Books published by Baylor University Press

This collection of primary sources from Early Stuart England, compiled by Deborah Shuger, reflects the varieties of religious expression, theological conviction, and spiritual experience of the fascinating and turbulent period in English religious history from 1603 to 1638.

Gary Dorrien expounds in this book the religious philosophy underlying his many magisterial books on modern theology, social ethics, and political philosophy. His constructive position is liberal-liberationist and post-Hegelian, reflecting his many years of social justice activism and what he calls "e;my dance with Hegel."e; Hegel, he argues, broke open the deadliest assumptions of Western thought by conceiving being as becoming and consciousness as the social-subjective relation of spirit to itself; yet his white Eurocentric conceits were grotesquely inflated even by the standards of his time. Dorrien emphasizes both sides of this Hegelian legacy, contending that it takes a great deal of digging and refuting to recover the parts of Hegel that still matter for religious thought.By distilling his signature argument about the role of post-Kantian idealism in modern Christian thought, Dorrien fashions a liberationist form of religious idealism: a religious philosophy that is simultaneously both Hegelian-as it expounds a fluid, holistic, open, intersubjective, ambiguous, tragic, and reconciliatory idea of revelation-and post-Hegelian, as it rejects the deep-seated flaws in Hegel's thought. Dorrien mines Kant, Schleiermacher, and Hegel as the foundation of his argument about intellectual intuition and the creative power of subjectivity. After analyzing critiques of Hegel by Soren Kierkegaard, Karl Marx, Karl Barth, and Emmanuel Levinas, Dorrien contends that though these monumental figures were penetrating in their assessments, they appear one-sided compared to Hegel. In a Post-Hegelian Spirit further engages with the personal idealist tradition founded by Borden Parker Bowne, the process tradition founded by Alfred North Whitehead, and the daring cultural contributions of Paul Tillich, W. E. B. Du Bois, Martin Luther King Jr., Rosemary Radford Ruether, David Tracy, Peter Hodgson, Edward Farley, Catherine Keller, and Monica Coleman.Dispelling common interpretations that Hegel's theology simply fashioned a closed system, Dorrien argues instead that Hegel can be interpreted legitimately in six different ways and is best interpreted as a philosopher of love who developed a Christian theodicy of love divine. Hegel expounded a process theodicy of God salvaging what can be salvaged from history, even as his tragic sense of the carnage of history cuts deep, lingering at Calvary.

The contemporary world has been shaped by two important and potent myths - Karl Jaspers' construct of the "axial age", and the myth of the "dark green golden age," as narrated by David Suzuki and others. Iain Provan illuminates the influence of these two deeply entrenched and questionable myths.

Romans 5-8 revolve around God's dramatic cosmic activity and its implications for humanity and all of creation. Apocalyptic Paul measures the power of Paul's rhetoric about the relationship of cosmic power to the Law, interpretations of righteousness and the self, and the link between grace and obedience.

Uncovers the shortcomings of contemporary moral philosophy and the depth and capacity of the Aristotelian and Thomistic traditions, reminding the reader that classical virtue ethics remains the most promising framework for understanding the moral life.

The Miss America pageant has extraordinary staying power. Despite the cultural winds of the past century, Miss America continues to captivate the nation, giving America what it wants most-sex, entertainment, competition, religion, and even self-discovery. In Miss America's God, Mandy McMichael traces the pageant's long and complicated history. She demonstrates that the pageant is a little explored window into American culture, one that reveals a complex cocktail of all Americans hold dear. Ultimately, McMichael contends that the pageant is an unexpected cultural space of religious expression and self-discovery for many contestants whose faith communities support and validate their pageant participation. Miss America's God utilizes feminist theory, women's history, sociology, psychology, ethnography, and religious studies to explain the enduring popularity of the pageant, as well as religion's curious embrace of its spectacle. While contestants use the pageant to build faith and identity, the pageant uses the faith of the contestants to remain relevant in a society that is increasingly suspicious of it. McMichael shows just how central religion has been to Miss America. Religion, for Miss America, sanctifies sex, ritualizes entertainment, justifies competition, and enables self-discovery. Religion makes Miss America a cultural icon that withstands the test of time.

Bates applies his method to both oft-referenced and underutilized passages in the writings of Paul and suggests a new model for Pauline hermeneutics that is centered on the apostolic proclamation of Christ.--Michael J. Gorman, Dean, Ecumenical Institute of Theology "St. Mary's Seminary & University"

With its origins in the author's experience of adjusting to the challenges of quadriplegia, "Crippled Grace" considers the diverse experiences of people with a disability as a lens through which to understand happiness and its attainment.

It is a road map to the emerging American political and cultural landscape.--Patrick J. Deneen, David A. Potenziani Memorial Associate Professor of Constitutional Studies, University of Notre Dame

Interreligious Relationships and Theological Questioning.

Traces the history of public school prayer in America and the legal debates since the 1962 Supreme Court ruling that outlawed the practice. The book makes available the historical and legal information from which readers can draw their own conclusions about this sensitive issue.

"Jacob Arminius' Declaration of Sentiments was delivered orally in Dutch before the States of Holland in October 1608"--Introduction.

One hundred and fifty years of archaeological investigation has yielded a more complete picture of the ancient Near East. This book combines the most significant of these archaeological findings with those of modern historical and literary analysis of the Bible to recount the history of ancient Israel and its neighbouring nations and empires.

"A century ago it was true that if you wanted to understand the ancient Israelites you had to read the Bible, the Old Testament. Today, if you want to understand the Old Testament, you need to study the history and archaeology of the ancient people of Israel"--Preface.

Offers the first book-length exploration of Kierkegaard's views on knowledge, an epistemology that M.G. Piety argues is both foundationalist and nonfoundationalist, substantive and procedural, and includes both internalist and externalist theories of belief justification.

Evans' analysis of Kierkegaard's Philosophical Fragments and Concluding Unscientific Postscript introduces even the nonspecialist to two of Kierkegaard's most challenging works without minimizing the complex nature of his philosophy.

In honour of Daniel Aleshire's decades of leadership over the Association of Theological Schools, the essays in this book propose methods for schools of various denominational backgrounds to restructure the form and content of their programs by resourcing their own distinctive Christian heritages.

By returning again and again to Christ's woundedness, we discover ways to live with our own.--Amy McLaughlin-Sheasby "Homiletic"

With prose as enjoyable as it is informative, he shows why the life--and death--of Nicholas of Myra so radically influenced the formation of Western history and Christian thought, and did so in ways many have never realized.--Paul A. Sanchez "Fides et Humilitas"