RELIGION &

SPIRITUALITY UPDATE
Scholars weave religion into politics, culture, and social ills

NOVEMBER 2018

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 Faith
Matters
Scholars weave religion into
politics, culture, and social ills
By Donna Freitas
A
bird’s-eye view of new and forthcoming
books in religious studies reveals which
subjects publishers think belong at the top
of their lists; it also shows which subjects
publishers are stepping back from.
Recent extreme weather events have
increased attention on climate change, yet there
appear to be fewer books on ecotheology and envi-
ronmental ethics. Among them is the anthology
Ecology, Ethics, and Interdependence: The Dalai Lama
in Conversation with Leading Thinkers on Climate
Change by the Dalai Lama, edited by John D.
Dunne and Daniel Goleman (Wisdom, out now).
At the annual Mind & Life Conference in March in
Dharamsala, India, he joined scientists, activists,
and scholars to discuss the future of the planet.
Planetary peril and how Christian theology can
help is the subject of Shelli M. Poe’s Schleiermacher
and Sustainability: A Theology for Ecological Living
(Westminster John Knox, out now). Writing for a
wide audience, Poe—a professor of religious stud-
ies at Millsaps College and author of Essential Trin-
itarianism: Schleiermacher as Trinitarian Theolo-
gian—mines Schleiermacher’s theology for direc-
tions toward sustainable living.
Islam has grown in importance in both politics
and religion in the U.S., and books that offer analyses, history, and
cultural critiques of Islam have been plentiful in the past several
years. But only a few head publishers’ lists this season, such as
Hashtag Islam: How Cyber-Islamic Environments Are Transforming
Religious Authority by Gary Bunt (Univ. North Carolina, out
now), which adds to the press’s Islamic Civilization and Muslim
Networks series. Bunt, a professor of Islamic studies at the Uni-
versity of Wales, also wrote the book iMuslims for the series.
TOPICS ON THE RISE
Religion scholars and authors are increasingly addressing the
turmoil surrounding race in America, and a growing number
of titles provide faith perspectives on racial conflicts and white
supremacy.
Catholic house Orbis continues its long tradition of publish-
ing about racism. “From the start of our program 50 years ago,
Orbis has amplified theological voices from the margins,” says
publisher Robert Ellsberg. In October, the press released Said
I Wasn’t Gonna Tell Nobody: The Making of a Black Theologian, a
memoir by James H. Cone, who died this past spring. Ellsberg
calls Cone “the father of black liberation theology.” “Fifty years
after Cone’s first book, a new generation of scholars and activ-
ists have rediscovered his message—that black lives matter,”
Ellsberg says. “His influence was not just in his books but in
generations of black scholars who carry on his legacy, finding
in the gospel message a tool to resist and dismantle white
supremacy.”
Also from Orbis is Knowing Christ Crucified: The
Witness of African American Religious Experience by M.
Shawn Copeland (Dec.), which explores the sig-
nificance of Christianity for black history and what
it means to live in a world ruled by white suprem-
acy. A Church Where Black Lives Matter by Bryan
Massingale (May 2019) offers a Catholic theologi-
cal and social justice perspective on the racism evi-
dent in Donald Trump’s election, the rise of the
“alt-right,” the killing of unarmed African-Amer-
icans by police, and the outrage that followed rev-
elations of contaminated water in Flint, Mich.
Jemar Tisby, president of The Witness: A Black
Christian Collective, uncovers the role of Christians
in supporting racism in The Color of Compromise: The
Truth About the American Church’s Complicity in Rac-
ism (Zondervan, Jan. 2019). Ryan Pazdur, associate
publisher and executive editor at Zondervan, says
Tisby “makes a compelling case that while there has
been some progress in addressing overt aspects of
racism, the majority of the American church failed
to speak out and stand against racism.”
Can ‘White’ People Be Saved? Triangulating Race,
Theology, and Mission, an anthology edited by Love
L. Sechrest, Johnny Ramirez-Johnson, and Amos
Yong (IVP, out now), offers diverse views on how
and why white normativity is intrinsically connected to Ameri-
can Christianity. Jon Boyd, editorial director at IVP Academic,
calls the book “a report from the front lines of the current aca-
demic conversation about race, theology, and Christian mission.”
And homiletics professor Carolyn B. Helsel’s Preaching About
Racism: A Guide for White Faith Leaders (Chalice, Dec.) provides
a practical manual for white preachers who want to address rac-
ism from the pulpit. Helsel has been writing, teaching, and
speaking on the subject for over a decade. “For pastors worried
that their preaching on Sunday may lead to their firing on Mon-
day, this may be a career saver as well as a congregational game
changer,” says Brad Lyons, Chalice’s president and publisher.
W W W . P U B L I S H E R S W E E K LY. C O M 1
 Religion & Spirituality Update
CALLS FOR ACTION
There are books that urge theological responses to other political
and cultural divisions, calling for justice, equality, and the pres-
ervation of democratic ideals. “We challenge the too-common
perception that Christians are exclusionary, racist, conservative,
compassionless zealots who care only for those who agree with
them,” Lyons says. “We give voice to progressive Christians,
underrepresented in the media conversation, who welcome those
who are different into their communities, who work to mend
the divides that have fractured our society, who stand up to
injustice and hatred.”
Preaching as Resistance: Voices of
Hope, Justice, and Solidarity, edited
by Phil Snider (Chalice, out now),
collects 30 “resistance sermons”
from pastors across the U.S. who
represent what Lyons describes as
the “huge numbers of Christians
who are outraged by the actions of
President Trump and his cronies on
immigration, civil rights, poverty,
racism, health care—to name just a
few—that contradict Christ’s
instruction to love your neighbor as
yourself.” Also from Chalice, True Inclusion: Creating Communities of
Radical Embrace (out now), by the pastor-activist Brandan Rob-
ertson, asks believers how their communities include people
who haven’t been welcomed in the past.
Baker weighs in with Moral Leadership for a Divided Age by
David Gushee and Colin Holtz (out now), who mine the wisdom
of 14 “moral leaders”—among them Ida B. Wells-Barnett,
Harriet Tubman, and Malala Yousafzai—and present them as
models for making a divided country whole. Gushee is the
incoming president of the American Academy of Religion and
the author of A Letter to My Anxious Christian Friends: From Fear
to Faith in Unsettled Times; Holtz is a Baptist seminarian and for-
mer political strategist for Barack Obama and Joe Biden.
In After the Protests Are Heard: Enacting Civic Engagement and
Social Transformation (New York Univ., Jan. 2019), Sharon D.
Welch uses liberation theology as a lens for evaluating and pro-
moting practices for justice, equality, and social responsibility
in institutional communities such as colleges and businesses,
both locally and globally. She writes about what comes after the
new activism of the Women’s March in Washington, D.C., and
the Black Lives Matter rallies in the era of Trump. Welch, a
professor of religion and society, is the author of Communities of
Resistance and Solidarity: A Feminist Theology of Liberation.
Events such as Matthew Shepard’s murder and Tyler
Clementi’s suicide mobilized a generation of politicians,
celebrities, and gay and straight Americans to defend the rights
of the LGBTQ community. In Dying to Be Normal (Oxford Univ.,
Mar. 2019), Brett Krutsch, who teaches religion at Haverford
College, “shows how religion became a weapon in the fight for
2 P U B L I S H E R S W E E K LY ■ N O V E M B E R 1 2 , 2 0 1 8
LGBT rights,” says Theo Calderara, editor-in-chief for history
and religion at Oxford.
