconsciously) intended to induce the deity to show favor? What underlies the various metaphors for atonement used in the Bible?Here, Stephen Finlan surveys psychological theories that help us to understand beliefs about sacrifice and atonement and what they may reveal about patterns of injury, guilt, shame, and appeasement. Early chapters examine the language in both testaments of purity and the scapegoat, and of payment, obligation, reciprocity, and redemption. Later chapters review theories of the origins of atonement thinking in fear and traumatic childhood experience, in ambivalent or avoidant attachment to the parents, and in poisonous pedagogy. The theories of Sandor Rado, Mary Ainsworth, Erik Erikson, and Alice Miller are examined, then Finlan draws conclusions about the moral responsibility of appropriating or rejecting atonement metaphors. His arguments bear careful consideration by all who live with these metaphors and their effects today.

"The devil has fallen on hard times. Surveys say that even the majority of Christians doubt Satan's existence. Burdened by doubts, skeptical believers find themselves divorced from Jesus' dramatic confrontation with Satan in the Gospels and from the struggle that galvanized the early church. In [this book], ... blogger and theologian Richard Beck reintroduces the devil to the modern world with a biblical, bold, and urgent vision of spiritual warfare: we must resist the devil by joining the kingdom of God's subversive campaign to interrupt the world with love"--Amazon.com.

Focusing on texts in the Hebrew Bible, and using feminist hermeneutics, Phyllis Trible brings out what she considers to be neglected themes and counter literature.After outlining her method in more detail, she begins by highlighting the feminist imagery used for God; then she moves on to traditions embodying male and female within the context of the goodness of creation. If Genesis 2-3 is a love story gone awry, the Song of Songs is about sexuality redeemed in joy. In between lies the book of Ruth, with its picture of the struggles of everyday life.

This volume offers two of Martin Luthers writings on prayer, excerpted from The Annotated Luther, volume 4. In Little Prayer Book (1522), Luther seeks to reform the theology and practice of prayer in clear and understable language for all people. In A Simple Way to Pray (1535), Luther offers readers insights into his own prayer life and organizes his comments around the seven petitions of the Lords Prayer.

The delay of the Parousia-the anticipated return of Christ-is an issue that has troubled theology since the late writings of the New Testament. This volume, arising from the Oxford Postdoctoral Colloquium on Eschatology, offers a constructive proposal on this issue in a truly interdisciplinary manner.

Revision of author's thesis (Ph. D.)--Wheaton College, 2016.

Love in a Time of Climate Change issues a call to readers to develop a loving response to climate change, which harms the poor, threatens future generations, and damages Gods creation. Exploring the theology of creation can help us understand the intrinsic value of creation and assess the physical and spiritual implications of climate changeespecially the disproportionate impact on the most vulnerableand our responsibility to work for climate justice in our time.

Constructive theology, over the last one hundred years, has developed a distinct method and set of concerns. Yet what makes constructive theology an important movement hasnt been explicitly formulated, its history analyzed, or its method clearly delineated. Constructing Constructive Theology offers that history as well as programmatic proposals for constructive theology. This book traces the overall historical arc of constructive theology, from proto-movement through the present. As constructive theology is the method of progressive Christian theology today, understanding it is crucial to undertaking the theological task of the present.