Also of note is ‘Jesus Saved an Ex-Con’: Political Activism and
Redemption After Incarceration by sociologist Edward Orozco
Flores (New York Univ., out now), which offers an unusual take
on prison reform. Many scholars have studied the role of religion
in rehabilitation post-incarceration, but Flores is interested in
how ex-offenders can use their own experiences of redemption
to foster social change. Flores is the author of God’s Gangs: Barrio
Ministry, Masculinity, and Gang Recovery.
A FOCUS ON VIOLENCE
Books by theologians and scholar-activists that confront the
relationship between religion and violence demonstrate how
religions can either perpetuate or counteract systemic violence.
One title with a global reach is Solidarity and Defiant Spirituality:
Africana Lessons on Religion, Racism, and Ending Gender Violence
(New York Univ., Jan. 2019), by theologian Traci C. West, who
assesses the intersection of gender-based violence with racism in
Ghana, South Africa, and Brazil and shows how the U.S. can
learn from the experiences of other nations.
To better understand and respond to violence carried out in
the name of religion, Confronting Religious Violence: A Counternar-
rative (Baylor Univ., out now), edited by Richard A. Burridge
and Jonathan Sacks, unearths the roots of religious violence and
shows the relationship between vio-
lence and sacred texts. Burridge is a
professor of biblical interpretation
and the author of Four Ministries, One
Jesus: Exploring Your Vocation with the
Four Gospels; Sacks is a rabbi and the
author of more than 30 books, includ-
ing Leviticus: The Book of Holiness.
L. Daniel Hawk’s The Violence of the
Biblical God: Canonical Narrative and
Christian Faith (Eerdmans, Jan. 2019)
untangles conflicting biblical views
on violence to offer “a truly new way
of approaching this subject that has
long vexed believers and proven a
stumbling block to many,” says
Andrew Knapp, acquisitions editor at
Eerdmans. Knapp believes that
Hawk’s book makes an important
contribution in a world “riven by dis-
agreement on how to respond to the
atrocities going on all around us.”
Hawk is a Methodist minister and
professor of Old Testament and
Hebrew at Ashland Theological Seminary.
Finally, one particularly damaging form of tribalism is
explored in Michael Coogan’s God’s Favorites: Judaism, Christian-
ity, and the Myth of Divine Chosenness (Beacon, Apr. 2019). Coogan
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 Religion & Spirituality Update
(profiled on p. 18) points to the toxic effects of some religious
groups’ conviction that they have been specially chosen by God,
which has been used to justify prejudice, war, and genocide.
“This is a necessary book for anyone who wants to have an hon-
est conversation about claims to territory or moral action based
on religious grounds,” says Amy Caldwell, executive editor at
Beacon. Coogan is also the author of The Old Testament: A His-
torical and Literary Introduction to the Hebrew Scriptures.
Other books take on a host of these complex problems, such
as Confronting Old Testament Controversies: Pressing Questions About
Evolution, Sexuality, History, and Violence by Tremper Longman III
(Baker, Apr. 2019). With a young audience in mind, the book
deals with religious violence, the evolution debate, and human
sexuality by drawing on the most challenging and controversial
biblical passages and texts. Longman is a professor of Old Testa-
ment at Wheaton, and author of The Lost World of the Flood:
Mythology, Theology, and the Deluge Debate.
In a collection of essays, Tenacious Solidarity: Biblical Provoca-
tions on Race, Religion, Climate, and the Economy (Fortress, out
now), Walter Brueggemann also employs biblical texts to
explore American religious identity and practices, and to use
the Bible to overcome social and political ills. Bruegge-
mann is emeritus professor of Old Testament at Columbia
Theological Seminary and the author of dozens of books,
including The Prophetic Imagination.
THE PRESENCE (AND ABSENCE)
OF WOMEN
Conspicuously missing this fall from the more conservative
Christian and Jewish publishers are scholarly books by any
woman, on any subject. With the exception of mainline progres-
sive houses such as Westminster John Knox and Chalice—there
seems not to be a single such book from evangelical Christian
publishers Baker and Zondervan or Catholic presses Liturgical
and Ignatius and Jewish press Urim. Asked about this gap,
publishers declined to comment.
From publishers that do take on gender, feminism, and wom-
en’s status in religions, there are books such as Holly Gayley’s
translation of the love letters between two prominent 20th-
century Tibetan Buddhist teachers. Inseparable Across Lifetimes:
The Lives and Love Letters of the Tibetan Visionaries Namtrul
Rinpoche and Khandro Tare Lhamo
(Snow Lion, Feb. 2019) presents an
unusual example of gender equality
in Buddhism. Gayley is also the
author of A Gathering of Brilliant
Moons: Practice Advice from the Rime
Masters of Tibet. An anthology edited
by Karma Lekshe Tsomo, Buddhist
Feminisms and Femininities (State
Univ. of New York, Jan. 2019), col-
lects essays by diverse contributors
who explore women’s identities and
4 P U B L I S H E R S W E E K LY ■ N O V E M B E R 1 2 , 2 0 1 8
feminism within Buddhism. Tsomo
is a Buddhist nun and professor of
theology and religious studies at the
University of San Diego.
Urim does have a book about
women’s roles in religions, though it
is authored by a man. Rabba, Maha-
rat, Rabbanit, Rebbetzin: Women with
Leadership Authority According to Hal-
achah by Daniel Sperber (out now)
mines Jewish law for answers to ques-
tions about women’s leadership, spe-
cifically in the Orthodox community. Sperber is a rabbi and
scholar of Jewish law, customs, and ethics.
Boyd at IVP Academic is “really geeked” about Amanda W.
Benckhuysen’s The Gospel According to Eve: A History of Women’s
Interpretation (IVP, July 2019), which he says “uncovers the last
couple centuries’ history of women’s own interpretation of Gen-
esis 1–3, and specifically their reading of Eve’s story.” Benckhuy-
sen draws on a variety of interpretations to show that “in Eve
they’ve found an advocate and a symbol of their dignity and full
humanity,” Boyd says. Benckhuysen is a professor of Old Testa-
ment at Calvin Theological Seminary.
Aiming to tackle women’s issues as well as satisfy the popular
culture fascination with Mormonism is Sister Saints: Mormon
Women Since the End of Polygamy by Colleen McDannell (Oxford
Univ., out now). History and religion editor Calderara says the
book “is a sweeping, myth-busting account of the important
roles women have played in shaping Mormonism from the 19th
century to the present day.” McDannell is a professor of religious
studies at the University of Utah and the author of Material
Christianity.
The Catholic affinity for Mary as an icon of femininity is
explored in Jesus and the Jewish Roots of Mary: Unveiling the Mother
of the Messiah by Brant James Pitre (Image, out now). Pitre is a
scripture professor at Notre Dame Seminary in New Orleans
and author of Jesus and the Jewish Roots of the Eucharist.
Writing from a Catholic perspective for a broad audience in
A Saint of Our Own: How the Quest for a Holy Hero Helped Catholics
Become American (Univ. North Carolina, spring 2019), Kathleen
Sprows Cummings (profiled on p. 19 recounts the long hunt for
a patron saint for America and how nuns and other religious
women were excluded from leadership in the campaign to can-
onize Elizabeth Seton, who was finally declared a saint in 1975.
BACK TO SCHOOL
Debates about religion in public schools and higher education
have spawned a number of titles. One that is sure to ignite
controversy is Debating Yoga and Mindfulness in Public Schools:
Reforming Secular Education or Re-establishing Religion? by
Candy Gunther Brown (Univ. North Carolina, spring 2019),
who offers definitions of what is “religious” and “secular” to
examine whether teaching yoga and mindfulness in public
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 Religion & Spirituality Update

New from schools violates the Establishment Clause.

Jacqueline A. Bussie In The Resilience of Religion in American Higher Education

(Baylor Univ., out now), John Schmalzbauer and Kathleen
Mahoney challenge the assumption that religion and aca-
demia are adversaries, finding examples from student life
to demonstrate openness and interest in religion in colleges
and universities. Schmalzbauer is a religion scholar at Mis-
The love of souri State University; Mahoney is the author of Catholic
Higher Education in Protestant America: The Jesuits and Har-
God crosses vard in the Age of the University. Philosopher Nicholas Wolt-
erstorff, in Religion in the University (Yale Univ., Apr. 2019),
all boundaries. argues that religious people and the teaching of religion are
more welcome in secular colleges and universities than
EVERY. in the past.
While Wolterstorff, Schmalzbauer, and Mahoney focus on secular institutions, the

SINGLE.
anthology Christian Higher Education: Faith, Teaching, and Learning in the Evangelical
Tradition, edited by David S. Dockery and Christopher W. Morgan (Crossway, out now),
offers the perspectives of 29 theologians and scholars on Christian higher education and
ONE. its responsibility to engage the larger culture.

AFFECTING THE CULTURE

Though many today call themselves spiritual but not religious, others could call them-
selves multireligious. When One Religion Isn’t Enough: The Lives of Spiritually Fluid
People by Duane R. Bidwell (Beacon, out now) challenges the notion of “religious and
spiritual identity as pure, static, and singular,” says Beacon’s Caldwell, who describes
the book as “a moving and fascinating on-the-ground look at a religious category we
mostly ignore and sometimes mock: people who consider themselves part of more than
one faith tradition.” Bidwell teaches at Claremont School of Theology and is the author
of Short-Term Spiritual Guidance.
Serene Jones—the first woman president of Union Theo-
logical Seminary—draws on the ideas of Hegel, Nietzsche,
and others, as well as her own experiences, in Call It
Grace: Finding Meaning in an Uncomfortable World (Viking,
Mar. 2019). Jones (Trauma and Grace) encourages a spiri-
tuality that will help those struggling in an alienating and
anxious time.
Kathryn Tanner provocatively argues for a Protestant
antiwork ethic in Christianity and the New Spirit of Capital-
ism (Yale Univ., Jan. 2019), refuting Marx’s thesis that
religions enable and perpetuate capitalism and instead
seeing in Christianity a counterweight to capitalist ideals.
$24.99 Tanner teaches at Yale Divinity School and is the author of Christ the Key.
Many believers find order and ground their lives in religious practices. Fleming
Available Now Rutledge explores one season of the Christian liturgical calendar in Advent: The Once
and Future Coming of Jesus Christ (Eerdmans, out now), which editor David Bratt
describes as “an occasion to think deeply about what it means that Christ came into
the world and about his promised return.” But in The Dangers of Christian Practice: On
Wayward Gifts, Characteristic Damage, and Sin (Yale Univ., out now), Lauren F. Winner
(profiled on p. 24) shows that the religious practices, rituals, and traditions designed
fortresspress.com/ to anchor believers in their faith also can have a dark side.  ■

LoveWithoutLimits Donna Freitas’s most recent book is Consent on Campus: A Manifesto (Oxford Univ.). She
currently teaches creative writing and literature at Adelphi University in New York.

6 P U B L I S H E R S W E E K LY ■ N O V E M B E R 1 2 , 2 0 1 8
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 Opening
the Bible
Scholars shed light on
the scriptures
By Lynn Garrett
A
sking what’s new in biblical studies might
not be the right question, according to
Carey Newman, Baylor Press director, who
thinks that emphasizing the new isn’t the
point. “A well-written book from a seasoned
scholar on an important idea always works,”
he says. “Prospecting for the mother lode of new and
different is really a search for fool’s gold—publishing
houses are built with the bricks of great books, laid
on top of each other, rather than out of flashy bill-
boards advertising something new.” This fall and
into 2019, biblical studies scholars provide the
bricks to build readers’ understanding of the some-
times-opaque scriptures.
TALK ABOUT THE BIBLE
Newman points to Craig Blomberg’s A Theology of
the New Testament (out now) as a cornerstone for Bay-
lor’s biblical studies list. Blomberg, distinguished
professor of New Testament at Denver Seminary,
writes, “The more I studied, the more [the] idea of
fulfillment as an integrating theme grew on me....
The Old Testament is a collection of largely open-
ended books looking ahead to a time in the long-term future
when all of God’s promises will be fulfilled, after the short-term
judgment that is so often predicted gives way to the restoration
and re-creation of God’s people and their world.” In contrast,
“every New Testament book states... that the age of the fulfill-
ment of these promises has arrived. The Messiah has come.”
Peter Enns aims to help readers discover How the Bible Actually
Works (HarperOne, Feb. 2019), writing, “The Bible becomes a
confusing mess when we expect it to function as a rulebook for
faith. But when we allow the Bible to determine our expecta-
tions, we see that Wisdom, not answers, is the Bible’s true subject
matter.” He adds, “The Bible... was never intended to work as a
step-by-step instructional manual. Rather it presents us with an
invitation to explore... and herds us toward a more subtle, inter-
esting, and above all sacred quest... [for] Wisdom.” Enns is the
8 P U B L I S H E R S W E E K LY ■ N O V E M B E R 1 2 , 2 0 1 8
Abram S. Clemens Professor of Biblical Studies at Eastern Uni-
versity, the host of the Bible for Normal People podcast, and the
author of The Bible Tells Me So and The Sin of Certainty.
Enns is a seasoned scholar who can write accessibly for readers
outside the academy. However, says Michael Maudlin, senior
v-p, executive editor at HarperOne, it has become more difficult
to find younger scholars who can write such books. “They are
discouraged by their institutions from writing for popular audi-
ences, and media dynamics have shifted so that it is much harder
for voices to break out even if they wanted to,” he notes. “And
the academy’s bias toward narrowing a scholar’s focus means it
is harder to interest a lay audience in what they do.”
There are many scholars who train a wide-angle lens on the
Bible and write for a general readership, including Peter J. Wil-
liams in Can We Trust the Gospels? (Crossway, out now). Williams
is the director of Cambridge’s Tyndale House (one of
the world’s leading institutes for biblical research),
chairs the International Greek New Testament Proj-
ect, and is a member of the English Standard Version
Translation Oversight Committee. In the book,
which is intended to appeal to scholars, believers, and
skeptics, he presents evidence for the historical and
theological reliability of the Gospels.
“Trusting the Gospels is both the same as trusting
other things and different,” Williams writes. “It is the
same in that we often have to evaluate the credibility
of people and things in daily life. It is different in that
the Gospels contain accounts of miracles and of a man,
Jesus Christ, who is presented as the supernatural Son
of God who can rightfully claim ownership of our
lives. But, before we consider such claims, we need to
ask whether the Gospels show the signs of trustwor-
thiness we usually look for in things we believe.”
Once there is trust, there is still the task of making
sense of the scriptures. Understanding the culture in
which the biblical texts were written can be crucial
for understanding them today, and Paula Fredriksen
is among the scholars tackling that subject; her When
Christians Were Jews: The First Generation was published by Yale
in October. Illuminating the Jewish roots of Christianity,
Fredriksen (From Jesus to Christ) tells the social and intellectual
history of how a group of apocalyptic Jewish missionaries began
a movement that grew into a new religion that came to domi-
nate the Western world. Fredriksen is Aurelio Professor of Scrip-
ture Emerita at Boston University, and is currently the distin-
guished visiting professor of comparative religion at the Hebrew
University of Jerusalem.
In How New Is the New Testament? First-Century Judaism and the
Emergence of Christianity (Baker, out now), Donald A. Hagner
counters what he sees as the trend in biblical studies toward seeing
early Christianity as a form of Judaism, rather than a distinctly
new faith. Hagner analyzes the New Testament canon, pointing
to the ways in which early Christianity both aligned with Judaism
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 Religion & Spirituality Update
and diverged from it, argu-
ing that the emerging
church’s newness was essen-
tial. Hagner is George Eldon
Ladd Professor Emeritus of
New Testament and senior
professor of New Testament
at Fuller Theological Semi-
nary in Pasadena, Calif., and
the author of The New Testa-
ment: A Historical and Theo-
logical Introduction.
Some authors zero in on specifics of Christian theology, as
with The Doctrine on Which the Church Stands or Falls: Justification
in Biblical, Theological, Historical, and Pastoral Perspective, edited
by Matthew Barrett (Crossway, Mar. 2019). Justification is the
doctrine that Christians are forgiven for their sins not by doing
good works, but by faith in Christ alone. The idea was radical
in the time of the Reformers, and it became the organizing
principle of Protestant theology. Barrett is associate professor of
Christian theology at Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary
and the author of The Grace of Godliness and Salvation by Grace.
Zondervan Academic’s Justification by Michael Horton (out
now) examines in two volumes the history of the doctrine and
locates it within contemporary biblical scholarship. Horton is
professor of systematic theology and apologetics at Westminster
Theological Seminary and the author of books including The
Christian Faith: A Systematic Theology for Pilgrims on the Way.
Theology matters, and not just in the academy, write Miroslav
Volf and Matthew Croasmun in For the Life of the World: Theology
That Makes a Difference (Baker, Jan. 2019), arguing that theology
is crucial for navigating today’s tangle of questions about what
is true, which values are universal, and what makes for a life well
lived. Volf (profiled on p. 20) is the Henry B. Wright Professor
of Theology at Yale Divinity School, founding director of the
Yale Center for Faith and Culture, and author more than 20
books, including A Public Faith, Public Faith in Action, and
Exclusion and Embrace. Croasmun is associate research scholar and
director of the Life Worth Living Program at the Yale Center
for Faith and Culture.
In Catholicism, study of the Bible was once the exclusive
purview of priests and scholars; the reforms of Vatican II put it
into the hands of the people in the pews. To help with scripture
study, there are books such as A Catholic Introduction to the Bible:
The Old Testament by John Bergsma and Brant Pitre (Ignatius,
out now), which introduces readers to each book of the Old
Testament and examines it in relation to Catholic teachings, as
well as historically, culturally, and theologically. Bergsma and
Pitre show how Old Testament passages are used in the Lection-
ary for Mass; they also include maps, illustrations, and other
reference materials. Pitre is professor of sacred scripture at Notre
Dame Seminary in New Orleans and the author of Jesus and the
Last Supper, The Case for Jesus, and Jesus and the Jewish Roots of the
12 P U B L I S H E R S W E E K L Y ■ N O V E M B E R 1 2 , 2 0 1 8
Eucharist. Bergsma is pro-
fessor of theology at Fran-
ciscan University, a senior
fellow at the St. Paul Cen-
ter for Biblical Theology,
and the author of The Jubilee
from Leviticus to Qumran.
Looking back to the
beginning, before the
Bible, is God’s Library: The
Archaeology of the Earliest
Christian Manuscripts by Brent Nongbri (Yale Univ., out now),
who argues that early Christian manuscripts should be viewed
not only as source texts, but as archeological artifacts whose
origins have been misrepresented on the antiquities market.
Nongbri is an honorary research fellow at Macquarie University
in Sydney, Australia, and the author of articles on the paleogra-
phy and codicology of early Christian manuscripts.
THE BIBLE THROUGH ITS PEOPLE
One friendly way into the scriptures is through its people, and
in The Prodigal Prophet: Jonah and the Mystery of God’s Mercy
(Viking, out now), Timothy Keller puts a contemporary spin on
the familiar story of the prophet who disobeyed God and was
swallowed by a whale. Drawing parallels to the tribalism of
contemporary politics, Keller calls Jonah “a highly partisan
nationalist” who is angry that God bestows mercy on pagans and
others outside the chosen people. Keller writes: “The book of
Jonah yields many insights about God’s love for societies and
people beyond the community of believers; about his opposition
to toxic nationalism and disdain for other races; and about how
to be ‘in mission’ in the world despite the subtle and unavoidable
power of idolatry in our own lives and hearts.” Keller, founder of
Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York City, is the author
of the New York Times bestseller The Reason for God.
Another Old Testament figure viewed through a modern lens
is Joseph, the favored son of Jacob, who was sold into slavery by
his jealous brothers. In Was Yosef on the Spectrum? Understanding
Joseph Through Torah, Midrash, and Classical Jewish Sources (Urim,
out now), Samuel J. Levine sees symptoms of autism in Joseph.
Levine, a lawyer, professor of law, and director of the Jewish Law
Institute at Touro Law Center, juxtaposes traditional interpreta-
tions of the text with insights from modern psychology.
Also viewing scripture through a contemporary lens is Reading
Genesis Well: Navigating History, Poetry, Science, and Truth in Gen-
esis 1–11 by C. John Collins (Zondervan Academic, out now),
who shows a way to read Genesis 1–11 as a conversation about
the relationship of science to faith. Collins is professor of Old
Testament at Covenant Theological Seminary and chair of the
Old Testament translation committee for the English Standard
Version, as well as the author of Science and Faith: Friends or Foes?
and Did Adam and Eve Really Exist? Who They Were and Why You
Should Care.
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Religion & Spirituality Update
The apostle Paul has been a favorite subject of New Testament
scholars in recent years, with seminal books such as Paul: A
Biography by N.T. Wright, which was published in February.
Now, in Studying Paul’s Letters with the Mind and Heart (Kregel
Academic, out now), Gregory S. MaGee, an associate professor
of biblical studies at Taylor University, unearths practical appli-
cations for contemporary Christians in Paul’s teachings. Also
from Kregel, The Gospel of John in Modern Interpretation, edited
by Stanley E. Porter and Ron C. Fay (Kregel Academic, out
now), a new volume in Kregel’s Milestones in New Testament
Scholarship series, looks at the work of eight influential Johan-
nine scholars over the past two centuries. Porter is president,
dean, professor of New Testament, and Roy A. Hope Chair in
Christian Worldview at McMaster Divinity College in Hamil-
ton, Ontario. Ron C. Fay is assistant professor of biblical studies
at Liberty University.
Reading Mark’s Christology Under Caesar: Jesus the Messiah and
Roman Imperial Ideology by Adam Winn (IVP, out now) focuses
on the question of how Mark was read by the early Christians in
Rome in the aftermath of the destruction of the temple in Jeru-
salem. Winn is assistant professor at the University of Mary
Hardin-Baylor’s College of Christian Studies and the author of
The Purpose of Mark’s Gospel: An Early Christian Response to Roman
Imperial Propaganda.
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The exotic apocalyptic visions in Revelation, the New Testa-
ment’s final book, have entered popular culture through such
books as the millions-selling Left Behind series and through
films, art, and other media. The Book of Revelation by Timothy
Beal (Princeton Univ., out now) traces the history of Revelation,
from its composition in first-century Rome to the modern-day
fascination with its sometimes bizarre imagery of destruction and
redemption. Beal is the Florence Harkness Professor of Religion
at Case Western Reserve University and the author of The Rise
and Fall of the Bible: The Unexpected History of an Accidental Book.
Some Christians read in Revelation a vision of the end of the
world (end times) in which believers are rescued from Earth
(raptured) and saved from the Tribulation (a seven-year period
of chaos and suffering). But, in Not Afraid of the Antichrist: Why
We Don’t Believe in a Pre-Tribulation Rapture (Chosen, Mar. 2019),
Michael Brown and Craig Keener analyze what the biblical texts
actually say, concluding that Christians should not expect that
rescue. Brown is the director of the Coalition of Conscience,
president of the Fire School of Ministry, and the author of 20
books, including Playing with Fire: A Wake-Up Call to the Pente-
costal-Charismatic Church; Keener is F.M. and Ada Thompson
Professor of Biblical Studies at Asbury Theological Seminary
and the author of 22 books, including Miracles: The Credibility
of the New Testament Accounts.
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 Religion & Spirituality Update
A Selection of Bible Commentaries

Hebrews–Revelation (Crossway, out now) is the 12th volume in the ESV Expository Commentary series,
edited by Iain M. Duguid, James M. Hamilton Jr., and Jay Sklar. Six scholars guide readers through some
of the most challenging books of the New Testament, focusing on the theme of hope. Duguid is a profes-
sor of Old Testament at Westminster Theological Seminary, pastor at Christ Presbyterian Church in
Glenside, Pa., and the author of many Old Testament commentaries. Hamilton is a professor of biblical
theology at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, preaching pastor at Kenwood Baptist Church,
and the author of What Is Biblical Theology? Sklar is professor of Old Testament at Covenant Theological
Seminary.
The Commentators’ Bible: Genesis (Jewish Publication Society, out now), compiled and translated by
Michael Carasik, is the final volume of the Rubin JPS Miqra’ot Gedolot Commentators’ Bible series,
bringing to life the voices of medieval Bible commentators in a contemporary English translation anno-
tated for lay readers. Carasik is the author of Theologies of the Mind in Biblical Israel and The Bible’s Many
Voices, also from JPS .
The Letter to the Galatians by David A. deSilva (Eerdmans, out now), the first volume in the New Inter-
national Commentary on the New Testament series, looks at the theological issues raised by this Pauline
letter; it replaces Ronald Y.K. Fung’s 1988 volume in the series. DeSilva is the Trustees’ Distinguished
Professor of New Testament and Greek at Ashland Theological Seminary and the author of An Introduction
to the New Testament, Introducing the Apocrypha, and Galatians: A Handbook to the Greek Text.
The Letter to the Romans, second edition, by Douglas J. Moo (Eerdmans, out now), is one of the 20 vol-
umes in New International Commentary on the New Testament series and a thorough revision of the first
edition, originally published in 1996. It deals with scholarship that has developed since then, including
more recent perspectives on Paul. Moo is the Kenneth T. Wessner Professor of Biblical Studies at Wheaton
College Graduate School and has authored commentaries on Galatians, Colossians, and James.
Jubilees: A Commentary in Two Volumes by James C. VanderKam (Fortress, out now) is the 52nd volume
in Hermeneia commentary series; it focuses on Jubilees, an ancient rewriting of Genesis and the
first part of Exodus by an anonymous second-century BCE Jewish author. VanderKam offers a
new translation and the first full commentary on the book in the English language; he is the John
A. O’Brien Professor of Hebrew Scriptures Emeritus at the University of Notre Dame, has edited
13 volumes in the series Discoveries in the Judaean Desert, is editor-in-chief of the Encyclopedia of
the Dead Sea Scrolls, and has authored, among other books, The Dead Sea Scrolls Today.
And in May 2019, IVP releases in paperback Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture. In 29
volumes, using the Revised Standard Version of Bible, the commentary covers the writings of the
early church fathers. Thomas C. Oden (1931–2016) served as the general editor for Ancient Christian Commentary, which IVP
calls the first full-scale early Christian commentary on Scripture published in the last 500 years.  —L.G.

BACK TO THE BOOK Commentary (Norton, Dec.), now com-

This season also brings the publication of new editions of the plete in three volumes. Alter (profiled
Bible, including John Goldingay’s Old Testament translation, on p. 18) is also a literary critic and
The First Testament: A New Translation (IVP, out now). Goldingay scholar, with books on the 18th-century
is David Allan Hubbard Professor of Old Testament at Fuller European novel and on contemporary
Theological Seminary and the author of The Theology of the Book Hebrew and American literature.
of Isaiah, Do We Need the New Testament? and the 17-volume Old Of course, for those who don’t read
Testament for Everyone series, where much of this translation the original languages, without trans-
was first published. lations there would be no study of the
In November, Crossway released The Greek New Testament: Bible. In The Art of Bible Translation
Reader’s Edition, produced at Tyndale House, Cambridge, which (Princeton Univ., Mar. 2019), Alter
combines a Greek New Testament translation with glosses of writes that any translation of the Bible must capture the beauty
words in the text and other study aids for those with limited of the original language—its poetry, rhythms, sound- and word-
knowledge of Greek. play, dialogue, word choice, and syntax—not only for reading
But the biggest event in Bible publishing this year is the release pleasure, but also to preserve accuracy. Modern English versions
of Robert Alter’s magisterial The Hebrew Bible: A Translation with fail on all counts, he says.  ■

16 P U B L I S H E R S W E E K L Y ■ N O V E M B E R 1 2 , 2 0 1 8
DID THE FIRST
CHRISTIANS BELIEVE
JESUS WAS GOD?

“Hurtado [makes] his main

argument clearly and logically
with admirable precision
and conciseness, undergirded
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Honoring the Son distills 30 years of research into one landmark work. Through an
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 Religion Update Profiles
In Profile
Authors talk about their new
books By Cathy Lynn Grossman
ROBERT ALTER
EMBRACES THE
BEAUTY OF THE
BIBLE
Robert Alter, translator and literary
critic, releases his translation of the
full Hebrew Bible in December,
with publisher Norton calling it the
“capstone” of his renowned career.
But it might be his next book, The
Art of Bible Translation (Princeton
Univ., Mar. 2019), that raises eye-
brows among biblical scholars, with its
line of fire about “the disastrous failures of
modern English-language translations,”
Alter says. “Some people are going to get
their backs up. They’re going to say, ‘Who
is this twerp who doesn’t have a PhD in
biblical studies to be criticizing us?’ ”
The “twerp” is an 83-year-old profes-
sor emeritus of Hebrew and comparative
literature at the University of California,
Berkeley, where he has taught since
1967. In The Art of Bible Translation, Alter slams translators
educated in elite academia, from Oxford to the Ivy League, as
tone-deaf and prone to introducing a Christian theological spin
that he says the ancient Hebrew text does not support. Common
translations of the treasured Psalm 23 line read “I shall dwell in
the house of the Lord forever,” which Alter says implies the
existence “heaven.” But, he notes, “the Hebrew Bible spends no
time talking about ‘heaven’ or an afterlife or ‘souls.’ Ancient
Hebrew has no notion of these ideas. My translations scrupu-
lously eliminate all souls.”
Alter’s central argument is literary, however. “Not only do the
modern translators lack a clear sense of what happens stylisti-
cally in the Bible, but also their notion of English style, its
decorums and its expressive possibilities, tends to be rather
shaky,” he writes. “The essential point in all this is that the
Hebrew Bible by and large exhibits consummate artistry in the
language of its narratives and of its poetry, and there must be an
answering art in the translation in order to convey what is
remarkable about the original.... The literary style of the Bible
in both the prose narratives and the poetry is not some sort of
18 P U B L I S H E R S W E E K L Y ■ N O V E M B E R 1 2 , 2 0 1 8
aesthetic embellishment of the ‘message’ of Scripture but the
vital medium through which the biblical vision of God, human
nature, history, politics, society, and moral value is conveyed.”
Look at the creation story in the King James Version, Alter
says: “The priestly author of the creation story and the flood
story offers beautifully choreographed cadences that convey his
sense of the grandeur and the harmoniousness of creation. If you
translate it in a way that destroys the cadences, you compromise
the religious vision of the author.” He adds: “My book offers an
analogy. We are all enchanted by Moby-Dick. The prose is won-
derfully rhythmic, with many lines that remind you of Shake-
speare, Milton, and the King James psalms. If you remove those
cadences, you just have a story about a whale and a crazy, one-
legged captain.”
MICHAEL COOGAN
© pardophoto
SAYS GOD IS NOT ON
YOUR SIDE
Michael Coogan, a scholar of the
Bible and other ancient texts,
wanted to cap his half century of
studying and writing about the
Bible with a provocative work aimed
not at other scholars but at general
readers. In God’s Favorites: Judaism,
Christianity, and the Myth of Divine
Chosenness (Beacon, Apr. 2019), his
message is this: the Bible is not divine.
It’s not literally or metaphorically true.
And, though you might choose God, no
God has chosen you.
Coogan, professor emeritus of reli-
gious studies at Stonehill College, tells
PW that he unravels the Bible’s author-
ity by showing scripture is not “God’s
word about God’s people but rather pro-
jections of people’s own needs and prej-
udices onto a God. If you want to believe
in the biblical God, you have a problem.” As Coogan details in
the book, the Bible and the concept of chosenness have been
used to justify imperialism, murder, genocide, and prejudice.
God’s Favorites goes from A to Z, Abraham to Zionism, mov-
ing century by century, dissecting prophets, apostles, psalms,
and more. Coogan locates biblical passages in the wider his-
torical and literary record; he also debunks the belief of some
American Christians that the U.S. is the “New Jerusalem” and
modern Israel is a step on the path to the Second Coming.
That the Bible was written in installments across time is not
unique, Coogan writes. “Its ideas and values, its laws and insti-
tutions, its stories and myths, even its idioms resembled those
of neighbors and rulers of the biblical writers, the ancient Bab-
ylonians, Egyptians, Canaanites, Greeks, Romans, and others.”
“These are stories of sibling rivals, rival wives, rival territorial
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 Religion & Spirituality Update

claims,” Coogan writes. “Only later are these melodramas and
conflicts elevated to be called a divine ‘choice’ and to provide
rationalization for a people’s claims to superiority and power.”
Coogan notes that the Gospel of John was “written when the
separation between traditional Jews and Christians, whether
Jewish or Gentile, was widening.” He adds, “The Gospel’s pejo-
rative view of ‘the Jews’ reflects that separation, rather than
being a hostility toward all Jews of all times. Yet that is how it
was interpreted soon after, and for most of Christian history:
Jews were labeled ‘Christ-killers.’ ”
God’s Favorites begins with Coogan expressing his “naïve
hope” that, no matter what they think the Bible says, people
will give up “creationism, patriarchy, and homophobia,” and
with them the tribalism that leads to division and violence; he
calls for abandoning “the myth of divine election, which has
caused walls to be built and wars to be waged between members
of the human community rather than uniting it.” He concludes:
“Fundamentally, we are all one tribe, one species, with no group,
ancient or modern, specially chosen.”
KATHLEEN SPROWS CUMMINGS
CHRONICLES THE SEARCH FOR
AN AMERICAN SAINT
© barbara johnston
alities and travails of devoted supporters as they mustered the
money and the moxie to persevere through setbacks and deliver
to Rome three essentials for canonization: volumes of records of
her accomplishments; testimonies to her life of holiness; and
proof that prayers to Seton prompted God to work miraculous
medical cures for two direly ill people.
Seton, who was born in the U.S., founded the Sisters of Char-
ity, the first Catholic women’s religious community established
in the U.S. without formal ties to a European congregation. So
why isn’t she American Catholics’ patron saint? “America
changed,” Cummings says. “We changed our vision of what it
means to embody American holiness. Saints tell us more about
the culture in which they are canonized than the culture in
which they live.”
Now that Catholics are firmly ensconced in every aspect of
American society—culture, government, academia and more—
there’s no longer a need to prove that an American could be
saint-worthy. There may be no single saint who could be seen
as the American exemplar, a patron saint to all, Cummings says.
Even so, Cummings has a saint of her own: St. Anne-Thérèse
Guérin (Mother Théodore, 1798–1856), founder of the Sisters
of Providence of Saint Mary-of-the-Woods in Indiana, who died
in 1856 and was canonized in 2006. One of the leaders of the

For nearly 150 years, American cause for Guérin’s sainthood, a sister in her early 80s, came to a
Catholics longed for a patron saint, class Cummings was teaching and told the story of how Mother
someone who represented the Théodore defied a bishop to establish her order, inspiring Cum-
essence of their national character, mings to write A Saint of Our Own and to name her third child
like Ireland’s St. Patrick or Spain’s Anne Therese.
St. James, an exemplary soul who
could carry their prayers to God. It MIROSLAV VOLF
took generations of struggle for BELIEVES THEOLOGY
prelates, nuns, and laypeople, from MAKES A
the American frontier to the halls DIFFERENCE
of the Vatican, to successfully bring The true purpose of theology,
before the pope a dozen potential saints. what it “ought to be, but largely
“And the irony is, we still don’t have a isn’t,” is to illuminate “what mat-
patron saint,” says Kathleen Sprows ters most—the true life in the
Cummings, author of A Saint of Our Own: presence of God,” write Miroslav
How the Quest for a Holy Hero Helped Cath- Volf and coauthor Matthew Croas-
olics Become American (Univ. of North mun in For the Life of the World: The-
Carolina, Apr. 2019). Cummings is asso- ology that Makes a Difference (Brazos,
ciate professor of American studies and Jan. 2019). Volf, Henry B. Wright Pro-
history and director of the Cushwa Cen- fessor of Theology at Yale Divinity School
ter for the Study of American Catholi- and founder and director of the Yale Cen-
cism at the University of Notre Dame. ter for Faith and Culture, teams up with
“Canonization may be fundamentally about holiness, but it is Matthew Croasmun, an associate
never only about holiness,” Cummings writes. “In the United research scholar and the director of the
States, it has often been about the ways in which Catholics Life Worth Living Program at the center,
defined, defended, and celebrated their identities as Americans.” to deliver a manifesto to Western
Among the many campaigns for sainthood Cummings writes Christian academic theologians. It
about, she zeroes in on the epic, convoluted, seven-decade drive begins with a cry: “Do something.”
for recognition for St. Elizabeth Seton, who was finally canon- Volf says he and Croasmun wrote this
ized in 1975. Cummings’s account is packed with the person- continued on p. 24

20 P U B L I S H E R S W E E K L Y ■ N O V E M B E R 1 2 , 2 0 1 8
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 Religion & Spirituality Update
continued from p. 20
urgent call hoping that readers would be moved, because “theol-
ogy, once the queen of sciences, has become irrelevant today. It
is on its way to rusting in a home for the elderly.” Volf and
Croasmun cite diminished demand and lost esteem for the field
and the fact that theologians today talk more about finding jobs
or publishers than finding God. Meanwhile, they write, many
churches “employ the Christian faith primarily as a set of ‘skills’ ”
for managing life.
The authors aim to make theology relevant in an era of “creep-
ing meaninglessness,” Volf says, by engaging in “great questions
of who we are as humans and what is our purpose. What is a truly
good and flourishing life? We have a hard time formulating a
positive vision about how to shape a life and share it with the
world.” The two took on the challenge because, they write, it is
more effective to say “I have a dream” than “I have a complaint.”
Contemporary tensions are another reason why theologians
need to step up, the authors argue. In For the Life of the World,
they write that the work of theology can help Christians “nur-
ture a culture of respect in pluralistic societies and... help craft
political regimes of respect.” Theologians must align them-
selves with the ideas they are expressing, Volf and Croasmun
note, like “pilgrims seeking understanding.”
The book devotes a chapter to the “first theologian, Paul.”
Modeling themselves on the apostle, believers need to be
engaged authentically, not just theoretically, in seeking a life
aligned with God’s purpose and presence, the authors argue.
Volf, a Croatian-American immigrant, grew up a Protestant
amid Catholics and Orthodox Christians in a Communist nation
and witnessed the bloody dissolution of Yugoslavia. Having
seen violence and religious suppression firsthand, Volf in the
book tells theologians that they must avoid “participating and
giving ammunition to religious wars, becoming tools and weap-
ons for cultural, economic or political conflicts.” Instead, he
writes, “We must talk about religious freedom and what it
entails, about who we are as human beings and what we ought
to desire. If I don’t have this freedom to orient my life this way,
I’m not free in any area of life.”
LAUREN WINNER EXPLORES
DANGEROUS PRACTICES
Lauren Winner, associate professor of Christian spirituality at
Duke Divinity School and an Episcopal priest, wrote a book in
2003 on the beauty of Christian practices, Mudhouse Sabbath, in
which she described them “all prettied up in a historical vac-
uum.” Fifteen years later, she offers a different approach in The
Dangers of Christian Practice: On Wayward Gifts, Characteristic
Damage, and Sin (Yale Univ., out now).
In Winner’s view, God’s flawless gifts are “damaged” by their
human recipients, who overlook the potential for Christian prac-
tices to be distorted or misused for destruction, violence, and
exploitation. “Because nothing created is untouched by the Fall,
Christians should not be surprised when lovely and good, poten-
tially gracious Christian gestures are damaging, or when human
24 P U B L I S H E R S W E E K L Y ■ N O V E M B E R 1 2 , 2 0 1 8
beings deploy those Christian ges-
© jen fariello
tures in the perpetuation of dam-
age,” she writes.
Winner gives examples from the
past: the Eucharist was turned into
a pretext for murderous attacks on
Jews, who were falsely accused of
desecrating the host in centuries
past; the Bible was twisted to jus-
tify slavery as biblical obedience to
one’s master; and too often today,
baptisms have been trivialized—
celebrated as private parties with
“creepy baby-face cakes,” she says.
But although sin riddled humanity
cannot help but misuse or misunder-
stand God’s gifts at times, Winner
writes, people can still recognize the
damage that Christian practices can
cause and turn to repentance, redress-
ing for past sins and consciously trying
to avoid extending the damage into
the future. For example, she notes, the
church community can “scrutinize its
baptismal rites and determine to baptize only at Sunday con-
gregational worship or at deathbeds.” She calls on readers to
recognize the twisted past when baptisms were violently forced
on Jews and other non-Christians and “look for hints of anti-
Judaism in your reading of Scripture.”
Winner commends a practice of lament, which is “the way
Christianity holds together original sin and moral responsibil-
ity,” she writes. “To lament is to recognize that human creatures
cannot wholly repair the world. I can repent of my habit of
praying only for citizens; I lament the sin-soaked structure of
misbegotten desire that means I will sometimes inevitably pray
for the wrong thing.”
There’s very little use of I in this book, however. Winner’s
earlier books include two memoirs, Girl Meets God: On the Path
to a Spiritual Life and Still: Notes on a Mid-faith Crisis. She has
also written several works that synthesize biblical exegesis,
cultural observations, and personal stories, including Wearing
God: Clothing, Laughter, Fire, and Other Overlooked Ways of Meeting
God.
Winner says The Dangers of Christian Practice is “a scholarly
departure” because she is not a theologian and the book is “fun-
damentally concerned with theological questions.” She took this
approach in order to do a deep exploration. “The topic has been
haunting me for a long time,” she says. “Practices are deeply
important to me, as a priest and personally. I care about this stuff
because I love it.”  ■
Cathy Lynn Grossman is a former religion, spirituality, and ethics
reporter for USA Today.
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 Cynthia Rigby’s introduction
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”
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Professor of Theology, Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary

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